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Write Ahead, Wellesley

Wellesley College’s Clapp library gushed over as “mid-century mundane” by architectural bloggers

March 26, 2016 by Deborah Brown Leave a Comment

Wellesley College, Clapp library
Wellesley College, Clapp library

Mid-century style is all the rage these days, its uncluttered vibe turning up in decorating magazines, its lean aesthetic suddenly everywhere you look. The term mid-century architecture generally refers to mid-20th century design from about 1933 – 1965. To give you a general idea, the mid-century interior look is anything currently in the furnishings section of Crate and Barrel, the exterior is any split-level home currently being torn down in Wellesley. Also think boxy regional bank branches, rather dull municipal offices, and utilitarian community college buildings, with A-frame churches and synagogues thrown in for good measure. Its structures have the type of style that on one hand is having a moment from a trend perspective, but on the other hand is generally waved good-bye to as the wrecking ball swings, no hand wringing over its significance, few moans of “oh, but I used to have my dentist appointments there” or “that’s where I did all my banking in the 80s.”

Apparently, Wellesley College’s Clapp library counts as mid-century modern, too, as featured in Mid-Century Mundane, an artsy blog I stumbled across which focuses on “the most exciting of mundane mid-century architecture.” The bloggers travel the country to document the genre, all the while conceding mid-century’s style issues with liberal use of the descriptors “bland,” “lack of elegance,” “rather plain,” and “a staid affair” in describing their subjects. Indeed, the bloggers say that the Clapp library “lack(s) elegance but continues to serve students’ needs ably.”

Fans of the period shouldn’t take such faint praise personally. Mid-Century Mundane bloggers say that they are devoted to exploring all this mid-century blandness exactly because it’s been largely ignored. Go to the site and click on a city that’s part of your very soul to remember some of the buildings you used to overlook on a daily basis, now the subject of photo shoots and artistic analyses. I have ties to New Haven (no, that’s not humblebrag code for “I went to Yale”) and enjoyed the virtual tour of places I well recall. Oh, look, there’s the Firestone Complete Auto Care down on Chapel St., and, wow, First Presbyterian Church on Whitney Ave., and yup, there’s the good old Crown St. parking garage. It made me downright misty. Those old buildings aren’t looking half bad now that some blogger has devoted actual time and effort into writing about them.

Here are a couple other examples of mid-century mod in town that the bloggers missed while they were here:

Christ Church, United Methodist, Wellesley MA
Christ Church, United Methodist, Brook St, built circa 1962.
110 Cedar St., Wellesley
This mid-century office building at 110 Cedar St. was built in 1969.

If you want to trick out your house in mid-century style, here are a few places to check out a bit beyond Wellesley:

Trilogy Estate Sales
Trilogy Estate Sales, Swellesley advertisers and hunters of all things beautiful for the home.
Cool lamp at Gallery 55 at 55 South Main St., Natick. I think I remember that sofa from a 1970s rumpus room somewhere.
Cool lamp at Gallery 55 at 55 South Main St., Natick. I think I remember playing Pong on that sofa in a rumpus room somewhere.
Robjets D' Art, Natick
Robjets D’ Art, 1 North Main St., Natick has an atmosphere that quivers with the possibility of finding the true treasures among the collection of jolly junk and ephemera.

Renew Arts & Industry, 19 South Main St, Natick. Owner and Wellesley resident Patrice Goldman let me poke around even though they were officially closed as they refresh the shop with lots of recently acquired finds. They reopen on Saturday, March 26. Photo credit: Virginia Fitzgerald.
Renew Arts & Industry, 19 South Main St, Natick. Owner and Wellesley resident Patrice Goldman let me poke around even though they were officially closed as they refresh the shop with lots of recently acquired finds. They reopen on Saturday, March 26. Photo credit: Virginia Fitzgerald.
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