Shri Sanatan Hindu Mandir | Brent | Complete

[El_Greco]

Originally Posted by menganito

Of course there is denying.

No, there really isnt. Streetscapes in the past were simply of far superior aesthetic quality than they are today.

Modernity more often than not produces "ugly monstrosities". Theres nothing interesting or beautiful or inspiring about Robing Hood Gardens or some glass box office. Theres a lot of that in St Pauls, this temple and 90% of old architecture. Its all nice and well to post the link to ArchDaily but how many new buildings are like that? Walk the City and pretty much all you see is dullness. Indeed if buildings on that site were the norm and the rule (rather than exception) I dont think there would be debates like this.

Originally Posted by i_like_concrete

regardless of what developers want, regardless of what their clients want.

Then whats the point in architects then if they have no say in the design process? Lets just have some chain-shop "Made-to-measure-boxes".

[Loathing]

You can't expect people to write comprehensively about their 10 Point Plan On Architecture and Development in the 21st Century, in a forum like this. After all, I've never seen you articulate such a plan. A debate exclusively on aesthetics is well within the scope of appropriateness for this sort of discursive space.

[menganito]

Originally Posted by El_Greco

No, there really isnt. Streetscapes in the past were simply of far superior aesthetic quality than they are today.

Modernity more often than not produces "ugly monstrosities". Theres nothing interesting or beautiful or inspiring about Robing Hood Gardens or some glass box office. Theres a lot of that in St Pauls, this temple and 90% of old architecture. Its all nice and well to post the link to ArchDaily but how many new buildings are like that? Walk the City and pretty much all you see is dullness. Indeed if buildings on that site were the norm and the rule (rather than exception) I dont think there would be debates like this.



Then whats the point in architects then if they have no say in the design process? Lets just have some chain-shop "Made-to-measure-boxes".

Tell me :

Is it very difficult to raise one's opinion to a matter of fact?

You seem to do it without effort.

What you mean that RHG is not inspiring? Is not enough enough proof of its value that creative people like Rogers or Hadid have said exactly the opposite?

------


The point of ArchDaily is that those buildings fulfil the definition of modernity. There are hundreds upon hundreds of them. I am glad you like them, it makes you a person of your time. Some people in this forum aren't.
Those are the products of modernity. In most cases far, far, far superior than your run of the mill fake neoclasical pieces of crap. (here I was trying to talk like you)

[DarJoLe]

But, but... What is beauty?

[El_Greco]

Originally Posted by menganito

What you mean that RHG is not inspiring?

Its ugly and soul destroying.

Some people in this forum aren't.

Noone on here despises modernity. If that was the case theyd not be on this forum.

Those are the products of modernity.

They are also exceptions to the rule. Cities are not filled with buildings like you find on that site they are filled with buildings like this -

http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showth...7#post68679497

Ugly, dull and uninspiring. And if that is what modernity produces I and I suspect many people, would prefer to have Terry. This is nothing to do with hatred of modernity but everything to do with aesthetics. His buildings (ie 264-267 Tottenham Court Road) simply look better than the building above.

[i_like_concrete]

Originally Posted by El_Greco

Then whats the point in architects then if they have no say in the design process? Lets just have some chain-shop "Made-to-measure-boxes".

Clients go to specific architects for outcomes they want. You don't go to Richard Rogers if you want a neo-classical terrace. You go to him because you want something modern, and expensive. Likewise, you don't go to a small 10 man architecture firm at the end of your street if you want a 60 storey skyscraper.

Architects who are bold enough develop their own vernacular set up their own firms, and bid for work on the basis of what makes them different, but you are a fool if you think big business walks up to an architects blind and says, "build me something!", without already having in mind what they want.

And you may well say "what's the point of an architect?" in that case, and you'd be quite right to, but that is about a changing world, it has nothing to do with aesthetics or modernism, it is about capitalist reality and prominence of globalised institutions maintaining a strong control over their image, which includes the buildings they occupy.

Originally Posted by Loathing

You can't expect people to write comprehensively about their 10 Point Plan On Architecture and Development in the 21st Century, in a forum like this. After all, I've never seen you articulate such a plan. A debate exclusively on aesthetics is well within the scope of appropriateness for this sort of discursive space.

That may be the case, but it is a debate as old as this forum, a debate that no matter which new members join, never ceases to regurgitate the same arguments. It is a debate with no conclusion, and as the years go by, both sides get more entrenched and more and more often resort to personal attacks.

If you've noticed, I don't actually believe in placing aesthetics above all else, so I've no interest in articulating such a plan. Feel free to waste more hours making exactly the same points that have been made over and over on this forum, and y'know, eventually people like Darjole and Menganito will stop bothering to respond and maybe you can claim some kind of pyyrhic victory.

I think, given the amount of pages dedicated to this, and every other debate about the aesthetics of contemporary cities, I actually can expect people to come up with a 10 point plan on architecture and development in the 21st century, if they truly believe there is another, superior and achievable way of doing it. I, and I suspect most others on this site, would enjoy reading that far more than childish spats between the usual suspects.

[menganito]

Originally Posted by El_Greco

Its ugly and soul destroying.



Noone on here despises modernity. If that was the case theyd not be on this forum.



They are also exceptions to the rule. Cities are not filled with buildings like you find on that site they are filled with buildings like this -

http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showth...7#post68679497

Ugly, dull and uninspiring. And if that is what modernity produces I and I suspect many people, would prefer to have Terry. This is nothing to do with hatred of modernity but everything to do with aesthetics. His buildings (ie 264-267 Tottenham Court Road) simply look better than the building above.

This is hilarious.

The first sentence says that a front example of modernity (as acknowledge by hundreds of modern architects and historians all around the world) is "ugly and soul destroying" and the second sentence says that "no one here despises modernity".


By the way really a good match this thing of trying to find the same architectural richness in St Paul's as in a cheap housing state for 250 families in the poorest area of the country. Yeah, I suppose that is fair. I am sure the same resources, (material, chrematistic and of time) were available for one endeavour and the other so one should expect the same level of cultural heritage.

[El_Greco]

Originally Posted by menganito

This is hilarious.

Except that there are many modern architects which I like. Indeed I can and do appreciate both old and new architecture. However Im not trying to fool anyone that the work of my favourite architects is the norm, because it certainly isnt. ArchDaily type stuff is an exception not the rule. I think others on here see things the same way.

[Langur]

Originally Posted by DarJoLe

But, but... What is beauty?

Something you're apparently incapable of appreciating, hence why you resort to moral, ideological, and economic arguments to defend modernism and diminish everything else. You daren't engage in discussions of the aesthetic because you don't understand it.

[Langur]

Originally Posted by El_Greco

Theres nothing interesting or beautiful or inspiring about... some glass box office.

Not always. Lever House, the Seagram Building, IBM Building, TD Centre, Canary Wharf HSBC headquarters, Trump World Tower, etc are all beautiful glass boxes.

[menganito]

Regarding Oxford St.... No, never Terry. You are right that proposal is a poor example of modernity, but at least it does not fake its time. Of course I would prefer a better modern project.... which automatically (by the use of the word modern) disqualifies mr. Terry for any intervention outside of Disneyland or the grounds of people too insecure about their identity or the time they live in. People that want to look like something they are not or want to live in a time that has passed.

ArchDaily is not just the exception.... it is just a taste of the exception; many great modern things don't make it to be published. Still there you will find hundreds of examples, I hope you won't compare each one individually with St. Paul's and then decide that old architecture wins.

[Langur]

Originally Posted by i_like_concrete

Over and over you say the same thing, aesthetics should take priority, but you've given no practical solution as to how it can be judged, who should judge it, and what recourse for appeal there would be if a project were judged to be aesthetically inferior? You've mentioned nothing about what clients of architects want, nor what architects themselves have to deliver, and you've mentioned nothing about strategic documents that combine a whole host of issues to deal with when developing.

Blah, blah, blah... yet how do you explain the aggression and hostility from the philistines towards these hindu temples, ie where aesthetics do take centre stage? Is the anger rooted in an ideological opposition that has nothing to do with economics? Is it because it shows up 99% of modernism as banal and mediocre by comparison?

[DarJoLe]

You really are becoming a nasty piece of work Langur.

[menganito]

Originally Posted by Langur

Something you're apparently incapable of appreciating, hence why you resort to moral, ideological, and economic arguments to defend modernism and diminish everything else. You daren't engage in discussions of the aesthetic because you don't understand it.

This is what I meant before, Langur.

There you had the chance to respond a direct aseptic question but you decided to get personal and nasty.

Does any one have to take lessons about hostility and thuggery from you?

[spindrift]

Langur, you are being unnecessarily aggressive and rude, tone it down or turn your computer off and calm down.

[cnapan]

Originally Posted by .Adam

For a building that is so admired where are all the photos? funny how everyone is rhapsodising about this building yet nobody has bothered to venture out and take a photo or see it?

What's funny about that?

Even a new housing development in Lewisham has more attention than this.

Very telling, It's a fine building and I have no problem with what has been achieved here, but we must be aiming for much more than this.

Why? It's a hindu temple. In what way isn't it achieving what it sets out to do?
.

[cnapan]

Originally Posted by i_like_concrete

Rather than proposing better ways to plan, develop and design, you simply attack other people for having different aesthetic tastes, throw words like 'desolate' and 'shite' around, and then wonder why people are taking issue with what you say...[snipped rest of tedious and inaccurate outpouring]

No offence, but have you got anything useful to say?

[DarJoLe]

Originally Posted by El_Greco

There really needs to be a new movement in architecture that will save us from the dullness that we are currently getting.

Well the New London vernacular springs to mind, especially with the latest trend in housing in London which seems to be spilling over into a few office developments as well.

[El_Greco]

Originally Posted by menganito

but at least it does not fake its time.

Were Georgians and Victorians faking it because they chose to build their buildings in the style of Civilizations that have been dead and burried for thousands of years? Was Renaissance nothing but a sham? I think these people understood aesthetics and beauty.

Originally Posted by Langur

Not always. Lever House, the Seagram Building, IBM Building, TD Centre, Canary Wharf HSBC headquarters, Trump World Tower, etc are all beautiful glass boxes.

True. But would they look equally good in the centre of London or Paris or any other European city? Werent there plans to build van der Rohe tower where 1 Poultry stands now? I think it would have looked dreadful.

[cnapan]

Menganito,

I'm still interested in why you claim that this building isn't authentic. Do you know? If you can't really explain, then I guess we can just move on