Comment by jimmaswell | Hacker News Reader

Comment by jimmaswell | Hacker News Reader

Parent Full thread

Brutalist? Don't you think that's a little hyperbolic? Every mall I've witnessed has had interior and exterior design far from brutalist. Pretty nice-looking, really.

A popular one around here actually has a large skylight spanning most of the middle of the roof.

There are a lot of good reasons to prefer an indoor place. The weather's often not comfortable outside. It's only really perfectly comfortable for a time throughout the year that sums to maybe a few months over here. Maybe you're used to some place where it's the perfect weather all year?

"People want shopping centers to reflect regional and local character, be in town centers, and offer high quality unique options with a few staples. Get rid of the huge parking lots and add a grocer."

Do they really want all that, or do they just want some place with a bunch of stores and maybe a movie theater and food court, in a nice indoor climate-controlled environment and some light music in the background?

You just admitted in your last paragraph that the weather in that place makes an outdoor gathering less desirable.

Brutalism is a style, not a term of abuse. It does often refer to high modernist 1960s and 1970s buildings which are expensive to operate, having been constructed before environmental friendliness was on the agenda. Some people don't like the rectilinear boxes and raw concrete, but that's not why the term brutalism is applied to a particular subset of the buildings of that period: it was the popular name of an aesthetic movement, for better or worse. The architects in question were influenced by the Japanese aesthetic of wabi sabi, as well as the notorious (but admittedly brilliant) Le Corbusier.

Here's a picture of where I went to college: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/6f/Courtyard...

You can think of it as Caprica from Battlestar Galactica, or the FBI HQ in the X Files. Brutalism in its full glory. Even crazier is the library: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Library-SFU-Burnaby-Britis...

I know some people have a rather low opinion about SFU academics, but maybe calling it a college is a little harsh ;)

U of T did you one better: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Robarts_Library.JPG

I swear only Canada makes this distinction between "university" and "college". In the US they call what we call college "community college".

And.. holy crap, that library is freaking awesome. Although, I think the Geisel Library at UCSD takes the cake: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Geisel-Library.jpg

And the UK, and much of the rest of the world. In the UK, college usually refers to either sixth form or Further Education college, between secondary school and university.

Even in America, there was a distinction, or at least there used to be. If it was a "college" then that meant there was limited to no opportunity for graduate studies. On the other hand, a "university" offered full undergraduate as well as graduate programs for most subjects. In highschool, I remember noting that some colleges where quite prestigious, such as Dartmouth and Harvey Mudd College.

Oh god, the fire-escape-as-a-useless-tower-over-an-inaccessible-bridge trope... again. It's a stupid enormous waste of concrete and steel, and would actually be kind of OK if there were a way to get in there and survey the area without setting off alarms.

I consider myself a fan of Brutalist architecture in all its bulky, muscular glory, but Robarts just about borders on frightening to me.

I'm sure I've seen your college on stargate :)

The way I'd heard it in school was that it was a style made to purposely be as unlikably soulless as possible as some kind of statement. That's apparently not true?

Not really. If you can get past the AR paywall (which is a bit erratic) you can read one of the original statements of the movement here: http://www.architectural-review.com/8603840.article Slightly contentious recent discussion of the broader style here: http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2014/feb/13/jonathan...

Just to emphasize this, the term "brutalist" derives from the French "brut", not English "brutal". "Brut" means "raw", and is used to describe the exposed concrete central to this style. Although both words derive from the same Latin word brutus, that word means both "heavy" and "stupid", with the French word deriving from the former and the English word deriving from the latter. (Or so Wiktionary tells me.)

There's some good tongue in cheek commentary about the style in this podcast:

http://kunstlercast.com/shows/kunstlercast_111_brutalism.htm...

"Darth Vader" windows :-)

Of course, the host's main concern is about peak oil, so he would have some other things to say about the gradual decline of malls.

I'm not as extreme, but mail order is definitely more economical than frequent commutes to a far away shopping center. I'm glad I live within easy biking distance from an outdoor shopping center, which has many little restaurants (chain & local) to hit for lunch when working from home, as well as a theatre, Target & a "Whole Foods"-like grocery store. I can carry a fair amount of stuff home on bike rack "pannier" bags, and sometimes only get in the car one or two days a week to make an appearance at work. Only the Target has decent bike racks, though. Otherwise, trees and trash cans get pressed into service :-)

Reply on news.ycombinator.com