bq. This goes to the heart of Chicago’s glaring shortcoming: its failure to recognize that urban fabric is the lifeblood of all great cities. When I go to New York and walk around SoHo with its wealth of glorious industrial architecture, Greenwich Village with its intoxicating Left Bank ambience, and Brooklyn Heights with its picture-perfect blocks, I come back here and literally ask myself where is the city? What part of Chicago really lends itself to casual strolling? I think the best cities strike the right balance between architectural fabric and architectural monuments.

bq. It’s most unfortunate that Chicago has yet to learn what may be the most important architectural lesson of all: that great architecture is not enough. This is a city whose trophy buildings have become its consolation prizes.

— David Sikon, writing to the Chicago Tribune in response to a Kamin article citing the recent wave of bland cement boxes as one of “Chicago’s Seven Blunders”