Former Timeswoman Julle Iovine, writing in the blog of the Architect’s Newspaper (where she is executive editor), got hold of culture editor Jonathan Landman‘s internal memo announcing the departure, after seven years, of Nicolai Ouroussoff, the NY Times‘ architecture critic.
According to Landman’s memo, Ouroussoff plans “to write a book about the architectural and cultural history of the last 100 years.”
Ouroussoff will be remembered by CultureGrrl readers for many memorable missteps (scroll down), but most of all for his unhinged recommendation in 2008 that New York’s Museum of Arts & Design, newly reclad and refurbished by architect Brad Cloepfil, be knocked down at once. (Last I looked, MAD, deservedly, was still standing.)
But is there a successor? Where’s the Times’ venerable architecture critic, Ada Louise Huxtable, when they really need her? (Writing perspicaciously for the Wall Street Journal, as it happens.)