Now You Don't Have To Tear It Down to Save It: McGruder Street Church

I'd been stalking the McGruder Street Church of God in Christ (1940) for about a decade. It's a little landmark. Here's the deal:

"Most landmarks and focal points in cities - of which we need more, not fewer - come from the contrast of use radically different from its surroundings, and therefore inherently special-looking, happily located to make some drama and contrast of the inherent difference ... noble buildings ... set within the matrix of the city, instead being sorted out and withdrawn into 'courts of honor'"- Page 228, ”The Death and Life of Great American Cities” - Jane Jacobs, Vintage Books Edition 1991


Finally in 2011 I spotted someone entering. I slammed on the brakes and ran after them. This "slam on the brakes and run after them" is NOT always the best method for this sort of thing. But it worked this time.


I learned that zoning and building codes prevented the owners from converting it into a place to live.
 


Parking was the prime issue. I'm paraphrasing: To make it a place to live they had to add off-street parking. There's just not room. (And that's not all.) So it sat empty and unused.



I won't bore you with the details because I don't understand them. Let's just say, what they couldn't do then they can do now.

But that's not what I'm here to blog about.

Last night I ran into Shana Robbins. Her family was connected to this place.

It reminded me that they built a new house across the street that featured views of the church.



Here's the view from the first floor.



Here's the view from the second floor. Bravo: designing to take advantage of  two Old Fourth Ward landmarks.

"Regrets Go Only One Way" - "Creomulsion Building" Demolished

Everything about this irritates me and I want to blame somebody. But though I'm a pretty good whiner - real good some say - I'm an inept blamer.

I wouldn't know who to blame anyway. because I don't think this is anyone's preferred outcome.

And if that's so, we're doing this wrong. Even Drew, the master who operated the excavator, told me he can't believe the buildings "we" tear down.

Here are some one-way regrets, pictures, videos, and a map. Discuss amongst yourselves. 


Kit laid a wreath.


The scene on January 3, 2014. Curbed Atlanta has the details.

The Palmetto Trust for Historic Preservation ran a year-end series that rings true for me:

"9. Regrets go only one way.

 "Over the years, I've heard regrets expressed about tearing a building down. 'We just didn’t know' they claim, that a neighborhood was on the cusp of revival, that an old building might have profitable new uses—or that what resulted turned out to be less valuable than what was lost.

"When looking ...  (at) any other old place that survived a battle to exist, do people ever say, 'Darn, we should have torn that building down when we had the chance?'" 

I always thought it was school. It was a block long, hidden by green vegetation for nine months, made ugly by gnarly branches for 3 months, abandoned but intact. It must have been something in its day.


It was no fun taking these pictures. And it rained.


They started on backside.


Imploded without explosives. On a clear day you can now see the Buckhead skyline from here.


The Glen Iris frontage remained intact while the excavator gnawed at the backside.


This is an engaged, pedimented portico, the Parthenon of the Old Fourth Ward, This is as noble as a factory gets.

"The oldest part of the building was constructed in 1929 and was designed by Hentz, Adler, & Shutze." - Kyle Kesler


They tore off the south wing first.


And I could see into the central "tower." It seemed in good shape.


Still impressive with a missing wing.


Then the north wing.


There must have been offices in the north wing.


I started looking at the details, more schoolhouse than cough-drop factory.


You might see details like this in a Buckhead mansion but you won't see them here anymore. Elegant brickwork in broad pilasters, tall metal windows embraced by sturdy sills kissing  the beefy architrave, the sills align with bands that take the eye around the corners. More like furniture than factory.


Perhaps the office door, smaller double-hung windows, a fan light over paneled door.


The north wing came down.



Spooky. The fanlight un-fanned.


Working  towards the middle.


On Saturday just this: a corner and column and a wall.


The ruin.


The arches lay sleeping after after 80+ years of service.


Go see.

I took 230 or so pictures:
2014-12-30 demolition 345 Glen Iris Creomulsion Building Atlanta GA Old 4th Ward
2015-01-02 demolition 345 Glen Iris Creomulsion Building Atlanta GA Old 4th Ward
2015-01-03 demolition 345 Glen Iris Creomulsion Building Atlanta GA Old 4th Ward 

So far I've put 41 videos of the Creomulsion Building demoliton on YouTube, about 33 minutes total. They are like this:

 

A Wedding and a Movie in one of Atlanta's Great Spaces

Is there a more comfortable outdoor gathering place in Atlanta? A more comfortable indoor space? When  events end, folks linger.

It looks like a rock quarry but when you fill it with people...

 
Folks gather for the Living Walls Movie Night on August 14, 2014. It's the amphitheater on the retention pond of Historic Fourth Ward Park.


My first visit was for Erin and Craig Kennedy's wedding on June 9, 2012.


You can bring a chair, sit on the wall, on the grass, on a blanket. There's plenty of space to move around and hug your friends.T-shirts are perfect, white suits and summer dresses too.


As you approach, you can see in, see the whole place, see everybody. Once inside you can see folks approach. It has a definite, comprehensible shape. It feels safe, small enough so that you can identify a distant face. There's a sense of enclosure. The curved benches are walls that make small "convex" spaces, places for groups to congregate with a view out into the larger space. It's a people watching paradise.


This is rocket science design for human comfort, comfort that helps shy folks be sociable. The really shy folks can watch from the balconies.


And who doesn't love a wedding.

I didn't return for a couple of years and I confess: I forget how great this place is. Thanks Living Walls!


There's a grassy "lobby" big enough for Food Trucks and Italian Ice Carts.


The stairway and the dogs are truly grand. But there are ramps for elders like me.


The clearly defined spaces feel informal and flexible. There's breathing room. It's hard to feel rushed in here. Where else can you bike to the front row?


By the time the movie started there must have been 250+ folks there.




The movie finished about 10 and the first wave of folks left.


The second wave wasn't in any hurry. The experienced picnickers packed up their baskets.


The third wave lingered and lollygagged.


The fourth wave chatted in cozy clumps. For all I know they stayed until the park closed.


Trust me on this: This is one of Atlanta's great spaces.

The Low Museum's Very First Show - Gallery Opening on Monday!

 
Pastiche Lumumba's projected survey based on "Girl with a Pearl" hashtags was live and interactive.

The High Museum closes on Mondays. The Low Museum opens. You can't get a haircut or visit a gallery on Monday. But there I was last night for the very first show at The Low Museum of Contemporary Culture in the Old Fourth Ward.


It's brand new, an idea rather than a place, run by focused students rather than veteran mavens. (The Low Museum is on Facebook and on Twitter @TheLowMuseum.)

It was a gallery hop with only one hop. It takes a little courage to visit a gallery for the first time. Would I see anyone I knew?

The show - #MoreOfTheSame - featured hashtags: "...we are intrinsically aware of the fact that anything we do has been done before."

Clovice Holt, Chris Holloway, Pastiche Lumumba, Steffen Sornpao, Jordan Stubbs, Beau Torres.


This is the place, a gallery in a student's apartment on this odd row of houses on John Wesley Dobbs just off Boulevard. I was happy to see inside after all these years of drive-bys.


The living area became a gallery.


By Steffen Sornpao.


"Double Rothko" by Chris Holloway was huge and delightful.


You young folks will "get" the hashtag stuff. I'll have to study.


I think "Iconversation" by Clovice Holt is a work in progress. It's been getting attention around town.


Jordan Stubbs is the Low Gallery guy. This is his "Last Supper," one in a set of 9 works. The phone in a frame is part of the work. Esme Jarrell is in the "Last Supper" and the only person I knew. Thanks for saying hello Esme.


These outward looking gender-confused portraits at eye-level by Clovice Holt were in charge of the glamor.


These witty artist-at-work self-portraits by Beau Torres rewarded a long look.


The opening and the gallery worked. Folks kept arriving, doing the gallery-browse and gallery-chat.


It was breezy on the porch and we needed it.


 Time to go. I switched to architecture tourist mode. The building is at a high point on the Boulevard corridor, on a wide street with a view of downtown. It feels open and airy.


I wondered about this side-facing ghost portico next door.

 
It was nice to get a close look. I watched it being built in 2004. It never really clicked with me though I liked the geometry, the innie/outie curves, and the scored bands. And who can resist a red awning? Last night I decided that the rustic California-style stucco finish muddied the crisp lines.Was the designer on vacation when they did the stucco?


Thanks for an interesting Monday.

The Low Museum is on Facebook and on Twitter @TheLowMuseum.