
Singapore Weighs Fate of Its Brutalist Buildings - pseudolus
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/27/world/asia/singapore-brutalist-buildings.html
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quicklime
Having grown up in a working class family, I find it strange that western
hipsters are so taken by industrial chic architecture. It's an environment
that I grew up hoping to escape from. But architectural styles come in and out
of fashion, and yesterday's factories and warehouses are being converted into
coffee shops and homes that people love and pay a premium for.

In particular, the neighborhood that my parents lived and worked in is now a
very expensive and trendy part of town. There's little industry left; in fact
a lot of local companies are complaining that there's not enough warehouse
space left to rent, because it's all being converted into lofts! Sadly my
family sold out way before it became cool :(

I've heard it said that it's the styles that have just recently gone out of
fashion that are the least fashionable, whereas the styles that have been out
of fashion for longer often make a comeback. This applies to clothes, cars,
music, and architecture too.

So one thing I've wondered is: if the industrial style could go from being
considered ugly to being loved, is it possible that this could happen to
another style of architecture/design that we all currently consider to be an
eyesore? And what style would be next?

It makes a lot of sense that Brutalism would be it, and maybe these
Singaporeans are just ahead of the curve.

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conanbatt
If there is objectivity to beauty, it would deem brutalism as an example of
ugliness.

I grew and studied around brutalist buildings and they are impersonal and
humbling in the bad way: like when you visit a gothic church. Particularly
because of the visible aesthetic decay of its materials.

I love hating brutalism though.

~~~
jcranmer
Brutalism _can_ be beautiful. The Washington, D.C. Metro system's coffer
vaults is generally ranked highly in terms of aesthetically pleasing designs,
and is also a prime example of brutalism.

~~~
improbable22
I'm surprised people think it brutalist. I took those tiled ceilings to be a
classical reference -- the pantheon in tube shape.

~~~
tptacek
There are other brutalist buildings with classical flourishes; the calling
card of brutalism is just exposed raw concrete.

~~~
improbable22
Do you have other examples in mind? Trying to think of some and failing...

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tptacek
The Canadian Embassy?

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improbable22
Thanks, had never seen that. Presumably the committee had a starchitect and an
ambassador, both with veto power.

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spacegod
Singapore may have the world's best modern architecture. I used to be a
skeptic of modern architecture but I really enjoy builidngs like the Interlace
and Marina Bay Sands. One of many things that changed my thoughts when I was
living there. Fantastic country and people.

~~~
jjcm
I'm very curious to live there at some point in the next 5 years. What things
would you have done differently if you could go back to when you first moved
there?

~~~
shaki-dora
Not OP, but I found Singapore to be rather hell-ish. It feels like one giant
American mall, with possibly too much money for its own good.

HK, as a comparison, has preserved its character and charm, with life on the
streets and many unique neighborhoods.

Singapore happens when you think SimCity is realistic: the primacy of the
automobile, the belief that one additional Starbucks is always better than one
marginal tree, the instinct that any public meeting must be broken up, unless
it’s a queueueueueue (a long queue) at an Apple Store, etc.

It’s completely identical to Dubai or any of the Gulf metropolis, only with
rain. The #1 Thing to Do in Singapour is taking the bridge to Malaysia, and
never coming back. They think they can demolish the brutalism, but it’s
already too late: it must be in the water supply. Anything built after ca 1980
is still brutalism, only with glass. When you get to Singapore, you take a $50
rise to the city center, and wonder why you are still in the airport.

Singapore is what happens when you don’t allow creative people the occasional
drag of a joint: they take revenge, and make you live in it.

~~~
sjwright
The parent is a controversial opinion and one that I do not entirely share,
but as a person who has lived in Singapore for a while I am comfortable saying
that it's a legitimate, plausible opinion.

To the people down-voting it because you disagree, please rescind your vote
and supply a rebuttal in words.

~~~
shaki-dora
It’s fine, I was arguably overdoing it for comedic effect. Still, for
Americans especially, I believe there are destinations in SE Asia that are far
more rewarding than Sing Sing. If you need the economic environment, HK would
be an obvious choice, and maybe Shanghai. If you are doing remote work, the
list becomes far longer. I spent three years in different cities worldwide in
ca. 3-month intervals before getting stuck in Berlin, and I would recommend
Barcelona, Florence, HK, Australia’s east coast, Melbourne, Cape Town, Buenos
Aires, Rabat, Cairo, Tel Aviv, Beirut (check the local war forecast), and
Havanna.

~~~
Gigablah
At least you didn’t quote William Gibson.

~~~
kirvyteo
Lol...I was waiting...

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Antonio123123
Here is a picture of the building in the article
[https://i.imgur.com/1BW2j35.png](https://i.imgur.com/1BW2j35.png)

To me it looks like an old beach resort.

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alexpetralia
When I read the title, I thought this was almost the exact same article as the
one about Poland: [https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/10/t-magazine/poland-
brutali...](https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/10/t-magazine/poland-brutalism-
architecture.html)

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hliyan
Even though this article contrasts brutalist buildings with the more modern
glass-and-steel aesthetic, I think both are products of their time and may age
equally badly in the eyes of future generations. On the other hand, the
architectural styles of the older, more historical buildings in New York,
London, etc. seem to have aged well. In that they look old, but not "brutal".
There may come a time when even the modern glass and steel facades will look
brutal...

~~~
tobylane
They've aged well because they were deemed worth saving after several decades.
Since Penn, Euston stations the interest in saving as much as possible rather
than just the best examples has caused some lesser quality old buildings to be
kept.

~~~
shaki-dora
I’ve heard this explanation (i. e. selection bias) a few times, but I don’t
think it holds true. I live in a 190x building in Berlin that was nothing
special for its time. Yet people prefer this style to anything built later,
including most modern buildings (which are, however, preferable to the
abominations of the 60s, brutalism or not).

Here’s a streetview:
[https://goo.gl/maps/bmFBmYywHAF2](https://goo.gl/maps/bmFBmYywHAF2) walk
around a bit and you see many such buildings. Only where bombs destroyed the
older houses in WW2 will you find anything build after 1920.

The reasons aren’t necessarily a loss in taste: the older buildings have far
higher ceilings, which may be due to them often being filled with far more
people than is usual today. Alternatively (or because of that) heating costs
did not factor into such decisions.

As to skyscrapers and larger buildings such as museums or hospitals, it’s
important to remember that glass & steel & concrete is rather new technology.
It’s far cheaper than brick, and simply a compromise between costs and
appearances that was not commonly available back then. It’s also somewhat
inconsistent but undeniable that we appreciate the decorative elements on the
exterior, or the stucco inside, yet it feels somewhat tacky to make them
today: McMansions are what happens when you think you can plunder all that’s
beautiful from previous eras.

~~~
darkpuma
Very high ceilings is one technique used to keep buildings cool during the
summer before AC or even electric fans were around.

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retrogradeorbit
Next time you are in Singapore, go check out the Park View building. Make sure
to explore the statues outside and go into the ground floor and be amazed.

~~~
netsharc
I remember seeing this building and thinking the building would fit for Wayne
Enterprises. Didn't know one could go inside!

~~~
snicky
I had exactly the same thoughts when I stumbled upon it wandering around the
downtown late at night. It was dark, I was alone in the patio and the building
front looked amazingly scary.

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beezischillin
Those Singaporean buildings look quite good and you can tell that they at
least cared enough to build them properly and take care of them. I've seen
some buildings built in that era in the UK, while travelling and I always
found that they stood out, painfully, most of them eyesores.

On the opposite side of the spectrum to Singapore, as a Hungarian who had the
bad luck to be born and grow up in Romania, I hope that one day it will be
financially worth it for the country for these buildings to come down and be
committed to the graveyard of bad memories. Imagine brutalist architecture
built to be exactly the same, shoddily and cheaply, repeating endlessly across
the landscape. Buildings where the goal was to stuff as many people in as
cheaply as possible, buildings where each of them was built not according to
plan but according to what materials were left when every worker and official
stole their tiny bit.

For most people in the west, it would be one of the most severe types of
punishment imaginable, having to be born, live and die in a depressing,
prison-like environment like that.

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wilkskyes
Something about the stairs of the building in the main photo looks extremely
dangerous, like one could easily fall off a side, or if someone were standing
at the top of the stairs, they would have a clear shot into the open space if
they jumped off.

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Nursie
Honestly those don't look as awful and oppressive as a lot of the european
examples. This may be because the sun shines in Singapore from time to time...
also they seem to at least have some concessions to form that is not pure
function.

But still pretty ugly. I can't grok the mindset that asks for these to be
protected, other than as a weird form of contrarianism.

~~~
zimablue
Brutalism is a lot more interesting when you have a vague idea of the
background of it => it's a kind of socialist/communist philosophy in
architecture, pretty buildings are the enshrinement of social hierarchies into
architecture, so build something that is egalitarian by nature - lots of
identical units, function over form. Open spaces, honesty in the sense that
the architecture shows you how it's really made with exposed concrete etc, not
a facade. I guess you could argue that it's the lisp of architecture - no
hiding the construction. I guess the point is that it's not mindlessly ugly,
it's a statement about priorities and honesty in aesthetics.

~~~
Nursie
But you have to look at the results - ugly monoliths that create oppressive
spaces.

Having grown up around the results in the towns and cities of England, it's
hard to see these ideals when a grey-brown lump of concrete is blocking out
the already weak winter sunlight, unbroken straight lines make the wind howl
through and chill you, and dark spaces accumulate litter and urine and seem to
just encourage social problems.

So that's why I don't grok the mindset - can people not see what it actually
becomes? I get that egalitarianism was there in the intent, but intent is not
really relevant. Results are relevant.

~~~
fredley
As with all architecture there are good and bad examples (with bad examples
usually lost over time - leaving only the good), and with brutalism in
particular issues with poor maintenance. Maintain any building of any age and
architectural 'school' poorly and it will become rundown, shabby, and
unpleasant to live in/around.

I walk through the Barbican frequently, which is rightly a much celebrated
building, and find it an extremely elevating experience. I also recently
visited Royan Cathedral which is honestly one of the most beautiful I've ever
been in. I think many brutalist buildings have been blighted by decades of
neglect almost from right after they were built. That's not going to leave the
best impression on anybody.

~~~
Nursie
I don't think you can just blame poor maintenance - the material and style
choices are just poor to start with.

The cathedral looks to me like a gun emplacement, or some relic of a forgotten
war.

~~~
darkpuma
Funny you mention relics of wars. Have you seen the ruins of the Oslobođenje
building in Sarajevo? That war ruin somehow manages to capture the aesthetic
of _well maintained_ brutalist architecture almost perfectly. Brutalist
buildings on their best days look like ruins from a city under siege. Walking
into a neighborhood with brutalist architecture feels like you've walked into
some alternate timeline where WWIII is raging.

The cynical side of me suspects that brutalist architecture is a reflection of
the psychological damage WWII inflicted on a generation of architects. They
experienced an ugly world, then sought to recreate that ugliness in their
work. Experiencing war corrupted them. Their legacy, their still standing
buildings, are not unlike the iron harvest French and Belgian farmers
experience every year when they till their fields and find bombs from WWI.

