A college professor calls the architect a "cheap wannabe."

A museum board member fires back, accusing the prof of "sour grapes, professional jealousy and immaturity."

This is getting pretty good.

If the Art Museum of Western Virginia wanted to raise its profile in the community, it has succeeded - before turning over even the first shovelful of dirt on its controversial new $46 million building downtown.

Since the museum unveiled the plans by Los Angeles architect Randall Stout in March, everyone in Roanoke seems to have formed an opinion about what has been called everything from "beautiful" to "the wreck of the Flying Nun."

"I'm not surprised that there are people who are critical of the design," said museum executive director Georganne Bingham. "Architecture is an art form. What it really does is make a statement about where a culture is or is going in the future. And it's not always easy to accept. We welcome debate."

Well, they've got it. At parties, in bars, in local stores and offices, in nonprofit board rooms, on The Roanoke Times opinion pages and the message board at roanoke.com, people are weighing in on the huge and unorthodox project in pithy and sometimes personal terms. The debate even threatens to eclipse the city's long-running argument over the fate of Victory Stadium.

There are yea-sayers and nay-sayers and many who seem to be wobbling on the fence as they contemplate a design that favors curves over right angles and stainless steel, zinc and glass over the City Market area's traditional bricksand mortar.

What there is not, and may never be, is consensus about this project that supporters say will reinvigorate a sluggish city and detractors seem convinced will ruin the precious heart of their home town.

"I like that it has evoked opinions," said museum board member Warner Dalhouse, a former chairman of Dominion Bankshares, who has served on many nonprofit boards. "It's a significant thing for the community, and it's gotten people engaged.

"To be sure, there are people who don't like it. Wouldn't it have been a shame if it had looked like all the rest of the 1920s buildings we have downtown?"

That, of course, depends on whom you ask.

Tony Whitwell, an art consultant and co-author of a book on Roanoke architecture, said the museum is making a mistake by embracing a style of architecture he believes is already dated, in an effort to seem avant-garde.

"There's little things like this all over the world," Whitwell said. He also doesn't buy the argument that it will bring in tourist dollars. "I don't think people on I-81 or the Blue Ridge Parkway are going to come there. If they do, it's only once."

Some of the most withering criticism has come from Virginia Tech architecture professor Dennis Kilper. In a March 27 opinion page piece, Kilper labeled architect Randall Stout a "wannabe" and criticized the curving, sculptural style of architecture favored by Stout and his one-time employer, Frank Gehry, designer of the celebrated Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, Spain.

"It is neither new nor visionary," wrote Kilper of Stout's design. "It is cheap imitation, low level mimicry of another architect of whom the world cannot stand too many more of his works, much less countless imitations."

Kilper argued the museum would cost a fortune to heat and cool, and in any case would probably prove too expensive to build. He also said the roof will leak.

A few weeks later, Dalhouse issued his riposte.

"Calling Stout a 'cheap wannabe' and suggesting that 'we have architects in our area with far more vision than Randall Stout' is uncalled for and smacks suspiciously of sour grapes, professional jealousy and immaturity," said Dalhouse's April 8 response, also published on the newspaper's op-ed page.

"You can only sit still for that sort of thing so long," said Dalhouse. "It's one thing to voice a subjective and personal opinion about the design. To make a personal attack on the designer was something else, it seemed to me."

Bill Green, an associate professor in industrial design at Tech, also took issue with Kilper's piece, which he described as "incredibly elitist" and "flat wrong." Green was an early advocate for renovating the Norfolk and Western passenger station, now home to the O. Winston Link Museum. He also assisted the art museum with its recent exhibit on industrial design.

"People build stuff like that consistently," said Green, when asked if he thought it was true the museum could never be built. Green also said he saw a section of the roof in the current exhibition on the new museum in the art museum at Center in the Square, and was impressed.

"This town could really benefit from this thing," said Green. "Nobody's gonna be laughing. It's not even that super innovative. But it's nice to see it here. What I don't want to see is people standing in the way of something because they wouldn't have done it exactly the same way. I think the only thing that could mess it up is academic whining."

Kilper, a full professor and a Ph.D., said he was "both sorry and delighted" to have stirred up a hornet's nest. He said with more knowledge of the project, he could conceivably change his mind.

But Kilper also said Roanoke could have done much better - perhaps by weaving several museum gallery spaces into the second floor of historic downtown buildings, or expanding the pedestrian walkway into an art gallery linking downtown and the Hotel Roanoke, in the spirit of the Ponte Vecchio - a bridge over the River Arno in Florence, Italy.

"Can you imagine an art museum that has its own hotel?" Kilper asked.

Kilper said his biggest concern, however, is as an educator trying to teach his students to design efficient buildings in an age when natural resources are in increasingly short supply.

Buildings like the new museum "are not the way we should be going right now with our architecture," he said.

(Stout, who gives lectures on environmentally friendly design, has said his building will use daylighting, water-cooled-and-heated floors, recycled materials and other techniques to reduce waste and energy consumption.)

Beyond the rarefied world of L.A. architects, tenured full professors and retired bankers, the argument rages as well. In the pungent atmosphere of their new gourmet cheese shop, which would be practically next door to the new museum, Billy's Ritz restaurant owners John and Betsy Williams waded into the debate on a recent spring afternoon.

"I like the design," John Williams said. "It will be interesting to see if a whole lot of people come to see it."

"I would have been disappointed if the building just sort of blended in," Betsy Williams said. "I certainly think it shows off the old buildings better. I just think the contrast is nice."

Up on the pedestrian walkway overlooking the site, Peggy Harris and her grown son, Scott Harris, visitors from Fairfax, stopped on their way to dinner to look at sketches of the new museum.

Did they like it?

"I'm not into that sort of architecture," Peggy Harris said.

"I like it," said her son.

"I don't like the contrast," his mother insisted, indicating the starkly different styles between the new museum and the string of old buildings beside it that includes Billy's Ritz.

Roger Leitch, visiting Roanoke on business from Houston, Texas, looked over the pictures from a rocking chair on the Hotel Roanoke porch. He said he probably wouldn't make a special trip to Roanoke just to visit the building, but, "I might go to see it if I was here. It looks nice. I do like the Roanoke area."

"I'm very delighted with it," said Audrey Palmer, enjoying balmy early evening air with friend Anita Hassell on the terrace of the hotel's Pine Room Pub. Both live in the valley, and already knew about the museum.

"I think Roanoke has got to get on the ball," Palmer said. "We're losing too many young people."

"My first reaction was, 'It's not Roanoke,'" said Hassell - but she decided that might not be bad. "We're got to do something. I think the design is extremely progressive for Roanoke. And it's a very good, positive thing."

John Reburn owns Roanoke Valley Printworks, next to the cheese shop and a stone's throw from what will be the new museum's soaring glass entryway.

The Los Angeles transplantee has lived in Roanoke for nine months. He said people often come into his shop and talk about the new museum.

"People are so split. And almost male-female," Reburn said. "Men love it, and the women have been unhappy about the design."

The bottom line, he tells them, will be the museum's influence rather than its looks. "Architecture? It doesn't matter. Let's see what it can do for the city," Reburn said.

He also said debating the museum's merits is a good thing.

"Anytime you can start that kind of a conversation about art and architecture," said Reburn, "bring it on."

What they're saying

"This one is the crowning touch to what's been going on in Roanoke for the last twenty years."

Warner Dalhouse, museum board member and retired chairman of Dominion Bankshares

"It's not my thing."

Peggy Harris, visiting from Fairfax

"I doubt Stout's scheme will be built. It will just be too expensive, and he won't be able to explain how to build it."

Dennis Kilper, professor of architecture, Virginia Tech (opinion piece, editorial page)

"People build stuff like that consistently. They got some real craftsmen with that roof."

Bill Green, professor of industrial design, Virginia Tech

"What a stunning structure! I expected to see just another downtown building ... If nothing else, Roanoke will definitely get noticed."

Ed De Launey, (roanoke.com)

"We don't think it's going to leak."

Georganne Bingham, art museum executive director

"Just how starved for attention is Roanoke that we should even consider such a structure? It's analogous to many of today's young people who deface their bodies with piercings and 'art' in a desperate attempt to be noticed."

Bill Weikart, (letter to the editor)

"What a windfall that wise city leaders have obtained the services of the genius-architect Randall Stout to design the new art museum building!. ... Groundbreaking will be a great day!"

Rose Bayly, (roanoke.com)

"It's the Bilbao of the Blue Ridge. I couldn't be prouder of a city I once called home."

"Looks like crap."

"I'm very disappointed to hear that the IMAX has been left out of the plans in the art museum. This is a big mistake ... One visit to the museum is enough for me, unless there is something else to get me in downtown Roanoke."

"I just hope that the town will support it. I'm from Roanoke, so I can talk about us. I think we're really bad about holding up our end of things."

"It reminded me of a train engine to the future. It inspired me to write an American haiku poem about it:

A futuristic

Train taking its passengers

To heaven on earth."

"Is this guy trying to make his mark by ego tripping on Roanoke? This is an out-of-date building. Architecture has moved on."

"I liked his concept of creating a design for the building that not only appealed to interstate drivers considering pulling off the exit ramp, but also building elements that attracted the attention of pedestrian traffic. ... If the citizens of Roanoke are seeking an economic stimulus from the museum and truly architecture as destination, they must also be willing to accept a radical design which attracts attention and may make them feel a bit uncomfortable."

"I don't think the design works, and the harsh lines and angles are unpleasant. The references to the geography of our region seem contrived - more high concept than inspiring artistic reference. I would rather have seen a more conventional design with the money used to buy or borrow good art and exhibits, and the Imax, than a building that becomes less interesting the more it is seen."

"I'm excited about it. I think a lot of thought went into it."

"It really looks like it doesn't fit at all with downtown Roanoke architecture. Maybe if it stood alone, it would be more pleasing to the eye and more acceptable to the general public."

"It was drunken. It was dirty. It was the bad back side of the market. Now there's life back here. And the museum is going to add this wonderful thing. I think it's an absolutely perfect location for it.

"Photo on the front page of the Times looks like the Wreck of the Flying Nun."