Maintaining the character of the neighborhood https://twitter.com/modernmultifam/status/1285314216254029824

I’m actually so mad because these buildings are way cooler and it is such a New England thing to want to freeze time in the 18th century when yes, buildings were beautiful for sure but also every generation and culture should get to make its mark on a neighborhood.

Also wanna throw out there that the architecture we associate with “character” is distinctly WHITE and HOAs and neighborhood associations and historical commissions that make architecture decisions are distinctly WHITE and older. They freeze out young architects and planners/

Where people of color are already a minority in the profession. But they are so disallowed from doing anything in their own voices or styles and it’s honestly disgusting how white people become the Aesthetic Police and push their boring tastes on entire cities.

I have seen VERY COOL designs rejected because they did not match the tastes of an entirely white, 60+ decision making body. “We love quirky and unique things!” they say, but quirky as in “going antiquing”, not “adding a cool, unexpected looking building to the streetscape.”

I love old architecture, I truly do. But that doesn’t mean I get to veto other aesthetic styles or freeze a neighborhood in time. There’s also something beautiful about blending the old with the new. And guess what? As time passes, one day, a building put up today/

Will be historic to generations in the future. What do we want our styles to say? That we stifled innovation, nonwhite aesthetics, and functional housing in the name of “character”, an amorphous term that NO ONE can define unless you just come out and call it what it is:

The preservation of an entirely white, upper middle class style and way of life. The reason people can’t define character (and I’ve heard them try) is that it’s hard to do without sounding like an overt racist. Because it is. The history, laws, and proof are all there.

Anyway the joke I made in the first tweet turned into a super long yet cathartic thread because people need to know that the very fabric of our streets is determined by unrepresentative and unelected bodies. I don’t have a call to action or anything. Just wanted people to know.

I have been struggling about how to be a better ally for racial justice. I don’t think this thread really accomplished anything other than to get people - especially white folks - to understand how white supremacy shapes literally everything around us.