News Analysis: The 'Green Era' Should Propagate Smarter Buildings

By Scott Carlson

Princeton, N.J.

It feels odd to look up at a Frank Gehry building, with its floating, cascading stainless-steel roof and angular conglomeration of shapes, and think: It's not radical enough.

That was the thought that bubbled up as I stood outside the new Lewis Library at Princeton University recently, and it was not about the aesthetics. The library is pleasing and playful, as one would expect of a Gehry structure. Whether it is worth $74-million for 87,000 square feet is another matter. The