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"Colossus," "visionary" and "giant" are superlatives used in the mid-twentieth century to describe Edward Durell Stone (1902-1978), a celebrity architect whose wholly unique aesthetic of "new romanticism" played a crucial role in defining middle-class culture.
Stone's legacy -- of giving form to the aspirations of the emerging consumer culture and of reconciling Modernism with the dynamism of the age -- is established in Edward Durell Stone: Modernism's Populist Architect, by Mary Anne Hunting, architectural historian, West Sider and member of the board of LANDMARK WEST!.
Dr. Hunting was a stalwart supporter of "Save 2 Columbus Circle," a grassroots campaign that called for a public hearing of the Landmarks Preservation Commission to consider Stone's former Gallery of Modern Art (at 2 Columbus Circle, now the Museum of Arts & Design) for landmark designation. The result was one of the most aggressive, passionate, high-profile, and much chronicled preservation advocacy efforts since the creation of the Landmarks Law in 1965. See, for example, Tom Wolfe's article in New York magazine, chronicling this "preservation drama."
For more on this important preservation milestone, visit the 2 Columbus Circle Chronology, sponsored by New York Preservation Archive Project.
Please join us on Wednesday, November 7th, from 6 to 8 PM, to celebrate the launch of this important addition to the ongoing conversation about the architecture of Edward Durell Stone.
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