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McMansion Hell: The Devil Is in the Details
- adultSwim 10y agoPrevious discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12286724 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12286724 Origin blog post/series the 99% invisible post is on: http://www.mcmansionhell.com/post/148605513816/mcmansions-101-what-makes-a-mcmansion-bad http://www.mcmansionhell.com/post/148605513816/mcmansions-10...
- sotojuan 10y agoAs someone who lived in upper middle class Texas suburbia, I'm pretty desensitized to "McMansions". Aside from older houses (usually near the city center, small, and can be expensive) or custom-designed houses (very expensive), there's not much choice if you actually care about this stuff. Even the new apartment/townhome complexes could be considered "McApartments".
- ktRolster 10y agoEven the new apartment/townhome complexes could be considered "McApartments". That's a problem here in SF, too. Andrea Palladio would have wept.
- blhack 10y agoI would happily live in any of these houses.
- harryh 10y agoOn one hand I'm really sympathetic to the criticisms from this blog. On the other hand people want big houses and they have a limited budget. They can't afford a real mansion, so this is what they get instead. Is it really so wrong for people to want a lot of space? I wish there was more in this blog about how to do it right other than "have enough money for a proper mansion" or "you should have a smaller living space."
- jaxomlotus 10y agoThe criticism in the article wasn't about people on a limited budget owning big houses. It was about the lack of architectural cohesiveness in the big houses they do build.
- Diederich 10y agoIndeed. Most of the 'McManshionish' stuff is more expensive.
- majormajor 10y agoSeems like the same thing - isn't that pretty tied up to "don't have the budget for a 'proper' architect"? Design is a get-what-you-pay-for field. Do it piecemeal vs a single grand unified vision from the start and you end up with something easier to pay for but less ideal.
- sotojuan 10y agoAlso note that many suburban neighborhoods have rules on what your house can look like. Usually you get to pick from a lot of designs (hence the crazy mismatch of styles) but very rarely do you get to "design it from scratch".
- CapitalistCartr 10y agoMost mcmansions have zero budget for design. Fifteen thousand dollars on a $600,000 job is good sense.
- CapitalistCartr 10y agoShe does have that a bit, too, but the blog is new and its in bits here and there.
- awesomerobot 10y agoI think the argument can be made that for the same money someone could build a mansion that also doesn't look awful.
- reflexive 10y agoThis reads like old-$ "highbrow" East-coast hate for the nouveau riche. What is the alternative for someone who wants to build a house for a large family while spending 6 (or low 7) figures, as opposed someone with Larry Ellison money and Ivy League cultivated tastes? "Cheap materials" - that's valid, but what is the cost difference for "real Louis XIV marble fireplace" as opposed to "imitation"? Why build something to last 500 years when your children may not even want it?
- vsipuli 10y agoLook at Europe. Large families there too, but nothing like the McMansion jungle in the United States. I suppose it comes down to priorities.
- reflexive 10y agoThat's true but Europe is full of large houses that are hundreds of years old, so there isn't as much need for new building. Plus if you look at neighborhoods in say, Belgium or the Netherlands, people value (ahem) architectural conformity quite a bit more, as opposed to individual taste.
- sotojuan 10y agoThere's a ton of space in the US between the coasts[1], so people have become accustomed to large houses that they can make "their own", so to speak. It's just a different culture. [1] A lot of it is still unused! My hometown in Texas has actually "grown" in the past ten years towards unused land to build new neighborhoods and schools. I can't imagine that there's large amounts of land in Europe to build entire new communities, right?
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- blhack 10y agoAre you trying to claim that Europe doesn't have suburbs? Because, uh, they do: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/07/05/end-of-the-good-life-britains-suburbs-being-left-behind/ http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/07/05/end-of-the-good-l... Look at that picture. It's full of McMansions, and it's a photo of suburban London.
- ktRolster 10y agoIt's a little harsh. Not everyone can afford a top-quality architect. And mixing styles (the main criticism of this article) is not always a bad thing: Chartres Cathedral is considered a masterpiece, despite it's weird mixed spires.
- CapitalistCartr 10y agoShe discusses that in Eclecticism. She uses pictures throughout to demonstrate the difference between mixing well and badly.
- jayess 10y agoDon't like it? Then don't buy one.
- intrasight 10y agoI believe the commenters so far have failed to address the main point: the devil is in the details. And everyone knows why the details suck in this category of McMansion: they are spec houses designed by beancounters. They represent the aggregate current view of what would have maximum curb appeal. That is the only design criteria for such houses.
- clock_tower 10y agoIs it possible to buy good craftsmanship these days? I'm asking this in all earnest, not to make a rhetorical point; does anyone know of businesses in the US today that can build a house that will endure like a 1920s Craftsman? If so, who are they, and where do they operate -- what businesses should I contact?
- CapitalistCartr 10y agoAbsolutely. The key is in the general contractor (GC). One accustomed to doing better work will know the right subcontractors (subs). For instance, those that specialize in restoration, remodeling, and repair in historical districts.
- clock_tower 10y agoThank you!
- _FKS_ 10y agoThe issue is that craftmanship means time & experience (experience like tens of years). Think compagnons. This is fading away since the end of WWII, and especially since all manufacturing was moved to Asia. There are still a few artisans standing, but it's expensive work and they are hard to find. Check This Old House (both the magazine and the PBS episodes). It's a pretty good starting point.
- clock_tower 10y agoThanks -- I'll look into this.
- zip1234 10y agoI have a 1928 craftsman bungalow. Not especially good quality. The architectural style has experienced a revival of sorts now. The build quality of 1920s bungalows varied a lot, just like it does for houses now.
- 33W 10y ago
- basseq 10y agoThis is the equivalent of graphic designers presenting alternate proposals for boarding passes and Craigslist. They're not wrong, and for those with a specific sort of sensibility, the "imperfections" can be grating, but for 99% of the population, they don't even notice and it works just fine.
- mbostleman 10y agoYea, I'm clearly a heathen. I don't really see a problem with any of the problems the author points out. What's more, I liked my McMansion and all of the other McMansions in my neighborhood. I liked my neighbors too. I never had a reason to hate them or their houses. There must be some very tortured people in the world.
- dimino 10y agoYou've said this in two places on this submission, but I challenge you on the claim that "99% of the population" doesn't care what their house looks like. I think a lot of people do care.
- basseq 10y agoI agree: a lot of people care what their houses look like here. But 99% of the population doesn't care about this level of architectural nuance. And certainly not the population of people who are in the market for these sorts of homes in the first place (upper middle-class, suburban, etc.). It's hard to prove a negative, but "despite all of this, the popularity of McMansions is picking up again". If McMansions are as "bad" as the author makes them out to be, and homebuyers "care" as much as you say they do, how do you account for the market?
- dimino 10y agoIf people actually didn't care, it would be of no consequence to hear their home called a "McMansion", and yet I suspect we both would agree that folks probably don't appreciate their home being critiqued such as how the blog writes about homes. The reality is, most people would care if they knew, but don't know and therefore can't possibly care. It's not apathy, it's ignorance that drives the sale of McMansions, even though McMansions are "bad", in the sense that they break architectural principles and are considered poor reflections of art because of it. Obviously art isn't required to prevent rain from falling on your head, but the folks who are buying these houses are spending this extra money for something other than the literal safety, aren't they? If someone buys a McMansion for any aesthetic reason, then they are making a sub-optimal choice. I think the assumption the blog makes is that a McMansion is a failed attempt at creating art, not a rejection of the concept of home beauty.
- codingdave 10y agoEven if we grant all these points as correct, not everyone shares the same aesthetic sense as professional architects. As long as you like your own home, it really doesn't matter what other people think of it. And I find the last bit of the article truly scary -- bragging over fan mail sent to the site about how this type of critique is letting people verbalize and validate their own instinctive hate for their neighbor's design choices. Is that really a net positive to our society? To use critique as a mechanism to feed negativity between neighbors?
- jayess 10y agoThere are a LOT of people who think they should be able to substitute their own judgment for other people's when it comes to the home they live in.
- wott 10y agoEuropean here. Are there really people who live in those er... things, or are they only used to shoot porn flicks? On a more serious note, if they want to display different styles, instead of packing them together, why don't they build 2 or 3 smaller buildings?
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- Abundnce10 10y agoThis is a little off topic but does anyone know of any resources for architecting/designing your own house. Specifically, I think it'd be worthwhile to learn from the layouts of other houses. I'd also love to hear about how people are wiring up their houses (fiber, audio, etc).
- DanBC 10y agoNot really what you're looking for but the UK tv series "Grand Designs" follows people who self-build. You get to see some of the mistakes they make, and they talk about the decisions they make. There's a wide variety of different building styles, from traditional brick and morter, through to high end kit homes, to hay-bale and plaster or car tyres and rammed earth. http://www.channel4.com/programmes/grand-designs/ http://www.channel4.com/programmes/grand-designs/ It's probably not great to binge watch. It has a reasonably similar format each week and sometimes the format is a bit annoying.
- RandomInteger4 10y agoHow to Design Your Own House: Step 1) Pay an Architect to design your house.
- Abundnce10 10y agoI'll definitely do that! I guess I'm just looking for places to get inspiration from.
- OrwellianChild 10y agoFor those lacking the visual aids to understand what a grandiose home vs. a McMansion looks like, the blog this is based on has a good visual explainer here: http://www.mcmansionhell.com/post/151896249151/the-mcmansion-scale-explained http://www.mcmansionhell.com/post/151896249151/the-mcmansion...