A Fair Land to Build In: The Architecture of the Empire State
Written and narrated by Brendan Gill, this short film from 1980 was produced by the Preservation League of NYS to showcase the remarkably varied architecture found throughout the Empire State. We've brought it out of the archive and digitized the original film in honor of our 50th Anniversary in 2024.
A Fair Land to Build In covers three centuries of New York’s history and development, beginning in the colonial era and continuing to when the video was produced in 1980. Looking back at this film now, nearly 50 years after it was produced, it is interesting to consider what a video detailing the architecture of New York might look like if we were to produce it today. In 2024, we preserve and recognize the significance of all types of places and structures, high style and vernacular, places tied to the rich and famous and those that are important to everyday people. In sharing this video today, we recognize that it is a product of its time. Perhaps in a 2024 version we would begin by centering the Native peoples of our state and the various kinds of architecture found on these lands before European settlers laid claim to it (wigwams constructed by Munsee peoples in the Hudson Valley, Haudenosaunee longhouses in Western New York). We might be inclined to supplement the focus on immigrant influence to more explicitly reference the impact non-European immigration has had; and with the inclusion of the African American experience and a nod to the effect the Great Migration had on cities and towns across the state. Contemporary preservation incorporates cultural and intangible history much more than the field did back in the 1980s, and the way we talk about our built environment reflects this.
Still, there are many things here that ring just as true today as they did in 1980. In reflecting on the importance of skilled craftsman and the current lack of professionals in those trades, not much has changed. Remarkable buildings are still being demolished every day. In his narration, Brendan Gill shares a quote from the 19th-century theorist John Ruskin’s The Seven Lamps of Architecture. In considering the question of whether to preserve historic buildings Ruskin said, “They belong partly to those who built them and partly to all the generations of mankind who are to follow us... it may hereafter be a subject of sorrow, or a cause of injury, to millions that we have consulted only our present convenience when casting down such buildings as we choose to dispense with.” Preservation brings the past into conversation with the future — and as an organization, the League is excited to keep pushing that conversation forward for many more years to come.
Many thanks to George Blood LP for their work digitizing the original film reel.
Following the video production of A Fair Land to Build In, the League published an accompanying catalogue to further document the nearly 400 buildings featured in the film. A PDF of the catalogue is coming soon. Below is the introduction to the publication written by then-League Executive Director Diana Waite:
The accompanying A Fair Land to Build In catalogue was published in 1984.
“A Fair Land to Build In: The Architecture of the Empire State is a celebration of the buildings of New York State. The enterprise began in 1980 when the National Trust for Historic Preservation held its 34th annual conference in New York City. Eager that participants in the conference, coming from all over the country, should learn as much as possible about our New York architecture, the Preservation League undertook the production of a slide/tape program that, though not skimping the landmarks of New York City, would call attention to the exceptional profundity of building styles that have developed throughout the entire state over the past three centuries.
Beginning in the early summer of 1980, Preservation League trustees and staff set to work. Two professional photographers were commissioned to travel the length and breadth of the state. Simultaneously, scores of public and private slide collections were examined in order to identify photographs taken in every season from many angles of vision, whether at long range or close up. Over 25,000 separate images of buildings and landscapes were scrutinized before 600 of the most suitable slides were selected for assembling into a 30-minute, 6-projector show. Our Chairman, Brendan Gill, composed and narrated the script. The project was directed by two consultants, the audio-visual designer Rusty Russell and John P. Grady, a partner at Chermayeff & Geismer Associates, who served as executive producer.
Following a premier at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel on October 10, 1980, the program was converted to 16 mm. film and videotape. Since then it has entertained hundreds of audiences, including civic and business groups, historical and cultural agencies, and students; thousands of other viewers have seen the show on public television stations. Almost without exception, viewers have been captivated by the beauty and diversity of the architecture of New York State and challenged by a desire to know where the many structures in the show are located and when they were built. We are publishing this catalogue to record these images in a permanent form and to document the history and location of the nearly 400 buildings featured in the film.
The Preservation League is indebted to the generosity of many individuals and institutions for the production of A Fair Land to Build In, both as a visual program and as a catalogue.
We are especially grateful to Joan K. Davidson, President of the J.M. Kaplan Fund, who from the very beginning of the project offered her support and guidance.
The American Express Foundation, headed by Stephen S. Halsey, provided generous support for both the visual program and the book.
Other contributions were made by architect Philip Johnson, Mobil Foundation, Mohawk Paper Mills, our membership, and anonymous donors. Government funding was provided by the New York State Council on the Arts and the Office of Motion Picture and Television Development of the New York State Department of Commerce.”