"He's a critic whose seven-year run has been distinguished by qualities of unfailing intelligence and integrity and the kind of relentless journalistic drive that propelled a worldwide search for steel-and-concrete manifestations of big, important ideas," wrote culture editor Jonathan Landman in a memo obtained by The Architect's Newspaper.

Or, as his former colleague Julie Iovine writes on that website:

The sporadic critic was known more for chasing down exotic locations and predictably championing all things Californian than analyzing local conditions and his even-handed voice sometimes had us all missing the impassioned harangues of his predecessor, Herbert Muschamp, but at least he was there writing about architecture for the general public, one of the last of a rare and rarer breed.

Mr. Ouroussoff took the job after the famed Muschamp left in 2004, and actually wrote his predecessor's obituary. According to Publisher's Marketplace, Mr. Ouroussoff's book will explore the "last hundred years told through its architects and their buildings, from Frank Lloyd Wright to Frank Gehry" and is tenatively titled The Tower of Babel: Building the Twentieth Century.

[via CultureGrrl]