Ugly buildings

[sidoze]

I know I know. jeez     

[Kullervo]

what's wrong with this one? the windows reminded me of the Fred & Ginger dancing building in Prague (which I think looks great -- and has a great position on the river)

Both were planned by Frank Gehry, I believe. I only know his buildings from photos, but I think they're some of the worst instances of crap self-consciously "modern" architecture.

[Lethevich]

And of course my birth-place, Heraklion, which was a fortress-city for centuries! Complete with a (now dry) impressive moat, and very prominently displaying the flat-top motif, as well; not to mention the vast walls, which were mostly torn down by municipal authorities for the sake of "clearing land", and other bullshit, if you'll excuse the term.

I've heard of a few towns doing that... I like the way that York handled it - it retained the city walls, with the "old town" inside, and directly outside is main roads and a few small skyscrapers Screw artificial "pretty views"

[sidoze]

I think they're some of the worst instances of crap self-consciously "modern" architecture.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! but the building has a sense of motion -- it dances! How many buildings know how to swing? I think it's great

[greg]

lol, i hate that place too

[suzyq]

Ugly buildings -New York City - just about all new buildings being constructed, huge, tall and so expensive that only Donald Trump can afford it.

The Lincoln Center Complex is undergoing a "facelift" - be interesting to see the results.  Just hope they don't play around with Alice Tulley Hall's auditorium.   We'll see.

Some architect had a nightmare and designed what looks like an Erector Set and dropped it on top of the Hearst Building (corner of 57th Street and 8th Avenue).

[Ten thumbs]

Here in Bradford, we keep being promised 'exciting' new shoeboxes with square holes cut in regular lines along the sides. Perhaps if we had some lady architects they would look like washing machines instead. What has happened to curved lines? Why has all ornament been abolished and, worst of all, why is the poor pedestrian at street level given nothing to look at but a blank wall?

[eyeresist]

When I first saw this pic, I thought I'd discovered an unknown Frank Gehry building

[ggluek]

The MetLife Building (formerly the Pan-Am Building) in New York deserves to have a plane flown into it.  :-)

[eyeresist]

The MetLife Building (formerly the Pan-Am Building) in New York deserves to have a plane flown into it.  :-)

Too soon?

Although I always thought the WTC towers were a horrible eyesore 

[Scarpia]

Too soon?

Although I always thought the WTC towers were a horrible eyesore 

Did you ever see them in person, or just in photos?

[eyeresist]

Did you ever see them in person, or just in photos?

I watched a long documentary about their building, which was fairly scandalous. (I can't find it on Amazon)

[Scarpia]

I watched a long documentary about their building, which was fairly scandalous. (I can't find it on Amazon)

In other words, you have no idea what they looked like.

My main encounter with the buildings was an accident.  I was on the subway trying to get to Park Row, and for some reason I ended up getting off at the wrong station, World Trade Center.  (New Yorkers on this site can guess where I was going.)  I figured I was near enough to walk and exited the station and somehow ended up in the plaza between the two buildings.  The footprints of the two buildings were such that from the center of the plaza each building faced you as a perpendicular wall.  I still remember the extraordinary feeling of being indoors when facing the two buildings from the center of the plaza.  It was like being inside the biggest cathedral you could imagine, with walls going up higher than you could see.  Then you would turn away, and suddenly you were outdoors again.

I would say the World Trade Center was one of the most extraordinary buildings I ever saw.  The replacement is pathetic by comparison, in my opinion.

And what was "scandalous" about it?  A trained documentary director can make buying a pack of gum seem scandalous.

[eyeresist]

In other words, you have no idea what they looked like.

And what was "scandalous" about it?  A trained documentary director can make buying a pack of gum seem scandalous.

No idea?

As vaguely I recall from the documentary, Port Authority head Tobin worked for decades to push the project through, with the suggestion being that he desired to create a personal monument.

From Wikipedia: Construction of the World Trade Center, subhead Controversy:

The site for the World Trade Center was the location of Radio Row, which was home to hundreds of commercial and industrial tenants, property owners, small businesses, and approximately 100 residents. The World Trade Center plans involved evicting these business owners, some of whom fiercely protested the forced relocation. In June 1962, a group representing approximately 325 shops and 1,000 other affected small businesses filed an injunction, challenging the Port Authority's power of eminent domain. The dispute with local business owners worked its way through the court system, up to the New York State Court of Appeals, which in April 1963 upheld the Port Authority's right of eminent domain, saying that the project had a "public purpose." On 12 November 1963, the United States Supreme Court refused to accept the case. Under the state law, the Port Authority was required to assist business owners in relocating, though many business owners regarded what the Port Authority offered as inadequate. Questions continued while the World Trade Center was constructed, as to whether the Port Authority really ought to take on the project, described by some as a "mistaken social priority."

Private real estate developers and members of the Real Estate Board of New York also expressed concerns about this much "subsidized" office space going on the open market, competing with the private sector when there was already a glut of vacancies. An especially vocal critic was Lawrence A. Wien, owner of the Empire State Building, which would lose its title of tallest building in the world. Wien organized a group of builders into a group called the "Committee for a Reasonable World Trade Center" to demand that the project be scaled down.

Also, I understand that office workers found the plaza uninviting and very windy.

[Scarpia]

No idea?

As vaguely I recall from the documentary, Port Authority head Tobin worked for decades to push the project through, with the suggestion being that he desired to create a personal monument.

From Wikipedia: Construction of the World Trade Center, subhead Controversy:

The site for the World Trade Center was the location of Radio Row, which was home to hundreds of commercial and industrial tenants, property owners, small businesses, and approximately 100 residents. The World Trade Center plans involved evicting these business owners, some of whom fiercely protested the forced relocation. In June 1962, a group representing approximately 325 shops and 1,000 other affected small businesses filed an injunction, challenging the Port Authority's power of eminent domain. The dispute with local business owners worked its way through the court system, up to the New York State Court of Appeals, which in April 1963 upheld the Port Authority's right of eminent domain, saying that the project had a "public purpose." On 12 November 1963, the United States Supreme Court refused to accept the case. Under the state law, the Port Authority was required to assist business owners in relocating, though many business owners regarded what the Port Authority offered as inadequate. Questions continued while the World Trade Center was constructed, as to whether the Port Authority really ought to take on the project, described by some as a "mistaken social priority."

Private real estate developers and members of the Real Estate Board of New York also expressed concerns about this much "subsidized" office space going on the open market, competing with the private sector when there was already a glut of vacancies. An especially vocal critic was Lawrence A. Wien, owner of the Empire State Building, which would lose its title of tallest building in the world. Wien organized a group of builders into a group called the "Committee for a Reasonable World Trade Center" to demand that the project be scaled down.

Also, I understand that office workers found the plaza uninviting and very windy.

Do you think anything has been built in New York City in the past 100 years without tearing something down to make room?   The fact that they had to tear down a group of dilapidated tenement buildings with some discount electronics stores to make room for a monumental building housing the largest financial center in the world is about as miniscule a controversy as can be cooked up.   A tempest in a teapot compared with cutting the Bronx in half to put in the Cross Bronx Expressway, tearing down the old Pennsylvania Station to put up Madison Square Garden, razing the old Metropolitan Opera House.  There were complaints when the porno theaters were kicked out of Times Square.  And if you go to Wall Street you'll see a little plaque saying "here stood Federal Hall, where George Washington was sworn in as the first President of the United States.   Shame the tore that one down too, huh?

[eyeresist]

Your seriousness on this subject seems a bit weird to me. Do you have some kind of horse in this race?

[Scarpia]

Your seriousness on this subject seems a bit weird to me. Do you have some kind of horse in this race?

Yes, it is odd that someone who lived for a time with the structure as part of the landscape and knew people whose lives were ripped apart by its destruction takes the subject more seriously than a someone who never saw it but vaguely remembers an asinine video and found some text with Google.

But, of course, that is what the internet is about,  people who can do sums, but who reveal that they have found flaws in Einstein's theory of general relativity.

[springrite]

One old-timer, a friend of my dad, has this to say about the majority of buildings in Beijing or any other major (or minor) city in China:

We used to have beautiful cities. Now, they look like a cities of tombstones. Don't all the new buildings look like tombstones to you? I was looking at Beijing from a hill top the other day and I felt compelled to burn some inscents and bow in the direction of the city.

[Scarpia]

I recently found myself standing in front of this structure, erected in 1798.



Not quite ugly, but so deathly dull.  It was a time when architecture consisted of cutting and pasting 'clip art' from various Greek, Roman or Ottoman sources. 

[drogulus]

I recently found myself standing in front of this structure, erected in 1798.



Not quite ugly, but so deathly dull.  It was a time when architecture consisted of cutting and pasting 'clip art' from various Greek, Roman or Ottoman sources. 

     I used to live a few blocks from there, on Revere St.

     I think buildings have a right to be ugly, at least for a few decades. After that they should be punished if they don't improve in my eyes. Fortunately, they often do. How they do that? Maybe we just get used to them.

     Am I alone in thinking art cult ideas fit poorly with building design, where utilitarian concerns must be, with rare exceptions, paramount? Not that I'm endorsing enforced ugliness for the poor and working class, it's more that housing for poor and even middle class (maybe especially the middle class considering the arbiters) is the standard for what counts as ugly, at least until the buildings get old and the arbiters are replaced by a new generation that thinks that Mad Men suburbia is way cool. So, by any standard, there's lots of crap out there. I try not to have "any standard", but sometimes I fail.

     If you like living in your house it will seem less ugly, though some houses might be loved and ugly, too. The concepts are not tied together in principle , but in practice they usually are. All the houses I happily lived in are "not ugly".