Broken Angel, Brooklyn

Superstructure of Broken Angel, seen from the southeast.

This will be slightly byzantine: Through Jenny Davidson’s post about my friend Lorin Stein’s excellent essay on Mary Gaitskill, I was led to an appealing blog titled Ben and Alice, among whose lusters was a photo of a strange building in Brooklyn I’d never seen before. Through Forgotten New York, I discovered that it’s located where Quincy Place bends and becomes Downing Street, and through Brownstoner, I found a link to a New York Times interview with the building’s designer and builder, Arthur Wood. The name of the building is Broken Angel. I visited this afternoon; here are a few pictures.

Left: Broken Angel, seen from the east (along Quincy Street). Above: Two details from the lower part of the eastern facade. Below left: Broken Angel, seen from the south (along Downing Street). Below right: Three details from the southern face of the superstructure.