jducoeur

Hear, hear!

I keep thinking eventually the people with all the money, who keep giving commissions to these guys (and as best I can tell, it's all guys) who think architecture is all about expressing their egos, will get tired of being ripped off. I'd like to think MIT suing Gehry is a harbinger of that, but I'm not holding my breath.

I thought about becoming architect for a while in my early 20s, but was pretty discouraged when I realized what an intellectual cesspit the field became in the 20^th Century. (The one exception I found was Christopher Alexander (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Alexander), but his influence seems to have been greater outside architecture than within it. But if you're not familiar with his work, you might want to take a look at A Pattern Language and The Timeless Way of Building.)

A friend of mine, who actually took an architecture degree in the UK and then went on to a career in computer games animation and design, talks about how the only time she was praised in a critique session was one day when she threw her hands up in frustration, said to hell with it and just drew something "completely impractical," without any thought to function or human scale. Her best friend in the program, who was actually making his living designing houses for people, was put down in class as much as she, and eventually dropped out to actually practice architecture full time. (Which surprised me when she told me about it; I can only assume licensure is rather different there.)

Sorry if it sounds like I'm saying "abandon hope, all ye who enter here." You seem to be going into the field with your eyes open and a clear idea what you think architecture should really be about. I hope you're able to maintain it and come out the other side and make the field better.

* I had at the time just abandoned plan A, which had been to become a professor of English Literature, after finally figuring out what an intellectual cesspit humanities scholarship was. So my nose was especially sensitive right then.

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vairavi.livejournal.com

I adore Alexander.
So far I've discovered that I have a truly stunning ability to make up gold-plated loads of crap that my instructors just adore. The less practical a thing is, the better.

(And fortunately, although I attend an Architecture school, I've recently switched from the B. Arch. program to a more Liberal Studies degree with a concentration in Historic Preservation...which is what I genuinely care about.)

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I worry that dishing out the kind bullshit people want to hear may be habit-forming. So I tend to think of it as a useful skill — but, like binding up wounds, one that it's preferable not to need. I trust the Historic Preservation faculty are happy to let you talk sense?

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Friends who have to work in there have been pissed off at Gehry for years. I supposed one of the sideways skylights must have leaked on someone important, finally.

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dagonell.livejournal.com

Try visiting the University of Buffalo sometime. It was designed shortly after the Berkeley riots. It is "riot-resistant". It is not only NOT "disabled accessible", it is actively "disabled hostile"! If it's possible for a door to open the wrong way, it does. The stair widths and heights were specifically designed to be awkward to prevent mobs from storming upstairs. For someone on crutches, it's a nightmare! There have been changes since, like making curb cuts, but it's like trying to put a bandage on sucking chest wound, it's just not enough.
-- Dagonell

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zachkessin.livejournal.com

Sounds like the Usdan student center at Brandeis. Also designed to be impossible for a group of students to try to hold.

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goldsquare.livejournal.com

Eh, what? Cite please? I'd be interested - very.

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dlevey.livejournal.com

While I don't have a citation, I remember that story too when I was there. I also remember drawing up plans to take the place, just for fun and to prove that it could be done.

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rufinia.livejournal.com

Oh, I like you.

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jducoeur

As I mention in my other comment, that was also the way Usdan was explained to me at the time -- I'm somewhat surprised that you hadn't heard it, since it was "common knowledge" of everyone I knew. Could be folk legend, but it's plausible...

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This may be relevant:
http://www.snopes.com/college/halls/riot.asp

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Hmph. "unclassifiable veracity" At least some of these claims are falsifiable; I wish they'd get checked out.

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I did a very quick Google search for Usdan and riot, but didn't find anything about building design. Of course, that's not conclusive.

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goldsquare.livejournal.com

Don't recall hearing it then, nor now.

Plausible? I shouldn't think so, it was built long before student riots were much of an issue, and long before the Brandeis Administration offices were taken over in the late 60s. In which case, THAT would be the building I'd be concerned with defending.

Still, would love references.

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jducoeur

Interesting. Brandeis' old Usdan Student Center is of the same vintage and motivation, but they took a totally different approach. Instead of making it awkward, they made it extremely *open*, in response to students taking over and occupying some of the older buildings. So they created something with a vast number of doors and entrances -- specifically (AFAIK) so that the riot police could storm the place easily. Easy to take, but hard to defend...

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laurion

That was my recollection too. I've counted at least 9 stairwells, and 14 exterior doors, although I think recent conversions into Usdan-as-an-office-building instead of Usdan-as-a-Student-Center have altered the building to a degree where it would be much easier to hold now.

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dlevey.livejournal.com

There are ways... Especially if you're co-ordinated enough to get ahold of certain equipment.

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jtdiii.livejournal.com

Before there was Gehry, there was I.M. Pei. He was the talk of the architectural world, all sorts of his buildings were built because they were pretty and sweeping in scale.

No one thought to ask the future users of the buildings about how functional they would be. Triangular classrooms with no windows, wind tunnels that forced exterior doors shut, or open, leaks or simple cost overruns were all ignored by the people funding the projects.

Like Pei, Gehry has simply found a way to sell his magnificent clothes to a set of donors and administrators who are so spellbound by his visions that they never talk to the ultimate users until it is too late.

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goldsquare.livejournal.com

The Pei firm was also capable of brilliance and beauty...

Alas, much of it was like software design - clever for the sake of impressing fellow devotees, not so good for us mere humans.

I'd go re-read Ayn Rand now, but her books really stink. Same problem. :-)

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When I was briefly smitten with Rand in my 20s, the first hint of trouble came when she described Roark's building and I realized she'd been drinking le Corbusier's rotgut — and thought it was fine wine. My lifelong habit of excessive loyalty even in the early stages of a relationship once again bit me, and I ended up sticking with her until I got to Galt's speech. But that ended it.

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And before there was Pei, there was Wright. Low ceilings, ugly buildings, leaky roofs. Near as I can tell, people liked his stuff because it was New And Different.

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laurion

But you have to give Wright credit for recentering living spaces into the large open living rooms most of us have now. Of course, the open floor plans and 4 room, 1000' floors of the McMansions these days seem to be the result of that, so whether or not you find it a good thing or not, you have to lay the credit on Wright.

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But you have to give Wright credit for recentering living spaces into the large open living rooms most of us have now.

That is nice; I didn't realize that was one of his.

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laurion

Yeah, he thought victorian houses were too boxed up, and he also thought that with the decline of household servants, the mother should be able to work in the kitchen and still be accessible to the kids in the living space. Central chimneys were also something he liked, which is just stupid. The point of having two or more chimneys on the ends of the house is that it keeps the house heated more efficiently. At least we have modern heating systems to make up for that. :)

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I approve of chimneys that aren't on outside walls, because half the heat isn't going outside (sideways at any rate. Lots goes up the chimney flue.)

But having the basic work space available to the family in general is an excellent one.

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laurion

Oh, I agreee with the principle, I just feel that, like many notions in architecture, htat it has been taken Too Far(tm). Have you seen modern houses? There's not enough walls for bookcases, and the overconnectedness that makes the living room the main hallway as well unfairly constricts furniture layout choices. Wright understood that a little bit more, and made a lot of 'built in furniture', but there isn't much of that anymore.

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This seems to be a common problem with college administrators. At least two Boston-area colleges have had new student centers built in the last decade which feature huge, airy spaces, and vast walls of glass to let in natural light. In New England. Where we don't *have* natural light for much of the school year. Where those huge, airy spaces with glass walls have to be *heated* completely, even though 80% of the airspace is above the heads of the occupants.

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Even cloudy 'natural light' is good for lifting people's moods.

The airspace issue is a key one, though, because that's where all the heat goes.

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I wasn't thinking of 'cloudy', I was thinking of 'dark'. The sun sets early in winter, and student centers often remain in use well into the evening.

I'm sure that natural light helps lift moods. I suspect that natural dark, in sufficient quantity, helps feelings of fear and paranoia.

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querldox.livejournal.com

Got a tour of Stada by a grad student back in '04 shortly after it opened. After the tour was finished, I told her I'd come to two conclusions;

1) You guys didn't get design approval did you?

2) Gehry apparently had never worked in an office in his life.

I recall it was full of ridiculous things such as grad student offices being under heavily trafficed overhead walkways, causing problems both with noise from people walking and talking and a sense of paranoia since you'd never know when someone might be looking down at you. But the kicker was a room with very high ceilings and odd strips of blue fabric, not in sync with the overall design, going from ceiling to floor.

I was told that this was "the room that makes people sick". Something about the visual cues in the room caused pretty much anyone in it for more than 10-15 minutes to get nauseous. The fabric strips were an attempt to fix it. Admittedly, it was a conference room, and there was a certain appeal to a conference room where no meeting could last more than 10 minutes, but still...

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rosinavs.livejournal.com

The thing is, this isn't even one of his prettier buildings.

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cheshyre

didn't the building also have problems with disabled accessibility, too, which had to be kludged around?

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corwyn-ap.livejournal.com

Gehry might have a valid defense in "I thought that was what you wanted" Any judge looking at the rest of MIT architecture might well agree. Full disclosure: My Grandfather was an architecture professor at MIT and designed many of their buildings.

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umbran.livejournal.com

The news of the day is that MIT is suing architect Frank Gehry, because -- shock, surprise -- it turns out that Stada Center is badly designed.

Well, first off, it is the Stata Center.

The shock and surprise is not that the thing is badly designed. I am far more shocked that the Institute didn't get such a design properly reviewed before accepting it. Rather surprised that they think they can sue over it now, when the flaws are probably quite obvious to any structural engineer who looked over the plans.

Makes me wish I knew the history there...

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rufinia.livejournal.com

They were blinded by science?

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If people at MIT could be blinded by science, there'd be a lot more German shepherds around here. :-)

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I am far more shocked that the Institute didn't get such a design properly reviewed before accepting it.

Yeah, MIT might find that the courts less sympathetic than they would be to, say, New England Conservatory. "What, you couldn't find any structural engineers?"

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oakleaf-mirror.livejournal.com

I'm curious about why you tagged this post Masonry? Is that in the sense of piling stones together to build structures as it relates to architecture, or (as I believe you're generally used it) relating to Freemasonry? If the latter, what's the relevance? Is Gehry a Mason?

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jducoeur

The tag came just before I posted, and realized how much my opinions about architecture are colored by Freemasonry. The name of the organization comes from the fact that architecture is the guiding metaphor of the whole thing: getting inducted into Masonry is, in part, a brief education in the subject...

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