London's Ugliest Buildings
London isn't a beautiful city in the classical sense. It's more an agglomeration of unorganised stuff. It's more a two thousand year draft of a city, with rewrites to plot, characters and events scrawled all over its terrain. It's a city where your state of mind is as important as the physical fabric. For example many of London's now extortionally expensive houses - homes to bankers and lawyers - were once classified as slums - earmarked for demolition. Writers have not only written London into their narratives, but have also impacted on its body (in Dickens' case though highlighting the inner-city slums). Does this mean that London's organisation is mostly imaginary? And if so, shouldn't writers like Peter Ackroyd, Iain Sinclair, or JG Ballard be candidates for head of the Architecture and Urbanism Unit at the GLA? So many London buildings move from 'ugliness' to 'beauty' through changes in attitude over time. Many of the ugliest buildings are assimilated, becoming part of the cities narrative - just as its population absorbs waves of immigration over hundreds of years enriching London's grand narrative. Having said that, there are some right architectural howlers. Take the Nat West Tower - it's the logo of a bank extruded skywards - that's a pretty ugly concept - however excused by its ridiculousness and its facile commercial brutalism (reminiscent of a Chicago album cover designed by the Smithsons). There are places like the Elephant and Castle - massive modernist conglomerations of traffic planning and housing that certainly lack genteel appeal. Even here though there is a lingering utopian vision. The cities arteries snake around housing like a Futurist choreography. It may be ugly, but at least it meant well. Ugliness however, isn't an aesthetic. It's about a mean-ness, a lack of generosity. In urban planning terms a grabbing of public resource for private gain. And there are two candidates for this crown, both on the stretch of riverfront from Vauxhall to Wandsworth: St George Wharf ("22 stories designed amid majestic gull-wing roofs and stylish terraces. Set amongst landscaped courtyards that sweep to the waters edge") and Battersea Reach ("a dramatic series of waterfront buildings that cascade towards the river's edge, spacious contemporary apartments and penthouses offer panoramic views across the Thames or the Wandsworth skyline") - both from developer St George. These are yuppie ghettos, bought off-plan on the back of buy-to-let mortgages. Designed from the brochure outwards they bristle with balconies that rubber-neck the river. It's not their venal maxing out of volume or limit-of-the-envelop massing that's the problem. Or the crashing together of economic circumstance (cheap loans, post-industrial rehabilitation, exponential rise in property value). It's the fact that it tries to look nice. That it does 'architectural' things (a touch of modernism, a little dash of High Tech, a dose of Pomo). It's these buildings restraint; their desire to please that is so despicable. They capture an anemic, generic marketing led reductiveness. If James Blunt were a building, he'd be these. If they were food, they'd be served on airlines. They are like penthouse perfect versions of 19th century rookeries where chardonnay replaces typhoid-riddled water. "The design brief for St George Wharf was challenging: Create a thriving Thames riverside community worthy of its place amongst some of Europe's most spectacular landmarks. The views would be breathtaking. The shimmering architectural aesthetic, interior detailing and landscaping would be the same. Read on to find fictions of your own possible near future: "Owning a luxurious apartment or penthouse is just the start of the adventure. As a St George Wharf resident, you will be part of a sophisticated, cosmopolitan living environment. Imagine: outside, a series of landscaped courtyards sweep out to the river's edge with a 275m promenade, for residents and public alike. Tranquil courtyards echo to the gentle sound of fountains. Stylish bistros, cafes and shops around the piazza provide an irresistible excuse to simply sit, talk or watch the world go by. A health and fitness studio is planned for the future." With a scenario written like this, someone needs to check that JG Ballard hasn't indeed been installed behind a desk the A+U unit, approving developments most likely to end in yuppie carnage. The buildings - named with watery-heritage - swim in 'high quality' public space where it is impossible to imagine anything ever happening. It's the fact these are monsters that have no idea of their own self. What is more terrible - the idea that developers are trying to hoodwink the entirety of public life? Or the fact that this is honestly an attempt to make sense of contemporary living? These are perversions of Richard Rogers 1980s plea for Thames-side urbanism. It's enough to make him spin in his grave even though he's still very much alive. Quite frankly, these buildings are fucking insults. They are an anathema to a London that spans from Handle to Hendrix, Inigo Jones to Steve Jones, kebabs to kings, the M25 to the Mall, suburbia to Soho. Of course, this early 21st century ugliness will one day become rewritten as late 21st century beauty, though quite what twists and turns in London's plot will precipitate this are hard to imagine. If you are in for the long term and an urban pervert, why not visit the marketing suites: Monday - Friday, 10-8. Weekends 10-6. +44 (0)207 978 4141.
Today, more than five years later, our vision has reached the 5th stage of completion. Every evening, new residents marvel at their new twilight vista." So say Broadway Malyan, the architects brave enough to have their involvement advertised on the front of the St George website, as though remisicing with satisfaction over some kind of significant contribution to mankind.
Posted by anothersam at April 4, 2007 10:39 PM. 1 Comments
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Contents:
More Scenes In Cartoon Deserta
Generic Powerpoint Template: Delivering Bad News
The Best New Building In London
Book Review: The Infrastructural City
The Michael Jackson Monument Design Competition
Now Showing: John Baldessari Sings Sol LeWitt
Obscure Design Typologies: Life Guard Chairs
Osama bin Laden Cigarette Lighter: Novelty Products as Congealed Culture
Absurd Car Crashes: A Eulogy for J.G. Ballard
Now Showing: Dan Grahams 'Rock My Religion'
This Concrete 'O': On Serotonin, the M25, and the Motorik Picturesque
Church of the Literal Narrative
Philadelphias Floating Architecture
Now Viewing: Married To The Eiffel Tower
Le Corbusiers Image Hoard: Poeme Electronique
Giant American Signs: Original Learning from Las Vegas Footage
Giant Soviet Signs Cut Into Forests
Bricks Melted Into Icicles: Napalm Decorative
C-Labs 'Unfriendly Skies' & 'Bootleg' Volume
2 The Lighthouse: Self Storage & Architectural Hallucinations
Ceci N'Est Pas Une Pipe: Infrastructure as Architectural Subconcious.
Viva Sectional Cinematography!
Now Showing: The Installation of an Irreversible Axis on a Dynamic Timeline
Sim Seasons Greetings! The Rise of Neo-Winter
Geography in Bad, Festive Drag.
Simulations of Industry: High Tech Architecture and Thatcherism
From The Factory to the Allotment: Tony Wilson, Urbanist
Koolhaas HouseLife / Gan Eden: The Revenge of Architectural Media
Ruburb-ric: The Ecologies of the Farnsworth House
Telly Savalas Looks At Birmingham Redux
Acts of Un-Building: Timelapse Demolitions
Yard Filth: Next Years Hot Look
Stonehenge: A Black Hole At The Heart Of British Architecture
The Popemobile: Mechanised Robes & Motorised Architecture
The Secret Language of Surface
Information Fields: Agriculture as Media
My Bloody Valentine: Sound as Substance
A Cubist Copse: Gehrys Serpentine Pavilion
Spouting Off: Some Thoughts On The Fountainhead
Form Follows Dysfunction: Bad Construction & The Morality of Detail
Vintage Tradeshow Surrealism: International Grune Woche
Moving Houses: Buildings In Motion
Desktop Study: The Strange World of Sports Studio Design
Married to the Eiffel Tower: More Objectum Sexuals
60 Years of The Crazy Horse Memorial
Married to the Berlin Wall: "The Best and Sexiest Wall Ever Existed!"
Inflatable Icebergs: Sublimated Guilt Has Never Been So Fun
The Cinderella Effect: Phantom Architectures of Illumination
Two Deaths and a Retirement: The Strange Shape of British Architecture
If London Were Like New York: Antique Schizo-Manhattanism
If London Were Like Venice: Antique Geo-Poetic Speculations and Hydro-Fantasy
41 Hours in an Elevator: The Movie
NASA: Mapping the Moon with Sport
Lemon Squeezy: Design Tendencies after the Juicy Salif
The Nihilistic Beauty of Weapons Arranged in Patterns
Dogs: Britains Greatest Design Obsession
Detroit Sucks: The Motor Shows Last Gasp
Authentic Replicas: Football and the Franchising of Place
Folk Football: Landscape, Space and Abstraction
A Wishing Well with a Fat Up Pipe
The Camoufluers and the Day-Glo Battleship
Pseudoccino: Instant Coffee Foam
Blown Up: More Inflatable Military Stuff
On Christmas Trees, Folk Forests and Staples Office Supplies
Hampton Courts Shrouded Sculptures
Named Fabric: 20 Sponsored Pieces of Architecture at the New Museum
Form Follows Felony: The Secret Home of the Un-Dead Canoeist.
Architectural Magazines: Paranoid Beliefs, Public Autotheraphy - More on Clip/Stamp/Fold
James Bond Lives Next Door: Suburban Imagery as Industry
The Ghost of Christmas Futurism
Chapters for an Imaginary Book About Architecture
Shrouded Plinth - Urban Striptease
In the Night Garden - Surreal Landscape of Nostalgia
Kim Jong II, The Great Architect
Place Faking: Instant Heritage for the Thames Gateway
The Marc Bolan Memorial Crash Barrier.
Enjoy The Silence: Bose Noise Cancelling Headphones
Telly Savalas Looks At Birmingham
In Search of Britains Vehicular History
Scary Suburbanism: Why Horror is at Home in the Suburbs
I Like Your Manifesto, Lets Put it to the Test-o
How to Become a Famous Architect
Northampton - Sci-fi Pop Planning Promotion
Advertising Central Milton Keynes
The Velvet Underground at the Glass House
Duplikate: Kate Moss on the Production Line of Individuality
Hollow Inside: Starbucks Foam and the Rise of Ambiguous Materials
Revisions to the Architecture of Hell
Crufts: Dogs, Design and Aesthetic Genetics
Eos Airlines: Executive Bubbles over the Atlantic
Google Earths Vertiginous Mapping
Church of the Ascension and Descension
Reyner Banham Loves Los Angeles
Reading Lines: Skateboarding and Public Space
Chris Cornish: Prototyping History
The Most Visited Location in the UK
Anything to Feel Weightless Again: The Cargo Lifter and the Tropical Island Resort
'Its beauty will know no season'
2000 Years of Non Stop Nostalgia. Or How Half Timbering Made Me Whole Again.
Backpeddling into the Future: The Historical-Futurism of British Architecture
Miss Selfridges' Feeling for Fake Snow. The Oxford St. Lights and Why We Need Artificial Winter
New Tory Logo: A Hazy Shade of Politics
Jeff Koons, Rem Koolhaas, Hans Ulrich Obrist at the Serpentine
Celebrity Scents: The Bittersweet Smell of Success
Imperfect Pitch - Football, Space and Landscape
Product Placement: Making the Impossible Possible
Suburban Growth: Matthew Moores Field of Dreams
Perfect Sound Forever: The Secret Function of High End Stereos
A Little Light Product Placement
Some Advice To A Young Designer
Useless Proclamations for a Beautiful City
Topsy Turvy VSBA: Inverted Heros of an Upside Down Avant Guard
Everything Flows: ideological cartography
How Geostationary Was My Valley?
The Psychotic Utopia of the Suburbs and the Suburbanisation of War.
In a Lonely Place - Under Construction
Mach 3 Nitro Gel - Design that's foaming at the mouth.
Marchitecture. Architectural things to do in London this March
What happens when you cross a pen with a car?
Football Pitch: Best of British
The First Cut is the Cheapest - Blenheim Palace: pop architecture that goes for the jugular
Holiday Snap II : Giant Glowing French Balls
Holiday Snap: Canadian War Memorial, Vimy, France
Anatomy of an Architectural News Story
Its All About the Big Benjamins
Poundbury, unexpectedly, in the rain
The Exploding Concrete Inevitable. Lou Reed and the Casa da Musica
Untitled (Plastic Sack and Timber)
Berlin 1945 - The Obscene Picturesque
Interview: Jeremy Deller & Alan Kane
An Incredible Smell of Roasting Coffee
Langlands & Bell - The House of Osama Bin Laden
Architectural Criticism gets Sharp
Venturi, Scott Brown and my love that dare not speak its name.
Douglas Coupland: Design and Fiction
Christopher Dresser at the V&A
Fugitives and Refugees' - Chuck Palahniuk
Just What is it That Makes Yesterdays Homes So Different, So Appealing?
Everything Counts - The Sound of Geography Collapsing.
Other:
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Hmmm. You really don't like this developer. What would you have done with the remaining Effra site in the context of Farrell's Spooksville? Moreover, given the potential of the site what alternative was there? Altruistic billionaire constructs Europe's largest homeless shelter from disused cold storage warehouse? (While obviously at the same time showing sensitivity to the beautiful 70's and 80's brick developments on both sides of the river). I live in St George Wharf, and I love it. As far as yuppie ghettos go, I work for the NHS and don't know my FTSE from my NASDAQ. I don't have a cheap loan, and I hate James Blunt. To me (and I'm afraid I have only an A-level in art and a casual interest in architecture, so maybe my opinions are valueless... then again it's all pretty subjective isn't it?) these buildings look bold and sleek. The location is awesome - it's central but also quiet, and my girlfriend feels safe at night. Best of all I go to sleep looking out over London's most spectacular natural landmark. Maybe that's the solution to your troubles - if you lived here you could look out of the development rather than into it? At least you have the number for the marketing suite...