Boylston Street at Massachusetts Avenue
Little seems, at first, to have changed in this row of buildings on Boylston Street in the 71 years between these two photos, one made in 1915 and the other in 1986. But a closer look reminds us of the constant flux that is the nature of a city.
The buildings stand across the street from what is now the Prudential Center and was formerly the Boston and Albany train yard. The biggest building, the one to the left of center with the square windows, is Bo...
The buildings stand across the street from what is now the Prudential Center and was formerly the Boston and Albany train yard. The biggest building, the one to the left of center with the square windows, is Boylston Chambers, a handsome commercial
block of 1890 that suffered a fire in 1985 and is now boarded up. Its owner is currently trying to get permission to add two stories to it. Next to it in the old photo are two bay-windowed townhouses. Built in the 1890s, they already, in 1915, have acquired extra
top stories, and their street floors have been converted to shops. Later on, in 1927, the right-hand of these two houses was remodeled to match the one on the left, and the pair became the single office building we see today.
At the extreme right are more townhouses that at some point, doubtless around 1960, acquired an ugly metal-and-glass-curtain wall. In the 1915 photo, horse carts mix with open-topped automobiles as a street -sweeper pushes a broom over the rough cobblestones. In 1986, the sealed automobiles roll noiselessly on smooth asphalt. What remains satisfyingly the same ill both photos is the way in which these buildings, with their varied heights and expressive deep-shadowed windows, gather into a whole that is larger than anyone of ,them. They are what urban designers call a "street wall," defining the edge of Boylston Street and helping shape it into a humanly scaled urban
corridor .
-Robert Campbell and Peter Vanderwarker, "CITYSCAPES - Small Change",Boston Globe, 18 January 1987
Boylston St & Massachusetts Ave
Edgerly Road Playground 605 feet
Massachusetts Avenue at St Germain Street 822 feet
West Facade, Boston Architectural Center 0.2 miles
Massachussetts Historical Society 0.2 miles
Former ICA Building 0.2 miles
Boston Architectural College 0.2 miles
Fenway Studios 0.2 miles