The problem is that we lionize/demonize architects instead of buildings. OMA has done some great work, some of it not. Most of my gripes with his work are with the detailing, but that's common. Koolhaas likes to write so he is an easy target for the anti-archibablers, but he is far more coherent a Dutchman than many in his field who speak English as a first language. Plus as stated above, it's Office for Metropolitan Architecture, not Rem L. Koolhaas Master Architect. Compared to his peers, often I find his work the least offensive.
the inside is nice, so the outside doesn't need to be nice? the library isn't open 24/7. I know seattle's weather is often pretty miserable - but this is pretty cynical way to look at civic space - which is almost entirely street and sidewalk in cities. Yes, there's a park right across the street, but aside from that trellis-y thing at the entry (which you can't really sit on), there's very little opportunity for public interaction with the envelope of the building. it's all inside or outside - take your pick. really the only thing you can do is urinate on it.
this is a problem in a lot of REM's work - he neglects edges and thresholds - it's all about where spaces overlap, but there's rarely good edge conditions in his work.
It does sound, gwharton, that you object mostly to the park-like use of the public spaces inside the building. You want more exclusion less inclusion ?
I've only seen a few OMA buildings in person. The buildings were very rich spatially and planning always exceptional. It's hard to understand what is objectionable about the office's work other than aesthetic quibbles.
The thing I find most interesting about their work is the ability to always work with culture without putting on airs (oma never claims to be misunderstood artists) and without defining their work as an aesthetic product. It's not an easy thing to do and still be relevant.
A generic world without starchitects is easy to imagine because its the cynical urinal world we live in. Somehow I can't bring myself to wish for more of it. BUT the cool thing about SPL is that it works great as civic building even if people piss on it.
That's great, Miles. There are a lot of programmatic and "cultural" misses with the SPL. There are some scaleless spaces, like the first photo shown, and it feels too techy in places. Then, there is a missed understanding that Seattle has more library usage than any American city per capita, with its prevailing "read a book in niche like privacy on an overcast day with a cup of coffee" culture. The library certainly doesn't allow for that. (Well, coffee is a no go at any library). However, it's just the crazy proportions, for the most part. In Porto PT's Casa de Musica by Rem, the appearance of an asymmetrically cut gem, as seen when approaching it from the Metro a block away works, because it is a performance hall and grandeur is implicit. But, SEA is still a second-tier metro area, and the library is a bit much. The previous central library looked like a converted low-rise bank building and did not beckon anyone to come in. However, that the author says they prefer the suburban Bellevue Library speaks volumes. It's understandable, really. The SPL doesn't mesh being a landmark with a respect for the values and vibes sought in the region's architecture.
as Labrouste was unavailable, they shoulda just built a copy of Hogwarts
but it has circulation problems of its own I guess.
yeah, the place does feel like a bit like a cheap nightclub or a cheap mod hotel. But I still think its worthwhile architecture and when I was in Seattle, it was full of people.
What I admire most about rems work is that it lacks a signature style. Most starchitects are like George Costanza who can't break out of that character.
I've never been one to 'curl up' in a library, so I don't really empathize with that argument, but I can understand where the author is coming from. The author also must have a bias against reading in public parks/areas in general though, such as on a bench in broad day light, on the train, etc., all of which I don't mind and often seek out, rather than a hidden corner in a public space.
As far as the spiral stacks, I acknowledge it takes time to find books just like any other library, but my point was it is much easier to understand, intuitively. As I said before, I've been to countless libraries that are far more difficult to use.. once books are divided between floors, staircases, and elevators, the act of finding books becomes much more challenging than having them all on one continuous plain. You don't really need to consult a plan to find out where a certain stack is in SPL, just follow the path.
Just curious, has anyone been to libraries they feel function better, as far as finding books is concerned? I'm not talking about the Bellevue intimacy thing.
Seeing that the whole point of the library was that the library is not relevant as a traditional library anymore, where people curl up with books, a lot of the criticism is just nonsensical.On the other hand, the kids' area on the ground floor is rather awesome, my kid loved it.
Whatever the SPL may do offensively to the street it more than makes for with the abundance of dymanic and engaging public space inside
the most important public "space" is the edge condition, not just the space itself. all the canted edges in this building basically say "keep off." it forces you to be constantly participating collectively (under the watchful eye of everyone else) rather than temporarily inhabiting the periphery where one can take some respite and allow for more intimate social interaction. I think gwharton's "criticism" - while somewhat crass - is actually pretty revealing- homeless people will tend to stay out of the middle of public spaces because they at least feel a little uncomfortable about their situation - if they're sitting out on the lounge chairs right in the middle of the fucking space it means they have no place else to go - which actually has the effect of making everyone else much less sympathetic toward them and makes the homeless individual feel even more invisible because everyone is now ignoring them - even the people who would normally interact with them on the edge condition.
geesh - I guess no one around here really gives a shit about the work of william whyte, jan gehl, chistopher alexander, etc... I guess we can all just continue talking about how the massing of the building isn't really offensive to the street, the entrancing (and somewhat disturbing) constant observation of human "flows," and something about materials we like and don't like.
Libraries, whether an urban barnacle in Seattle or a gargoyle supporting brown block in Chicago are filled with people with time on their hands. They are there to get out the heat or the cold, read the paper, look at magazines file their unemployment on the computers, watch youtube etc. basically the same thing other people do at their jobs. Children like to go to the library for story time. Old people go there to read about their ailments. Foreigners like it for their hometown newspapers. It isn't the best place to meet women unless you are helping them to file their unemployment forms for the week. Its a good place to get dvds. Most have signs in the bathrooms stating that washing hair and or clothes is a no no. Some have coffee shops.
Wm whyte and Chris Alexander not really good fits for our world. Jan gehl is awesome. Not sure if he would hate Oma or not. I suspect not. Cuz he's an adult. And he knows about the secret life of libraries that vado accidentally let slip. That was very naughty.
what other buildings by Oma do y'all generically dislike? Is it just the library ?
Well, let's see how divorced a lot of architects are from the general public. We love the library, they hate it. Oh no, wait its the other way around. Frustrated architects hate it, while the general public seems to love it .... noooooooo!
Some interesting photos. The red walls are very ... ahem ... red. Maybe WA can legalize prostitution like NV and they can devote part of the building to being a legal bordello. You know, like they did with the city morgue in "The Night Shift" with Henry Winkler and Michael Keaton. The kids don't have to know what's going on. Heck, it could even help pay off the bonds that much earlier. I think that, for Seattleites who have embraced it, it's because they've been handed a landmark. Venturi's Seattle Art Museum (SAM) was also embraced in its day because it was such as uptick from the then current art museum, and then it fell off the radar screen. SAM - tasteful, restrained, conservative, quirky, and goofy, all at the same time. I still don't know what to think of it, and no one really thinks of it that much, actually.
I don't know who william whyte or jan gehl is. Should I read them before or after patrik Schumacher? Cuz im never going to read Schumacher.
there's only one canted edge that the public can interact with - the one across the street from the park. the perp sides are typical Seattle side streets for parking access and the opposite side is basically a large overhang over an entrance. No seating, but hey you wont get wet and the interactivity of the street is minimally maintained, perhaps in a more friendly way than the canted side.
I agree with Q - the most important space is the one you walk into. all this talk about overlap and edges seems like half-read homeless theory.
Yelp reviews?
Borromini would shit a curvy brick and then stab himself.
sameddoctor, the public also loves McDonalds, McMansions, Steven Segal movies, deep fried butter on a stick, new jeans that come ripped and stained, pants riding low to expose boxers, Hummers (at least they did for a while), really bad politicians enough to vote them in repeatedly, etc.
A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky dangerous animals and you know it. Everything they've ever "known" has been proven to be wrong. A thousand years ago everybody knew as a fact, that the earth was the center of the universe. Five hundred years ago, everybody knew that the Earth was flat, and fifteen minutes ago, you knew that humans were alone on it. Imagine what you'll know tomorrow.
this is the problem with your framework miles - its indecisive. if a project is too successfully edgy - you can call it a success because its unpopular or unused. It can be unsuccessful on all fronts but be the only game in town and thus be consistently filled (ie popular). It can be unsuccessful on all fronts and just be popular (pomo, Seaside style). it could be a programmatic success and be unpopular aesthetically. It could be bad for people like McD and be popular. It could be aesthetically bad and be popular (pomo seaside style - wink wink).
etc etc infinitum.
this is why I called your comment a McGuffin. Could have called it a leaky bucket - it seeps in all directions, despite having a hatred for people at its core. I don't think anyone else is equating success and popularity - I think people are emphasizing that the place gets used as intended, despite its flaws. That's a version of success which develops popularity and does not participate in the characterization you're trying to place upon it.
The effect of linking the ehemmm 'avant garde' with McDonalds the way you did was a nice move. it was a good aphorism, but I think one that rings hollow if anyone spends thirty minutes to think about it.
im a bottle and a half to the wind and I just wrote the post I was trying to avoid having to write. feeelings.......
It can be unsuccessful on all fronts but be the only game in town and thus be consistently filled (ie popular).
...
The place gets used, despite it's flaws
It seems we are in agreement. Where we differ seems to be that I think architects have a greater responsibility than what we see evidenced by the work of the most notable (for lack of a better term). It is certainly a cultural thing, influenced by money and media, neither of which are arbiters of success (for me).
Thus we seem to have boiled this down to semantics, specifically the definition of success. For some that would be money, or media exposure, or hordes of people (regardless of whether or not they were other options for them).
For me it's more about sustainability, environmental responsibility and programmatic functionality. Subjective aesthetics are the most visible and least important factor in regard to those qualities.
Starchitects are the darlings of a stupid, status-conscious society that is ignorant of fundamental principles.
Great, you argue about how the "public" cannot use the civic edge of the builidng, and when when i post a Yelp review, which is of course, very "public", you come up in arms about it being very, lets say pedestrian. So what exactly are you trying to point out?
"For me it's more about sustainability, environmental responsibility and programmatic functionality. Subjective aesthetics are the most visible and least important factor in regard to those qualities." Great, hope this works out for you, or you are going to be bitter all your life. Oh, and I can argue that the SPL is one of the most sustainable libraries around because people actually use it, as opposed to many other downtown libraries.
By the way, if Rem ever read this forum, he would be jumping in joy that hes being compared to Disneyland or Mc Donalds. After all, did he not validate "dross" as a valid urban form?
I agree that the 'edge condition' is a moot issue in this case. Quondam is pretty much stating the obvious. That this building goes against a dominant culture of hermetic institutions-buildings exempts it from the being conceived within the rationale of remedial measures. Perhaps similarly, you wouldn't ask about the edge conditions or inside-outside interface of a covered alleyway or bazaar. The access to many bazaars is pretty abrupt.
Just to pose the question whether this rationale of remedial measures by creating a complex interface between the outside and the inside goes hand-in-hand with the increased now predominance of -spatial hermeticism? And cynically viewed , wouldn't the the latter be a ploy to divert attention away from the underlying sociopathy of an institutionally parcelled urban environment...therefore an illusion. Would you be happier with the illusion over a genuine affordment of a covered liberal space?
"And cynically viewed , wouldn't the the latter be a ploy"
I meant to say the former not latter.
Quondam, mine was a 'continued reading' of your point.
Also, I'm thinking that the desired interface between building and physical context would be subservient to the globally self replicating economic context. I mean that any such spatial interface would be largely conceived as profit engineering for the major institutions that are physically condensed within the building or for the hub of secondary institutions occupying the ground floor. What is good for institutions is what is good for the people and nay differentiation between. The illusionary porosity - cappuccino froth- of the building at the level of minimum substance/significance and, yet, maximum accessibility, I.e. the ground floor, typically houses other institutions to maximise the influx and movement of capital. The Seattle library seems to me the antithesis of this. Funny, I thought Rem was a doyen of archi-capitalism. This looks like it needs more thought..
By the way, if Rem ever read this forum, he would be jumping in joy that hes being compared to Disneyland or Mc Donalds. After all, did he not validate "dross" as a valid urban form?
drossnoun
1: the scum that forms on the surface of molten metal
2: waste or foreign matter : impurity
3: something that is base, trivial, or inferior
Miles, so you start by saying everyone hates it and then when it becomes clear that some people (possibly quite a few people) actually love it, you say everyone is stupid. why not just say you don't like it and not worry about justifying it. it would be more honest.
any architecture that is loved as much as mcdonalds is at least worth taking seriously. so little of what we do is ever accepted or understood by the public so im pretty interested in anything that can turn that trick. except neo-classical. But that's cool cuz you know everyone hates it, or if they like it they're stupid. ok fine i just don't like neo-classical.
@ spike, wm whyte was famous for measuring the effect of public space design ages ago. he also wrote a truly ignorant book about suburbia that everyone should think about reading someday. Personally I think he has done a lot more harm than good.
jan gehl is an architect who is really very good at urban planning. its all public space centred, people on the streets sort of thing. very cool. not always necessary in my mind. maybe rem could have done more, maybe it was not a real issue. i think it speaks more about the city than the OMA design approach.
will, read my posts. Not what you think I said but what I actually wrote.
I didn't say everyone hates "it" (SPL?) or everyone is stupid. I said popularity is a dubious measure of success, cited examples, and ended up with a definition of success. I also posted a critique of the SPL by a noted critic and an essay about architectural responsibility that uses SPL as a poor example. In fact I never mentioned my own opinion of SPL, although what I think of Koolhaas and other starchitects is pretty clear.
How you get from that to neoclassic style - or doc to "clean" modernism - is an absolute mystery to me. Are you completely unconscious of practical effects and consequences? Or is a pretty facade (in your eye, anyway) enough to allow you to forget them?
any architecture that is loved as much as McDonalds is at least worth taking seriously.
I'm aghast that you think McD's is loved for it's architecture (golden arches aren't architecture, they're signage). McD's is "loved" because of aggressive marketing to children with free toys and poisonous, dirt cheap food substitute (pink slime and sugar). Between that and the deforestation of the Amazon to raise ever increasing amounts of cattle for "beef" (pink slime) I couldn't care if they had the most exquisite architecture ever produced as it would only be a monument to the rest of their practices. Or is profit your measure of success?
^I dont think he was referring to 'the architecture of McDonalds' rather its popularity as a brand, style (of food and everything else) and institution. Ironically, in Europe, McDonalds tend to be much more up market in their interior design (and are often located in renovated historic buildings).
I find it hilarious that this conversation focuses on one building of OMA (now a 300 person corporate powerhouse). Rem is best understood and critiqued through his writing. The buildings are somewhat of an afterthought, though now produced in such volume (well, unbuilt projects included) that they become an essay or oevre in their own right. One can imagine how much Rem is actually involved in most projects. There are, I believe 6 or 7 other partners. The man is in his late 70s, though i'm sure sleeps little, and have heard tell via the grapevine that he doesn't drink a wick of alcohol ever. At any rate, you may not like Rem's buildings (or le Corbusier's), but it would be a little silly to underestimate the explosive influence of his writing, diagramming, design process etc. His writing has brought cultural critique firmly into the profession. He has used diagrams and created the fetish we now see for them, and to very successfully spatially plan (in plan and section) his buildings. I would even go so far as his design process, akin to creating multiple options at every stage of design, and at any juncture caused by a new question, has spread endemically throughout the industry. Perhaps it has always been this way, but it seems like a relentless business-ification, of fordist-production line like consequences, of the design process. It allows design to become a simple series of steps, or decisions to be made by a project architect, having been given an overview by the never ending work of minions. I could go on to discuss his self-promotion, the research work of AMO (now with Prada as its patron) or his production of books in itself. These aspects of his work are also spreading like wildfire through the avante-garde (starchitects) and even the mass design industry, partly through his many many progeny.
n.b. I prefer to use the term 'the avante-garde' instead of starchitects. Most of these companies from my knowledge are prolific, but run on small budgets, often possible through the use of hordes of interns. This 'poor-but-famous' situation seems best described as 'the avante-garde'. They do not make up a large share of architectural revenues, let alone of the construction industry as a whole.
Do you really find this hilarious? Are you LOLing? Or was it a smug expression signifying nothing more than a baseless admonishment to make it appear that your post has more substance than the others' above - while obviously nothing you said actually detracts from the validity of digressing into a postulation on one of his seminal built projects. You are not, for example,able to make your point without offending our intelligence? Must we offend yours in return and inform you that the content of your post, rotterdamarchitect, is already beknownst to us. Did you really provide any, any insight besides the one into your smugness?
Sorry I should correct it to be 'I find it a little limited'. Also, i find you're response to be a little like an emotional ad-homonym attack. I was just trying to contribute to the discussion and provoke a response, but you havn't responded to anything I've said, because....you already understand these things to be true, or given with Koolhaas? Enlighten me, as obviously I havn't understood the situation. I was trying to open up the floor to a discussion of the architect, rather than just one building.
Its limited because it is our choice to limit it not because we were primed to be oblivious objects of your ignominious hilarity but because it 1. Is an interesting digression 2. sheds light on-or more truthfully teases out- the possibilities of bigger pictures.
It is not an ad hominem attack on your person. It is a reaction to your trivialization of others' well intentioned contributions (and I'm reacting because I'm involved). If you take that backlash personally, then you need to trace it back to the origin of you offence initiating person.
Open the floor for yourself but don't close another for others. No need to enlighten you further.
Ok, well thank you for the lesson. I'm only 21, so I am quite sure that I have a lot to learn; particularly from people like you. But would you perhaps digress from your main argument to discuss the aspects that i've mentioned? Diagramming et. al. Or at least some of Rem Koolhaas' other buildings ; the theoretical 'Voluntary Prisoners' and 'Jussieu - Two Libraries, the domestic 'Patio Villa' and 'Villa D'Alva', or the institutional 'Kunsthal' or 'CCTV Headquarters'. At the moment, it seems like Americans speaking about an his only building in America. I am also American by the way.
Rotterdamarchitect, dont mind tammuz. You will meet many like him/her in your career (I say that just because you mentioned youre 21). He/She is probably good at her/his job, but convolutes the hell out of any argument with archispeak banter.
sameolddoctor, I'm not to blame for irking the puritanical worm residing in your or anyone else's protestantly tight rectum. should you not appreciate or wish to engage with me, then you have all the right to ignore my posts and my person in absolute. i encourage that. i do not tell you that i find your intellect uninteresting and wanting, do I? in return, can you not be civil enough and mind yourself. rotterdamarchitect i(and at 21, his mother should have already taught her or him some manners) is calling other people's posts trivial and you tell him not to mind me? what are you, his anally constricted messiah?
tammuz, I am sorry I was not clear enough and was being nice. I just intended to say that your 90s archi-banter is completely worthless in this day and age.
Why is everyone bashing OMA and Rem Koolhaas?
@Quondom:
the inside is nice, so the outside doesn't need to be nice? the library isn't open 24/7. I know seattle's weather is often pretty miserable - but this is pretty cynical way to look at civic space - which is almost entirely street and sidewalk in cities. Yes, there's a park right across the street, but aside from that trellis-y thing at the entry (which you can't really sit on), there's very little opportunity for public interaction with the envelope of the building. it's all inside or outside - take your pick. really the only thing you can do is urinate on it.
this is a problem in a lot of REM's work - he neglects edges and thresholds - it's all about where spaces overlap, but there's rarely good edge conditions in his work.
It does sound, gwharton, that you object mostly to the park-like use of the public spaces inside the building. You want more exclusion less inclusion ?
I've only seen a few OMA buildings in person. The buildings were very rich spatially and planning always exceptional. It's hard to understand what is objectionable about the office's work other than aesthetic quibbles.
The thing I find most interesting about their work is the ability to always work with culture without putting on airs (oma never claims to be misunderstood artists) and without defining their work as an aesthetic product. It's not an easy thing to do and still be relevant.
A generic world without starchitects is easy to imagine because its the cynical urinal world we live in. Somehow I can't bring myself to wish for more of it. BUT the cool thing about SPL is that it works great as civic building even if people piss on it.
How the new Central Library really stacks up
That's great, Miles. There are a lot of programmatic and "cultural" misses with the SPL. There are some scaleless spaces, like the first photo shown, and it feels too techy in places. Then, there is a missed understanding that Seattle has more library usage than any American city per capita, with its prevailing "read a book in niche like privacy on an overcast day with a cup of coffee" culture. The library certainly doesn't allow for that. (Well, coffee is a no go at any library). However, it's just the crazy proportions, for the most part. In Porto PT's Casa de Musica by Rem, the appearance of an asymmetrically cut gem, as seen when approaching it from the Metro a block away works, because it is a performance hall and grandeur is implicit. But, SEA is still a second-tier metro area, and the library is a bit much. The previous central library looked like a converted low-rise bank building and did not beckon anyone to come in. However, that the author says they prefer the suburban Bellevue Library speaks volumes. It's understandable, really. The SPL doesn't mesh being a landmark with a respect for the values and vibes sought in the region's architecture.
OA- Rem, you cynical bastard! FUCK U!..
Rem- Hey O, I call you tomorrow. Thanks.
feelings . . .
nothing more than feelings.
the unassailable ground of feelings
as Labrouste was unavailable, they shoulda just built a copy of Hogwarts
but it has circulation problems of its own I guess.
yeah, the place does feel like a bit like a cheap nightclub or a cheap mod hotel. But I still think its worthwhile architecture and when I was in Seattle, it was full of people.
^ And McDonald's is a $100 billion corporation. Measuring success with popularity is essentially a measure of stupidity.
interesting move, miles . . .
very interesting . . .
but I think your sweet aphorism might be something of a McGuffin
Spike - It took you half an hour to come up with that?
What I admire most about rems work is that it lacks a signature style. Most starchitects are like George Costanza who can't break out of that character.
I've never been one to 'curl up' in a library, so I don't really empathize with that argument, but I can understand where the author is coming from. The author also must have a bias against reading in public parks/areas in general though, such as on a bench in broad day light, on the train, etc., all of which I don't mind and often seek out, rather than a hidden corner in a public space.
As far as the spiral stacks, I acknowledge it takes time to find books just like any other library, but my point was it is much easier to understand, intuitively. As I said before, I've been to countless libraries that are far more difficult to use.. once books are divided between floors, staircases, and elevators, the act of finding books becomes much more challenging than having them all on one continuous plain. You don't really need to consult a plan to find out where a certain stack is in SPL, just follow the path.
Just curious, has anyone been to libraries they feel function better, as far as finding books is concerned? I'm not talking about the Bellevue intimacy thing.
^(and I'm confident there are other great examples)
Seeing that the whole point of the library was that the library is not relevant as a traditional library anymore, where people curl up with books, a lot of the criticism is just nonsensical.On the other hand, the kids' area on the ground floor is rather awesome, my kid loved it.
Miles - What can I say? It was truly a sweet aphorism.
like a gelatinous treat that lost shape under the pressure of thoughtful consideration
Take it as a compliment.
Kids love it too!
Argument Officially Over.
@quondom:
Whatever the SPL may do offensively to the street it more than makes for with the abundance of dymanic and engaging public space inside
the most important public "space" is the edge condition, not just the space itself. all the canted edges in this building basically say "keep off." it forces you to be constantly participating collectively (under the watchful eye of everyone else) rather than temporarily inhabiting the periphery where one can take some respite and allow for more intimate social interaction. I think gwharton's "criticism" - while somewhat crass - is actually pretty revealing- homeless people will tend to stay out of the middle of public spaces because they at least feel a little uncomfortable about their situation - if they're sitting out on the lounge chairs right in the middle of the fucking space it means they have no place else to go - which actually has the effect of making everyone else much less sympathetic toward them and makes the homeless individual feel even more invisible because everyone is now ignoring them - even the people who would normally interact with them on the edge condition.
geesh - I guess no one around here really gives a shit about the work of william whyte, jan gehl, chistopher alexander, etc... I guess we can all just continue talking about how the massing of the building isn't really offensive to the street, the entrancing (and somewhat disturbing) constant observation of human "flows," and something about materials we like and don't like.
Libraries, whether an urban barnacle in Seattle or a gargoyle supporting brown block in Chicago are filled with people with time on their hands. They are there to get out the heat or the cold, read the paper, look at magazines file their unemployment on the computers, watch youtube etc. basically the same thing other people do at their jobs. Children like to go to the library for story time. Old people go there to read about their ailments. Foreigners like it for their hometown newspapers. It isn't the best place to meet women unless you are helping them to file their unemployment forms for the week. Its a good place to get dvds. Most have signs in the bathrooms stating that washing hair and or clothes is a no no. Some have coffee shops.
Towards an Architecture of Place
what other buildings by Oma do y'all generically dislike? Is it just the library ?
They are there to (do) basically the same thing other people do at their jobs.
This is a brilliant observation.
A cavernous place, where the halls are neon and the crowds are weird, but the light is always beautiful and the internet is always on
We can discuss other OMA buildings, but first a moment of appreciation from a Seattle resident.
Well, let's see how divorced a lot of architects are from the general public. We love the library, they hate it. Oh no, wait its the other way around. Frustrated architects hate it, while the general public seems to love it .... noooooooo!
http://www.yelp.com/biz/seattle-public-library-central-library-seattle
Okay, now lets use archi-banter to counter what the masses have to say.
Some interesting photos. The red walls are very ... ahem ... red. Maybe WA can legalize prostitution like NV and they can devote part of the building to being a legal bordello. You know, like they did with the city morgue in "The Night Shift" with Henry Winkler and Michael Keaton. The kids don't have to know what's going on. Heck, it could even help pay off the bonds that much earlier. I think that, for Seattleites who have embraced it, it's because they've been handed a landmark. Venturi's Seattle Art Museum (SAM) was also embraced in its day because it was such as uptick from the then current art museum, and then it fell off the radar screen. SAM - tasteful, restrained, conservative, quirky, and goofy, all at the same time. I still don't know what to think of it, and no one really thinks of it that much, actually.
best Observant post in ages. Nice job! Like a wine finally coming into it own. Delicious.
I don't know who william whyte or jan gehl is. Should I read them before or after patrik Schumacher? Cuz im never going to read Schumacher.
there's only one canted edge that the public can interact with - the one across the street from the park. the perp sides are typical Seattle side streets for parking access and the opposite side is basically a large overhang over an entrance. No seating, but hey you wont get wet and the interactivity of the street is minimally maintained, perhaps in a more friendly way than the canted side.
I agree with Q - the most important space is the one you walk into. all this talk about overlap and edges seems like half-read homeless theory.
Yelp reviews?
Borromini would shit a curvy brick and then stab himself.
as opposed to just stabbing himself.
sameddoctor, the public also loves McDonalds, McMansions, Steven Segal movies, deep fried butter on a stick, new jeans that come ripped and stained, pants riding low to expose boxers, Hummers (at least they did for a while), really bad politicians enough to vote them in repeatedly, etc.
A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky dangerous animals and you know it. Everything they've ever "known" has been proven to be wrong. A thousand years ago everybody knew as a fact, that the earth was the center of the universe. Five hundred years ago, everybody knew that the Earth was flat, and fifteen minutes ago, you knew that humans were alone on it. Imagine what you'll know tomorrow.
this is the problem with your framework miles - its indecisive. if a project is too successfully edgy - you can call it a success because its unpopular or unused. It can be unsuccessful on all fronts but be the only game in town and thus be consistently filled (ie popular). It can be unsuccessful on all fronts and just be popular (pomo, Seaside style). it could be a programmatic success and be unpopular aesthetically. It could be bad for people like McD and be popular. It could be aesthetically bad and be popular (pomo seaside style - wink wink).
etc etc infinitum.
this is why I called your comment a McGuffin. Could have called it a leaky bucket - it seeps in all directions, despite having a hatred for people at its core. I don't think anyone else is equating success and popularity - I think people are emphasizing that the place gets used as intended, despite its flaws. That's a version of success which develops popularity and does not participate in the characterization you're trying to place upon it.
The effect of linking the ehemmm 'avant garde' with McDonalds the way you did was a nice move. it was a good aphorism, but I think one that rings hollow if anyone spends thirty minutes to think about it.
im a bottle and a half to the wind and I just wrote the post I was trying to avoid having to write. feeelings.......
nothing more than feeelings.....
best shit ever.
It can be unsuccessful on all fronts but be the only game in town and thus be consistently filled (ie popular).
...
The place gets used, despite it's flaws
It seems we are in agreement. Where we differ seems to be that I think architects have a greater responsibility than what we see evidenced by the work of the most notable (for lack of a better term). It is certainly a cultural thing, influenced by money and media, neither of which are arbiters of success (for me).
Thus we seem to have boiled this down to semantics, specifically the definition of success. For some that would be money, or media exposure, or hordes of people (regardless of whether or not they were other options for them).
For me it's more about sustainability, environmental responsibility and programmatic functionality. Subjective aesthetics are the most visible and least important factor in regard to those qualities.
Starchitects are the darlings of a stupid, status-conscious society that is ignorant of fundamental principles.
Great, you argue about how the "public" cannot use the civic edge of the builidng, and when when i post a Yelp review, which is of course, very "public", you come up in arms about it being very, lets say pedestrian. So what exactly are you trying to point out?
"For me it's more about sustainability, environmental responsibility and programmatic functionality. Subjective aesthetics are the most visible and least important factor in regard to those qualities." Great, hope this works out for you, or you are going to be bitter all your life. Oh, and I can argue that the SPL is one of the most sustainable libraries around because people actually use it, as opposed to many other downtown libraries.
By the way, if Rem ever read this forum, he would be jumping in joy that hes being compared to Disneyland or Mc Donalds. After all, did he not validate "dross" as a valid urban form?
I agree that the 'edge condition' is a moot issue in this case. Quondam is pretty much stating the obvious. That this building goes against a dominant culture of hermetic institutions-buildings exempts it from the being conceived within the rationale of remedial measures. Perhaps similarly, you wouldn't ask about the edge conditions or inside-outside interface of a covered alleyway or bazaar. The access to many bazaars is pretty abrupt.
Just to pose the question whether this rationale of remedial measures by creating a complex interface between the outside and the inside goes hand-in-hand with the increased now predominance of -spatial hermeticism? And cynically viewed , wouldn't the the latter be a ploy to divert attention away from the underlying sociopathy of an institutionally parcelled urban environment...therefore an illusion. Would you be happier with the illusion over a genuine affordment of a covered liberal space?
^ you are why this field is broken.
"And cynically viewed , wouldn't the the latter be a ploy"
I meant to say the former not latter.
Quondam, mine was a 'continued reading' of your point.
Also, I'm thinking that the desired interface between building and physical context would be subservient to the globally self replicating economic context. I mean that any such spatial interface would be largely conceived as profit engineering for the major institutions that are physically condensed within the building or for the hub of secondary institutions occupying the ground floor. What is good for institutions is what is good for the people and nay differentiation between. The illusionary porosity - cappuccino froth- of the building at the level of minimum substance/significance and, yet, maximum accessibility, I.e. the ground floor, typically houses other institutions to maximise the influx and movement of capital. The Seattle library seems to me the antithesis of this. Funny, I thought Rem was a doyen of archi-capitalism. This looks like it needs more thought..
By the way, if Rem ever read this forum, he would be jumping in joy that hes being compared to Disneyland or Mc Donalds. After all, did he not validate "dross" as a valid urban form?
dross noun
1: the scum that forms on the surface of molten metal
2: waste or foreign matter : impurity
3: something that is base, trivial, or inferior
How high we aspire. Alas.
Miles, so you start by saying everyone hates it and then when it becomes clear that some people (possibly quite a few people) actually love it, you say everyone is stupid. why not just say you don't like it and not worry about justifying it. it would be more honest.
any architecture that is loved as much as mcdonalds is at least worth taking seriously. so little of what we do is ever accepted or understood by the public so im pretty interested in anything that can turn that trick. except neo-classical. But that's cool cuz you know everyone hates it, or if they like it they're stupid. ok fine i just don't like neo-classical.
@ spike, wm whyte was famous for measuring the effect of public space design ages ago. he also wrote a truly ignorant book about suburbia that everyone should think about reading someday. Personally I think he has done a lot more harm than good.
jan gehl is an architect who is really very good at urban planning. its all public space centred, people on the streets sort of thing. very cool. not always necessary in my mind. maybe rem could have done more, maybe it was not a real issue. i think it speaks more about the city than the OMA design approach.
Actually it was not Koolhaas, it was Lars Lerup (Stim and Dross).
But Miles, open your eyes, its a new world now and we are not stuck in the era of "clean" modernism....
will, read my posts. Not what you think I said but what I actually wrote.
I didn't say everyone hates "it" (SPL?) or everyone is stupid. I said popularity is a dubious measure of success, cited examples, and ended up with a definition of success. I also posted a critique of the SPL by a noted critic and an essay about architectural responsibility that uses SPL as a poor example. In fact I never mentioned my own opinion of SPL, although what I think of Koolhaas and other starchitects is pretty clear.
How you get from that to neoclassic style - or doc to "clean" modernism - is an absolute mystery to me. Are you completely unconscious of practical effects and consequences? Or is a pretty facade (in your eye, anyway) enough to allow you to forget them?
any architecture that is loved as much as McDonalds is at least worth taking seriously.
I'm aghast that you think McD's is loved for it's architecture (golden arches aren't architecture, they're signage). McD's is "loved" because of aggressive marketing to children with free toys and poisonous, dirt cheap food substitute (pink slime and sugar). Between that and the deforestation of the Amazon to raise ever increasing amounts of cattle for "beef" (pink slime) I couldn't care if they had the most exquisite architecture ever produced as it would only be a monument to the rest of their practices. Or is profit your measure of success?
Ha, I do not know who mentioned Mc Donalds here, but here is the yelp review for a Micky Ds in Seattle
http://www.yelp.com/biz/mcdonalds-seattle-10#query:mc%20donald%20restaurant
^I dont think he was referring to 'the architecture of McDonalds' rather its popularity as a brand, style (of food and everything else) and institution. Ironically, in Europe, McDonalds tend to be much more up market in their interior design (and are often located in renovated historic buildings).
I find it hilarious that this conversation focuses on one building of OMA (now a 300 person corporate powerhouse). Rem is best understood and critiqued through his writing. The buildings are somewhat of an afterthought, though now produced in such volume (well, unbuilt projects included) that they become an essay or oevre in their own right. One can imagine how much Rem is actually involved in most projects. There are, I believe 6 or 7 other partners. The man is in his late 70s, though i'm sure sleeps little, and have heard tell via the grapevine that he doesn't drink a wick of alcohol ever. At any rate, you may not like Rem's buildings (or le Corbusier's), but it would be a little silly to underestimate the explosive influence of his writing, diagramming, design process etc. His writing has brought cultural critique firmly into the profession. He has used diagrams and created the fetish we now see for them, and to very successfully spatially plan (in plan and section) his buildings. I would even go so far as his design process, akin to creating multiple options at every stage of design, and at any juncture caused by a new question, has spread endemically throughout the industry. Perhaps it has always been this way, but it seems like a relentless business-ification, of fordist-production line like consequences, of the design process. It allows design to become a simple series of steps, or decisions to be made by a project architect, having been given an overview by the never ending work of minions. I could go on to discuss his self-promotion, the research work of AMO (now with Prada as its patron) or his production of books in itself. These aspects of his work are also spreading like wildfire through the avante-garde (starchitects) and even the mass design industry, partly through his many many progeny.
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-te2sXqhBazk/TWEca9zrJtI/AAAAAAAAFQ4/zOexuib9LyA/s1600/rem+koolhaas-children-ofspring-startups.jpg
n.b. I prefer to use the term 'the avante-garde' instead of starchitects. Most of these companies from my knowledge are prolific, but run on small budgets, often possible through the use of hordes of interns. This 'poor-but-famous' situation seems best described as 'the avante-garde'. They do not make up a large share of architectural revenues, let alone of the construction industry as a whole.
Why do you find it hilarious? Are you actually laughing? Or is it a smug expression signifying moral of some moral
Some of us found it interesting to discuss a specific building of his; in what way does that
Tablets!
Do you really find this hilarious? Are you LOLing? Or was it a smug expression signifying nothing more than a baseless admonishment to make it appear that your post has more substance than the others' above - while obviously nothing you said actually detracts from the validity of digressing into a postulation on one of his seminal built projects. You are not, for example,able to make your point without offending our intelligence? Must we offend yours in return and inform you that the content of your post, rotterdamarchitect, is already beknownst to us. Did you really provide any, any insight besides the one into your smugness?
Sorry I should correct it to be 'I find it a little limited'. Also, i find you're response to be a little like an emotional ad-homonym attack. I was just trying to contribute to the discussion and provoke a response, but you havn't responded to anything I've said, because....you already understand these things to be true, or given with Koolhaas? Enlighten me, as obviously I havn't understood the situation. I was trying to open up the floor to a discussion of the architect, rather than just one building.
Its limited because it is our choice to limit it not because we were primed to be oblivious objects of your ignominious hilarity but because it 1. Is an interesting digression 2. sheds light on-or more truthfully teases out- the possibilities of bigger pictures.
It is not an ad hominem attack on your person. It is a reaction to your trivialization of others' well intentioned contributions (and I'm reacting because I'm involved). If you take that backlash personally, then you need to trace it back to the origin of you offence initiating person.
Open the floor for yourself but don't close another for others. No need to enlighten you further.
Ok, well thank you for the lesson. I'm only 21, so I am quite sure that I have a lot to learn; particularly from people like you. But would you perhaps digress from your main argument to discuss the aspects that i've mentioned? Diagramming et. al. Or at least some of Rem Koolhaas' other buildings ; the theoretical 'Voluntary Prisoners' and 'Jussieu - Two Libraries, the domestic 'Patio Villa' and 'Villa D'Alva', or the institutional 'Kunsthal' or 'CCTV Headquarters'. At the moment, it seems like Americans speaking about an his only building in America. I am also American by the way.
Rotterdamarchitect, dont mind tammuz. You will meet many like him/her in your career (I say that just because you mentioned youre 21). He/She is probably good at her/his job, but convolutes the hell out of any argument with archispeak banter.
rotterdamarchitect, I'm not american.
sameolddoctor, I'm not to blame for irking the puritanical worm residing in your or anyone else's protestantly tight rectum. should you not appreciate or wish to engage with me, then you have all the right to ignore my posts and my person in absolute. i encourage that. i do not tell you that i find your intellect uninteresting and wanting, do I? in return, can you not be civil enough and mind yourself. rotterdamarchitect i(and at 21, his mother should have already taught her or him some manners) is calling other people's posts trivial and you tell him not to mind me? what are you, his anally constricted messiah?
doc, Please wipe your feet. You seemed to have stepped in something and are tracking it through the foroom.
tammuz, I am sorry I was not clear enough and was being nice. I just intended to say that your 90s archi-banter is completely worthless in this day and age.
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