With it's beacon-yellow turret and its faded TAVERN sign, Mickey's is one of Willy Street's landmark buildings. It looks a bit like a dive on the outside but if you venture inside you can order some of the best locally-brewed beer and eat some of the most delicious food to be had in the neighborhood.

Another lovely old building along Williamson Street that's managed to not only hang on over the years, but grow more handsome with age.

I don't know if the King Midas Flour sign is authentic, but it does add a nice touch.

Early morning sun on the Jackman Building, downtown Madison

Unfinished building

At the southeast corner of State and Lake
there's this odd little building that looks almost as if
somebody began building an art deco office block,
got to the third floor and ran out of imagination, money and willpower
all at the same time.

The Marina's one of the newest condos in downtown Madison.
Hugely swank, just off the shore of Lake Monona,
an apartment there sells for gazillions.

I admit, it's got some Jetson-esque qualities I like...

... but overall, it's a box, and I don't like boxes.
I like the corrugated siding even less.

The cathedral rectory of St. Raphael's has stood empty for as long as I've lived here
... since July '05, anyway.

The design is clearly meant to evoke a cathedral's wide apse flanked by narrow galleries.

The brassy screen across the front keeps the entrance shady and cool
without blocking out light.

I don't know what this architectural style is called,
but the American 1960's was lousy with clerestory windows and these plain, clean lines,
particularly public buildings and institutions like this.

Slender columns soar over the entrance.

A heap of rubble at the back door betrays
the rectory's either undergoing renovation
or not long for this world.

The Suhr Building's distinctive prow marks it as one of the city's "flatirons"
a term that gets overused. I like "wedgie" myself.

As unusual as its shape may be,
the old wedgies are getting lost in the growing skyline of our fair city.

Even with its sandstone flanks glowingly lit by the noonday sun,
the Suhr tends to shrink under the towering Tenney building.

But on her own, she still stands out as obviously very special.

As usual, it's the details that make all the difference.
This little sprout is shooting up from the cornice,
barely visible in the photo above.

When you think of Wisconsin cheese ...

... you should think of this house. Adolph Marschall built this house in 1912 for his family after he got his business, the Marschall Dairy Laboratory, up and running just six years before. Marschall was a Danish chemist whose business extracted and purified rennet, the stuff that curdles milk. An awful lot of rennet, as it turned out. He must have been pretty comfortably well-off by the time he commissioned Claude & Starck to design this Prairie-style mansion on Pinckney Street. I love the staggered roof out front and the set-back entrance to the right, behind the porch. The condition of the place is just a bit rough around the edges but still, considering the condition of other Madison landmarks, not bad at all. I'd move in tomorrow, if I had a million dollars. *sigh*

I never get tired of looking at this old bank on cap square. Everything about it is pleasing to the eye: The proportion and number of the windows, the gentle weathering of the sandstone facade, the colors they've added to the cornice. Whoever the goddess of old buildings is, she's worth every hozannah if she can keep more places like this around.

The gray skies over yesterday's farmer's market
lent just the right hue to the new office block at 33 E Main St
and the stainless steel shingles arcing over Walgreen's.

The Death Ray by night

I'm sure that the "artwork" installed in the entry of the federal court house is loaded with meaning, and I would love to hear what it is so I could laugh and laugh and laugh.

Madison Museum of Contemporary Art

The prow of Madison's newest flatiron glows incandescantly on a recent overcast night.

What's the Scoop?

Every time I've walked past a vantage point that gave me a full-on view of this side of the new Dane County Court House, I've looked at the big scoop in the side of the building and wondered: What was the architect thinking about when he did that?

Sunset's Reflection

Looking across Fairchild St and the buildings along West Main. The Inn On The Park is to the left, the Jackman Building on Hamilton just beneath the reflected sunlight in the windows of the Anchor Bank building.

"I expect you to die, Mister Bond!"

The entry to the federal court house, on Henry Street

The more I look around, the more I'm astonished at how many really ugly buildings there are in downtown Madison.

Surely this has got to be in the running for the ugliest. There aren't any others that combine indigo-colored steel cladding with red highlights, and no other building in town has a death ray hanging over the entrance.

A Church In The Brutalist Style

That seemed more than a little contradictory to me.

They don't make them like this anymore

Tucked away between a four-story apartment building and a block of flats, this tiny bungalow is hanging on behind a nicely done front gate. It can't be more than a couple of rooms and a cozy front yard. I wouldn't have believed you could still find a house this cute in the middle of Madison unless I'd seen it with my own eyes.

... and the house looks like this.

The deep, narrow lot sort of necessitates a bungalow about this size. Still looks mighty cozy.

Fall colors frame the Steensland Mansion

It used to be a thrift shop for the Bethel Lutheran Church but it's been closed now for quite a while. It desperately needs somebody to move in and make it a home (not a block of flats). If I had a million dollars ...

Hideous Kinky

I took my camera to the streets of Madison over the noon hour, looking for a subject I worthy of these pages.

What would I find? Something with an autumnal theme? Something historical? Maybe college coeds enjoying the last warm days of summer?

And then my eyes beheld it: The ugliest apartment block I'd ever seen.