A Little Help From My Friends

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I couldn’t do it by myself. Though my signature is on every image in Metro-Photo.com, I’ve had invaluable help from many people and organizations, all of whom know more about architecture and urban history than I could ever hope to absorb.

Taking photos of interesting architecture is sorta easy. Sure, you need the right light, and the right angle, and maybe some luck to get to the building when there’s no scaffolding or trucks parked in the way of your shot. Cameras and software do a lot of the technical magic, so getting good photos is easier than it was when I started out shooting on Tri-X, Kodachrome and High Speed Ektachrome. I can’t say that I miss those hours in the dark room, threading film by feel onto developing reels, watching times and temperatures, breathing in those chemical fumes.

But the photo galleries here aren’t just the photos, are they? You want to know about the architecture. What’s the name? Where is it? Who designed it? What’s the style? When was it built? Why was it built? In journalistic terms, we want the who, what, when, where, why, and how. Getting those answers often takes more time than getting the photos.

I have two styles of photo walks: Planned, and unplanned. Either way, I need help.

Planned excursions start out with my seeing someone else’s photo of a building or neighborhood – maybe in a book, maybe online, or even a TV program. I once shot a whole neighborhood in Brooklyn because of a scene in the series “Person of Interest.” My method is to find my target(s) in Open Street Map, print out the map section and mark it up with red outlines around the buildings I’m interested in. I used to use Google Maps exclusively, but Open Street Map gives me a clearer printout. Then I’ll mark my start and end points – the mass transit stops I use to get to and from the subject. I may also consult SunCalc to find the best time for photos, because it’s all about the light. And of course the final determination is the weather: I prefer a few clouds for interesting skies, but plenty of direct sun to bring out the texture of masonry, and hard shadows to define a building’s depth and detailing.

Unplanned excursions are not completely unplanned. Sometimes I browse neighborhoods in Google Maps satellite or street view, scanning for interesting architecture. Sometimes I’m just intrigued by a neighborhood’s history. Either way, I’ll pick my transit start and end points, and then walk a grid, hiking up and down streets, looking for interesting buildings. A typical walkabout takes about five hours during which I cover seven or eight miles and take a few hundred shots of 20 or so buildings. It’s good exercise, since I’m generally carrying about 20 pounds of gear.

Oddly enough, unplanned walkabouts are often more productive than planned trips. The problem with plans is that they are self-imposed blinders. I get so focused on particular buildings that I fail to see sometimes spectacular architecture that’s nearby. The problems with unplanned is that sometimes I look without seeing (more about that another time), and sometimes I have trouble identifying the buildings I’ve photographed.

Thank goodness for Google Maps’ street view – especially when I don’t get around to writing captions within a day or two.

Once I have a building’s name and address, the fun begins. If the structure is famous, then the architectural details are usually available in a city’s American Institute of Architects (AIA) guidebook, or a quick Google search. Wikipedia is invaluable for getting a lot of well-researched information, fast. In fact, when I do a Google search for a building name or address, I often include “Wikipedia” in the search query. Other helpful keywords are “architect” or “architecture,” “history,” and “preservation.” Without those keywords, search results are often littered with unhelpful links to real estate brokers. They’ll tell you the rent or asking price, but usually not the architect’s name, style, or building date.

There are a few exceptions among real estate sources: Emporis and Phorio are a couple of databases that record vital statistics on hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of buildings around the world. (I’ll put all the links at the end.) YIMBY (Yes In My Back Yard) is a pro-development media company with websites for major cities around the U.S. City Realty in New York City has extensive write-ups about significant buildings, thanks to their in-house architectural critic, Carter Horsley.

A real goldmine is the National Park Service – keeper of the National Register of Historic Places (NRHP). Just be aware, the NRHP is huge. Finding your architectural needle in this historical haystack starts with their search page. Your reward is page after page of detail about the building(s), and their historical context. If the report is about an historic district, you may have to sift through a lot of material to find a specific building.

Local historical societies and landmark commissions are treasure troves, too. Some even have smart phone apps, for the benefit of archi-tourists like myself. I’ve listed some below.

I’m most familiar with the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC), of course. Their public resources are spectacular. LPC has gone to great lengths to make its records accessible. In the commission’s early years, landmark designation reports were prepared by typewriter. The record copies were often corrected with hand-written notes. As a result, LPC’s first-generation PDFs were sometimes difficult to read, and impossible to search. Photo quality was poor. In the last several years, LPC went to the extraordinary length of re-inputting every report, so text and photos are clear – and searchable. What’s more, the reports are all linked to a very detailed, easy-to-use Discover New York City Landmarks map.

Beyond the “official” sources of information, there are myriad unofficial experts who bring amazing color to the field. My favorite is Tom Miller’s Daytonian in Manhattan blog, which does deep dives into the history of a building and its inhabitants. Mr. Miller’s illustrated essays quote newspaper accounts and are fascinating reading. He’s even got a book, “Seeking New York: The Stories Behind the Historic Architecture of Manhattan – One Building at a Time.” 

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