THE SKYSCRAPER reached out to me from a small box at the bottom of Page 1 of the Rhode Island section in the July 5 Journal. Lovely. But the headline on the story that ran with the picture was ominous. It read: “Cranston developer dreams of a skycraper on Federal Hill.”

“Dream” may be the operative word, because “skyscraper” and “Federal Hill” don’t mix.

With its arched loggia and thin vertical fenestration, the 33-story condo tower known as Vista della Torre reminds me of New York’s AT&T Building (built in 1984), by Philip Johnson, his best and most controversial work. The Madison Avenue masterpiece is famous for its Chippendale roof. The proposed Vista building’s roof, with its monumental windows set between cornices, is also quite elegant. But it no more belongs on Federal Hill than a triple-decker belongs on Madison Avenue.

It makes me wince to cast aspersions on a proposal that appears so attractive, designed, in this case, by Newport Collaborative Architects’ Michael Abbott. Its architecture departs radically from the conventional modernist designs of most skyscrapers in Providence over the past four decades. During that period, only the two Westin towers have been built outside the contemporary design box.

(Please do not interpret these remarks as critical of our modernist skyscrapers. They are mostly displeasing, but not because their design is boring. In modern architecture, dullness is a virtue. Oddity of form makes for a scintillating sculpture garden but a ridiculous skyline. The stodginess of our modernist skyscrapers may be their greatest strength.)

A more unorthodox skyscraper with the classical lines of the building proposed for Federal Hill would make an excellent addition to the city’s skyline, if it were in the Financial District. Downtown Providence could definitely use another nice tower.

But opposing any attractive building proposal is painful. There are ways to try to reduce the pain. For example, you could take refuge in the small size of the illustration as it originally appeared in the newspaper. At that size, the allure of certain details might be wholly illusory. To be specific, you could assume that the apparently ornate cornice would be clunky if you could see it better. Or, if you had a larger illustration (as above) and the details still seemed impressive, you could assume that the developer intends to dumb them down to save money at a later stage of the project. (It’s so convenient to assume that all developers are creeps!) Or, if you prefer to trust the intentions of the developer — stay with me here — you might safely assume that the members of the Downcity Design Review Committee will call upon the architect to eliminate the most attractive aspects of the design. One member did just that last week when the Procaccianti Group had the audacity to propose a garage with classical features, of all things. Tsk, tsk! Creativity is always to be encouraged, so long as it is modernist creativity!

So far, municipal development authorities seem reluctant to push this project forward too fast, and it may be that their reluctance springs from a growing recognition of its inappropriate location.

“It would open the floodgates to more extremely tall and massive buildings that would tower over and shade out the existing buildings, and, over time, completely change the character of our neighborhood from one that is walkable and human in scale to the scale of major high-rise cities like New York,” says West Broadway Neighborhood Association executive director Kari Lang.

Frank Zammiello, its developer, has reversed the usual pattern of development in Providence. It is conventional around here to find a site that cries out for development, and then propose building something ugly there. This makes it harder for developers to raise public support for their projects, but they don’t seem to care. Zammiello has proposed instead to build an attractive building in a place where most people probably don’t want it to go.

Zammiello obviously wants to erect his building between Atwells Avenue and Broadway because that is where he owns land. This makes sense, but why can’t he sell that land and buy land more suitable for a skyscraper? That would make sense, too. But Zammiello also owns Camille’s Roman Garden. He probably wants a pied-À-terre at the Vista so he can stroll over to his restaurant. I can hardly argue with that. On the other hand, I fear that his laudable lifestyle aspirations might smother his project.

Maybe he can swap for land in the Financial District, which has had no new skyscraper since 1985. The One Ten Westminster project appears to be going nowhere, even though a beautiful old building was torn down to make way for it. (The city must never allow that to happen again!) The site would be a great place to erect a beautiful skyscraper. In fact, city authorities ought to be so eager to atone for having approved the demolition of a beautiful old building for nothing that they might allow the Vista della Torre to soar even beyond 33 stories.

David Brussat is a member of The Journal’s editorial board. ( dbrussat@projo.com)