Responding to recent works by Thomas Heatherwick and Bjarke Ingels, Rowan Moore interrogates architecture's obsession du jour. With each recently unveiling their "most striking landmark to date"—for Heatherwick, the Vessel and for Ingels, the Amager Bakke waste-to-energy power plant—Moore is prompted to ask: "why does great architecture have to be fun?"
In his latest for the Guardian, Moore notes the reverence for child-like pleasure that sits at the heart of the work of two of architecture's most talked about practitioners—which is hardly meant to be taken as a positive. "They offer at most two-liners," Moore says of the architectural gimmicks that have made clients such as Google flock to their work.
Despite bringing them high-profile commissions, the fun in their work—at least as skeptical critics have come to see it—are puns without a purpose; a building with kissing roofs whose only answer to the question of "why?" is "why not?"
"There’s real power and attraction in those excessive constructions," Moore writes. "They appeal to a desire that people have of their surroundings, to engage and excite them. The really impressive achievement would be to respond to that desire with structures that have more than one, or even two, things to say."
But Miles, have you been to the Marina Bay Sands in Singapore? How is it any different from Bjarke's ski slope garbage mashup? Its a brutal building with a pool on top. Kind of cool, with zero urban character except from where you can't see the thing (inside it or on the very cool pool), or from far away, where it is in fact also cool. Actually walking around that area is disturbing. It feels like old school fuck the proletariat building to me. Not like habitat at all.The point of the building was spectacle.
I visited most of BIG's stuff in Copenhagen and 2 projects in Canada near completion. They are all accessible and comfortable, and worked well. I was expecting they wouldn't, but they were convincing in reality. The only thing about those buildings that was not cool, was the same as the Safdie project. It had no urban presence, entirely un-intended to integrate because the master-plan calls for a truckload of big boxes. That is not the fault of any of the architects. Its what they are asked for, or maybe it is what the economy can put in place when its funneled through developers. The only project by BIG that I thought really had a chance of becoming part of a living city fabric was the one in Vancouver, which cleverly integrated elevated highways into the design. Most of Vancouver is off putting to me at least because of the tower on a plinth format, which is not actually that comfortable if you are used to more organic cities like London or Tokyo (the only big cities i have lived in). Bjarke's project seemed to get past that somehow. I was impressed.
The article is basically a get off the lawn complaint. In 50 years we will see if it is valid. It could be. In the meantime, seeing the city and architecture as something to enjoy is not entirely out of place. Why not embrace the creation of places that start from individual moments of joy? It is at least as valid as starting with serious austerity.
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The really impressive achievement would be to create socially relevant and environmentally conscious architecture.
That would take us only to banal social housing, etc., of a sort we have seen before. We need to restore/enlarge the cultural conversation. Our solutions should be complex, rich, and comprehensive.
The reason we don't have solutions is because they are not simple, efficient, and direct. Or more precisely because there is no profit in that, so it is "better" to have expensive complexity.
.
Complex in the sense that architecture recognizes our complexity, that we are not children. It starts by enlarging the heart and mind. Reading is free, as is going out and talking to people.
The media needs "new" architecture and architects to trumpet every few years. The media will discard BIG and the like in a few years in favor of a) another iteration of postmodern neoclassicism and historicism or b) some kind of crafty, vernacular architecture that the clients build with their hands under the guidance of architects working pro-bono. I'm not sure yet which it will be.
A helpful exercise is to think about all of the most important buildings in your life and why they matter to you. I doubt they were shallowly fun. There was kind of a fork in the road with OMA, where serious exploration became real estate gimmicks. I still love IIT and Seattle Public Library, but they were much more rigorous than what became of Bjarke, Gang and Heatherwick.
One of the best critics of architecture out there is time. These are highly commercial times worthy of a dark comedy. It is tempting.
I'm more interested in science news. I mean that image of the black hole was amazing.
Well said, Orhan.
I don't understand this. If you don't like BIG, or Gehry, or Work AC, and you would like a tomb-like stoic building, you have Zumthor, or Chipperfeld, or Max Dudler or the other countless Swiss/German/Belgian firms that produce austere stone buildings.
Why are these humorless critics so insistent that everyone cater to their preferences?
Gehry’s work is great (and even fun) without being a two-liner or joke — that seems to be the point. I don’t see “humor” as being a relevant architectural criteria outside of design circles, which reinforces the common critique against architecture culture as being insular. I’ve never heard any random person say, “I love that building, it is so clever/funny.” Even Vegas has a kind of fake traditional kitsch which isn’t “funny”
On the other hand, the ski slope might end up being an actual good building, but I’m guessing skiers value natural settings more than industrial buildings ... would be interesting to see if that is so a few years after the opening
At this level architects aren't solving problems, they are competing against each other for huge commissions and awards. Efficient, functional, sustainable work is irrelevent - except for greenwashing PR.
Mayne even came right out and said it. He designs for [against] "other architects", and he has been rewarded for that! Thus BIG's quarter-baked floating cities and Safdie without a Pritzker.
But Miles, have you been to the Marina Bay Sands in Singapore? How is it any different from Bjarke's ski slope garbage mashup? Its a brutal building with a pool on top. Kind of cool, with zero urban character except from where you can't see the thing (inside it or on the very cool pool), or from far away, where it is in fact also cool. Actually walking around that area is disturbing. It feels like old school fuck the proletariat building to me. Not like habitat at all.The point of the building was spectacle.
I visited most of BIG's stuff in Copenhagen and 2 projects in Canada near completion. They are all accessible and comfortable, and worked well. I was expecting they wouldn't, but they were convincing in reality. The only thing about those buildings that was not cool, was the same as the Safdie project. It had no urban presence, entirely un-intended to integrate because the master-plan calls for a truckload of big boxes. That is not the fault of any of the architects. Its what they are asked for, or maybe it is what the economy can put in place when its funneled through developers. The only project by BIG that I thought really had a chance of becoming part of a living city fabric was the one in Vancouver, which cleverly integrated elevated highways into the design. Most of Vancouver is off putting to me at least because of the tower on a plinth format, which is not actually that comfortable if you are used to more organic cities like London or Tokyo (the only big cities i have lived in). Bjarke's project seemed to get past that somehow. I was impressed.
The article is basically a get off the lawn complaint. In 50 years we will see if it is valid. It could be. In the meantime, seeing the city and architecture as something to enjoy is not entirely out of place. Why not embrace the creation of places that start from individual moments of joy? It is at least as valid as starting with serious austerity.
The flying boat project is a poor example of Safdie's work. Everyone has winners and losers. As you say, look at the body of work.
Most architecture these days is "fuck the proletariat", often in more ways than one.
Grown-ups don't ski?
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