Façade, Central Havana
Christopher Raymond

The building was once grand. The paint is still blue, technically, though it has been peeling for so long that the peeling is now part of the architecture. Laundry hangs from the iron balconies on the second floor. People move along the colonnade below, unhurried, past a classic American car parked at the curb. The structure is occupied, inhabited, load-bearing in every sense. Nobody is waiting for it to be restored.