Boston Properties Office Tower | 888 Boylston Street | Back Bay

It's like the Gonk Droid to 111 Huntington's R2D2
 
I think what bothers me the most about the design is how much the massing of the building really accentuates how tall the mechanical rises above the occupied floors, which further accentuates how short and squat the building is. I think that's also what really bothers me about the Brigham Building for the Future and a few other recent developments - rather than designing to accentuate height, they design for stubby stoutness. Maybe that's intentional; to allay neighbourhood concerns about 'tall' buildings...

Viewed along the skyline though, it's just another low height building around the Pru that further adds to this growing uncomfortable height contrast between the Pru and Hancock/100 Clarendon against all the other similar-height buildings around them. It's aesthetically unbalanced and I'm not sure we're going to get the balance of more 30-40 storey buildings here for a while.

As datadyne suggests, yeah this is an incomplete building, so I'll give it the benefit of the doubt.
 
A well proportioned plain glass box would have been fine here, with a good ground level. I just think unless its a great design that is worth the extra effort, at a minimum it should be better than if it were a plain box. If not, a short box that has a glass facade has never ruined a skyline and at this height would have faded into the background while improving the street life. That would have been a win/win, once finished this may be a lose/win.
 
timsox6 said:
It's like the Gonk Droid to 111 Huntington's R2D2
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Timsox -- sorry I thought that you had written Gronk and I was going to point out that he's taller than R2D2 or even C3P0

But with respect to the aspect ratio discussion -- these days bigger companies or companies that want to be bigger prefer larger floor plates all other things being equal

One large floor lets you have:
  • the traditional endless sea of "Dilberts" toiling away
  • open mix of lab and office users for those companies needing both
  • room for foosball, dodgeball, basketball. etc., for those so inclined
  • room for lounges, food kiosks. various kinds of formal and casual meet-ups
  • room for big labs with small assembly facilities
  • general flexibility without worrying about elevators or even stairs

and on top of that -- many companies have deemphasized the windows and the corner office in favor of "one-big-happy-family" -- its almost as if hundreds of years of interior specialization has been rolled back to the era of the Meade Halle
 
The east-west views are the least satisfying for me because the building looks chaotic.
Nice photos though!
 
IMG_7942.jpg
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The construction hoist came down this past weekend (you can see the crane taking it down in the pis) so this one should be zipped up soon and hopefully they will start work on the plaza.
 
The best thing about this tower in that picture is that the millennium tower draws your eye away from it.
 
DZH22 said:
From 3/6



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DHZ -- I think this telephoto compression shows us what Frank Gehry really had in mind for the old Tower Records project at the corner of Newbury and Mass Ave -- its so-so
scan0002.jpg


so so -- his style ;)
 
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davem said:
Seriously, they put back the same escalator configuration? There should be two up escalators and double the width stairs.
.
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Myr reaction as well. They couldnt have gone with full width escalators???
 
A precious, non-FAA height or shade challenged parcel wasted

to become Boston's latest abomination.....

possesses not even one redeeming feature.

would be bad enough in an office park in Toledo. but here.... Geebus.

epic box turd clashes with every goddamn thing in the Back Bay.
 
My god this is a fat stump. Nothing really wrong with the design or the material. It's just sooooo squat and fat. It's like an Apple Store on steroid. This building should really be in the Seaport, not Back Bay.



Fat.
 
The seaport doesnt want this either. Imagine if this wasnt surrounded by taller buildings and brownstones to save ur eyes. Little kids would cry when they saw this.
 
Man, you people need to take a breath and chill out.
 
mdd said:
Man, you people need to take a breath and chill out.
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Indeed.

Anyone know if there are plans for lighting the top at night? All this framework for wind turbines and such, it could be quite striking.
 
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