5 ms·

I read an interesting study a while back about architecture in London, taken with a sample of professional architects and a sample of general population, all ba

I read an interesting study a while back about architecture in London, taken with a sample of professional architects and a sample of general population, all based in London. All the architects in the study hated the old Edwardian terraces, and pitied people who lived in them. All the non-architects loved the old Edwardian terraces, and hated the majority of the buildings the architects loved. You could easily make an argument from the point of view of the architects in that study that a row of Edwardian terraces are dull and boring, but most Londoners would love to live in them. With that in mind, I'm a bit wary of this - there are certainly plenty of horrible buildings around - 60's brutalist concrete would be an example of a style I particularly dislike - but how do we decide what's bland and what's attractive?

TheOtherHobbes 10y ago
Possibly by doing representative sampling of the user population and finding what works for them. Architects are encouraged to be outrageous, individualistic, capricious, even dictatorial. A generic Edwardian terrace is the opposite of everything creative architecture is supposed to stand for. So a divergence of opinion is not a surprise. But I think it's interesting that you can estimate the health of an environment by measuring the effects it has on people. That's not quite a new idea in architecture, but it's certainly not central to architectural teaching. "Objective architecture", assessed by measurable effects instead of subjective whimsy, would revolutionise the profession.
- cm2187 10y ago
  I think it is rather that since the early XX, architects, like painters, stopped caring about doing "beautiful" and only cared about doing "original". But the difference between painters and architects is that painters can only offend the visitors of the Tate Modern, who are presumably consenting. Architects will offend anyone who happen to live in a city where they exercise their creativity.
  - true_religion 10y ago
    It's actually a reversal of previous eras where people didn't want "beautiful" but wanted to ape the classics. Today originality is seen as a boon, but for a long time you were only seen as a true master if first you could replicate old works.
- vlehto 10y ago
  ""Objective architecture", assessed by measurable effects instead of subjective whimsy, would revolutionise the profession." Agreed. It could also put money back to architecture. Let's say your company revenue of 70k$ per year per employee, there is 300 of them in a factory. You move your company to new factory, but you meet architect who can promise you 5% increase in employee productivity. That's 70X300X0,05= 1050k$/year more in revenue. You can probably spend some money to hire that archi-rainmaker.
Spooky23 10y ago
Architects are in the same bind that the craftsmen whose work they now despise were. With modern materials, the scut work and routine labor that master masons and carpenters cut their teeth on is gone -- they mostly assemble. So there's no skilled tradesmen at the level that you could find 100 years ago. When my local cathedral did a rehab, they shipped in Italian stonemasons and paid them $150/hr. Enter the architect. With prefabrication and computerization, tens of thousands of man-hours of architect time has been vaporized. So at the low end, they pay the bills with cheap templated crap that wins bids and looks bland. At the high end, they produce stuff that is "unique" and often completely non-functional and/or visually offensive. (But looks good in the portfolio) In the meantime, most lay people are attracted to more classic architecture that has been perfected over centuries.
- Retric 10y ago
  There are many low cost options for making big Efficent buildings distinctive. The real issue is arcatects are judged more like sculptors than people who create useful spaces.
- Scoundreller 10y ago
  My hypothesis is that increasingly complex building codes makes it increasingly economic to rebuild the same stock of housing multiple times. It's a bit unusual, what could have increased the workload of architects as design requirements became more complex instead lead to their downfall.
devishard 10y ago
As an example of your point: I love 60s brutalist concrete.

TheOtherHobbes 10y ago

Possibly by doing representative sampling of the user population and finding what works for them. Architects are encouraged to be outrageous, individualistic, capricious, even dictatorial. A generic Edwardian terrace is the opposite of everything creative architecture is supposed to stand for. So a divergence of opinion is not a surprise. But I think it's interesting that you can estimate the health of an environment by measuring the effects it has on people. That's not quite a new idea in architecture, but it's certainly not central to architectural teaching. "Objective architecture", assessed by measurable effects instead of subjective whimsy, would revolutionise the profession.

cm2187 10y ago
I think it is rather that since the early XX, architects, like painters, stopped caring about doing "beautiful" and only cared about doing "original". But the difference between painters and architects is that painters can only offend the visitors of the Tate Modern, who are presumably consenting. Architects will offend anyone who happen to live in a city where they exercise their creativity.
- true_religion 10y ago
  It's actually a reversal of previous eras where people didn't want "beautiful" but wanted to ape the classics. Today originality is seen as a boon, but for a long time you were only seen as a true master if first you could replicate old works.
vlehto 10y ago
""Objective architecture", assessed by measurable effects instead of subjective whimsy, would revolutionise the profession." Agreed. It could also put money back to architecture. Let's say your company revenue of 70k$ per year per employee, there is 300 of them in a factory. You move your company to new factory, but you meet architect who can promise you 5% increase in employee productivity. That's 70X300X0,05= 1050k$/year more in revenue. You can probably spend some money to hire that archi-rainmaker.

Spooky23 10y ago

Architects are in the same bind that the craftsmen whose work they now despise were. With modern materials, the scut work and routine labor that master masons and carpenters cut their teeth on is gone -- they mostly assemble. So there's no skilled tradesmen at the level that you could find 100 years ago. When my local cathedral did a rehab, they shipped in Italian stonemasons and paid them $150/hr. Enter the architect. With prefabrication and computerization, tens of thousands of man-hours of architect time has been vaporized. So at the low end, they pay the bills with cheap templated crap that wins bids and looks bland. At the high end, they produce stuff that is "unique" and often completely non-functional and/or visually offensive. (But looks good in the portfolio) In the meantime, most lay people are attracted to more classic architecture that has been perfected over centuries.

Retric 10y ago
There are many low cost options for making big Efficent buildings distinctive. The real issue is arcatects are judged more like sculptors than people who create useful spaces.
Scoundreller 10y ago
My hypothesis is that increasingly complex building codes makes it increasingly economic to rebuild the same stock of housing multiple times. It's a bit unusual, what could have increased the workload of architects as design requirements became more complex instead lead to their downfall.

devishard 10y ago

As an example of your point: I love 60s brutalist concrete.