Buying the New Yorker 1986 - page 42

Contrary to the image in the ad, The Charles Hotel is not located in the middle of the Mass Ave Bridge. It's just up the road a bit here. (If you look over to find the bridge on the map, you'll see that it is technically called the Harvard Bridge. Notice that there are bridges closer to Harvard. Notice also that Massachusetts Avenue is the road that actually goes across it. The guys who invented Boston just loved messing with people's heads.) Twenty years on, the hotel is pretty much as advertised here. The logo is the same, the Le Pli spa and salon is still there.

I like that they are admitting that they have some slight room for improvement. My suggestion - actually move the hotel so that it really is on the Mass Ave Bridge! That would be so neat!

This ad for The Shores reminds me to put a little perspective to this leg of the journey. In an nutshell, the mid-eighties were a fine time to go build something that reeked of money. And then it was suddenly, to coin a phrase, not so much. The Shores is still there, and, after twenty years, there are still unbuilt lots for sale. Here's one. It's going for $2,395,000. If someone reading this clicks through and decides to go buy the place, I dibs a point from the commission.

Meanwhile, Hugh Newell Jacobsen is still designing houses, go to his website and have a look. Some of the examples pictured might even be located in The Shores. There is a slight problem, however. This is his bio from his website. This is the page on the website run by the American Embassy in Paris that details the history of their buildings. Now take another look at the first sentence of his quote.

Let's just say I'm not seeing those dots being connected. But I'm sure that sooner or later someone will be along to help.