Shaping Harlem's Future

"[A] racially charged debate over the very meaning and value of its architecture is coming to the fore as the area undergoes what is being touted as its second renaissance: a building boom that is raising the question of what to preserve and what to build. More important is who, ultimately, will make such decisions; African-American architects, planners, and developers feel they have not had a satisfactory hand in shaping what that renaissance will look like. [Some] black architects...are designing modern interpretations of the area's preexisting architecture. But others are creating new buildings with motifs and shapes that hark back to African ancestors instead of making references to European ones."

Thanks to Abhijeet Chavan