Last summer, Gossips followed closely the evolution of the design for 67-71 North Fifth Street. Over several months, a spokesperson for Galvan Partners presented two designs for the building that bore no resemblance to the building as it was or ever had been. Members of the Historic Preservation Commission repeated asked for a design more in keeping with the house as we know it. Finally, in August 2012, a design was presented that was reasonably close to the design of the original, and the HPC was able to grant a certificate of appropriateness.
Some people wondered why the pitch of the front gable couldn't be the same as the original and why there couldn't be windows in the peak as there had been in the original, but there is no need to agonize over such details anymore. The roof is done, and there is no gable.
How, one asks, do things like this happen? How, one also asks, is the City of Hudson, whose laws have been flouted, going to respond?
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Some people wondered why the pitch of the front gable couldn't be the same as the original and why there couldn't be windows in the peak as there had been in the original, but there is no need to agonize over such details anymore. The roof is done, and there is no gable.
To play devil's advocate, was this stark, Shaker-like design ever approved by the HPC?
ReplyDeleteIf not, yet another example of why it is impossible to trust Galvan, its principals, its staff, its advisors, its architects, its "historic" preservation advisers and its contractors.
Taken as a whole, they act with impunity and revolting arrogance, shielded by advice and counsel from a public official and the principals' combined mantle of extreme wealth, avowed social liberalism, sexual orientation and racial minority status.