Frankly, i think the guy who put up the sign is an egotistical jackass.

Just one more reason that when I build my own home its probably gonna be in the middle of nowhere, or at least obscured by woods.

The angry neighbor/'victim's house ain't so great either.

Exactly: that McMansion on the right is the piece of crap.

A lot of the commenters state that it's somehow wrong to put up a modern house in a neighborhood of "traditional" houses, that "blending in to the neighborhood" is the only acceptable solution. I don't understand this viewpoint: I was here first so your freedoms don't matter? If something is bad but everyone else is doing it it must be good? Change is not allowed?

xactly LB.

Buncha fascists and commies if you ask me!

Both houses look crappy. Waterfront structures almost always do.

lots of people on that forum worried about how this house does or doesn't fit in.

'fits in' is objectively meaningless, i.e., it means what any one person wants it to mean for his/her own situation and based on his/her own predilections.

only when put in the form of zoning regulations or deed restrictions do these opinions become meaningful - and that's only because these restrictions are an agreement that a critical mass of people hold the same opinions.

Part of the point here is that the sign-guy thinks his own house is "tasteful design." And, sadly, I bet the majority of Americans would agree, because the majority of Americans like quasi-historical crap.

However! That doesn't make Eric Cobb's building good, just because it's modern (and I'm generally a supporter of good modern.) It could be awful when it's finished, and badly sited, and offensive.

This looks like a situation where two people with bad taste are battling it out over whose taste is worse.

But both are equally valid under the zoning regulations, as Steven points out. The beauty of America. We all get to be jackasses!

If the owner had just extended the concrete wall across the entire project, then it could be seen as social commentary. But the one wall is sort of a half-statement.

I'd rather live in the one that's under construction (when it's done) than that McMansion next door. The person who built that large McMansion probably built in someones backyard at one point. However it seems really crowded in there - but that doesn't really have much to do with the style of the new house - that's more of a zoning issue. Now I'm going to check out that architect's website.

The cobb house is very big for a "modern" home. Large modernist homes rarely work IMO.

A lot of times they knock down small bungalows or cottages from the 20's to build these waterfront monstrosities.

go to 'morell residence'

i think this guy was in dwell recently (the home page photo)

yeah it's a huge house but i dig it

damn! i'm scrolling through his work and it's some nice eye candy

who cares if it's a monstrosity cobb does some nice detailing ..

Actually, that could be pretty hot FRaC. I like the "prison wall", it keeps him separate from his asshole neighbor!

The bittersweet irony is, depending on how the house is constructed and detailed it could easily become way more expensive than the neighbor's pad.

i can understand why the neighbor is pissed. he has to stare at a big ass wall. regardless of the style of either of the houses, it wasn't a very neighborly thing to build there.

a. it's mercer island. gross.

b. it's eric cobb, so it'll be an expensive, well detailed box.

c. apparently people are stupid and seem to think the only thing you can build next to sh*t is more ugly sh*t.

d. the guy with the modern house would have had to look at the fugly abortion next to him.

frankly, i think it's awesome. more seattle passive-aggressive b.s.

and it's a replay of what happened w/ pb elemental's queen anne house

pb's queen anne house also came to my mind when i read that story. ugh.

BOTH HOUSES SUCK

the guy who put up the sign is being a baby. bitching comes with doing contemporary architecture.

I personally prefer the Graham House over the McMansion to the right.
The McMansion is more out-of-Place and improperly sited than the new neighbor. Who's the one with bad taste. I suspect the prison wall was added during design with each successive problem from Sign Guy. People should hire Architects and not choose their EIFS three-fireplace Faux Chateaus from a book.

"I suspect the prison wall was added during design with each successive problem from Sign Guy."

i had the same thought...

funny thing though, is that the wall sometimes comes from the other direction. i once worked on a commercial project that was adjacent to sfr zoning. one evening, after protracted negotiations with the neighbors, one homeowner said that she'd prefer a 30' tall concrete block wall (full-on allowable zoning envelope and upslope from her lot mind you) visible from her home rather than give us 50' of alley & parking re-zoned for the commercial development.

i had to stop her and get confirmation, "do you know what a 30' tall concrete block wall in your backyard would really look like from your home??"

holz's post is spot on. i think it looks like a big modern middle finger. modern architecture can be done better than this.

one could argue the wall might act as an off-gassing curb from the neighbor's VOC dwelling

el jeffe: Did you end up building the concrete wall? If so, any pictures?

we didn't get to proceed with the project. the developer had too much of a history with the neighborhood and they wouldn't let him do jack. he ended up selling the parcel and another arch did it.
here's what they get to look at...still under construction.

pocz, is that a cobb rendering?!? it's hella fugly

Odd that a member of the AIA might be so out of touch with typical neighborhoods and their respective residents.

What a pity that without codes and committees, architects can't even determine whether or not something fits in well.

Ah, the rarified luxury of ARCHITECTURE!

Enjoy.

kurt, read Steven's comment above re: "fits in".

In this neighborhood, if it has no community-sanctioned aesthetic requirements, anything can "fit in", depending on who you are asking.

In a neighborhood of trophy-house-on-steroids, any style goes as long as it proudly proclaims its bigness.

^very true

it's not a community, it's an assorted collection of residences for the uber wealthy, each is an oasis away from reality, at least the normal reality.

was being a little tongue in cheek...

I wouldn't buy the "fitting in" argument you're making, however. I can't live with your zero objective value approach to art / architecture...

OK - forget "fitting in"...

Any other standards besides committee sanctioning you'd accept?

Can someone actually be a jackass, objectively?

the point isn't zero objectivity, merely that 'fits in' is such an absurdly vague concept that its use-value approaches zero. to discuss a relationship to context requires a lot more precise and nuanced thinking than the concept 'fitting in' allows for. (correct me if i'm wrong, lb, steven)

So you can't tell if it "fits in" or not either?^

one might successfully argue it's the mcmansion on the right that doesn't 'fit in'.

boy oh boy... fitting in for the nw...

a longhouse

i propose a kind of solomonic solution:

saw both houses in half, and swap, half for half. there, context issue solved!

it's a double edged sword. If you have no guidelines anywhere we'll get every more bizarre crap.

Shouldn't that sign be illegal? If not, you think you could sue the punk for slander or something.

he didn't call his neighbor a jackass, directly...

and what exactly is industrial concrete?

is there commercial concrete?

if anything, it's residential concrete, and it probably has a nice finish.

i bet someone sometime didn't think that totem pole 'fit in'.

Ticky tacky houses suck. Hey now he can say to first time visitors "I'm one past the modern looking house" or "if you pass the modern looking house, you've gone too far". Homogenous neighborhoodsd are such a bore.

that cobb house is going to be spectactular! can't wait to see it finished!!



mr. mcmansion should pump up his house with some 4th floor turrets or something. you know, tasteful design ..

might be a good time to bring up this website...

passive aggressive notes

Ha, so I get home yesterday after reading this thread at work and my copy of Residential Architect is waiting for me... with Eric Cobb on the cover!

in a free country, you should be allowed to build whatever you want. the kind of person who would put up a sign like that is somewhat of an asshole. but he does have legitimate concerns, however. while i'd generally wait to pass judgement on this house until it's done, the fact that it appears to stand closer to the water than the adjacent house and has a massive concrete wall on the right side could very well affect the neighbor's property value, and in a negative way. in a time when this individual has certainly seen his property values drop significantly, i think he has some reason to feel miffed regardless of his architectural taste.

as the site is zoned, there is a 20' front yard setback and a 25' rear yard setback.

a stringline setback would probably have been a lot more appropriate (as it keeps all the homes about the same distance from the shoreline)...

i agree. it is important, in my opinion, for designers to consider the quality of life of the neighbors when designing a house. the only problem i really have with it is how much closer it is to the lake, and i think that is probably where most of the animosity is coming from. the neighbor on the right wouldn't have to stare at that concrete wall, and the neighbor on the left wouldn't have privacy concerns, if that thing was about 25' farther from the water. anytime when views are a resource people get upset when someone builds in front of them. we see a lot of that out west. sometimes it's unavoidable, but in this case i'd say it was very avoidable.

"In this neighborhood, if it has no community-sanctioned aesthetic requirements, anything can "fit in", depending on who you are asking." Libertybell

Many comments here have been a little sarcastic, including my own, and so maybe this one is? But wow -- if not, I can't figure out how this makes sense among architects.

This statement is of course true from a legal stance - and maybe a couple of you are actually happy to stop there. But I doubt it. That stance won't take you very far, because as you've noted, as long as zoning is not infringed, all structures are equal. So then what?

Even in a neighborhood full of houses we all might despise, there is a social/physical/historic/etc. etc. etc. context beyond codes and zoning that all impact a design. Did Eric Cobb, AIA, do that? Maybe, i've not been there -- but from what we've seen, and "styles" aside, no. Le bossman made some points along this line of thought.

Some of this thread is very possibly based on disdain for the layman's phrase "fitting in". Yes, we all get pretty tired of some of those phrases. Does Mr. McMansion have legal grounds for complaint? Doubtful. But depsite our potential irritation with his affinity for McMansions, his disagreement with the Cobb design is likely not without any merit.

I support being able to build free of most gov. constraints. At the same time, I doubt that we are looking in the Cobb house at the best solution a complete architecture could offer.

That sign should be against HOA.