9 ms·

Almere is painful. The lack of history makes everything so sterile. Everything is hypermodern, clean and new. You won't have that cute old bar, infrastructural

by fleddr 4y ago

Almere is painful. The lack of history makes everything so sterile. Everything is hypermodern, clean and new. You won't have that cute old bar, infrastructural imperfection, clash of cultures, hybrid of old and new, it's entirely without soul. It feels like a VR game. Maybe I just hate modern architecture.

BlargMcLarg 4y ago
Can't invoke history where there is none. Can't create history when most of the city is running off to other places for those "rustic, authentic" experiences. Can't build with a bit of chaos when prices have to be kept low, density high and requirements must be met which naturally prefers prefabs and cheap, stale-looking materials. The criticisms are valid, but people haven't exactly given Almere a chance to be anything other than hypermodern, either.
- jacquesm 4y ago
  If they had taken a more organic approach from day #1 I think that could have been avoided, but then the growth would have been much slower. It quite literally feels like a city designed behind a drafting table instead of something that matured over time. And that's not something that you can buff out a few decades later.
  - BlargMcLarg 4y ago
    Yeah, you see almost the exact same in new streets and new sections of existing cities. They aren't made with the idea of being organic or adding a little chaos to simulate it. They are made with the intent of putting down prefabs in the cheapest way possible while still hitting requirements and budgets. Every new project around say, Utrecht, has the same "hypermodern" feel to it. Little contrast, straight lines, visible patterns, flat and rectangular. They try to add a little more chaos to it (probably to avoid being compared to Almere) and some more greenery, but it's a far cry from the old European city look.
    - jacquesm 4y ago
      They even try to imitate that (and fail) for instance, this area in Beverwijk: http://overall-pictures.nl/portfolio-3/straat-fotografie/beverwijk-broekpolder/ http://overall-pictures.nl/portfolio-3/straat-fotografie/bev...
asiachick 4y ago
I've always wondering why can't some architects build small, twisted, imperfect, or maybe just small. In particular, in Japan here are lots of older buildings or collections of buildings with tiny businesses. At some point developers come in, bulldoze the place, put up a high-rise building. The bottom 1-3 floors of the building have shops, but they are all 4x larger than the shops they displaced. The result is those shops end up being 90% chain stores such that there's now nothing drawing anyone to the new building (well, there are tenants). My wish is that some architect would break with convention, build the bottom 1-3 floors with tiny spaces and then be hailed as the new fashion in architecture and see it spread. Sure it's not the old imperfection, but I'd hope given smaller spaces you'd get the variety that was there before. As an example here's a spot in Shibuya in 2009 https://www.google.com/maps/@35.6628366,139.7024402,3a,75y,137.32h,96.38t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1sZPynZNkVZTFD4y1NeQFJpQ!2e0!5s20091101T000000!7i13312!8i6656 https://www.google.com/maps/@35.6628366,139.7024402,3a,75y,1... You should be able to move the timeline to 2022 and see it now. Before there were 10 tiny indie businesses. Now there is 2 chain restaurants, 1 chain supermarket, one chain clothing store. (though at least they have 3 varying food trucks for lunch) OTOH, I personally love much modern architecture.

by fleddr 4y ago

BlargMcLarg 4y ago

Can't invoke history where there is none. Can't create history when most of the city is running off to other places for those "rustic, authentic" experiences. Can't build with a bit of chaos when prices have to be kept low, density high and requirements must be met which naturally prefers prefabs and cheap, stale-looking materials. The criticisms are valid, but people haven't exactly given Almere a chance to be anything other than hypermodern, either.

jacquesm 4y ago
If they had taken a more organic approach from day #1 I think that could have been avoided, but then the growth would have been much slower. It quite literally feels like a city designed behind a drafting table instead of something that matured over time. And that's not something that you can buff out a few decades later.
- BlargMcLarg 4y ago
  Yeah, you see almost the exact same in new streets and new sections of existing cities. They aren't made with the idea of being organic or adding a little chaos to simulate it. They are made with the intent of putting down prefabs in the cheapest way possible while still hitting requirements and budgets. Every new project around say, Utrecht, has the same "hypermodern" feel to it. Little contrast, straight lines, visible patterns, flat and rectangular. They try to add a little more chaos to it (probably to avoid being compared to Almere) and some more greenery, but it's a far cry from the old European city look.
  - jacquesm 4y ago
    They even try to imitate that (and fail) for instance, this area in Beverwijk: http://overall-pictures.nl/portfolio-3/straat-fotografie/beverwijk-broekpolder/ http://overall-pictures.nl/portfolio-3/straat-fotografie/bev...

asiachick 4y ago

I've always wondering why can't some architects build small, twisted, imperfect, or maybe just small. In particular, in Japan here are lots of older buildings or collections of buildings with tiny businesses. At some point developers come in, bulldoze the place, put up a high-rise building. The bottom 1-3 floors of the building have shops, but they are all 4x larger than the shops they displaced. The result is those shops end up being 90% chain stores such that there's now nothing drawing anyone to the new building (well, there are tenants). My wish is that some architect would break with convention, build the bottom 1-3 floors with tiny spaces and then be hailed as the new fashion in architecture and see it spread. Sure it's not the old imperfection, but I'd hope given smaller spaces you'd get the variety that was there before. As an example here's a spot in Shibuya in 2009 https://www.google.com/maps/@35.6628366,139.7024402,3a,75y,137.32h,96.38t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1sZPynZNkVZTFD4y1NeQFJpQ!2e0!5s20091101T000000!7i13312!8i6656 https://www.google.com/maps/@35.6628366,139.7024402,3a,75y,1... You should be able to move the timeline to 2022 and see it now. Before there were 10 tiny indie businesses. Now there is 2 chain restaurants, 1 chain supermarket, one chain clothing store. (though at least they have 3 varying food trucks for lunch) OTOH, I personally love much modern architecture.