
The era of radical concrete - smacktoward
http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-29082338
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Detrus
I grew up in a "radical" concrete neighborhood built by the Soviets in the
1980's. Closest thing to the "garden city" dream promised by concrete utopia
planners.

Looks something like this [http://www.niekonaujo.lt/wp-
content/uploads/2012/08/14-tv_pa...](http://www.niekonaujo.lt/wp-
content/uploads/2012/08/14-tv_panoramos-20120519.jpg)

[http://static.panoramio.com/photos/large/43031765.jpg](http://static.panoramio.com/photos/large/43031765.jpg)

Very fun place when I was a kid. Kindergardens, schools and stores all walking
distance in those images. Remove some of the green space and you get a
dystopian looking brutalist nightmare.

But functionally you can fit dense housing, a public backyard for your kids, a
place to have a picnic, stores, schools in the middle of a city. Some people
just balk at the idea because so much of this utopian planning went wrong in
one way or another, often in ways that have nothing to do with the housing
style but became associated with it.

~~~
eru
Plenty of Singapore looks similar, and works fairly well.

~~~
twic
I was struck by how similar some of those pictures - both of the old tenements
and the new towers - looked to Hong Kong. Hong Kong seems to work quite well;
a friend of mine who grew up there waxes lyrical about how wonderful a
childhood spent on the streets in the sky was. Although she now lives in a
detached house in a small town in Cambridgeshire, so i should take that with a
pinch of salt.

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at-fates-hands
This is classic architectural brutalism. Just getting a wider glimpse into the
history of this is totally fascinating to me.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brutalist_architecture](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brutalist_architecture)

"Brutalist architecture is a movement in architecture that flourished from the
1950s to the mid-1970s, descended from the modernist architectural movement of
the early 20th century."

"Examples are typically massive in character (even when not large), fortress-
like, with a predominance of exposed concrete construction, or in the case of
the "brick brutalists" ruggedly detailed brickwork and concrete together.
There is often an emphasis on graphically expressing in the external
elevations and in the whole-site plan the main functions and people-flows of
the buildings. Brutalism became popular for educational buildings (especially
university buildings), but was relatively rare for corporate projects.
Brutalism became favoured for many government projects, high-rise housing, and
shopping centres to create an architectural image that communicated strength,
functionality, and frank expression of materiality."

~~~
Semiapies
This was because concrete was _cheap_ , more than anything.

~~~
zanny
I'd much rather live in a concrete house than one built out of sticks and glue
like most of suburbia.

Tornadoes and hurricanes would be much less of an issue throughout much of the
US, at least.

~~~
at-fates-hands
I lot of modern architecture utilizes various forms of concrete these days to
incredible effect:

[http://themodernhouseblog.net/](http://themodernhouseblog.net/)

Only problem is they also use a ton of glass to facilitate lots of natural
lighting.

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g8oz
In her classic book "The Death and Life of Great American Cities" Jane Jacobs
made a powerful argument against both alienating high rise buildings and
suburban sprawl. Instead she advocated for an approach that emphasized mid-
rise buildings and short mixed use blocks to get the right mix of density and
human scale streets. Worth a read

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chiph
I was surprised The Barbican wasn't mentioned.

I went there (from the US) for a trade show several years ago, and the low
ceilings were oppressive. Can't imagine what the tower flats were like.

~~~
noelwelsh
It's actually an amazing place to be, if your life circumstances fit. I have a
friend with a flat there. It's very small, and the tech. is a bit old now
(electric burners are a hassle, for instance), but the flat and building
services are very well organised and the Barbican centre has fantastic
amenities. His flat is a studio. There are larger flats but I haven't seen
inside them.

[Decoder key: flat in UK = apartment in US]

~~~
chiph
1.45 million pounds for a 3 bedroom? OMFG. "Life circumstances", indeed!

~~~
noelwelsh
It's the middle of London ... prices are comparable to other major cities.

Regarding life circumstances, I was thinking about my own living situation
with two young kids. I can't imagine how we'd physically store all the plastic
crap they have accumulated in a Barbican sized flat, let alone prepare meals
or keep up with the laundry. It would require a very different lifestyle. I'm
sure people do it, but you gotta really buy into it and probably spend a lot
of money on activities outside of home to keep them amused. Likewise if you
are a real homebody I can't see the Barbican working for you, unless that
homebody-ness is accompanied by a strong liking for minimalism.

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dsego
Ah, commie blocks
[http://www.skyscrapercity.com/forumdisplay.php?f=477](http://www.skyscrapercity.com/forumdisplay.php?f=477)

~~~
kazagistar
In places where they are not ultra-dense, these can mean that a good 80% of
the land is green space.

Maybe I just never understood the appeal of having a teeny fenced off piece of
land, instead of a large shared one.

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sean-duffy
My first year accommodation at the University of York was somewhat similar to
this, having been built in the 60s from prefabricated concrete panels. I lived
in Derwent college, which is some of the cheapest accommodation due to it
being in this old part of the campus, a lot of the other accommodation is
newly built hotel-standard stuff with en-suites. While a lot of people find it
unattractive and an eyesore, I thought it had a certain unique appeal. Despite
the concrete there's a lot of greenery, and the covered walkways were very
convenient in the rain. It's possible to walk between most points in the
campus without ever leaving a covered walkway, you probably wouldn't see that
level of pragmatism in a modern build.

Here's a (fairly large) image as an example:
[http://www.york.ac.uk/media/abouttheuniversity/supportservic...](http://www.york.ac.uk/media/abouttheuniversity/supportservices/internationalrelations/Central%20Hall%20Physics%20Lake.jpg)

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LeoPanthera
The full set of high-res photos can be found here.

[https://www.flickr.com/photos/jrjamesarchive/sets/](https://www.flickr.com/photos/jrjamesarchive/sets/)

