What is organic architecture?

What sites in Boston, MA would be beneficial for an architecture student to visit?

• We are taking a group of 5 architecture students from Kansas State University to Boston to study architecture. Our main focus will be studying the buildings of architecture universities, but we also would like to see other architecture achievements. Thanks for your help!

• Answer:

  Copley Square is a must. You get the Richardson Romanesque Trinity Church, I.M. Pei's ultra-modern Hancock Tower, the Gothic revival Old South Church, the Italian Renaissance Boston Public Library Main building (the main hall has incredible coffered ceilings and a barrel vault) with the post-modern monstrosity of the new addition. The whole square is breathtaking if you keep the CVS store to your back.... About 2 blocks away is the Boston Architecture College on Newbury Street, a street with Victorian townhouses and brownstones. They usually have exhibits on their first floor. One street over is Comm Ave, a divided parkway with a central mall. At 45 Comm Ave (cross street Hereford) is The Burrage Mansion (1899), designed to look like a French Chateau with gargoyles and turrets. Government Center has the hideous 1969 brutalist Boston City Hall, across the street from colonial Faneuil Hall and federal Quincy Market. In a fit of urban renewal, the city razed an entire neighborhood to build the concrete horror (except for the Sears Block and Sears Crescent,19th century buildings next to City Hall). Also across from City Hall is the Blackstone Block, 300 years of Boston's architecture in one block. It retains the original 17th century street layout and has buildings from the 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries. The block includes The Union Oyster House, the Green Dragon Tavern, the Boston Stone (where distances used to be measured from), the Hancock House, old street lamps, and cobblestones. This part of Boston is stuffed with wonderful buildings. The Old State House is from the Colonial era with a subway station under it. Diagonally across the street is the Ames Building, either the last large masonry building built in Boston or the first skyscraper, depending on your definition. (It's also the building where Ally McBeal was supposed to work). Down Washington Street is The Old Corner Bookstore building from 1712, across from a cast iron facade building which is another contender for the first Boston Skyscraper. Down State Street is The Customs House, which used to be a Greek Revival temple with a dome until they plonked a tower on top without taking out the dome. You can see the internal structure if you arrange a tour. Name another section of town and I can tell you what's interesting there.