Competing Impulses

When it’s safe, we’ll take a right to cross 10th street. We’ll follow the sidewalk north along Baltimore. Remember to watch for cars before crossing.

These competing impulses are rarely reconciled as elegantly as they are in this building before you. There are many places in Kansas City that are like this building, and throughout the country as a whole. America never had a pastoral period, or a dark age, or even a renaissance. It was always a project, from the moment the first colonists set foot on the shores of New England, right up until today. By the time Kansas City had settled upon a legacy, a style, or an aesthetic, things had gone and changed again. And so it was on to the next thing. The block ahead is a perfect encapsulation of that, though the results paint a picture that’s very different from the elegant synthesis of the downtown branch of the library. 

Take a hard look down at the red stone building across the street. Those bricks look a bit larger than usual, no? Now look up and take in the full stature of the structure. Something that ancient isn’t supposed to look that imposing.