Duanny

Duanny of DPZ is perhaps the leading figure in the New Urbanist (NU). NUs like traditional neighborhoods where you can walk from houses to stores, there are porches, the streets are pedestrian friendly, etc. One of the criticms of NUs is that they are not pushing architecture in a new direction. That they just recylce old ideas and old styles. My personal feeling is that I will take good old ideas over bad new ones, but ideally I would like to see some high quality modernist developments where the buildings have appropriate form for the human environment.

I pushed Duanny on this point to see his reaction. I expected a empasioned defense of the traditional architecture that he designs with. In fact, he said, "She me five quality modernists buildings in Biloxi that promote street life, that have appropriate massing, that have a healthy relationship with the street, and I will do a design charrette around them."

I was impressed with his answer.