[HN Gopher] Sainsbury Wing contractors find 1990 letter from donor
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Sainsbury Wing contractors find 1990 letter from donor
Author : bpierre
Score : 229 points
Date : 2024-08-27 15:49 UTC (7 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.theartnewspaper.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.theartnewspaper.com)
| klik99 wrote:
| This might be the most passive aggressive thing I have ever
| heard. England truly elevates passive aggression to art form
|
| EDIT: Someone downvoted me, so I should say I grew up in England
| until I was 14 so I'm allowed to say this! Downvoting itself is a
| form of passive aggression
| debo_ wrote:
| A true pillar of passive-aggression /joke
| MrBuddyCasino wrote:
| In that case you might enjoy ,,DON'T MAKE FUN OF RENOWNED DAN
| BROWN": https://onehundredpages.wordpress.com/2013/06/12/dont-
| make-f...
| jprd wrote:
| This is classic, and just might be my favorite book review of
| all time.
| rkachowski wrote:
| > They even say my books are packed with banal and
| superfluous description, thought the 5ft 9in man.
|
| I find myself regularly thinking about this sentence
| gedy wrote:
| > He particularly hated it when they said his imagery was
| nonsensical. It made his insect eyes flash like a rocket.
|
| Haha classic
| shepherdjerred wrote:
| For someone unfamiliar with Dan Brown, is there a reason for
| this? Is he high-strung/sensitive about his books/reviews?
| notwhereyouare wrote:
| i think it's more that he fills his books with a ton of
| filler. could probably reduce the books by 1/3 and lose
| nothing of interest/value
| mhandley wrote:
| Thanks for that - five minutes well spent!
| athom wrote:
| Had a quick peek at the first couple of paragraphs, here.
|
| And now, I want to go back and reread some of that turgid
| text!
| tantalor wrote:
| I BELIEVE THAT THE ABOVE FLAMEBAIT IS A MISTAKE OF THE AUTHOR
| AND THAT WE WOULD LIVE TO REGRET OUR ACCEPTING THIS COMMENT
| taylorius wrote:
| I'm from the UK and I took it as a compliment.
| useless_foghorn wrote:
| The columns: https://atlive-wp.s3.eu-west-2.amazonaws.com/wp-
| content/uplo...
| fourteenfour wrote:
| Ha, was looking for this, just read 3 articles about these
| columns without a picture of the layout. Resorted to a video
| tour, are you sure it wasn't the larger ones here?
| https://imgbox.com/nh1Wx8JF
| useless_foghorn wrote:
| That would make more sense! I was misreading this article:
| https://architecturetoday.co.uk/learning-from-venturi-
| scott-...
|
| Thanks for the correction!
| Suppafly wrote:
| which of those are the 'two large columns in the foyer'?
| fourteenfour wrote:
| I have no idea, there is a severe lack of graphic context
| in these articles about a specific architectural detail. In
| the original article it looks like people are standing by
| the column the letter was found in.
| tobyjsullivan wrote:
| I think it's two of the five columns on the right in this
| image:
| https://images.adsttc.com/media/images/6352/6dc1/66b7/442f/b...
|
| Note that they are absent from this render:
| https://images.adsttc.com/media/images/6352/6d02/da69/b45e/2...
|
| > located on the ground floor near the former cloakroom,
| halfway between the street entrance and the stairs and lift
| leading down to the basement. Three adjacent structural columns
| have needed to be retained.
| adastra22 wrote:
| Why would the architect want those columns to be there? It
| makes absolutely no sense.
| amelius wrote:
| In architecture, there is this phenomenon where people may
| have an irrational fear of collapse. Adding (the suggestion
| of) redundant structural support may take away that fear.
| radicaldreamer wrote:
| Same reason why the WTC windows were smaller than they
| needed to be, to give people a sense of security.
| corndoge wrote:
| To find out, you can read the article
| carabiner wrote:
| Strange idea but it might work.
| RIMR wrote:
| That first link is spot on. Looking at the third image in the
| article, they are standing next to the destroyed column, and
| it is clearly one of the columns you indicated.
|
| https://cdn.sanity.io/images/cxgd3urn/production/0a733d1463e.
| ..
| Simon_ORourke wrote:
| The guy was right, but as a donor surely someone there could
| have just instructed the architect not to add them in.
|
| Here on one side of the argument is a rich guy who's giving you
| millions, and on the other a glorified hired hand who's looking
| to be expressive or whatever. Money talks, usually, I'm
| surprised how the architect got away with this one back in the
| day.
| corndoge wrote:
| If you want to find out how, you can read the article
| nickdothutton wrote:
| I think he was probably right, an adornment.
| axus wrote:
| "Stone-columning" is the new "bikeshedding".
| lainga wrote:
| // TODO: evil hack!! refactor this
| csours wrote:
| // if you've found this comment oh god i'm so sorry
| rsynnott wrote:
| So, it seems like the architect died in 2018, and Sainsbury in
| 2022. This could all have been extremely awkward if they'd done
| the work a few years earlier...
| Retr0id wrote:
| I'd like to think they'd have just had a laugh about it.
| debo_ wrote:
| Perhaps they'd use it as the foundation to support a new
| friendship with each other /weak architecture joke
| bee_rider wrote:
| Or maybe it would turn out that the false columns were
| actually structurally significant to their friendship,
| which would subsequently fall apart.
| shepherdjerred wrote:
| I'm sure that the donor made his opinion known given that he
| went to the trouble of leaving a letter.
| brudgers wrote:
| _Learning from Las Vegas_ is Robert Venturi and Denise Scott
| Brown 's seminal work and the ideas drove their work. In a
| nutshell, buildings are either ducks or decorated sheds. [0]
| Their clients hired them to design decorated sheds and that is
| why there were non-structural columns.
|
| That doesn't mean the columns did not have a purpose. Columns
| can create points that organize spatial experience. Columns are
| cultural iconography (e.g. the Parthenon vs Johnson Wax).
|
| There are certain ironies in the fine article:
|
| 1. The criticism of the non-structural columns for non-
| functionality in the context of an art museum.
|
| 2. If Venturi and Scott Brown had designed a duck (very common
| among museum commissions) removing the columns would have been
| difficult or impossible [1].
|
| For context, Charles Windsor's architectural opinions are
| contrary not just to the ideas of Venturi and Scott Brown but
| to the aesthetics of the last 150 years.
|
| [0]: https://99percentinvisible.org/article/lessons-sin-city-
| arch...
|
| [1]: Architects with functional dogma will incorporate
| structural columns into their designs to achieve iconography
| and spatial organization because structural use justifies their
| inclusion.
| fluoridation wrote:
| Surely that's an inherent false dichotomy. The mere utterance
| of "decorated shed" implies the existence of an undecorated
| shed, where nothing lacks structural purpose.
|
| >The criticism of the non-structural columns for non-
| functionality in the context of an art museum.
|
| The letter reads as if the columns are criticized not for
| lacking structural purpose, but rather for being unnecessary
| obstructions. "We [will] live to regret our accepting this
| detail of his design." That would have to be because the
| columns are either ugly or a hindrance.
| brudgers wrote:
| Because they are sheds, most sheds are undecorated. They
| are unremaked upon for the same reason.
|
| But to be clear, Venturi and Scott Brown's distinction is
| in the context of architectural practice. _Learning from
| Las Vegas_ started as a studio in Harvard's GSD. The
| radical idea was looking at actual buildings built for
| ordinary reasons in ordinary ways...the radical idea was
| valuing the study from contemporary vernacular
| architecture.
| milksoup wrote:
| It seems, then, that Venturi and Scott turned out to be
| like the torpedo fish. That the columns should confuse and
| disorient the visitor as if entering a crypt.
| hinkley wrote:
| Wright had the reverse problem. He didn't want structural
| elements where nature and physics demanded them. So his stuff
| sort of falls apart.
|
| The last factoid in the tour of his house was how he removed
| a load bearing wall from his sister's house and did not
| replace it.
|
| That whole tour was supposed to be for Wright fans but it
| just made me loathe him with every fiber of my core. Can you
| tell I'm an applied sciences person?
| brudgers wrote:
| There are lots of reasons to dislike Wright and though his
| house has historical significance, it is not among the
| works I find interesting enough to recommend...for me, his
| houses don't resonate because they reflect lifestyles I
| dont identify with.
|
| His more public work is another matter. I was struck by the
| color of the sky against the blue roof the first time I
| passed Marin County Civic Center from the highway. And
| Florida Southern in Lakeland is spectacularly good.
| causality0 wrote:
| They weren't criticized for simply existing without purpose.
| They were criticized for blocking the view of multiple points
| of interest and confusing navigation.
| Taylor_OD wrote:
| So funny. The perfect passive aggressive told you so ever.
| fuzzfactor wrote:
| Notice the supermarket company still had a Telex number in 1990.
|
| Even though they had likely possessed a fax machine for quite
| some time already.
| qingcharles wrote:
| Telex was still pretty big in the UK in 1990...
| dboreham wrote:
| If you have working telex, fax isn't an upgrade.
| worstspotgain wrote:
| This is easily, without a doubt, the most British thing I've ever
| seen. Glorious.
| raldi wrote:
| How do I set up Git to thank future generations for removing code
| I regret checking in?
| throwup238 wrote:
| Git hooks? https://git-scm.com/book/en/v2/Customizing-Git-Git-
| Hooks
| teqsun wrote:
| Add a server side hook listening for the change
|
| https://stackoverflow.com/questions/36327382/git-precommit-h...
| hinkley wrote:
| If I know I'm writing the code under protest or to deal with a
| bug in a library or elsewhere in the system, I put it in the
| commit message, and set up the commits so the worst change can
| be reverted by itself.
|
| Essentially here's the reason we "had" to do this. Subtext:
| here is my blessing to revert this when it's not necessary
| anymore.
|
| In a way it's my Chekov's Gun. Load the weapon, leave it lying
| around and wait for the third act.
| BurningFrog wrote:
| I sometimes make a test that will go red with an "X has
| changed, now you must do Y" message.
| PhilRodgers wrote:
| This reminds me of the letter in the pond
| https://thatcanadiangirl.co.uk/2008/05/30/the-letter-in-the-...
| moomin wrote:
| I note that if future generations had decided the columns were
| great and should stay the letter would never have been found.
| JCM9 wrote:
| This sort of thing is brilliant. Folks put things inside walls a
| lot.
|
| When doing a bathroom repair I needed a few additional tiles that
| would be impossible to find (was an old house). Guess what I
| found when we busted open the wall... the leftover tiles from
| when the house was built like 70 years prior! I could almost feel
| some tile layer from generations prior giving me a little smile
| and pat on the back.
| ghostly_s wrote:
| The customary place to put those is in the attic, where they
| can be easily found.
|
| https://alsyedconstruction.com/what-is-attic-stock-in-constr...
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(page generated 2024-08-27 23:00 UTC)