3 ms·

I'm all for density, but can't modern architects stomach a little embellishment? The latest version of the mansion block lacks any markers that might allow one

I'm all for density, but can't modern architects stomach a little embellishment? The latest version of the mansion block lacks any markers that might allow one to be mistaken for a mansion.

rwmj 3y ago
Modern housing in the UK is ugly as hell. The only upside is it is so poorly constructed it won't be around for that long.
- nickdothutton 3y ago
  Ah yes, I too once owned a Barratt property. Now happily a mansion block dweller.
- baz00 3y ago
  Yeah my place is falling to bits and it's only 10 years old.
- m463 3y ago
  https://xkcd.com/2730/ https://xkcd.com/2730/
- DrBazza 3y ago
  1960s-70s: pebble dashing. 1970s-80s: stone cladding. 1980s-90s: cream brickwork, porticos 1990s-00s: boxes with white upvc windows, red tiles, garages 2020s: grey plague - grey windows, grey doors, grey plastic faux-wood cladding, grey roof tiles, car 'ports'. The current awful trend would be hilarious if it wasn't actually dangerous. And by that I mean modern UK houses are very, very well insulated. And we recorded our first 40C temperature in England. There's a reason why houses in the Mediterranean are absolutely not grey, and are very definitely white. There have even been one or two TV programmes where they've measured these houses and apartments having indoor temperatures of high 20s low 30s C, long after the sun has set.
  - reedf1 3y ago
    I think you have a bit of a misunderstanding of what insulation is supposed to achieve. If your home is meaningfully affected by the outdoor temperature it is very much not "well insulated".
    - kamray23 3y ago
      It could be. A well insulated home requires cooling of some sort to stay cool or it will heat up, as it contains heat sources and is well insulated. That gets harder as the outside temperature rises. This has nothing to do with the colour of the building, though. And it's not something you can ease by removing the insulation – that actually makes it worse as now the high outside temperature might just make the inside temperature even higher.
      - theluketaylor 3y ago
        Insulation resists heat transfer in both directions. Extremely well insulated and air sealed homes resist heating up just as much as they resist cooling off. Windows are a bit special in that you can get solar gain through them, but modern windows can have coatings that filter UV and IR from entering a building. People and electronics are heat sources inside a home, but pretty minimal ones. Any reasonably speced ventilation system a modern home needs to exchange outside air will easily handle keeping a modern house cool.
        kamray23 3y ago
        Most UV and IR doesn't actually need any real coatings. Glass just isn't transparent to that light, completely by itself. It's actually specifically the imperfections in said glass which cut out the most dangerous part of UV radiation, and it's the inherent temperature which messes with IR.
    - DrBazza 3y ago
      "insulation - noun [ U ] the act of covering something to stop heat, sound, or electricity from escaping or entering, or the fact that something is covered in this way" In common language usage, UK houses are insulated to stop heat escaping in our mostly temperate climate for energy efficiency reasons, not to stop heat entering. Everyone opens their doors and windows in the UK allowing the heat in. Aircon is rare, but increasing. So houses stay hot long after the afternoon peak. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-62126463 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-62126463 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-23180965 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-23180965 and so on.
foota 3y ago
Personally I'm a fan of brutalist architecture, but maybe it's nostalgia for my university.
odiroot 3y ago
It's not about blocks. Post-war terraces and detached houses are totally bland as well.
dublinben 3y ago
Architects are usually all for embellishment and aesthetic details. By the time a design is actually built, all visual appeal has usually been value-engineered out, or fallen victim to the whims of local zoning officials.
- ethanbond 3y ago
  Embellishment is very rare in most architecture programs today. You can thank Corbusier, a criminal against humanity as far as I am concerned.
WalterBright 3y ago
They need gargoyles.
dist-epoch 3y ago
> architect and theorist Adolph Loos, in a 1908 essay called “Ornament and Crime,” dramatically declared that a lack of ornamentation was a “sign of spiritual strength.” > Architects are terrified of producing so much as a fluted column, because they believe their peers will think they are stupid, nostalgic, and unsophisticated. https://www.currentaffairs.org/2017/10/why-you-hate-contemporary-architecture https://www.currentaffairs.org/2017/10/why-you-hate-contempo...
timerol 3y ago
I opened the article after reading this comment, looked at the cover image, and thought you must be out of your mind. Then I scrolled down, and the newer images looked progressively worse. The South Gardens complex looks like it's afraid to be anything other than a box. There are balconies that give clear opportunities for a varied facade, but they look almost identical to everything else. (I say this as someone who heavily advocates for needing to build more in expensive cities. Bland boxes are way better than no new construction.)
renewiltord 3y ago
It's the classic problem: you dislike it but it won't make you support or oppose. For the ones who hate buildings: they will oppose anything. In a world like that, every bit of ornamentation is a novel handle you give someone who will use it to pull you down, and they're going to try to extract as much surplus value as possible out of the construction process through various mechanisms. So the simple thing is, you say things but do not care, so those who build do so by listening to those who care.
DrBazza 3y ago
Developers never have a problem selling as they know that people will always buy apartments in cities, it's the inside that counts. Adding fluff to the outside costs money, and in England these days, it's a race to the bottom to maximise profit and minimise cost. Council planners have little power to demand things on buildings outside of that which meets legislation requirements. Hence we're getting some pretty awful buildings, not just apartments, in existing suburbs that don't blend in at all.
- ethanbond 3y ago
  No it’s the land that counts. Location, location, location. That’s why we should tax land and not tax development. Then all the upside of building a particularly nice place goes directly into the pockets of the people who choose to build a particularly nice place, instead of 70% of the value going to the landowner regardless of what piece of shit gets built on it.

I'm all for density, but can't modern architects stomach a little embellishment? The latest version of the mansion block lacks any markers that might allow one to be mistaken for a mansion.

rwmj 3y ago

Modern housing in the UK is ugly as hell. The only upside is it is so poorly constructed it won't be around for that long.

nickdothutton 3y ago
Ah yes, I too once owned a Barratt property. Now happily a mansion block dweller.
baz00 3y ago
Yeah my place is falling to bits and it's only 10 years old.
m463 3y ago
https://xkcd.com/2730/ https://xkcd.com/2730/
DrBazza 3y ago
1960s-70s: pebble dashing. 1970s-80s: stone cladding. 1980s-90s: cream brickwork, porticos 1990s-00s: boxes with white upvc windows, red tiles, garages 2020s: grey plague - grey windows, grey doors, grey plastic faux-wood cladding, grey roof tiles, car 'ports'. The current awful trend would be hilarious if it wasn't actually dangerous. And by that I mean modern UK houses are very, very well insulated. And we recorded our first 40C temperature in England. There's a reason why houses in the Mediterranean are absolutely not grey, and are very definitely white. There have even been one or two TV programmes where they've measured these houses and apartments having indoor temperatures of high 20s low 30s C, long after the sun has set.
- reedf1 3y ago
  I think you have a bit of a misunderstanding of what insulation is supposed to achieve. If your home is meaningfully affected by the outdoor temperature it is very much not "well insulated".
  - kamray23 3y ago
    It could be. A well insulated home requires cooling of some sort to stay cool or it will heat up, as it contains heat sources and is well insulated. That gets harder as the outside temperature rises. This has nothing to do with the colour of the building, though. And it's not something you can ease by removing the insulation – that actually makes it worse as now the high outside temperature might just make the inside temperature even higher.
    - theluketaylor 3y ago
      Insulation resists heat transfer in both directions. Extremely well insulated and air sealed homes resist heating up just as much as they resist cooling off. Windows are a bit special in that you can get solar gain through them, but modern windows can have coatings that filter UV and IR from entering a building. People and electronics are heat sources inside a home, but pretty minimal ones. Any reasonably speced ventilation system a modern home needs to exchange outside air will easily handle keeping a modern house cool.
      - kamray23 3y ago
        Most UV and IR doesn't actually need any real coatings. Glass just isn't transparent to that light, completely by itself. It's actually specifically the imperfections in said glass which cut out the most dangerous part of UV radiation, and it's the inherent temperature which messes with IR.
  - DrBazza 3y ago
    "insulation - noun [ U ] the act of covering something to stop heat, sound, or electricity from escaping or entering, or the fact that something is covered in this way" In common language usage, UK houses are insulated to stop heat escaping in our mostly temperate climate for energy efficiency reasons, not to stop heat entering. Everyone opens their doors and windows in the UK allowing the heat in. Aircon is rare, but increasing. So houses stay hot long after the afternoon peak. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-62126463 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-62126463 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-23180965 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-23180965 and so on.

foota 3y ago

Personally I'm a fan of brutalist architecture, but maybe it's nostalgia for my university.

odiroot 3y ago

It's not about blocks. Post-war terraces and detached houses are totally bland as well.

dublinben 3y ago

Architects are usually all for embellishment and aesthetic details. By the time a design is actually built, all visual appeal has usually been value-engineered out, or fallen victim to the whims of local zoning officials.

ethanbond 3y ago
Embellishment is very rare in most architecture programs today. You can thank Corbusier, a criminal against humanity as far as I am concerned.

WalterBright 3y ago

They need gargoyles.

dist-epoch 3y ago

> architect and theorist Adolph Loos, in a 1908 essay called “Ornament and Crime,” dramatically declared that a lack of ornamentation was a “sign of spiritual strength.” > Architects are terrified of producing so much as a fluted column, because they believe their peers will think they are stupid, nostalgic, and unsophisticated. https://www.currentaffairs.org/2017/10/why-you-hate-contemporary-architecture https://www.currentaffairs.org/2017/10/why-you-hate-contempo...

timerol 3y ago

I opened the article after reading this comment, looked at the cover image, and thought you must be out of your mind. Then I scrolled down, and the newer images looked progressively worse. The South Gardens complex looks like it's afraid to be anything other than a box. There are balconies that give clear opportunities for a varied facade, but they look almost identical to everything else. (I say this as someone who heavily advocates for needing to build more in expensive cities. Bland boxes are way better than no new construction.)

renewiltord 3y ago

It's the classic problem: you dislike it but it won't make you support or oppose. For the ones who hate buildings: they will oppose anything. In a world like that, every bit of ornamentation is a novel handle you give someone who will use it to pull you down, and they're going to try to extract as much surplus value as possible out of the construction process through various mechanisms. So the simple thing is, you say things but do not care, so those who build do so by listening to those who care.

DrBazza 3y ago

Developers never have a problem selling as they know that people will always buy apartments in cities, it's the inside that counts. Adding fluff to the outside costs money, and in England these days, it's a race to the bottom to maximise profit and minimise cost. Council planners have little power to demand things on buildings outside of that which meets legislation requirements. Hence we're getting some pretty awful buildings, not just apartments, in existing suburbs that don't blend in at all.

ethanbond 3y ago
No it’s the land that counts. Location, location, location. That’s why we should tax land and not tax development. Then all the upside of building a particularly nice place goes directly into the pockets of the people who choose to build a particularly nice place, instead of 70% of the value going to the landowner regardless of what piece of shit gets built on it.