Okay, I get it, and I agree. The SF Federal Building is butt-ugly. However, as for this:

"Mayne frequently thumbs his nose at convention—you expected this, but I'll give you that.... I admire Mayne's sense of architectural conviction, and it's not that public buildings can't occasionally flaunt convention, but in his case, the flaunting seems both willful and arbitrary...."

The word being sought here is "flout," not "flaunt." It's one of those substitutions that bespeaks fuzzy or merely lazy thought and speeds language debasement. Writers can escape such lapses with a stern scolding and a half-dozen "Hail Noah Websters;" copy editors who let them slide should be horsewhipped and ridden out of town on a rail.