Toronto U of T: Lawson Centre for Sustainability | 16.52m | 4s | U of T | Mecanoo Architecten

Towered said:
That building is...new?
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Yes; broke ground in 2015, finished in mid 2017.

Full article on it linked below:

www.architectmagazine.com

Robert A.M. Stern On The Design of the New Pauli Murray and Benjamin Franklin Colleges

The New York–based architect discusses designing the new Gothic-style residential colleges at Yale University, the legacy of James Gamble Rogers, and his views on Modernist heaven.
www.architectmagazine.com

This is the college's page; it's a residence at Yale.

Welcome | Benjamin Franklin College

benjaminfranklin.yalecollege.yale.edu benjaminfranklin.yalecollege.yale.edu

Lovely, isn't it?
 
DavidCapizzano said:
Stern buildings are gauche. If want that level of fakery I’ll go to Disney Land thank you very much.
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One may prefer the nod to history or not; but this is not cheap pomo knock-off stuff; Disney has never spent the kind of money on faux storefronts that would be involved in a Stern building.

In my experience he uses a similar/same caliber of material as one might have in the periods he is emulating; real limestone/granite/marble etc.

That is again, not amusement park level stuff.

That said, I like a great deal of his work; I can appreciate great modern architecture; but I see nothing wrong w/continuing classic-styles through modern times, so long as they are well done, have modern
utility and functionality.
 
I think paying homage to styles of yesteryear through interesting interpretations of form and material are just fine - I draw the line at mimicry. Bob Sterns buildings (as high quality as they might be) feel disingenuous, like a caricature of whatever it’s trying to reference. His designs scream right wing money and an obsession with puritanical traditional style that on the surface looks like nostalgia but underneath just feels like a wealthy clients desire for decadence and a lack of restraint when it comes to ornament.

The quality between RAMSA & Disney might be different but I maintain that the idea behind them is the same. Better suited to the world showcase at Epcot vs IRL.

there are dozens of NY architects who can pull off this style like Morris Adjmi, Handel, and Rawlings.
 
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DavidCapizzano said:
I think paying homage to styles of yesteryear through interesting interpretations of form and material are just fine - I draw the line at mimicry. Bob Sterns buildings (as high quality as they might be) feel disingenuous, like a caricature of whatever it’s trying to reference. His designs scream right wing money and an obsession with puritanical traditional style that on the surface looks like nostalgia but underneath just feels like a wealthy clients desire for decadence and a lack of restraint when it comes to ornament.

The quality between RAMSA & Disney might be different but I maintain that the idea behind them is the same. Better suited to the world showcase at Epcot vs IRL.

there are dozens of NY architects who can pull off this style like Morris Adjmi, Handel, and Rawlings.
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So your criticism is based at least partly on the world view/values that drives historicalist architecture - and less on the architecture itself. I think that there is some validity to that (it's akin to the reactionary "Modern Art isn't Art" warcry).

AoD
 
Northern Light said:
Yes; broke ground in 2015, finished in mid 2017.

Full article on it linked below:

www.architectmagazine.com

Robert A.M. Stern On The Design of the New Pauli Murray and Benjamin Franklin Colleges

The New York–based architect discusses designing the new Gothic-style residential colleges at Yale University, the legacy of James Gamble Rogers, and his views on Modernist heaven.
www.architectmagazine.com

This is the college's page; it's a residence at Yale.

Welcome | Benjamin Franklin College

benjaminfranklin.yalecollege.yale.edu benjaminfranklin.yalecollege.yale.edu

Lovely, isn't it?
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It gives me hope that old styles can still be done very well after all, and that a firm like this would be the one to go to if one were to rebuild lost heritage buildings that deserve to be reincarnated, so to speak.
 
DavidCapizzano said:
Stern buildings are gauche. If want that level of fakery I’ll go to Disney Land thank you very much.
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Like what I've said before, the modern architectural-education scene has conditioned people to believe that society is incapable of building in old styles/old styles are uneconomical; and moreso than that, that old styles = historic/inaccessible - rather than simply another set of colours in the architectural palette.

Historicism (also a loaded term that situates styles in the past) is not necessarily a right-wing fantasy, lest you believe that Stalin's piles were the epitome of modernism, or that Mussolini's futurist designs were a revanchist past (it was, but in a theoretical manner).


Here's a controversial point- Main Street Disneyland is good urbanistic and architectural design, but also an act of urbanistic fakery (which is more the reason it's derided for).

Disneyland is like a flower preserved under glass, since it can't evolve and that there's no local economic/societal agency that drives changes and adaptation, its architecture never breathes. Which is why, aside from the fake second floor and its appeals towards Americana, it's considered a pastiche.

Same points are leveled against new urbanism and historic preservation, and a point to make when examining why neighbourhoods with local agency tend to be more vibrant than masterplanned ones (but that's another tangent).
 
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If you can't respect quality historicism, can you respect architecture in general? The "modern or nothing" mantra seems so narrow minded in light of how many beautiful styles we're capable of building in. New technologies will most likely allow us to build in historical styles at much lower costs like 3D printing in stone and wood, robotic sculpting, and laser cutting.
 
junctionist said:
If you can't respect quality historicism, can you respect architecture in general? The "modern or nothing" mantra seems so narrow minded in light of how many beautiful styles we're capable of building in. New technologies will most likely allow us to build in historical styles at much lower costs like 3D printing in stone and wood, robotic sculpting, and laser cutting.
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Of course one can reject historicism, regardless of its quality, and still respect architecture generally. A historicist building may be a fine example of its type, but that does not mean that the impulse behind creating something out of another age must be accepted as of right. While you may believe it somehow tarnishes architecture to require that it be reflective of its era, others would understand that the time an object was created in to be an intrinsic part of the design, and that it would cheapen architecture not reflect it.

I'm not bothered that you feel the way you do about architecture, but I don't see where you get off requiring others to tow your same line: there is a value judgement regarding the role of time here, so there is more than one way to write the laws of what constitutes respectability.

42
 
interchange42 said:
Of course one can reject historicism, regardless of its quality, and still respect architecture generally. A historicist building may be a fine example of its type, but that does not mean that the impulse behind creating something out of another age must be accepted as of right. While you may believe it somehow tarnishes architecture to require that it be reflective of its era, others would understand that the time an object was created in to be an intrinsic part of the design, and that it would cheapen architecture not reflect it.

I'm not bothered that you feel the way you do about architecture, but I don't see where you get off requiring others to tow your same line: there is a value judgement regarding the role of time here, so there is more than one way to write the laws of what constitutes respectability.

42
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Though late Baroque/Rococo is probably bad taste anytime, anywhere, and I will pass judgement on all those who worship at that altar :D

AoD
 
AlvinofDiaspar said:
Though late Baroque/Rococo is probably bad taste anytime, anywhere, and I will pass judgement on all those who worship at that altar :D

AoD
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Or there's these guys trying to bring their take on the Palace of Versailles to Forest Hill...

200 Russell Hill | 30.5m | 5s | Hirsh Development Group | Rafael + Bigauskas

Super luxury condo planned for a property backing on Winston Churchill Park which once had a mansion on it. No docs at the City's site yet, but a rather lavish website at http://200russellhill.com which has the unmitigated gall to quote Frank Gehry on the timelessness that architectural works...
urbantoronto.ca urbantoronto.ca
 
AlbertC said:
Or there's these guys trying to bring their take on the Palace of Versailles to Forest Hill...

200 Russell Hill | 30.5m | 5s | Hirsh Development Group | Rafael + Bigauskas

Super luxury condo planned for a property backing on Winston Churchill Park which once had a mansion on it. No docs at the City's site yet, but a rather lavish website at http://200russellhill.com which has the unmitigated gall to quote Frank Gehry on the timelessness that architectural works...
urbantoronto.ca urbantoronto.ca
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Yeah, they need a Look in the Mirror Hall in that palace.

AoD
 
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