
Spite buildings: when human grudges get architectural - bryanrasmussen
https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/jun/21/spite-buildings-when-human-grudges-get-architectural-in-pictures
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wccrawford
I don't really see how the second one is a "spite house". He loved his house
and its location, and in return for giving it up, he demanded they move the
house to a location that was almost as good and pay him for his inconvenience.

I'm sure he was quite happy with the deal in the end, and there's no need for
anger on either side.

~~~
soared
It sounds like it was political spite. He didn't like the authority and
spitefully required them to waste time and money in order for him to comply.

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bryanrasmussen
I would actually like to see some investigations of important 'spite'
technical architectures. Not sure if some decisions about SOAP weren't done
spitefully.

~~~
mbel
Even more than architectures, there seems to be a tiny little bit of spite in
everything IT related from programming language design (C++) to end-user
facing software (Windows Update).

~~~
vorg
> a tiny little bit of spite in everything IT related from programming
> language design

A mere hour after your comment, a link to the dynamically-typed Gravity
language (
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17373545](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17373545)
) appeared on HN. The syntax appears to be based on Apache Groovy's (and its
syntactic clones Dart and Swift), and as for the name, well, "Gravity is
groovy" ?!

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fredley
There is (at least one) example of this in Cambridge, UK. King's College built
a new building in the 50's that has some windows that overhang the wall into
neighboring Queens' College.

When Queens' built a new (one of the very earliest) brutalist building a few
years later, it juts out over the same wall back into King's, blocking the
views from the Master's lodge.

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jarofgreen
There are tons of examples like the last one.

[https://www.theglasgowstory.com/image/?inum=TGSA00948](https://www.theglasgowstory.com/image/?inum=TGSA00948)
"In 1986 the city renamed St George's Place, the location of the South African
consulate, as Nelson Mandela Place in his honour. "

And painting the street crossings outside russian embassies with rainbow
colours seems to be a common protest thing now, but I'm sure years ago there
was one European country that did that officially.

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alien1993
An old spite building could be the Rocca Paolina in Perugia, Italy, it was
ordered by Pope Paul III and it has been built atop the Baglioni family's
houses after they revolted against the Pope.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocca_Paolina](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocca_Paolina)

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crottypeter
An example of this in London is the Cornhill Devils.

Supposedly the architect of the building on which they appear fell out with
the Vicar of the adjacent St Peter's Church.

[http://hidden-london.com/the-guide/cornhill-devils/](http://hidden-
london.com/the-guide/cornhill-devils/)

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yardie
A local spite building (well part) is the spite wall the original owner of the
Fountainebleau Miami built that overlooks the Eden Roc Hotel

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eden_Roc_Miami_Beach_Hotel](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eden_Roc_Miami_Beach_Hotel)

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BerislavLopac
Here's another example in Croatia: [http://zaklada-
brac.hr/zanimljivosti/prica-o-kuci-u-kuci/](http://zaklada-
brac.hr/zanimljivosti/prica-o-kuci-u-kuci/)

