For 150 years the word “downtown” meant a central district where people worked and didn’t live. A product of the first half of the 19th century, especially in the cities of the US and the UK, downtowns responded to the unprecedented volume of trade in the Industrial Revolution and depended on a series of innovations in architecture, construction, and municipal transport. In his new book, The North Atlantic Cities, developer and historian Charles Duff, highlights vibrant centers such as the Victorian examples of Manchester and Liverpool, as well as the birth of the New York skyline. Join us for a talk that explores the birth of the all-business Downtown.
Charles Duff is a developer and planner and an authority on Baltimore’s architecture and development. For two decades, he has been President of Jubilee Baltimore, leading a team that has built or rebuilt houses and apartments for thousands of the city’s residents. A frequent lecturer on architectural history at the Walters Art Museum and the Johns Hopkins University, Duff is also the past president of both the Baltimore Architecture Foundation and the Patterson Park Community Development Corporation.
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