670-foot-long reflecting pool along the eastern side of the site, creating one of Boston’s most monumental public spaces.

The Christian Science complex completed the development of Boston’s 19th-century landfill neighborhoods of Back Bay and the South End. Interest then turned to the city’s long-neglected waterfront, where Gropius student Hugh Stubbins’s Federal Reserve Bank of Boston (1977), adjacent to the 1899 South Station rail terminal, is arguably the last purely modern building to have been erected in Boston, with a heat-minimizing aluminum skin and spandrels that temper downdrafts.

Architectural innovation has continued with the Stata Center (2004), by Frank Gehry, home to MIT’s computer science department and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory. The nearly 750,000-square-foot complex has been plagued with construction flaws, but the angular jumble of buildings has a visceral energy that manifests the creativity inside.

The building to best capture the public imagination in recent years is the Institute of Contemporary Art by Diller Scofidio + Renfro (2006) on land donated by the Pritzker family, sponsors of the annual Pritzker Architecture Prize. Sensitively designed for its waterfront site on Fan Pier, the 65,000-square-foot museum cantilevers the main exhibition galleries over the water and wraps an undulating ribbon around horizontal glass cases. This transparent jewel box marks the approach to Boston’s inner harbor and provides striking views back toward the central city.

The two most eagerly anticipated new projects are in the Fenway area of Boston’s Avenue of the Arts: a new wing for the Museum of Fine Arts by London’s Norman Foster, currently under construction (the original 1907–09 museum building is by Guy Lowell; the 1981 West Wing is by I.M. Pei) and an auxiliary building for the Venetian-style palazzo of the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum (1902).

Modernism is now as much a part of Boston’s architectural vocabulary as the Federal style or Romanesque Revival. This contrast between tradition and innovation gives Boston its unique architectural character and bodes well for the preservation of major modern buildings as the city moves forward. “I believe we can maintain the security and respect of tradition in Boston’s urban growth, and at the same time embrace the future,” says Hubert Murray. “That’s our architectural challenge.”

Patricia Harris and David Lyon write about art, design, travel and food from Cambridge, Mass.


[SIDEBAR]
MUSEUMS AND SIGHTS

Harvard University
Information Center in Holyoke Center
1350 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge
617/495-1573, www.harvard.edu

Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts
24 Quincy Street, Cambridge
617/495-3251, www.ves.fes.harvard.edu/ccva.html

Loeb Drama Center
64 Brattle Street, Cambridge
617/547-8300, www.amrep.org
Designed by Hugh Stubbins & Associates, 1960.

Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Information Center, Building 7-121
77 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge
617/253-4795, www.mit.edu

Kresge Auditorium and Chapel
48 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge
617/253-1000, www.mit.edu

Boston Architectural College
320 Newbury Street, Boston
617/262-5000, www.the-bac.edu

Jewett Arts Center
106 Central Street
Wellesley College, Wellesley
781/283-1000, www.wellesley.edu

Institute of Contemporary Art
100 Northern Avenue, Boston
617/478-3100, www.ica.boston.org

John F. Kennedy Presidential Library & Museum
Columbia Point, Boston
617/514-1600, www.jfklibrary.org
A soaring 1979 structure on Boston Harbor by I.M. Pei.


DINING

Harvest Restaurant
44A Brattle Street, Cambridge
617/868-2255
Designed by Benjamin Thompson.

SHOPPING

Machine Age
645 Summer Street, Boston
617/464-0099, www.machine-age.com
Vintage modern furniture in a former industrial building.

Reside
266 Concord Avenue, Cambridge
617/547-2929, www.resideinc.com
Vintage mid-century pieces, African textiles and
contemporary art.

20th Century Provenance
348 Broadway, Cambridge
617/547-2300, www.provenance20.com
20th-century American design, especially Art Deco.

Sparkle Plenty @ Marcia and Bee Antiques
1 Lincoln Street, Newton
617/332-2408
Jewelry of the ‘20s through ‘40s.

Tom Gibbs Studio
Mid-century modern furniture warehouse near Boston.
By appointment. 610/730-8309, www.tomgibbsstudio.com

D-Scale
520 Harrison Ave, Boston
617/542-2074, www.dscalemodern.com
Custom and vintage furniture, plus accessories.