Architecture sucks

A side blog where I ramble about architecture and complaint about architects || send me asks

[germanpostwarmodern]

House (1963-65) built for himself in London, England, by Brian Housden. Photo by David Spero.

[germanpostwarmodern]

Church St Ludgerus (1927-29) in Bottrop, Germany, by Josef Franke

[germanpostwarmodern]

Zuidpleinflat (1940-49) in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, by Willem van Tijen & Hugh Maaskant

[witchrealms]

(x)

[germanpostwarmodern]

House Platte (1957-58) in Berlin, Germany, by Fehling + Gogel. Demolished in 1985. Photo by Jan George.

[awidevastdominion]

The Ziggurat of Ur

[germanpostwarmodern]

Office Building (1979-81) in Den Bosch, the Netherlands, by Magis en Witlox

[germanpostwarmodern]

Institut für Hygiene und Mikrobiologie (1966-74) of FU Berlin, Germany, by Fehling + Gogel. Photo by Kay Fingerle.

[davidaltrath]

Concrete Villa Photo: David Altrath

[athosbulcaograndniece]

One thing that will always piss me off is that autocad and revit don't have the same shortcuts

[fuckyeahplattenbau]

Residential building, built in the 1970s. Sofia, Bulgaria. Photo: Stefano Perego

[germanpostwarmodern]

Apartment Building (1939) on H. C. Ørstedsvej in Copenhagen, Denmark, by Edvard Thomsen

[germanpostwarmodern]

Gemeentehuis (1962-63) in Hazerswoude-Rijndijk, the Netherlands, by Maaskant, Van Dommelen, Kroos & Senf

[germanpostwarmodern]

Former Incassobank (1916-20) in Utrecht, the Netherlands, by Willem A. Maas

[germanpostwarmodern]

The built manifestations of Brutalism, despite their omnipresence on social media, remain controversial: especially in Europe they are loved by some and hated by many. In other parts of the world opinions aren’t as polarized and Brutalism simply a part of the built environment, e.g. in Japan. Okinawa-based photographer Paul Tulett has been exploring the Japanese brutalist heritage for years and in his new book „Brutalist Japan“, recently published by Prestel, points to the particular appeal concrete had in postwar Japan: it offered seismic safety, was resistant to termites and easy to pour in form and via the shuttering boards also left room for the skilled Japanese wood crafts. At the same time the Japanese tradition for leaving natural materials rough and raw played in the hands of „béton brut“ that, as Tulett explains, became „béton nécessaire“.

The former’s gradual aging and the acceptance thereof agains roots in Japanese tradition, i.e. the concepts of „wabi sabi“ and „mono no aware“ which embrace the beauty of imperfection and describe the ambivalent awareness of the fleeting nature of beauty. Against this background and Tulett’s introduction to Japanese philosophies it becomes easier to understand why Brutalism is a lot less controversial in Japan than it is in other parts of the world and never disappeared. Accordingly the buildings gathered in „Brutalist Japan“ date from the 1950s to the present day and offer a comprehensive panorama of Brutalism in Japan: in brilliant photographs Tulett shows classics like Kenzo Tange’s Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum (1955) and Setagawa Ward Office (1959) or Le Corbusier’s National Museum of Western Art (1959) but also a plethora of little-known buildings. And they are compelling: the fortress-like Tanimura Art Museum (1983) by Togo Murano, the Keihan Uji Station (1995) by Hiroyuki Wakabayashi or the Okinawa Prefectural and Art Museum (2007) by Ishimoto and Niki Associates demonstrate the masterful use of raw concrete while also dealing with Japanese history and traditions.

This beautifully crafted mix of buildings makes the book a great read and an eye-opening survey of Japanese Brutalism. Highly recommended!

[thehereticpharaoh]

This is what hieroglyphs and figures in ancient Egyptian temples looked like before their colors faded. They were recreated using a polychromatic light display at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, following thorough research.

[ms-hells-bells]

If this is your kind of thing, new zealand has the world's first life sized re-creation of an Egyptian temple for an idea of how it would have looked back then

[eunique]

For those who want to know where in New Zealand it is, this is in Hamilton Gardens in Hamilton!

[wgm-beautiful-world]