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I don't know about that. In my North American city, the old public schools, buildings, bridges, and earthworks from pre-WW2 are embellished with intricate patte
by mitthrowaway2 3y ago
I don't know about that. In my North American city, the old public schools, buildings, bridges, and earthworks from pre-WW2 are embellished with intricate patterns and decorative detailing, even when they are made from reinforced concrete. Buildings made after the war are, almost without exception, made plain and featureless, even when they are also made from reinforced concrete. Modern tools, computers, and electricity don't make it any harder to add detailing (and it's also hard to believe such features become harder to afford as society became wealthier in general).
- pseudalopex 3y agoSociety became more fixated on efficiency also.
- b112 3y agoI wonder of some of the markings were wards. A practice that would eventually cease, with a loss of wide spread belief in mysticism.
- pessimizer 3y agoExcept in square footage.
- SoftTalker 3y agoYes, I agree. Postwar buildings are much more likely to be featureless compared to 19th or early 20th century buildings, even regular houses. I think the economic boom and demand for new houses and buildings contributed to skipping the sort of traditional detail and ornate finishing work for the sake of moving on to the next project.
- trilbyglens 3y agoAlso a function of modernistic ideas about architecture, if you can even apply such a label to most american building work. Most of it is just really utilitarian and miserable.
- nemo44x 3y agoWhy would we continue to create the same thing? We had access to steel and glass in a way we never did before. He’ll you couldn't create a decent larger sheet of glass until the 1940s. Nails cost more than wood when blacksmiths made them.
- mitthrowaway2 3y agoWhat I'm talking about is for example, a nearby school has a concrete embankment because it's built on a hill. Being built around 1910, the concrete surface is intricately and unnecessarily decorated with little arches and buttresses to make it visually appealing. If that same embankment were built today, it would not be made of glass, but rather bare concrete, with the only surface decoration being the formwork grid of tie marks left over from construction, eg: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tadao_Ando#/media/File:Galleria_akka.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tadao_Ando#/media/File:Galleri...
- nemo44x 3y agoPossibly. We need to be careful of selection bias when comparing old construction to new. There was a lot of crap built long ago that wasn’t detailed, etc and it’s gone by now. This happens with houses a lot. And I’m a person that lives old buildings and their methods! But there’s also lots of great modern architecture that will survive the test of time. The Calatrava train station in NYC for example. Most public transit stations are unremarkable but that one is amazing. We still build great things. And crap too. But we always have. But yeah you’re probably right that in the early 20th century you saw a bit more craftsmanship in vernacular architecture. We had a lot of guys over from the old world with those skills that worked for cheap.
- nemo44x 3y agoMaterials from the postwar period are completely different. Within a decade we had 100 years of tech develop. Also - compare a building from the 19th cent. To earlier 20th. Those same building you say are intricate are not nearly as much as just decades earlier. Carpenters had access to a lot of new tech starting in the late 1800’s.