Sally Giddings Smith: In defense of Burlington’s cathedral and its parkland

This commentary is by Sally Giddings Smith of Montpelier.

I am not Catholic, nor am I a professional critic. However, I love great buildings and great parks, particularly when they go together, and especially in places which do not have many great buildings or much urban green space.

The Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception , designed by Edward Larrabee Barnes, is a grand example of a modernist building. Barnes used simple shapes and local materials in this building, just as he did at the Haystack Mountain School of Crafts in Maine, the Dallas Museum of Art, the Thurgood Marshall Federal Judiciary Building in Washington, D.C., the Indiana University Library and the NSU Art Museum of Fort Lauderdale, among others.

But most significant for all Vermonters is the parkland that surrounds the building. Dan Kiley of Charlotte was internationally famous for designing landscapes to balance the geometric harshness of modern structures.

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The trees used here are honey locusts — the same trees that surround the Eiffel Tower in Paris. They smell lovely in the spring and turn yellow gold in the fall. They are plenty hardy here in Vermont and seem tolerant — so far — of the abuse they have been receiving in the last 20 years. I can’t overstate the significance of having a Dan Kiley landscape right here in our own backyard.

It should be impossible for this building and this parkland to be demolished. It is now eligible for historic preservation and must be preserved for future generations. Its demolition would be a black eye for Burlington and for Vermont, and an insult to the people who rebuilt Vermont after World War II.

The ruling of the Vermont Supreme Court on Sept. 25 will undoubtedly be on a strictly legal basis. But really, something must be done! A retreat? A place of rehabilitation? An ecumenical study center? A building for the historical preservation program at UVM? A place of inspiration and a reminder of great creativity and beauty?

Is this too much to ask of a Church, a city and a state?

Read the story on VTDigger here: Sally Giddings Smith: In defense of Burlington’s cathedral and its parkland .