You can blame this guy: Adolf Loos, at least in part.
Major influence behind Modernism. He was mainly reacting against Art Nouveau which he was a staunch critic of.
“The evolution of culture marches with the elimination of ornament from useful objects” is the core theme of his essay “Ornamentation and Crime” .
Basically,
ornamentation causes buildings and useful objects to go out of style.
Things that go out of style require materials and manpower to update.
It is the moral imperative of the designer to make useful things, things that need to be redone are less useful and are wasteful.
Therefore it is the moral imperative of the designer to remove all ornamentation from design.
He saw ornamentation as “degenerate” and equated ornamentlessnes with moral and intellectual development. He also made it a race thing. He used the example of people from Papua New Guinea having tattoos. Paraphrasing: “these primitive savages ornament themselves with tattoos, we enlightened europeans don’t. We smart, they dumb. Therefore ornament = dumb bad, no ornament = good smart. See?”
He was a major inspiration behind the modernist movement. It helped that unadorned buildings are cheaper and easier to construct - especially with the advent of cheap glass and steel construction. So you end up with this sort of soulless architecture that gives no sense of time or place - that tells you nothing about its purpose or the people who built/use it.
The popularisation of the idea that ornament is inherently bad genuinely did far more damage to the visual environment of the UK than the Luftwaffe managed with years of strategic bombing in my view.
We can pretend he’s the main influence, whilst ignoring the fact that most people prefer square even walls for aesthetic, functional, and - most of all - cost purposes.
I do agree we could do better w.r.t to colour, and millenial grey needs to go. But don’t knock the rectangle. Rectangle is good. Rectangle is steady. You can plan on rectangle.
I now feel the need to create a coordinate system where a 120 degree angle is orthogonal, so people will say the same for hexagons.
And then pixels on the monitors will be arranged in a hexagonal formation.
It would be fun to watch.
But IDK if that will work out. Perhaps create another space.
Oof, I’d hate to live in a hexagon house with hexagon rooms. Can you just imagine what the corridoors would be like?
Either you accept that the corridors are constantly bending in and out, or you shove a rectangle through there for normalcy and disrupt all the other rooms
There’s nothing in the construction world that I hate more than the fake gray wood interlocking vinyl floor planks that are in every house now. I guess they’re supposed to be the color of wood on old barns or fences, but I’ve never seen real wood of that color on a floor anywhere. I bought my house a couple of years ago and it had that type of fake flooring in the living room. I deliberately left it uncovered during the renovations, assuming that it would be trashed which would force me to replace it with something I actually like – no such luck, that stuff is actually pretty indestructable, unfortunately.
Rectangles were fucking hard for a very long time. Which is why vernacular building strategies came about (why there’s so much variation in architecture older than the Industrial Revolution).
This entire thread reads like it’s filled with opinions from people who have never put anything together.
I was talking more about the overall shape of the building rather than doors, windows etc etc and also not pre-industrial revolution ages.
I lived in a souther italian commune for a while and i still go there in vacation, the houses are very old and most shapes are cubic or rectangles except for windows and doors because it was just easier to build that way (the houses are also not big so it’s a factor to keep in mind) while bigger structures do use more arches and many shapes
I think an aspect of the problem is the modern high expectations of functionality for things like climate control and ingress protection against pests and water. It’s much easier to not make a mistake on those if you aren’t adding any “frills”. Balancing those needs with ornamentation and cost is such a difficult juggling act, most people just don’t.
It’s also a question of cost. You can probably take the layout off the modern house and have the facade look like the housing of old. But building houses is expensive so costs need to be cut where it can, thus very minimalist facades. If you live in your own house would you pay 50k or 100k just to have your house look a certain way from the outside? I know I wouldn’t. I could barely afford the house.
Rectangle good, sure. But rectangle that gives no sense of time or place sad, I think.
I really like some architecture inspired by modernism. Huge FLW fan - fallingwater is my favorite building. But the good modernist or modernist-derived buildings incorporate and emphasize their surroundings and give a sense of time and place by incorporating traditional stylistic elements, local materials, etc.
Also, no pretending needed - this guy was a major progenitor of the style. The style can be a very good fit for the needs of people who commission buildings to be built, and it can look cool in its own right, but regardless of any of that Loos was a pioneering force in the Modernist movement
Unpopular opinion: I never saw the appeal of Frank Lloyd Wright, honestly. I don’t know how anybody can look at Falling Water and not see a bunch of cardboard boxes somebody left at the creek.
I don’t know how anybody can look at Falling Water and not see a bunch of cardboard boxes somebody left at the creek.
I don’t have a strong opinion about this, but I find it funny that even your unflattering critique acknowledges that it does convey a sense of time and place.
I know it was fairly cheap ornamentation, but the damage his philosophy did to buildings in Germany is profound. They straight up tore the ornamentation off a lot of buildings.
At least all the things I see on the buildings in the top picture seem to have a utilitarian purpose.
Of course, how well they fulfilled their purpose would have depended upon the availability of materials and manufacturing processes at the time.
You can blame this guy: Adolf Loos, at least in part.
Major influence behind Modernism. He was mainly reacting against Art Nouveau which he was a staunch critic of.
“The evolution of culture marches with the elimination of ornament from useful objects” is the core theme of his essay “Ornamentation and Crime” .
Basically,
ornamentation causes buildings and useful objects to go out of style.
Things that go out of style require materials and manpower to update.
It is the moral imperative of the designer to make useful things, things that need to be redone are less useful and are wasteful.
Therefore it is the moral imperative of the designer to remove all ornamentation from design.
He saw ornamentation as “degenerate” and equated ornamentlessnes with moral and intellectual development. He also made it a race thing. He used the example of people from Papua New Guinea having tattoos. Paraphrasing: “these primitive savages ornament themselves with tattoos, we enlightened europeans don’t. We smart, they dumb. Therefore ornament = dumb bad, no ornament = good smart. See?”
He was a major inspiration behind the modernist movement. It helped that unadorned buildings are cheaper and easier to construct - especially with the advent of cheap glass and steel construction. So you end up with this sort of soulless architecture that gives no sense of time or place - that tells you nothing about its purpose or the people who built/use it.
The popularisation of the idea that ornament is inherently bad genuinely did far more damage to the visual environment of the UK than the Luftwaffe managed with years of strategic bombing in my view.
“I think that thing is ugly, so I’m gonna make something even uglier!”
We can pretend he’s the main influence, whilst ignoring the fact that most people prefer square even walls for aesthetic, functional, and - most of all - cost purposes.
I do agree we could do better w.r.t to colour, and millenial grey needs to go. But don’t knock the rectangle. Rectangle is good. Rectangle is steady. You can plan on rectangle.
I now feel the need to create a coordinate system where a 120 degree angle is orthogonal, so people will say the same for hexagons.
And then pixels on the monitors will be arranged in a hexagonal formation.
It would be fun to watch.
But IDK if that will work out. Perhaps create another space.
Oof, I’d hate to live in a hexagon house with hexagon rooms. Can you just imagine what the corridoors would be like?
Either you accept that the corridors are constantly bending in and out, or you shove a rectangle through there for normalcy and disrupt all the other rooms
If in a given space, 120° is orthogonal angle, then 240° will be the angle at any point of a straight line.
Oh you rewrote the universe with a curved geometry. That’s very practical
No.
It was curved before.
I made it straight.
You can’t just pray the gay out of people, that’s not how that therapy works
There’s nothing in the construction world that I hate more than the fake gray wood interlocking vinyl floor planks that are in every house now. I guess they’re supposed to be the color of wood on old barns or fences, but I’ve never seen real wood of that color on a floor anywhere. I bought my house a couple of years ago and it had that type of fake flooring in the living room. I deliberately left it uncovered during the renovations, assuming that it would be trashed which would force me to replace it with something I actually like – no such luck, that stuff is actually pretty indestructable, unfortunately.
But consider this:
Hexagons - bestagons
Rectangle looks like shit and is monotone
No like really, I can see it making sense for older times where it was harder to build shit but cmon we are in 2026…
Rectangles were fucking hard for a very long time. Which is why vernacular building strategies came about (why there’s so much variation in architecture older than the Industrial Revolution).
This entire thread reads like it’s filled with opinions from people who have never put anything together.
I was talking more about the overall shape of the building rather than doors, windows etc etc and also not pre-industrial revolution ages.
I lived in a souther italian commune for a while and i still go there in vacation, the houses are very old and most shapes are cubic or rectangles except for windows and doors because it was just easier to build that way (the houses are also not big so it’s a factor to keep in mind) while bigger structures do use more arches and many shapes
I think an aspect of the problem is the modern high expectations of functionality for things like climate control and ingress protection against pests and water. It’s much easier to not make a mistake on those if you aren’t adding any “frills”. Balancing those needs with ornamentation and cost is such a difficult juggling act, most people just don’t.
It’s also a question of cost. You can probably take the layout off the modern house and have the facade look like the housing of old. But building houses is expensive so costs need to be cut where it can, thus very minimalist facades. If you live in your own house would you pay 50k or 100k just to have your house look a certain way from the outside? I know I wouldn’t. I could barely afford the house.
Rectangle good, sure. But rectangle that gives no sense of time or place sad, I think.
I really like some architecture inspired by modernism. Huge FLW fan - fallingwater is my favorite building. But the good modernist or modernist-derived buildings incorporate and emphasize their surroundings and give a sense of time and place by incorporating traditional stylistic elements, local materials, etc.
Also, no pretending needed - this guy was a major progenitor of the style. The style can be a very good fit for the needs of people who commission buildings to be built, and it can look cool in its own right, but regardless of any of that Loos was a pioneering force in the Modernist movement
Unpopular opinion: I never saw the appeal of Frank Lloyd Wright, honestly. I don’t know how anybody can look at Falling Water and not see a bunch of cardboard boxes somebody left at the creek.
Holy shit this is a bad take.
Yeah, that’s unpopular alright. How do I look at it without seeing cardboard boxes? With my functional eyes
I don’t have a strong opinion about this, but I find it funny that even your unflattering critique acknowledges that it does convey a sense of time and place.
Tell me you’ve never read Buckminster Fuller without telling me
Hmm, tricky but I’ll try.
*Mimes: Five words*:
LMFAO
Like… everything he wrote?
Relevant YouTube video: how did the world get so ugly?
I know it was fairly cheap ornamentation, but the damage his philosophy did to buildings in Germany is profound. They straight up tore the ornamentation off a lot of buildings.
Man, I really don’t care for this Adolf character…
Just Adolf things
At least all the things I see on the buildings in the top picture seem to have a utilitarian purpose.
Of course, how well they fulfilled their purpose would have depended upon the availability of materials and manufacturing processes at the time.
Ayn Rand also writes about this in The Fountainhead
Somebody mentions Ayn Rand in a neutral/positive light and gets only upvotes.
What’s going on here.
Positive? We established here these boxes are ugly and uninspired.
Goddamn she found a way to be as wrong as possible about every single topic.
I read The Fountainhead in college and thought it was great. Then I recovered from the flu and thought “what the hell was that shit?”