The issue was design criticism, not design

They Revived the Pritzker

Martin Filler responds to my comment in the New York Review of Books blog (NYRB),

Perhaps if David Sucher followed the link to my New York Review piece on the New Museum he would have found the degree of detail he deems lacking in my necessarily shorter blog posting, but I suspect that no amount of argument could persuade him of SANAA's merits.

Alas, my issue is not aimed to the designer — SANAA — but to the critic — Filler. In fact I think that the Museum is pretty nice and appears to be a good urban building — I'll check it out soon in person. But here it is, below, as annotated.

Among other things Filler's specific point (in his NYRB post) says that SAANA did a "thrifty" job — at $800 SF. That strikes me as preposterous, and once opening up the question by specifically addressing cost. NYC is expensive but not that expensive and a series of boxes with few windows even with cantilevers should in fact be a thrifty and astute design — but not at $800 SF.

The other thing really odd about his post is that 
1. he additionally states that the interior, as a museum, is not all that good
2. he doesn't even mention that the Museum is in fact a good urban building in terms of urban design, in how it addresses the street, which incidentally is far better than the Modern.

Read his whole post and the comments. To some degree I wondered if I may have treated Filler a bit harshly in comments. But the NYRB is the big time, as is the Pritzker Prize and the New Museum. So he should get it right if he is going to be an architecture critic.