Urban Shocker
Doyenne
My pleasure entirely.
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Post: Architects veer away from 'car crash' design
- Thread starter AlvinofDiaspar
- Start date
Earlscourt_Lad
Active Member
For the elucidation of myself and others, I wonder Mr. Shocker if you could explain the "Cheddintonista" reference.
Urban Shocker
Doyenne
The Cheddingtonista movement has been gradually pushed back to the outer fringes of the city, where it builds faux monster homes. A few obstinate boluses remain, clogging up neighbourhoods with pretentious stylings drawn from the pre-industrial age before parliamentary democracy and universal suffrage were introduced, refusing all efforts to flush them out, and causing the drains to back up. They've circled their wagons in Forest Hill, for instance, and at the Bridle Path, and are putting up stubborn last-ditch resistance there. There will be an occasional sighting of a McMansion here, and the odd flare up of bloated row houses somewhere else, and they'll mount a half-hearted attempt at reviving their successful insurgency of the '80s '90s now and then, but they're mostly a dormant, spent force.
L
lawsond
Guest
Agreed.
Did Diamond etc. design the Eaton Centre? It's the one mall on earth that doesn't make me want to hurl.
As for the whole de-constructed smash-up-derby architecture of Liebskind and Gehry, some might say it's a reflection of the big fat mess that the 21st century has turned out to be. (so far)
Granted, Bilbao and others were on the drawing boards in the late 20th, but I think most people sensed the dread of the coming century.
Take a look at Experience Music or the ROM or Disney Hall and you see a glimmer of the WTC ruins.
But then again, have a great day!
TKTKTK
Senior Member
I think your description obscures the fact that there are successful attempts at historicist and revivalist(?) architecture. It also denies that aesthetics aren't actually tied to specific points in time. No one's going to deride neo-gothic now, just because in its day it was trying to be pastiche and unmodern.
Re: Eaton's Centre: it was Zeidler.
H
Hydrogen
Guest
It works well for a donwtown mall, but it has been modified over time (exterior).
adma
Superstar
Ah, but you didn't get the point of my sarcastic multi-smiley, which you deleted. By implication IOW, anyone who uses the "dated or crap" judgment of Jack Diamond's oeuvre is, er, pretty unsophisticated...
Archivist
Senior Member
Couldn't have said it better myself!
Obviously, I screwed up the quote, unless I have inadvertantly discovered that adma and UrbanShocker are one and the same. Anyone seen them in the same room together?
junctionist
Senior Member
Yet modernism was not yet mainstream when neo-gothic buildings were built and revivals were more palatable. Modernism revolutionized architecture to such a degree that going back is extraordinarily difficult. The overwhelming majority of today's "traditional" architecture follows loose and vague interpretations of pre-modernist styles.
You're right, there are a few exceptional buildings in this style. If this house was actually built in 1978, then it might be one of those exceptions:
scarberiankhatru
Senior Member
Re: Diamond - I wouldn't consider the Earth Sciences Centre a success in any way (not that there's any way my opinion would matter unless I became an architect, got onto some kind of board, and selected the complex/my peer for a prize). It's possibly the dreariest spot on UofT's campus and it's a veritable maze...you'll go loco trying to find a specific room in this LoPo rabbit's warren.
Earlscourt_Lad
Active Member
Thank you for the explanation Urban Shocker.
The trouble with the mcmansion and faux-historicist stuff is a complete lack of understanding of the details that comprise traditional architecture. To often we see an totally inappropriate scale, wherein the details such as cornices, architraves, pediments, quoining, etc., are missing or are too large or too small. A total lack of depth or differentiation between planes on an elevation (if you look at older buildings, observe how far in windows are set, and how various details exist on a separate plane). I think, but I do not know, it is that many architects now have never been trained in the classical orders and the sense of proportion that flows from that. The blame there lies with the modernists, who I think have pushed the inheirited knowledge of thousands of years of architecture, from current architectural curriculae.
Not, may I add, that am I opposed to modernist and contemporary architecture but rather we have nearly lost the ability to produce a western vernacular. Or for that matter a Toronto vernacular. Observe if you will the housing stock built in Edwardian and pre-WW2 toronto and we see common themes that are now ignored or added perfunctorily as pastiche. Corbels on end walls, porches with gables, bay windows, and proper brickwork, for example seem lost to the modern builder. Woodwork, often the detailing that can make a plain house seem more than it is, is woefully misused or missing. The summation of this is to my mind what you refer to as the Cheddingtonistas, poorly executed attempts to create a traditional appearance.
The trouble with the mcmansion and faux-historicist stuff is a complete lack of understanding of the details that comprise traditional architecture. To often we see an totally inappropriate scale, wherein the details such as cornices, architraves, pediments, quoining, etc., are missing or are too large or too small. A total lack of depth or differentiation between planes on an elevation (if you look at older buildings, observe how far in windows are set, and how various details exist on a separate plane). I think, but I do not know, it is that many architects now have never been trained in the classical orders and the sense of proportion that flows from that. The blame there lies with the modernists, who I think have pushed the inheirited knowledge of thousands of years of architecture, from current architectural curriculae.
Not, may I add, that am I opposed to modernist and contemporary architecture but rather we have nearly lost the ability to produce a western vernacular. Or for that matter a Toronto vernacular. Observe if you will the housing stock built in Edwardian and pre-WW2 toronto and we see common themes that are now ignored or added perfunctorily as pastiche. Corbels on end walls, porches with gables, bay windows, and proper brickwork, for example seem lost to the modern builder. Woodwork, often the detailing that can make a plain house seem more than it is, is woefully misused or missing. The summation of this is to my mind what you refer to as the Cheddingtonistas, poorly executed attempts to create a traditional appearance.
adma
Superstar
The main problem with your judgment is the LoPo label. If it fails, it's as HiPo, not as LoPo...
scarberiankhatru
Senior Member
LoPo with good intentions, then, but that's as far as it goes.
adma
Superstar
How on earth is it LoPo *at all*?
*This* is LoPo.
*This* isn't.
*This* is LoPo.
*This* isn't.