This past week I took a much-needed vacation back home to Cincinnati, my first real vacation (other than short weekend trips) since my 2001 trip to London. I had been hoping to take a 2-week trip to the UK later this summer, but that was looking increasingly unrealistic from a fiscal point of view, so I decided another trip to Cincinnati was in order. This was the longest trip I’ve taken to Cincy in quite a while, and it felt good to be back home without having to rush around to cram everything into a couple short days.

Most of my time was spent meeting up with friends and family, and wondering around town and taking lots of photos. A couple highlights included:

• Meeting local bloggers Randy Simes, the Provost of Cincinnati, Sherman Cahal, and a few others for drinks on Fountain Square. Randy was also kind enough to meet up for drinks and give me a brief driving tour of the city the day before. It’s nice to meet up with people who share a passion for the city and who are doing what they can to make it a better place.
• I had a meeting with a longtime professor at the University of Cincinnati’s school of architecture to talk about the program and have him look over my portfolio. The meeting went well, and I came away cautiously optimistic that, if all goes well, I’ll be starting my M.Arch. degree at UC around this time next year. I’m trying not to jinx myself by getting my hopes up too high before anything is official, but it’s hard not to be excited about the idea.
• I was able to visit the Cincinnati Zoo, Union Terminal, and a few other spots around town that I haven’t had a chance to visit in far too long.

Most importantly, though, the trip was a chance to remind myself how comfortable Cincinnati feels to me, and I’m looking forward to the opportunity to finally move back there.

The only real black mark on the whole trip was the return flight to New York. I showed up at Cincinnati / Northern Kentucky Airport (CVG) at around 6 PM for an 8 PM flight. But the flight kept getting delayed because they were waiting for a crew member to arrive on an inbound flight from JFK, and when they finally loaded us onto the plane at 11 PM, we taxied out to the runway only to be informed that the plane had some mechanical issues. We sat there for an hour while some mechanics tinkered around with the hydraulic system, before finally sending us back to the gate and canceling the flight. They put us up in a hotel, and then I was finally able to catch a 4:30 PM flight the next day. I landed at JFK at around 7:00 Saturday evening, 25 hours after first arriving at CVG for my departure. And people wonder why I hate flying so much…

Here are lots of photos. Click on the title to view the full album.

Fort Thomas, Kentucky

I was born in Cincinnati near Mariemont, but I spent most of my childhood just across the river in Fort Thomas, Kentucky. “Cake Town” is about as middle-America as you can possibly get, a cozy bedroom community strung along the top of a steep ridge overlooking the Ohio River, best known for its excellent public schools and its streets of tidy, well-kept houses. The type of place where you want to wake up on Christmas morning.

For me, it’s always refreshing going back there. Almost every spot in the city has some sort of childhood memory associated with it. No matter where I’ve been and what kinds of sordid ordeals I’ve been going through in my life, I feel like I can always go back and find Fort Thomas pretty much just as I had left it.

Most of my extended family and a few old friends in the Cincinnati area still live either in or near Fort Thomas, so the town typically serves as the hub of my activities during my periodic visits back home.

Prior to my most recent visit, though, it occurred to me that I hardly had any photos of the city, so I made a special point to remedy that oversight with my new digital camera. (63 photos)

Downtown Cincinnati and the Riverfront

While growing up in the Cincinnati area, downtown was like the nerve center of my universe. I was always begging my parents to take me over there. Until I visited Atlanta for the first time in high school, Cincinnati was the largest city I had ever been in. Later in my life I found myself living in places like Chicago and New York City, so downtown Cincy no longer really impresses me with its bigness.

That said, downtown Cincy is no slouch, and there are some much larger American cities that would kill to have a central business district as strong as Cincinnati’s. Many fine old buildings have been preserved and restored, the streets are generally clean and well-kept, and things are looking up. Downtown went through some rough periods through the 90’s and 2000’s, but the mood seems much more optimistic now that vacant storefronts are being filled and more people are choosing to actually live downtown. (108 photos)

Over-the-Rhine

To the north of downtown lies Cincinnati’s famed (and infamous) Over-the-Rhine neighborhood, a spectacular collection of 19th Century Italianate buildings that was once the most densely-populated American neighborhood outside of New York City. OTR spent much of the post-war period as a burned-out ghetto, but is now finally being rediscovered and redeveloped. Think of it as Cincinnati’s answer to the Lower East Side. (32 photos)

Union Terminal

Have you ever been given a priceless family heirloom or antique that, despite its incredible beauty and functionality, never seems to really fit anywhere in your home? That seems to be the dilemma Cincinnati has faced with its magnificent Union Terminal complex over the years. Completed in 1933, Union Terminal was not only one of the finest examples of art deco architecture in the world, but it was also one of the best-planned transportation facilities of its age. A large concourse spanned the tracks at the rear of the building and provided stairs to each train platform. At the front, dedicated ramps for taxis, busses, and streetcars funneled passengers to their ultimate destinations in an efficient manner. The central hub of activity was the massive half-domed rotunda.

Unfortunately, Union Terminal opened just as passenger rail in the US was beginning its long decline. Despite an upsurge in rail travel during the Second World War, the building soon found itself empty and obsolete. In 1974, the Southern Railway demolished the concourse to make room for an expanded yard for its freight operations. As if to add insult to injury, all but one of the concourse’s famous murals were relocated to the new airport across the river in Boone County, Kentucky.

In 1990, Union Terminal re-opened as a home to the Cincinnati History Museum, the Museum of Natural History & Science, an Ominmax theater, and a children’s museum. The following year, Amtrak resurrected the building’s original function as a passenger rail station in a limited way, with its Cardinal train calling at the station three times a week in each direction.

With plans underway to develop a regional high-speed rail system, Union Terminal may once again see its place restored as a magnificent gateway to the city. (25 photos)

University of Cincinnati

My earliest memories of the UC campus are from some sort of grade school field trip to Nippert Stadium. Since then, many parts of the campus have been completely rebuilt, and the campus now includes new structures by some of the most prominent architects currently practicing. (46 photos)

Maysville, Kentucky

One of the most frustrating things about living in NYC without a car is that I don’t often get the chance to take a nice long drive on country highways. So, this past week I decided to take a break from Cincinnati and head down Kentucky 8 towards the historic river town of Maysville. The town’s history dates back to before the American Revolution, and it was an important waypoint for travelers navigating the Ohio River. (10 photos)

Mount Adams, Eden Park, and the Krohn Conservatory

The Cincinnati neighborhood of Mount Adams and adjacent Eden Park have always been one of my favorite parts of the city. Mount Adams is a vibrant urban neighborhood that consists of steep, narrow streets that wouldn’t be out of place in San Francisco, and densely-spaced row houses that cling to the hillside for dear life.

Eden Park, although not the city’s largest public park, is arguably the best-known and most popular. The park features the Cincinnati Art Museum, the Krohn Conservatory, and incredible views overlooking the Ohio River. (66 photos)

Cincinnati Zoo

It had been ages since the last time I visited the Cincinnati Zoo, so I decided to stop by and check the place out. It’s the second-oldest zoo in the US (opened in 1875, only 14 months after the Philadelphia Zoo) and is consistently ranked as one of the best zoos in America. (59 photos)

Village of Mariemont

Mariemont was founded as a planned community in 1923, and modeled after an idyllic English village. I was born nearby, so I guess you could say my Anglophile streak goes back a long way. My maternal grandmother, now 86 years old and still sharp as a tack, still lives a few blocks away. (20 photos)

Around Town

Here are a few neighborhood shots and various other photos that don’t neatly fit into albums of their own. This album includes Columbia-Tusculum, Hyde Park, Mount Lookout, Spring Grove Cemetery, and an unplanned late night at CVG Airport. (41 photos)

“Freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.”
– Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Truth and fact are two distinct concepts. The story I’m about to tell is truthful, and contains elements that are factual.

The year was 2005, the city was Chicago, and I was on my way back home after building a LEED-Platinum orphanage in Darfur and helping sweatshop workers in a Pakistani rug factory form a labor union. As my Blue Line train from O’Hare pulled into the Damen Avenue station, I put away the tattered copy of Marx’s Communist Manifesto that I had been reading for the 20th time, adjusted my black fedora, and stepped off the train. A group of fellow comrades from the leftist blog site known as Archinect had planned a get-together at a local bar, Rodan, so that we could plot our workers’ uprising against the capitalist pigs and discuss the chances of the White Sox actually making it to the World Series that year (though not necessarily in that order).

Amidst the bourgeois 20-something hipsters filling the impeccably-detailed space of Rodan, there sat a group of fellow revolutionaries who went by the code names of lletdownl, make, postal, and floating tooth. I bought a beer and joined them, and the conversation throughout the evening was engaging and thoughtful.

Toward the end of the evening, our group began to thin out, and looking at the time on my union-made wristwatch, I decided that I too should head back to my modest apartment, located in the nearby shantytown known locally as Lincoln Park. Before leaving, though, I had to made a quick pit stop in the men’s room. After relieving myself and zipping up, a disturbed-looking man-child called out to me from a nearby toilet.

He introduced himself as “evilplatypus”. As I backed nervously out of the men’s room, he followed me and informed me that he was headed to the bar, and asked me if I wanted a drink. I noted that he curiously spoke only in lower-case letters, but never being one to pass up a free drink, I took him up on his offer. “Sure. Extra-dry Tanqueray martini”, I replied.

“whoa!”, he exclaimed. “that shit’s expensive. i’ll get u a pbr instead.”

An hour later, evilplatypus returned from the bar and handed me a lukewarm Pabst Blue Ribbon lager with a hair floating in it. I removed the hair as I considered making a run for the door, but I didn’t want to be rude and decided to stick around just long enough to finish the beer. We were in a public place, so what’s the worst that could happen to me? We found a place to sit down. Rodan’s sound system pulsated with house music, and somewhere out on the street, a dog barked twice.

The conversation with evilplatypus began amicably enough, the same way a conversation with the Jehovah’s Witness on your front porch begins with awkward small talk about the weather. In the back of your mind you know he’s there with an agenda, and evilplatypus was no different. He described his occupation as an architect who makes six figures designing strip malls and toxic chemical factories in low-income neighborhoods. In addition to being the architect of record for every Wal-Mart store in DuPage County, he was also the local EIFS product rep for northeastern Illinois.

By this point I was beginning to sense something about the guy that I didn’t quite like, but I couldn’t put my finger on it.

Finally, he sprung his trap. With my back to the corner and my glass of lukewarm PBR still three-quarters full, he asked, “r u familiar with the writings of ayn rand and the objectivist movement? i’m a registered democrat only because the city won’t approve my building permit applications otherwise, but i really think the libertarians have some good ideas. let me explain 2 u the virtues of a free market economy, u pussy fag douchebag.”

Curses! The classic Lukewarm PBR Bait-and-Switch: the oldest trick in the book, and I fell for it. Must have been the jet lag.

For the next three hours evilplatypus recited to me from memory John Galt’s courtroom monologue from Atlas Shrugged. I was able to get an occasional glimpse of the exit sign above the front door, but evilplatypus blocked my every move as he continued to talk. I tried to gain the attention of the attractive bartender so that she could summon the authorities, but she was too busy admiring the ironic John Deere t-shirt worn by some emo kid at the other end of the room. This time there would be no escape; I was in it for a long haul.

Finally, after finishing my lukewarm PBR and agreeing to spec 100,000 square feet of EIFS for my W Hotel project in downtown Prague, I was permitted to leave. “u should come here for brunch sometime,” evilplatypus said as I donned my trench coat. “there eggs benedict has the best traditional hollandaise sauce i’ve ever tasted.”

I nodded and hurriedly walked out the door. Shaken, but now more determined than ever to overthrow the shackles of greed and oppression that enslave the world, I lit a Gauloise and made my way down Milwaukee Avenue. I glanced back toward Rodan to see evilplatypus kick a homeless man in the shin and tell him to get a job, and then disappear into the dark streets of the city.

I vowed never to look back again, but deep in my heart I knew this wouldn’t be my last encounter with evilplatypus.

In the criminal justice system of Cincinnati, the people are represented by three separate yet equally important groups: the police who investigate crime, the district attorneys who prosecute the offenders, and the goddamn Shadow Hare.

These are their stories.

If the Shadow Hare and his friends are really serious about fighting crime, they’ll need a good Hall of Justice.

This past Saturday, with clear skies and temps in the 70’s, I decided that it was the perfect day to take a long-overdue break from the concrete canyons of Manhattan.

I picked up the rental car at around noon, and took the Saw Mill River Parkway and Taconic Parkway up the east side of the Hudson River to the Kingston-Rhinecliff Bridge. After crossing over, I made my way through Saugarties and Palenville to Catskills State Park. Highway 23A is a steep, windy road that heads up through a dramatic gorge that wouldn’t be out of place in the Oregon Cascades.

I pulled over at the trailhead to Kaaterskill Falls and hiked the half-mile trail to the base of the falls. While fairly short, the steepness of the trail and the rocky terrain made it one of the more brutal hikes I’ve taken on either coast. (I’ve noticed that many Northeastern hiking trails tend to be fairly trashy and head straight up the side of a steep hill, while the trails I hiked in the Northwest tend to ease you up a hill through a series of switchbacks.) Probably doesn’t help that I’m completely out of shape and that it’s been months since I’ve walked on something that isn’t made of asphalt or concrete.

Once I made it back to the car, I drove the long way around through the Catskills, passing through a series of some quaint and not-so-quaint small towns and hamlets. Woodstock was particularly interesting; the whole town is like one giant head shop, and I saw a couple people wandering around who appeared to have been “wandering” around town since 1969. It’s sort of like a hyper-condensed version of Eugene, Oregon. (I later learned that the 1969 Woodstock music festival took place about 40-some miles from the actual town of Woodstock.)

On the way back toward the city, I came back down the west side of the Hudson on Highways 32 and 17, passing through Kingston, New Paltz, etc. before eventually finding myself driving through the suburban wastelands of northern New Jersey. I was able to stop in IKEA and pick up a new dresser as planned, and then came back into the city via the George Washington Bridge.

I need to make a point to do something like this much more often. The scenery north of NYC is quite beautiful, and (at least depending on which route you take) it’s amazing how it transitions from urban to almost-rural within a very short distance. Compare to Chicagoland, where you have to drive through almost 40 miles of suburban sprawl before you get anywhere that even resembles “rural”, and even then you’re out in the middle of cornfields rather than mountains and forests.

All my life I’ve been searching for the Holy Ghost with varying degrees of success. Turns out he’s been living in a box in Central Park all along.

Boo! Happy Easter!

That was fun. Now back into the box until Pentecost…

He seemed a bit young to be a real bishop, although I can think of an Episcopal diocese or two that might be desperate enough. At least the box makes him easy to ship.

I grew up Fort Thomas, Kentucky, a pre-war bedroom suburb just outside Cincinnati. Fort Thomas has a mix of larger craftsman-style homes in the upper-middle-class northern part of town, and a lot of 1950’s Cape Cod and ranch houses in the merely-middle-class southern end of town. Very few of the houses are architecturally noteworthy by themselves, but collectively they form a very homey, comfortable feel to the town that hasn’t changed much since the early 1950’s. (And the locals fight tooth-and-nail to make sure it stays that way, for better or worse.)

The house I grew up in was a modest Cape Cod near the south end of town. It didn’t really have any notable features aside from its location on a quiet side street that backed up to some woods, but my grandparents’ house in north Fort Thomas was a bit larger with a decorative fireplace, dormer windows upstairs, a huge front porch, and a couple more generations of people who grew up within its walls. Most of my fondest childhood memories are from my grandparents’ old house, partly because of the house itself, and partly because of the family gatherings that used to take place there.

One of my favorite movies is the 2000 film Wonder Boys with Michael Douglas and Tobey Maguire, filmed almost entirely in various Pittsburgh neighborhoods that look very similar to parts of Fort Thomas.

In the movie, there’s a scene where Professor Grady Tripp (Douglas) and James Leer, his socially-awkward student protege (Maguire) break into the childhood home of Tripp’s estranged wife. The home is a typical pre-war frame house with a generous yard, hardwood floors, tasteful furniture and bric-a-bric, and the usual family photos on the fireplace mantle. Once they get inside the house, there’s a brief exchange that has always stuck with me:

Leer: “It feels really… good in here.”

Tripp: “Yeah, I know… It’s the kind of house you like to wake up in on Christmas morning.”

As much as I love architects like Mies and Tadao Ando, I don’t think many people would say that about the houses they have designed.

This past Saturday I decided that I needed to get out of Manhattan for a few hours so that my head wouldn’t explode, so I took the train out to Forest Hills Gardens in Queens, a planned community fashioned after a traditional English village, not unlike Mariemont, Ohio, although a bit more dense.

This is probably the time to confess one of my architectural guilty pleasures. I generally consider myself a hard-nosed minimalist when it comes to design; give me sleek shapes without any arbitrary lines or useless clutter, large expanses of point-supported glazing, exposed structural elements, clean geometry, and a simple palette of honest materials. That said, I have a bit of a fetish for Tudor Revival and Gothic Revival architecture, and I have very little desire to live in a glass box. If I could afford it, I’d probably buy a home like this in a heartbeat:

(Photo courtesy of Jayson Gomes at cincyimages.com.)

Is an architect being a hypocrite for wishing to live in a type of house they would probably never design for somebody in a million years? I would argue not, and I would also argue that there’s a difference between the house above and the historicist schlock that continues to spring up in our cities and suburbs like mushrooms.

Today, most contemporary architects and critics generally look down anything that reeks of historicism. There’s a sense that it’s somehow inauthentic, a stage prop in which suburbanites can play-act living in Ye Olde English Village. According to modernist orthodoxy, the Tudor-style house built in 1929 is no more authentic than the one built in 2005; they’re both equally fake. If you really want to live in an authentic English Tudor house, you’ll need to move to England and live in a centuries-old house with drafty walls, low ceilings, uneven floors, and no indoor plumbing. I think very few people would be willing to take their Tudor fetish to that extreme, not even a confessed Anglophile such as myself.

I don’t see the need for such rigid dogma, though, and I’d be happy to buy the Tudor Revival house built in 1929, assuming it’s been reasonably well-maintained over the years and that I could make some sensitive upgrades. That said, I can’t see myself buying a Tudor-style style house built in 2005, even if it looked virtually identical and all else was equal. Why is that? Neither of them can be considered true Tudor homes, and they’re not even built on English soil. But there’s still that nagging sense that the 1929 home is more “real” than the 2005 one.

Region certainly plays an important role in what we judge as authentic. The Tudor Revival house above looks perfectly natural in the wooded setting of Cincinnati’s verdant Hyde Park neighborhood, but would look pretty ridiculous among palmetto trees in Florida or out in the suburbs of Phoenix. Likewise, I have to roll my eyes when I see a Spanish mission style dwelling surrounded by tall evergreen trees and a foot of snow on the ground.

Equally important, I think, is the era in which the house was built. The house above was most likely built sometime in the 1920’s or 30’s. At that time, modernist masters Walter Gropius and Le Corbusier were doing their stuff in Europe, but aside from the art deco movement and a few other exceptions, the vast majority of everything being built in the US was some form of historicism or another, and would remain so until the post-war boom brought modernism into the mainstream. Around the same time, post-war developers became far more concerned with making a quick buck than in building sustainable communities. Pride of workmanship by skilled artisans was replaced with mass production by unskilled labor.

Sure, you can still get excellent detailing and workmanship in a newly-built custom house if you’re willing to pay for it, but that’s not how most houses get built today. And how many of us will ever really be able to buy our own piece of land and build our own custom dream home to our exact standards? I can design it for people who have the money to spend on it, but the chances of me being able to build something like that for myself on a typical architect’s salary are pretty slim.

So, if you’re an architect looking to buy an older home in an American pre-war neighborhood, it’s pretty much a given that the home you buy will be some form of historicism. I don’t see that as a bad thing, and I don’t see anything hypocritical about it even if you spend your career designing glass and concrete boxes for other people.

But even if money were no object, I’d still be very tempted to buy the Tudor home.

One of my professors at UIC had a strong interest in Romanticism and the Picturesque movement, and I found myself sharing some of that interest. I get nervous when new buildings try to emulate historical styles (it’s usually done very badly), but I think there’s something to be learned from the scale, materials, and details found in such styles. I love the modernist houses in Dwell magazine as much as the next architect with the black turtleneck and pretentious glasses, but the historic styles remain popular, and I think it’s worth exploring why.

I think we can safely assume that historicism and romanticism in architecture will always be with us, and that contemporary architects disparage it at their peril. What can be learned from historicist styles such as Tudor Revival, et al? How can those lessons be applied to the type of design work we prefer to do?

Maybe we can start by refusing to discuss historicism and modernism — or romanticism and rationalism — as mutually-exclusive opposites, and seek design solutions that incorporate the best ideals of each. Perhaps the reason for Frank Lloyd Wright’s success is that he found a way to dispense with overt historicism and yet still create environments that seemingly responded to human needs (provided you didn’t actually sit in his chairs or expect the rain to stay outside). A disciple of Wright’s, E. Fay Jones, has a special spot in my heart, and not just because of his famous chapels; I find his houses very appealing as well. His projects reject overt historicism, but still find ways to respond to their context and the needs and desires of their occupants.

Maybe in a few years when I become David Cole FAIA, a potential client will come to me and ask, “Can you design me an English Tudor home like the one you live in?”

I don’t think I’d be able to slap a bunch of half-timbering and a stone chimney onto a McMansion and still be able to look myself in the mirror that night. But I hope I’d be able to talk with the client a bit and find out what he/she finds so appealing about the English Tudor home and incorporate those elements into a design that’s appropriate for the site, the client’s needs, and in keeping with my own ideas about good design.

Mies Van Der Rohe, despite being the high priest of boxy modernism, lived in a Streeterville brownstone for most of his career. In a similar vien, I used to know somebody who was a well-regarded classical violinist who has performed at Carnegie Hall and with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. But when she was at home and not playing the violin, her favorite type of music to listen to was 80’s hair metal like Guns ‘n’ Roses and Metallica. Maybe there’s something to be said for maintaining a certain detachment between your personal life and your professional life. Not even the most accomplished artist can be expected to live and breathe their work 24/7.

What am I doing here at 4:30 AM instead of sleeping? A week or two ago it was gunfire behind my apartment building; tonight it sounds like either a street party or a riot. I can’t directly see the street from my window (I have a lovely view of a brick wall), but I woke up a half hour ago to the sounds of a large crowd of people shouting, horns blaring, police sirens, and some asshole with his car stereo cranked up loud enough to rattle my windows. It’s still going on right now.

New York is the only city I’ve ever lived in where it’s apparently socially acceptable to park your car on the side of the street in a residential neighborhood at 4 AM, roll down the windows and open all the doors, and blast hip-hop music your car stereo while you and a dozen of your closest gangbanger friends hang out on the sidewalk and smash beer bottles on the pavement and yell at people. The police won’t bother to intercede unless there’s weapons involved.

Actually, I know this happens in certain neighborhoods of plenty of other cities, but this the only city I’ve lived in where I can pull in a good salary and yet still not be able to afford to live in a neighborhood where this sort of thing doesn’t happen on a near-nightly basis, at least not without involving a 90-minute commute.

Speaking of commuting, after work this evening I entered the Columbus Circle subway station and when I got down to the platform, I was immediately overpowered by the stench of body odor and human feces strong enough to literally make me gag… Luckily my train pulled in right away, or else I would’ve had to leave the station before throwing up, and take a different subway line home. WTF?

There’s a lot of great things about NYC, but quality of life certainly isn’t one of them, and I’m now remembering why I got so burned out and moved to Oregon the first time I lived here. Living back in the Cincinnati area (or Oregon or almost anywhere else, for that matter) will no doubt have its own set of frustrations, but at least I’d be able to afford to live in a neighborhood where I can get some sleep and not have to put up with this shit every night.

End of rant… I hate to sound so negative, but I’m getting seriously fed up. It’s now 5 AM and the local thug element seems to have moved on, so I’m going to try going to bed again.

This morning I read that Al “Uncle Al” Lewis passed away Saturday at the age of 84. I vaguely remember watching his show when I was a kid while growing up in Fort Thomas, especially in the days before cable TV and Nickelodeon came into my life. He wasn’t well-known outside of the Cincinnati area, but he was a beloved local institution, and his show was on the air longer than either Captain Kangaroo or Mr. Rogers. In reading his obituary, it seems like he spent his entire career doing what he truly loved. We should all be so fortunate.

The Uncle Al Show goes back to an age when local television stations produced much more of their own programming, rather than simply passing along whatever crap that comes through the feed from New York or Los Angeles. Unfortunately, it seems like the idea of truly local programming (aside from the yapping heads on the local news) has pretty much died along with Al’s show.

Rest in peace, Uncle Al.

I just have to share this photo I recently found online:

Florence Mall, Kentucky, sometime in the late 1970’s.

Ah, the memories. I was born around the time this mall opened, and practically grew up in it. I can still smell the greasy Karamel Korn and soft pretzels from the food court, and I can still hear the analog electric organs that used to be sold from a piano shop not far from where the photo above was taken. Just imagine: This is what shaped my architectural sensibilities for the first decade of my life.

Florence Mall’s primary claim to fame is the red and white water tower looming over I-75, adjacent to the mall’s parking lot. It was originally painted to say “FLORENCE MALL”, but legend has it that the Commonwealth of Kentucky didn’t appreciate public property being used to advertise a private business. So, rather than spend considerable funds to repaint the entire water tower, the city of Florence simply modified the “M” into a “Y” and added an apostrophe. The rest is history.

After my family moved to North Carolina in 1984, we’d take periodic road trips back home to Cincinnati. After driving up I-75 all day through Tennessee and Kentucky, the “FLORENCE Y’ALL” water tower was our official sign that we had finally entered the Greater Cincinnati area and were getting close to home.

However, the delights waiting inside the mall was far more interesting to me as a child. Up near the food court was a Murray Brothers store that had all sorts of coffee, tea, and candy. Kay Bee Toys had an impressive store on the lower level, and of course there was the obligatory Spencer Gifts. Scattered throughout the mall were these giant granite sculptures of various animals for kids to play on, including an alligator and a pair of hippos. I usually played on the escalators, though, and I remember being fascinated at how you could stand on the upper level and look down and see the lower level shops. John Portman, eat your heart out.

The only thing Florence Mall was missing was some sort of a water fountain in the central court. For that, you had to go to either Eastgate Mall or Northgate Mall on the Ohio side of the river. Each of those malls had impressive water features, and more often than not, my brother and I would end up soaking wet at some point during the shopping trip. In retrospect, maybe that’s why we usually shopped at Florence Mall.

As I grew up and moved around a few more times, other malls would come into my life: Regency Square and The Avenues in Jacksonville, Woodfield Mall in the Chicago suburbs, King of Prussia outside of Philly. I still wear the leather jacket I bought at Cherry Hill Mall in South Jersey. Even on subsequent visits to Cincinnati, I find myself at fashionable Kenwood Towne Center more often than dowdy old Florence Mall. In fact, it’s probably been at least 20 years since the last time I was inside Florence Mall.

At some point, Florence Mall was renovated and now looks like just another exercise in 1990’s postmodern suburban schlock. This is hardly surprising, as shopping centers are always having to re-invent themselves in order to keep up with current fashion. Kenwood Towne Center was formerly an outdoor strip mall, but literally turned itself inside-out (or outside-in, more accurately) in order to take the crown from Florence and become Cincinnati’s shopping mall of choice.

In looking at the photo above, though, I can’t help but imagine the retro appeal Florence Mall would have today if they had left the original 70’s decor intact. The hipster crowd would certainly be beating down their doors. Maybe in a couple more decades, historical preservationists will succeed in declaring Florence Mall a landmark, and restore it to its former earth-toned glory. Can they bring back Pogue’s and Shillito’s while they’re at it?

I’ve always had this weird fascination with suburban shopping malls, maybe because of my formative years spent at Florence Mall. As a liberal city person currently living in Manhattan, I’m supposed to look down my nose upon the mall and everything it stands for. But as much as I loathe their bland homogeneity and negative impact on urban centers and formerly-productive farmland, I still have a hard time resisting the urge to explore some mall I’ve never been in before. I guess you could consider it one of my guilty pleasures.

Maybe one of these days I’ll write a coffee table book that explores the development of the typical 1970’s indoor mall, including diagrams about how the malls changed and grew (or withered and died) over the years. Then I’d follow it with a survey of maybe a hundred or so malls from all over America, with a brief history and some past/present photos and plans.

I wonder how many people who grew up in the 80’s would see that book in Borders, flip through it, and say, “Hey, me and my friends used to hang out in that mall!”