urbanSTL

Cynic!



(though I'm not sure you're wrong - I'm having a problem 'thinking BIG')

Call me old fashioned, but Gehry does NOTHING for me. I love glass, steel, and curves just as much as the next guy but come on. Now maybe one or two structures in his style might be OK, but this is too much for me.



Different strokes I guess....

I'm fine with most of it, but where are the BUILDINGS with PEOPLE? That was the whole point! I love having theatre and art. But you need to through in SOME functionality. This is coming from a guy who supported the Libeskind design for the BD.

Mayor Slay is a slick fellow!



He mentioned that Ghery wanted to do a project in St. Louis but he "was not sure if it would ever happen."



Slay knew the entire time and he didn't even show signs of this at all.



This occured at an UMSL Political Science Association Meeting.



Well this is great news for St. Louis!!!!!!!!! This guy does some great architecture!

This would definatley accentuate how horrible looking those garages are.

Crimany people!



Its a bad joke, or what the RFT must consider one!

For the record - I think it's for real.



Anyone else want to go on record?

RFT has been know to print completely fabricated cover stories as satire.

This fits the bill, and hits on all notes.



I mean come on...



Moving the Serra sculpture.

Moving the Kiel Opera house is like "moving a double-wide"

And Mike Shannon wants his Cabo-Wabo Cantina



This is clearly the RFT making fun of hoosier cards fans and the uppity rich arts and architecture community.



This is about as believeable as McGowan's 81-story tower.

ya but you gotta like it for it's entertainment value...good read but completely rediculous! Wow that serra sculpture sure does fit right in...

Fake....



If you would like to see the real thing visit the 17th floor of BOA tower DT . Coordish has on display in the lobby a huge model of the proposed development.



By the Randal the author of the article is doing a radio show on KDHX tonight , the show begins I beleive at 8.

Wow, what a horrible design, even as a joke. Yuck.



Although, I do like the idea of move the opera house but I doubt it could be done. There is no possible way they could get it onto the site unless they airlift it, which is also implausible.

The website under construction access seems very fishy - I think it's possible to move the Kiel however. Along Michigan Avenue in Chicago a large number of buildings were jacked up and moved back nearly a century ago - surely something similar could be done now. The names in the story seem to check out - the building mover, Pulitzer (having made a number of large gifts in St. Louis arts - Wash U., etc.), Gehry wanting to do a project in St. Louis . . .

It would be a shame if they brought on Gehry as the architect for this project. Gehry's designs are best suited for small comissions and, if you've seen his proposals for a skyscraper in Manhattan and the huge Atlantic Yards development in Brooklyn, the impracticality of his designs are very readily apparent. The overly-abstract era of Gehry, Libeskind, Herzog & de Meuron, etc. seems to be coming to a close and I don't want to see this development show up as the third or fourth encore when people have already moved on.



If they're going to hire an big name architect, give the comission to SOM or KPF or Pelli or Gensler, heck, even Foster or some firm that has proven they can balance scale, elegance, and contemporary design while maintaining some sense of practicality (read, this does NOT mean HOK, not every big development in Stl should feel compelled to hire these throwback quacks).



Though the project seems satirical (Emily Pritzker loves her Serra sculptures) and even if Gehry were proposed as the architect, all those conservative preservationists who want more imitative brick crap would probably shoot anything too big and bold down before it could get anywhere really.



But that's just my caffeine-addled two cents rant.

It's a joke and even if it's a "real proposal" it may be for the sake of speeding up the negotiations between the real developer, the city, and the Cardinals.



I have no doubt a large building can be moved, I've seen it done, but I don't know that there is space for the Kiel Opera House to fit through to get to BPV.

The overly-abstract era of Gehry, Libeskind, Herzog & de Meuron, etc. seems to be coming to a close and I don't want to see this development show up as the third or fourth encore when people have already moved on.

I understand your point, but I would surely not rather have Joe Architect put in something that mimicks historic architecture - i.e. the Brentwood Boulevard or even Busch III. Talk about passe - wouldn't that be entertainment districts like Power and Light in KC and whatever LIVE in Baltimore or Louisville?



Also - I just looked up who owns the domain ballparkvillage.com and found (I guess this could still be fake, but dam*, someone at the RFT must have a lot of spare time on their hands - writing the story, a quick rendering, paying to register ballparkvillage.com under F. Gehry . . . :



Registrant:

Associates, F. Gehry **



ATTN: BALLPARKVILLAGE.COM

c/o Network Solutions

P.O. Box 447

Herndon, VA 20172-0447



Domain Name: BALLPARKVILLAGE.COM



Administrative Contact :

Associates, F. Gehry **

xs6t54f25jc@networksolutionsprivateregistration.com

ATTN: BALLPARKVILLAGE.COM

c/o Network Solutions

P.O. Box 447

Herndon, VA 20172-0447

Phone: 570-708-8780



Technical Contact :

Network Solutions, LLC.

customerservice@networksolutions.com

13200 Woodland Park Drive

Herndon, VA 20171-3025

US

Phone: 1-888-642-9675

Fax: 571-434-4620

True - just saying that the RFT spent quite a bit of time on this.

Well, it looks like it has to be a joke.



Think about it, it is just lumping all of St Louis' failures into one thing:



Gehry = The Bottle District Libeskind Failure

The Opera House = The failure to renovate the building along with the Keil Center.

The Serra Sculpture = The Serra Sculpture



All they needed to add was that there will be an indoor mall... It's a clear comment that they don't trust the outcome of Ballpark Village.



They have don this kind of article before but never on such a scale. If you ask me, I think it's downright irresponsible that they would put such a large, fake article, with a website and all and not put some sort of fine print that this is not legitimate news or legitimate interviews with real people.



By this point, though, if it is real... It's already really a sad sign for the project that so many of us are convinced that it isn't.

I'm having a very tough time believing this, especially the moving of the Kiel Opera house. Moving it, maybe, but getting it to Ballpark Village would probably require demolishing buildings. Plus, what would be done with the Current Kiel site and the giant open wound left on Scottrade. Pulitzer doesn't own it anyway.

Sheesh!



...Although I suppose anything's possible. Note that the article says that the Cardinals can void this "deal" with Pulitzer in the event that they get their tax-assistance from the city. It could be that this was a pie-in-the-sky fantasy dream-project that Pulitzer would like to build if she had her druthers. But it looks like the Cardinals will get their tax breaks anyway, which means they will go ahead with their version of Ballpark Village.



An interesting story, anyway.

BTW, if anyone actually proposed that design for downtown, I would be convinced to finally give up on St. Louis and move. That thing is but ugly.

^I agree. I'm not really a fan of Gehry. And I would prefer the highrises the Cardinals want to build over the mid-rise stuff in this Gehry plan.

The opera house is also proportioned completely wrong in their site plan, and besides the ridiculously expensive move, those building could never cost as much as the supposed budget.



I just really don't get the point of this article and the trouble they went through to create this little scenario.