This wasn’t like falling out of love; this felt like having someone that I admired brought down a peg. I think I’ve gone through this now with most of the modernist adherence to clean lines and simplicity when a close look reveals that the lines often aren’t clean and rarely simple, and that the idealism doesn’t allow much space for actual messy human nature or any other nature really. Much like any system (hello communism) it’s pretty until you pull it off the page and thrust it into reality. On carefully guided tours we move from room to beautiful room, framed in miles of smooth oak and it’s a fine response to the wedding cake houses of the Victorian era but I’m not sure it’s better. The roofs leak and we bang our heads on the doorframes installed by a man who built to his own size although like most men lied about his actual height. The guide can only refer to him using all three names; my own reverence is fading by the moment. We learn that when a neighbor built a house he didn’t want to look at he bricked up his own windows. A church without a parking lot. Children’s rooms with pale carpets. The purported reverence for nature is somewhat diminished when you realize that every skylight is framed by an image of the outside that prevents you from actually seeing outside. Still I like the ideas, and it is certainly something to look at and I’m glad to learn things, but a person who was a giant to me has now been adjusted to his actual size in my mind.