Philadelphia AIA Lewis Mumford Architectural Journalism Award, 2005

Author of Philadelphia Architecture Honored With AIA Journalism Award The Philadelphia Chapter of the American Institute of Architects, a group with more than 1300 members, annually bestows this award "...on a regional journalist who has written articulately, responsibly, and with foresight on the contributions of architects to the built environment." The award will be given tonight at Davio's restaurant, 111 South 17th Street, from 6:00 to 7:30 pm. We are happy to say that much of Thom Nickels' writing has, for many years, found its way into our publications and that this award couldn't have come at a better time. In architecture, timing is, if not everything, extremely important. Ask them over at the Kimmel Center (or ask their attorneys). Just now Arcadia Publishing, a company which has become the largest publisher of regional history books in North America, publishing more than 3,000 titles, has released Philadelphia Architecture by Thom Nickels, a walk through Philadelphia streets past and present, highlights the richness and diversity of the city's architectural history. Besides being a journalist, Nickels is poet, and author of eight books, including Gay and Lesbian Philadelphia and Manayunk. It's not surprising that he came from a family of architects, growing up around drawing boards and architectural blueprints in the farmlands of Chester County. From a very early age, he read about architecture in his father's architectural magazines, and was fascinated, but his aversion to math prevented him from pursuing a career as an architect. During his alternate service during the Vietnam War, Nickels met famous Bauhaus architect, Walter Gropius. Gropius was dying at the time and needed a life-saving operation. Nickels struggled with a hospital physician to remove Gropius' bed from the small hospital room and roll it through the poorly designed hospital door. It was a scene of high irony and intensity: the world famous father of the Bauhaus School, which taught that form followed function, left this world "witnessing" a very bad function. Nickels knew at that moment he would someday write about architecture. During the 1970s, Nickels became a newspaper columnist and began to write a column in Philadelphia's Welcomat, one of the first gay-issues oriented columns in a large city weekly in the nation. He soon began publishing books in the mid-1980s. Nickels says that an Arcadia editor actually suggested one of two projects for him, "Philadelphia Architecture," or "Famous Philadelphians." Considering his family background, the first choice seemed best. He hasn't ruled out a book about famous Philadelphians. After taking the assignment, it took Nickels about a year to get the material together. Along the way Thom says he discovered that one of architect William Strickland's earliest known works is a Romanian Orthodox church in Northern Liberties. He tells us that, "This building has fallen into a state of disrepair and was/is largely hidden on a quiet neighborhood street. By including the building in my book," he asserts, " and by writing about the building for a newspaper where I am on staff I think I may have helped it secure publicity and hence some needed funding for restoration." Nickels maintains that doing the book caused him to have a new appreciation for Strickland in general. This appreciation went into high gear when he discovered that a club owner in Old City had painted another Strickland Greek Revival building a lurid blue. He adds regretfully, "An article I wrote about this in the Weekly Press attracted some attention and outrage but unfortunately the club owner has not yet been forced to remove the blue paint job." Our Contributing Editor tells us that he discovered that many of Philadelphia's great buildings were controversial when they were proposed or built. "In many cases," he says, "the rhetoric bantered about then (I am thinking especially of the uproar surrounding the design of the PSFS building) reminds me a great deal of the criticism I hear today when a new downtown skyscraper is proposed. It is only lately that Philadelphia has shed its oppressively conservative skin. The results of this can be seen in the city's striking new skyline." For Thom Nickels, buildings are like houses we have once lived in. "They are, he says, "a part of our present, past, and future. They comprise our world. They can be the mental repository of our emotions." There's a book signing party for the newly published Philadelphia Architecture, Wednesday, December 7, 6:00 to 7:30 p.m. at La Creperie Cafe, 1722 Sansom Street, given by Joseph Fox Bookseller, 1724 Sansom Street. From The Weekly Press (by Robert Christian) 8 December 2005