Baranes photo credit: Shalom Baranes Associates Architects
Headline: Punch List Architecture Newsletter, 12/5/2025
Christopher Hawthorne reports:
What might turn a few heads are these details: The new architect in question, Shalom Baranes, is a self-described refugee who was born in Italy to Jewish parents who had fled Libya, and who arrived in New York with his family at age six. During Trump’s first term, Baranes published an op-ed in the Washington Post that delicately, but unmistakably, challenged the administration’s policies on immigration, taking aim at the Muslim travel ban in particular.
“I came here a refugee. And then I renovated the Pentagon,” the headline on the 2017 piece read. The subhed? “My work would be impossible without my fellow immigrants.”
“To this day, I remember the excitement of my father’s first glance at the Statue of Liberty as our ship sailed into the harbor,” wrote Baranes, who would later earn citizenship. “I was only six at the time and still mourning the loss of the red two-wheeled bike we had to leave behind.” [emphasis added]
Related posts:
December 2025White House ballroom price tag: $200 million. $300 million. $350 million. Do I hear $400 million? (12/7)
White House Ballroom correction: This is not construction; its demolition and site preparation. (12/4)
November 2025
White House Ballroom oversight gaps emerge: Let us count the ways (Part 1: National Capital Planning Commission). (11/18)
What did Donald Trump know about the demolition of the East Wing of White House and when did he know it? (11/2)
No comments:
Post a Comment