Here we go again. For the second time in only a few months the Tribune has seen fit to beat up on the 520 N. Michigan Ave. Building (McGraw-Hill), first in an editorial and now in an Op-Ed column by John McCarron.
What galls me about this is the refusal by these writers to offer what the issue so desperately needs, namely a careful, objective, historically informed description of the building. The “argument” in both articles comes down to this: 520 is, to quote McCarron, “a soot-covered, limestone hulk” and is “non-descript.”
How about telling your readers the name of the architect (Thielbar & Fugard, a distinguished firm of the period), and the date (1929), and explaining why it is properly identified as an Art Deco building (the use of limestone, the notching of the corners at the top, the emphasis on verticality) and briefly describing the single most distinctive feature about 520 (artist Gwen Lux’s mythologically inspired designs cut into the Michigan Avenue facade)?
This kind of basic information offers a starting point for a sensible discussion about the pros and cons of landmarking 520. As for the Tribune’s list of epithets quoted above, I suggest that Mr. McCarron and the editorialists consult their dictionaries, at the very least. How 520 fits the definition of a “hulk” escapes me. And the presence of that incised sculpture on the facade alone makes the building not “nondescript.” Finally, to suggest that the building is uninteresting because it is dirty and clad with limestone is just dumb.
To borrow another of Mr. McCarron’s phrases, fair-minded preservationists (and the newspaper’s readership in general) deserve a lot better from the Tribune than this feeble excuse for architectural criticism.
