Dream builder - architect Stanford White - excerpt from 'Architect of Desire'

Washington Monthly, Dec, 1996 by Suzannah Lessard

The tragedy of Stanford White is that combined with his softness and sensitivity there was something in him that was hard and unfeeling, something blind and crushing--incapable of the responsiveness that humility brings. One can see how hard he tried with the University of Virginia buildings, and also how doomed his efforts were. He knew how to restrain himself; his buildings are delicate and sophisticated, and reflect in many ways the best he had to give. Yet in the context of the open tenderness and authenticity of Jefferson's architecture, the very sophistication of Stanford's buildings exposes a kind of emptiness--as if the buildings were a performance, a kind of dressing-up; a charade. In Jefferson's architecture, in contrast, there is thoughtfulness, humility, love, and, above all, conviction.

From the book Architect of Desire. Copyright @ 1996 by Suzannah Lessard. Reprinted by arrangement with The Dial Press, an imprint of Dell Publishing, a division of Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group, Inc.Suzannah Lessard is contributing editor of The Washington Monthly.