manhattan on thames: the skyscraper thread
- Thread starter guinnessdrinker
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ChrisFilter
Like a boss.
Suck my scraper! 
Zinedine*
Well-Known Member
buffalosid
New Member
adsr said:
6 years to get that together?? i got my doubts
Reno
The In Kraut
Over the last ten years there has been a change for the better when it comes to modern architecture in London. The British have to get over this stuffy Prince Charles mentality that all new buildings should be a pastiche of Georgian or Victorian styles. This would turn London into a Disneyfied theme park version of itself.
London is one of the largest and most cosmopolitain cities in the world and it has to move with the times. I think tall builings are an essential part of a skyline for any modern city and London is finally making up for its small minded neglect of modern architecture over the last century. Only the British would regard magnificent 20th Century classics like the Barbican, the Trellick Tower or the South Bank as eyesores that should be pulled down.
Walking along the Thames and seeing modern landmarks like the Gherkin, the London Eye and the London City Hall makes me proud to live in this city right now.
London is one of the largest and most cosmopolitain cities in the world and it has to move with the times. I think tall builings are an essential part of a skyline for any modern city and London is finally making up for its small minded neglect of modern architecture over the last century. Only the British would regard magnificent 20th Century classics like the Barbican, the Trellick Tower or the South Bank as eyesores that should be pulled down.
Walking along the Thames and seeing modern landmarks like the Gherkin, the London Eye and the London City Hall makes me proud to live in this city right now.
untethered
For industry & decency
The reason that many people deride many 20th/21st Century buildings isn't because they're eyesores, though they are often that, too. It's because they don't actually provide pleasant places to live and work. You can browbeat people as much as you like with rhetoric, but their own experiences often tell a different story to the architectural establishment's propaganda.
It's easy to dismiss critics of modernist architecture as stuffy reactionaries that are more interested in nostalgia and past glories than "progress". And you're right that it's easy to be lazy and opt for pastiche rather than apply some imagination and design talent to a project.
But what you're describing isn't a progression at all but a regression. Progress implies building on what we already know, or at least experimenting to see how we can extend what we know. Modernism and its derivatives, by contrast, opt for an ideological rejection of the cumulative knowledge of building working human settlements. They throw millenia of experience in the bin so that they can slavishly follow a narrow aesthetic agenda. The results might look impressive. They certainly have the attraction of novelty - for a while. But the novelty soon wears off when the occupants realise that they are lab rats in buildings that are scarily impersonal, expensive to maintain, impossible to adapt to future requirements and without getting too new-agey on you, just downright soulless.
I would be the first to say that the 21st Century needs 21st Century architecture. But what it actually gets is a pastiche - there's that word again - of some discredited 20th Century ideas. Modernism and its descendants haven't modernised. We're still just seeing endless rehashing of towers in the (car) park.
Until the early 20th Century, architecture was a conservative profession, not because it was stuffy and moribund, but because most of what there is to be known about how to produce pleasant places to live and work in was already known. The context in which architecture takes place changes gradually according to politics, economics, technology, environment and above all, fashion. What doesn't change are the essential features of what is required as a final product.
The reason why most of the good buildings in my opinion are over 75 years old is not because I prefer old buildings to new ones. It's because they're based on a tradition of what works, rather than desperately trying to be different and "new".
You're wrong that "only the British" hate the useless excresences that you cite. People the world over can tell a pleasant building from a tawdry one. Likewise, you will find representatives of the global architectural/fashion establishment in every country that love them.
For the record, I think that the London Eye is a fantastic innovative structure that does its job incredibly well. But the Gherkin and the Bollock are yet more slick, overbearing Foster Toss which are already highly disliked by many if not most of those that inhabit them. Tower 42 probably doesn't have more than another decade before it's pulled, and I wouldn't expect either of those two to have a much greater lifespan.
It's easy to dismiss critics of modernist architecture as stuffy reactionaries that are more interested in nostalgia and past glories than "progress". And you're right that it's easy to be lazy and opt for pastiche rather than apply some imagination and design talent to a project.
But what you're describing isn't a progression at all but a regression. Progress implies building on what we already know, or at least experimenting to see how we can extend what we know. Modernism and its derivatives, by contrast, opt for an ideological rejection of the cumulative knowledge of building working human settlements. They throw millenia of experience in the bin so that they can slavishly follow a narrow aesthetic agenda. The results might look impressive. They certainly have the attraction of novelty - for a while. But the novelty soon wears off when the occupants realise that they are lab rats in buildings that are scarily impersonal, expensive to maintain, impossible to adapt to future requirements and without getting too new-agey on you, just downright soulless.
I would be the first to say that the 21st Century needs 21st Century architecture. But what it actually gets is a pastiche - there's that word again - of some discredited 20th Century ideas. Modernism and its descendants haven't modernised. We're still just seeing endless rehashing of towers in the (car) park.
Until the early 20th Century, architecture was a conservative profession, not because it was stuffy and moribund, but because most of what there is to be known about how to produce pleasant places to live and work in was already known. The context in which architecture takes place changes gradually according to politics, economics, technology, environment and above all, fashion. What doesn't change are the essential features of what is required as a final product.
The reason why most of the good buildings in my opinion are over 75 years old is not because I prefer old buildings to new ones. It's because they're based on a tradition of what works, rather than desperately trying to be different and "new".
You're wrong that "only the British" hate the useless excresences that you cite. People the world over can tell a pleasant building from a tawdry one. Likewise, you will find representatives of the global architectural/fashion establishment in every country that love them.
For the record, I think that the London Eye is a fantastic innovative structure that does its job incredibly well. But the Gherkin and the Bollock are yet more slick, overbearing Foster Toss which are already highly disliked by many if not most of those that inhabit them. Tower 42 probably doesn't have more than another decade before it's pulled, and I wouldn't expect either of those two to have a much greater lifespan.
Streathamite
ideological dogmatist
But the gherkin is a terrif place to work in, I'm told, as is Lloyds
Reno
The In Kraut
untethered said:
That's an opinion we'll have to disagree on.
If I could afford it I'd happily take a flat in the Barbican or Trellick Tower over any conversion in a Victorian terrace. People who chose to live in these buildings absolutely love their homes. I'm currently attempting to buy a property in a less high profile modernist building (see my thread on the Alexandra Road Estate: http://www.urban75.net/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=144054 ) but due to British tastes and prejudices it's difficult to get a mortgage on concrete ex-council flats and leaseholders who invested in these kind of properties are frequently being fleeced by councils who neglected them for decades.
The problem is that it's ingrained in the British mentality that everybody should have their own house with garden which has resulted in small, cramped living spaces because if you build sideways instead of up you'll have to build small houses. The British will live in the smallest flats of anywhere in Europe as long as they have their own front door.
In most European cities the average height of residential buildings is five to eight floors and people live in much larger flats. My mother lives in a modern and very well maintained social housing estate in Germany and the whole Victorian one bedroom flat I live in would fit into her lounge. Having to balance my dinner on my knees because I can't fit a table into my living room is what I call an unpleasant living space.
and as if the shard was not enough, now it appears that there may be a baby shard to go with it, according to the Suthwark News yesterday. hardly a baby at 2/3 the size of Canary Wharf. although the picture shown in the paper makes it look a good deal smaller than that.
handy1 said:I love them,they're how i make me living.
H
are you a property developer?
I am in 2 minds about new architecture in London.
On one hand I am against new buildings that don't have any architectural context with the surrounding buildings, but on the other hand, I do believe that we cant hold on to the past as Prince Charlie wants us to do. Does he propose all new buildings are built in the style of the Prince Albert Memorial? In my opinion this would be insulting to the style as there is no relevance to it anymore, it would only be a mere imitation. By all means preserve these pieces of art but don't try and copy.
If you look at Foster's roof for the British Museum you will see a perfect synergy of old and contemporary design that flows between ages without conflict.
I agree that some of the proposed buildings look out of context, but also remember that it takes a building years/decades before they fit in. It takes a bold architect to look that far into the future to see what is relevant.
I can see how people wont like the new proposals for London, but what do they suggest? More neoclassical/neoartdeco copycat stuff that might look good now but will be looked back upon as a half hearted imitation in a few decades?
Nobody is going to destroy British architectural heritage by adding new creations. It can only add to our collection of fabulous buildings.
On one hand I am against new buildings that don't have any architectural context with the surrounding buildings, but on the other hand, I do believe that we cant hold on to the past as Prince Charlie wants us to do. Does he propose all new buildings are built in the style of the Prince Albert Memorial? In my opinion this would be insulting to the style as there is no relevance to it anymore, it would only be a mere imitation. By all means preserve these pieces of art but don't try and copy.
If you look at Foster's roof for the British Museum you will see a perfect synergy of old and contemporary design that flows between ages without conflict.
I agree that some of the proposed buildings look out of context, but also remember that it takes a building years/decades before they fit in. It takes a bold architect to look that far into the future to see what is relevant.
I can see how people wont like the new proposals for London, but what do they suggest? More neoclassical/neoartdeco copycat stuff that might look good now but will be looked back upon as a half hearted imitation in a few decades?
Nobody is going to destroy British architectural heritage by adding new creations. It can only add to our collection of fabulous buildings.
Harold Hill
Jay Emm forgot his p/word
Andy the Don said:
I'm expecting the Canary Wharf bubble to burst soon. Almost every move I've heard that banks etc have made from the City to the Docklands have been deeply unpopular. the transport links are nowhere near as good as the city. I suspect when/if staff turnover rates go up and these companies find it harder to attract staff from other firms some will start to move front office staff back to the city which would start a domino effect of other back office/counterparties/brokers etc doing the same, making these projects more viable.
For what its worth re the Swiss Re I don't think 1 Canada Square at Canary Wharf was at full occupancy for at least 10 years (is it even now?). Heard either the HSBC or Citigroup (forgotten which) tower isn't at full occupancy either. Does any large building not wholly used by one firm fill up at once??
lang rabbie
Je ne regrette les gazebos
salaryman said:
Will Alsop's Palestra ?
The overall design is more interesting than most things in Blackfriars Road, but as built all those yellow bits inside the cladding are a really vile day-glo colour. They hit the back of my retina every time I walk past stone cold sober - what effect do they have on someone under the influence?
BTW Does anyone have the foggiest why it is called Palestra
untethered
For industry & decency
Reno said:
I agree with all that. But this argument seems to be becoming polarised into skyscrapers vs. suburban semis, or traditional/classical vs. modern/ist. There's much more to it than that and there are many intermediate positions. Plus, it isn't one size fits all.
The solution for many people in many places is that which you propose, mid-rise, high-density blocks. Many people do need more space in their homes, and equally importantly, they need to be sufficiently clustered together to provide an adequate level of local employment, social opportunities and public facilities. Mid-rise perimeter blocks surrounding semi-private gardens and squares are a good way to do that. Skyscrapers generally aren't.
I'd also challenge one of the implicit assumptions behind this whole thread which is that we think the urban "centre" should be developed in a particular kind of way. Cities can be, and to a large extent, are, polycentric. If you want to raise the denisity of a city, surely the first thing to do would be to intensify the sparse suburbs rather than overdevelop existing high-density areas? If this was done intelligently, those places could have real employment, real communities and real culture, rather than relying on overstretched public transport and packed roads to ferry suburbanites from their dreary dormitories to where the action is.
untethered
For industry & decency
lang rabbie said:BTW Does anyone have the foggiest why it is called Palestra
Because pretentiouspileofartwankbullshit.com was already taken?
untethered
For industry & decency
adsr said:
The "loony Prince Charlie" argument is good for a laugh, but there is a lot more to traditional architecture than nostalgia and recycling the past. The key is to perpetuate the living traditions of building rather than to force everyone to live in a nostalgic theme park. As I have mentioned earlier, that means a gradual process of adaptation based on long experience, not a rash of mould-breaking "artistic statements".
The forces at work here are:
1. What makes the most money?
2. What generates the most attention and free media coverage?
3. Sod context, we need a statement.
4. Public space is someone else's business.
and rarely:
1. What works best?
2. Play nicely with others.
3. It's a building, not a statement.
4. Public space is as important as what's under the our roof.
Foster's Great Court works well because it follows the second set of principles. Good opportunity and an enlightened client no doubt help here. But no matter how skilled he and others may be, when the client whistles, he jumps. And the tune they play generally follows the first set of principles, not the second.
Prince Charles now backs INTBAU and the Prince's Foundation for the Built Environment, both of which are worth a look if you really want to know what he and that section of the profession proposes.
Harold Hill said:
as I understand it, the Daily Telegraph is moving to Victoria from Canary Wharf. as for the second paragraph, I believe the World Trade towers wereempty for twenty years or so.
the B said:
what's the economic interest in that, as far as these banks are concerned?
untethered
For industry & decency
Anyone interested in the politics and economics of some very well known tall buildings might want to take a look at Eric Darton's Divided We Stand, an "architectural biography" of the World Trade Center. It was published in 2000 before the events of 9/11. I'd be interested to know if he plans a new edition or a follow-up.
lang rabbie
Je ne regrette les gazebos
Just seen this week's Architects' Journal:
The site - the triangle in the middle of the Vauxhall cross gyratory
(opposite the bus station and currently filled with advertising hoardings). Not the most obvious location for an "urban forest"
The site - the triangle in the middle of the Vauxhall cross gyratory
(opposite the bus station and currently filled with advertising hoardings). Not the most obvious location for an "urban forest" 
agricola
a genuine importer of owls
I doubt they would get planning permission to build it there - for a start, you would cause chaos at the busiest (IRRC) road junction in the country, you would massively affect the view and light access of the flats that are on the north side of the junction (St Georges Wharf), the bus station would have to move at least during the development, and the area is already heavily developed (when you add the Tower in), both in terms of residential, retail and leisure units.
I would also question whether there is anywhere near the space on that roundabout to build the tower and the necessary access, parking etc as well as accomodating work traffic, cranes etc etc.
I would also question whether there is anywhere near the space on that roundabout to build the tower and the necessary access, parking etc as well as accomodating work traffic, cranes etc etc.
magneze
🎧
I really don't like the idea of London becoming a NY-style high rise city. I went to NY last year and found it quite oppressive - because of all the tall buildings it feels like a very dark city, even in daytime - this is something you just don't get in London and I think we'll miss that if it goes.
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