Why has architecture become an exercise in stage set building?
ON THE PRAIRIE WHERE I LIVE arises a strip mall. It looks like it belongs on the French Riviera: turrets and arches, awnings, balconies with wrought iron railings… Well, I’ve never been to the French Riviera, but in this ignorance is my point. The everyday buildings we build around us want to be anything but everyday. They want to be stage sets of Somewhere Else. And their proliferation seems to suggest that everywhere we Americans go, we want to be Somewhere Else. Getting up in the morning on the Moran Prairie, where the deer and the antelope used to roam, we have our cereal, and then we must drive by Something Mediterranean on our way to Washington State University’s Riverpoint campus in Spokane. It is an irony that the hot topic in teaching architectural theory these days is “sense of place.” Faculty write about it. Students stress over it. Academic conferences are held on it. What is “sense of place,” or it’s near cousin: “sense of community?” Whatever these mysterious substances
ON THE PRAIRIE WHERE I LIVE arises a strip mall. It looks like it belongs on the French Riviera: turrets and arches, awnings, balconies with wrought iron railings… Well, I’ve never been to the French Riviera, but in this ignorance is my point. The everyday buildings we build around us want to be anything but everyday. They want to be stage sets of Somewhere Else. And their proliferation seems to suggest that everywhere we Americans go, we want to be Somewhere Else. Getting up in the morning on the Moran Prairie, where the deer and the antelope used to roam, we have our cereal, and then we must drive by Something Mediterranean on our way to Washington State University’s Riverpoint campus in Spokane. It is an irony that the hot topic in teaching architectural theory these days is “sense of place.” Faculty write about it. Students stress over it. Academic conferences are held on it. What is “sense of place,” or it’s near cousin: “sense of community?” Whatever these mysterious substances
