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Comment by acbabis | Hacker News Reader

I'm not an architect, and I probably wouldn't have even noticed how ugly these houses are if I spotted them in the wild, but having read this article, it seems mind-boggling that someone would spend the money it takes to make a house and not adhere to basic architectural principles. Can someone explain how this happens?

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These homes tend to be pre-built in bulk by developers, or offered as purchase options in developed communities.

The builder is simply trying to deliver the most product for the lowest cost: a giant inoffensive box. To this day, buyers believe more square footage is better, even if it is mostly garage. The "grand foyer" implies fewer rooms to spec, support, plumb, and wire.

I've never understood single-family buyers who look at 5000sq ft and up...you end up with empty rooms or ridiculously underutilized rooms ("gift wrapping room" etc)

My wife and I once looked at homes in a Portland development that were 6500 sq feet and up. I could afford them....but WHY? We wanted a house, not a mall.

> The builder is simply trying to deliver the most product for the lowest cost: a giant inoffensive box.

The houses the author likes are inoffensive boxes. The rambling, varied, multifaceted ones are what he doesn't like.

I'm addressing my own observations, I don't care what the author thinks.

> To this day, buyers believe more square footage is better, even if it is mostly garage.

Which part of the US counts the garage as "square footage"?

Nowhere, but from the curb it gives the impression of mass

I took few architecture classes once. About 250sq ft/person was the recommendation when designing a city block.

It's a consequence of excessive land costs. If the lot costs half a million, it seems appropriate to put a big fancy house on it. This leads to too much house for the lot.

Most people's idea of a house is rather conservative. It includes slanted roofs and modest sized windows with small panes. If you build a modernist steel and glass house with stone elements in a suburban setting, you may get a writeup in Architectural Record, but it will be hard to sell.

In addition to newer regulations aimed at exclusion. After a burst of new development of upper-middle-class homes in my town, the new residents voted in a new mayor and aldermen, and the new leadership passed a law preventing the construction of any home within city limits of less than 2000 square feet. The old part of the city would be mostly illegal to build under current regulations.

And this happens everywhere. When you realize that most of the desirable places to live in the US are illegal to build, it really makes you wonder what the hell we're doing. The answer is that we'll suffer an immense burden of stupidity in return for order. If you've ever sat at a red light at midnight, you should know that feeling.

I tend to think of "basic architectural principles" as the things that keep buildings from falling over.

If land is expensive and you want a lot of space, isn't a "McMansion" the ideal building for you?

I don't have any stake in this fight, but I also don't have a lot of sympathy for people who want to control what their neighbors' houses look like.

Two critical parts of the McMansion phenomena were half of all architects (house and software and any other design craft) are below median in skill. So they produce a parody or meme version of architecture but pass it off as something real. The other problem is the bottom half of architects will normally find employment as waiters or bartenders as they should, but during multi-generational level market booms they'll find architectural work and everyone's stuck with the consequences.

I don't understand. They looked fine to you until someone with authority told you they were actually ugly, and now you can't understand how anyone could think they look fine? Perhaps yourself-of-two-hours-ago could offer some insight?

I'm saying I wouldn't have noticed any problems on my own, but I agree that the authors examples of what he considers good look nicer than the examples of what he considers bad. The house with lots of windows looks particularly unpleasant to me, but I normally wouldn't stop to notice or care because I'm not an artist or anything like that. I hope that's more clear.

It's a least partly like any other fad. There's no rational basis for it, but the look becomes popular for a period of time. Then years later people scratch their heads and say "what were they thinking?"

>I probably wouldn't have even noticed how ugly these houses are if I spotted them in the wild

That's because they're not. The vast amount of people buying them didn't think so either. It's just classic elitism: you get to feel more "sophisticated" if you can say people's taste is wrong with made up but smart sounding criteria. None of the author's criteria foe making architecture look good are actually so.

The customers like those houses. They chose them. Tastes vary. That's life.

> Can someone explain how this happens?

Principles aren't facts?

People hold different sets of principles?

I guess what I'm asking is: are these principles culturally universal?

The principle that principles should be culturally universal is very much not culturally universal...

Exactly.

Some people have a superficial idea of what taste is.

ie. It involves spending a lot of money. It should be complex. Columns are a sign of taste.

So they are easy to "fool", they only look at bits they can tick off. They don't have the knowledge to get the overall concept.

So even through they might not subliminally love the design they get enjoyment from thinking it is great through their criteria.

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