Notre Dame, Paris
Camello Sitte, an urban planner in the late 1880s was disturbed by the radical changes modern planning was having on the urban fabric of Europe.
He believed that, through the understanding of how cities developed over time, planners could continue to build beautiful spaces that also reflected the lifestyles of a new Industrial Age.
After our recent return from Europe, I found his reflections expressed a certain truth that still applies today:
“Enchanting recollections of travel form part of our most pleasant reveries. Magnificent town views, monuments and public squares, beautiful vistas all parade before our musing eye, and we savor again the delights of the sublime and graceful things in whose presence we were once so happy.
To linger! If we could but linger again in those places whose beauties never waned; surely we would then be able to endure many difficult hours with a lighter heart, and carry on, the strengthened, in the eternal struggle of this existence…Anyone who has enjoyed the charms of an ancient city would hardly disagree with this idea of a strong influence of physical setting on human soul.”