• merc@sh.itjust.works
    6·
    5 hours ago

    This sentence from the Wikipedia article makes a lot of sense to me:

    The style was further popularised in a 1955 essay by architectural critic Reyner Banham, who also associated the movement with the French phrases béton brut (“raw concrete”) and art brut (“raw art”).

    So, the adjective wasn’t “brutal”, but “brut” meaning raw. The buildings were supposed to be raw. Instead of decorations in the stone like gargoyles, or even basic things like a decorative frieze, they’d just leave the raw lines required to make the structure sound. From that point of view, I get it. Reduce all the decoration to a minimum and let the structure “speak” for itself. Brutalist architects weren’t intentionally making buildings ugly and “brutal”. They were trying to make them clean, simple and undecorated.

    A brand new brutalist building that’s dry and unweathered on a day with bright sunlight and a blue sky might look nice. It would showcase the architect’s design of the building, rather than some other artist’s design of a gargoyle or other decorative feature. But, like in the picture, a wet, weathered building on a grey, overcast day is different. There’s not much contrast between the building and the sky. The clean, monochrome concrete looks weathered much more quickly than natural stone. Also, it just looks like it’s function over form, which is something we associate with places that aren’t built for the public to enjoy: warehouses, military structures, even prisons.

  • Basic Glitch@sh.itjust.works
    16·
    5 hours ago

    I really have never understood the intense hate brutalist* architecture gets.

    But also honestly kinda love this. Almost reminds me of neo-Andean architecture

    • quips@slrpnk.net
      2·
      6 hours ago

      The complete lack of any ornamentation reminds you of corporate architecture. Profit over all vibes.

      • Basic Glitch@sh.itjust.works
        1·
        4 hours ago

        Ok, I can see that. Makes a lot of sense.

        I always hear people shitting on it online, but the first person I ever heard express that opinion (and the only person I’ve ever known irl) who had a very intense hatered of brutalist architecture just thought it was really ugly, but he was definitely not opposed to corporate interests.

        Tbf to him, he was honestly passionate about architectural beauty, but kind of oblivious at best to profit driven causes of human suffering.

        I went to undergrad at a university that had a lot of brutalist architecture buildings, so I guess kind of have fond memories of it for those reasons, but if it was all I was surrounded by I could see that being super depressing. (Edit: actually just searched for the main building I was thinking of and my first thought looking back at it was “ughh” so almost definitely just nostalgia clouding my memory of the actual architecture).

        I honestly don’t know much about the history of architecture, but I also really like mid century homes. For some reason I always kind of broadly associate the two.

  • captainlezbian@lemmy.world
    4·
    7 hours ago

    Ok I kinda love it though. But also I think brutalism at its best can be pretty good even though I think most of what it does well art deco does better (except create a sense of communal bureaucracy)

  • Phoenixz@lemmy.ca
    3·
    7 hours ago

    JFC what a difference

    The lower isn’t directly my style but it’s beautiful in its own way

    The upper one is just Hitler’s death bunker or something

  • MinnesotaGoddam@lemmy.world
    3·
    8 hours ago

    i mean adjust the pigments off of primary colors and i’m there, but that ain’t so bad. i especially like that hue of blue

  • Tess@piefed.blahaj.zoneEnglish
    57·
    18 hours ago

    I kind of like brutalist architecture, especially the interior design. It’s kind of soothing to be around, especially when it’s combined with plants.

      • MinnesotaGoddam@lemmy.world
        2·
        8 hours ago

        the public university i went to had lots of funds. the part of it i went to looked like this. for some reason it always felt like i was in an underfunded classroom. it bothered me.

      • underscores@lemmy.zipEnglish
        22·
        17 hours ago

        I love that aesthetic personally, especially compared to hyper clean hospital looking buildings

        • InfiniteStruggle@sh.itjust.works
          12·
          16 hours ago

          Not to mention, the Brutalist architecture interior will look the same in 20 years, while any other kind would just look dilapidated and aged as shit. As long as someone is living in there, concrete don’t age, son. And even if it falls apart, just make some more concrete to fill it in.

          • merc@sh.itjust.works
            2·
            6 hours ago

            It seems to me that concrete definitely does age and it eventually leads to collapse.

            But, even ignoring the structural issues. Concrete is especially bad at looking discoloured over time. It’s not that that doesn’t happen to stone. But, stone starts off with its own patterns and colours which hide any discolouration. Concrete starts as some even shade of grey, which makes any discolouration much more visible. So, rust stains are more obvious, growth of mold or mildew is more obvious, efflorescence is more obvious.

            If people actually did paint the concrete, like in the picture, it would help a lot. It’s probably much easier to paint concrete than other things too. Because it’s a manufactured material that’s very even, it probably handles being painted a lot better than other kinds of stone, and especially than stone joined by mortar.

          • Eric@lemmy.blahaj.zone
            10·
            11 hours ago

            Maybe this is just my Northeast US prejudice, but brick is so much classier. Also concrete doesn’t age, but rebar sure does

              • Eric@lemmy.blahaj.zone
                8·
                11 hours ago

                Roman concrete is unreinforced, meaning no rebar inside to rust. You can’t use modern construction techniques with unreinforced concrete. It can’t handle tension well.

                • Test_Tickles@lemmy.world
                  6·
                  11 hours ago

                  Seriously, there’s a reason we don’t “build like the Romans”. We would be using 10x the concrete that we use now. We can’t even keep up with concrete demand now, I can’t even imagine how much worse the environment would already be if we needed 10x the concrete.

  • VicksVaporBBQrub@sh.itjust.worksM
    24·
    21 hours ago

    Someone in the 1930’s must have wanted to paint the Maginot Line. That was a long-ass line of brutal concrete structures. Maybe a snake, maybe rainbows. Imagine that France had a colorfully gay Great Wall.

      • The D Quuuuuill@slrpnk.netEnglish
        4·
        11 hours ago

        (the maginot line actually did its job of forcing the germans to attack through belgium. the real failure was in maintaining their relationship with belgium and tehn the french command structure being rather feckless)

        • merc@sh.itjust.works
          2·
          4 hours ago

          It was more the incompetence and possible treason of Charles Huntziger.

          The Maginot Line was only intended to delay an attacking army. It wasn’t going to stop them on its own. So, when it was attacked the army needed to gather its forces and counter-attack before the Maginot Line fell. But, when the Germans attacked that didn’t happen. Not only that, but before the attack, Huntzinger stood out for being one of the few generals not asking for more troops to reinforce his position.

          It’s hard to believe that Huntzinger was that incompetent. So much so that some historians think that he was actually a Nazi sympethizer and intentionally caused the French collapse. That might just seem like French historians diverting blame. But, Huntzinger not only failed completely at stopping the German invasion, he was also one of the first who was pushing for an armistice, then he also somehow became the person who met with the Germans and signed France’s declaration of surrender. Then, during the Vichy regime, he was a promoted to an even higher position.