( this site is currently in development.)

The Guildwood Ruin

"What is more beautiful than a beautiful thing,
is the ruin of a beautiful thing." – Charles Baudelaire.

Guildwood Park is a manicured ruin. Flowers are tended, topiary clipped, and lawns mowed. Buildings are "under police surveillance". The Guild Inn and its quite recent addition of a modern and hardly-used hotel (both apparently slated for demolition in the near future) are boarded-up and surrounded by chain-link fencing, in a vain bid to keep out vandals, squatters and explorers. The fence is broken through, the vandals have got in.

The Guild is now a city park that draws some numbers of visitors.

Guildwood Park resonates for me on several levels: architectural fragments from (mainly) the city's financial district. The linking of neoclassical architecture to our received, greco-roman ideal of 'great' civilization. The concept of the 'ruin'.

In what form will The Guild continue to 'be'? To whom does it 'belong'?

Are the architectural fragments 'our' heritage, or disowned curios, not worth 'our' tax dollars to maintain?

Are they being maintained?

Will the topiary take over, and swallow up the ruin?