New Student Center at Wheelock

William Rawn's fascination with curves (see Northeastern and MIT Graduate housing) adapts well to this site on the curving Fenway boulevard, and creates fantastic reflections in the fall light. Scale problems abound, however.

Piano's Gardner Museum addition

The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum's $60 million expansion is underway, with foundations and a mockup in full view. The site is busy, with substructure and foundation work ongoing. The best part was seeing the impressive mockup of the exterior overhang that will occur along Evans Way, making a fantastic public facade taking advantage of the park across the street. The rigorous geometry and carefully crafted details remind us of the larger MFA addition by Piano's onetime partner.

Fenway/Parcel 7 renderings

Meredith Management's $450 million proposal comes to us via renderings by the office of Carlos Zapata in New York. Nice.

Jimmy's Harborside redevelopment underway

Jimmy's Harborside redevelopment. We approve of reinforcing density and mixed uses in this part of the city. Hopefully, this will be typical once the entire seaport district is built out. This is anticipated to house four restaurants and leased offices. The substructure is now under construction.

Russia, er...Atlantic Wharf update

A slender proportion for this facade saving redevelopment makes it all right. We are liking how it is coming out in this part of the city.

Interesting...must not be in Boston

Gehry's Beekman tower under construction in lower Manhattan.

Updated: Disappointment at the Clarendon

Our least favorite execution of the skin of this box is near the ground level corner at Stuart Street, a thin 7th-8th story band and street level corner of curtain wall that belies the scale of the whole building. The consensus likes the massing that pushes the tower away from the street front, and also gets its most interesting view from the Pike.

W Hotel Sidewalk VE

It looks like the sidewalk got cut from the construction budget for the W Hotel on Stuart Street. Nothing at all there, and a cheap concrete finish. On Tremont, a few trees and a bike rack (for the LEED point no doubt).

Fan Pier Nears Completion

Recently saw the nearly complete exterior of the first piece of the seaport district's plan. Build quality and landscaping look good. Clearly, the design begs to be part of the larger scheme, so let's hope more structures break ground soon.

MIT Media Lab Addition

New Images of Maki's Media Lab addition at MIT, with Leers Weinzapfel as the executive architect. Nice job!