Jury Duty

As the market shook off its holiday torpor, likely fueled by lower prices and bargain basement rates, civic duty intervened. My breaks were stuffed with phone call catch-up and an obsession with the 6th floor view.

The courthouse, spare and unrelenting, might be described as Brutalist architecture, a modernist/minimalist sub-set. The term originates from the French breton brut, or raw concrete, and quixotic architect Le Corbusier.

My view was made more interesting by brise soleils, or sun breakers, a lone and lively piece of architectural adornment, that subtracted weightiness by adding delicacy.

Brise soleils or cobogos, reticulated screen block surfaces (of terra cotta or concrete) are common in California, utilized as a means to deal with harsh Southerly exposures or to balance intimacy and exteriority.

Less common are meshrebeeyahs (or "privacy windows"), a feature in some Islamic architecture: elaborately carved or turned wood screens or latticework.

Think Damascus or Alhambra, or...the Hill Street Courthouse?!