Facelifts

[Cojapo]

These recladding projects got me thinking, what building in Boston could use a reclad?
Verizon Tower-NYC
Before:

After:

Tour Axa-Paris
Before:

After:

IMO, One Boston Place would top my list:

 

[Ron Newman]

At one point during the malling of the Prudential Center, there was a semi-serious proposal to reclad the tower, to give it a 1930s look. I sort of wish it had happened.

 

[unterbau]

Man, that Verizon tower looked better before...

 

[lexicon506]

My top candidate for reclad would have to be One Beacon.....actually, why waste the money, it should just be torn down.

 

[justin]

unterbau, I agree: both those examples looked better before.

 

[BarbaricManchurian]

I think they look much better, more modern, and a cleaner look after the recladding. Tour AXA is way different after the recladding, and for the better. You may like 70s brutalist architecture with these examples but I don't.

 

[Joe_Schmoe]

One Boston gets my vote as well. I privately refer to it as the Death Star.

 

[statler]

I'm pretty sure there are a few people on this board who like One Boston. (I'm not one of them). I'm curious as to why.

Justify your love for One Boston.

 

[PerfectHandle]

The Verizon tower was leaps and bounds better before.

Tour AXA, I think, will be better post-reclad.

I'm pretty sure there are a few people on this board who like One Boston. (I'm not one of them). I'm curious as to why.

Justify your love for One Boston.

I like the giant X in One Boston. That's about all I like about it. I'd rather see Ashburton Place reclad though.

 

[Cojapo]

At one point during the malling of the Prudential Center, there was a semi-serious proposal to reclad the tower, to give it a 1930s look. I sort of wish it had happened.

As much as I like the Pru, mostly because it is one of the most recognizable Boston buildings, I would love to see a reclad.
I am a huge fan of glass towers, so to me, the Verizon and Axa towers look a hell of a lot better now then prior.

 

[czsz]

The Verizon tower's old skin was classic pseudo-colonnade. It had a vocabulary. The redo is slickness for slickness' sake. An empty gesture.

One Boston, I think, is hideous, but there's something very apropos to it. It reminds me of the sort of totalitarian, sinister Boston of the Puritan era, an homage to the Scarlet Letter and the Crucible. It even sort of looks like a 17th century hat, if you squint enough.

 

[Cojapo]

It reminds me of styles of clothing thru different decades. Clog shoes, bell bottoms and leisure suits reminds all of us of the 70's, and I am sure we are all thankfull we don't have to look at them everyday. That is how I feel about certain building movements. The 60's and 70's gave us a unique style of architecture, but I don't need or want to be reminded of it everyday!

 

[unterbau]

I gotta say that I quite like One Boston as well. It looks like a slightly altered Mies tower, and except for the ground floor, is quite elegant. By flaunting its structure it avoids the heaviness of some of Boston's other towers (i.e. One Beacon). I've always thought of it as Boston's Darth Vader building - and I should point out that Darth Vader has lots of style.

 

[Suffolk 83]

I always hated one boston but after staring at that picture. its not all that bad. just lose the top that completely kills it.

 

[unterbau]

The little hat is the best part! Without that it's just the Seafirst center (aka "the box the space needle came in")

 

[czsz]

^ The above building actually looks way more elegant than One Boston...all because of the base. God, if only it opened up like that instead of projecting some increasingly bulky fashion of the decade patch at street level...

 

[Boston02124]

These recladding projects got me thinking, what building in Boston could use a reclad?
Verizon Tower-NYC
Before:

After:

Tour Axa-Paris
Before:

After:

IMO, One Boston Place would top my list:

I think it would benefit if they change the bronze glass to something more mirror like that would show off the framing during the day and at nite light the crown and maybe lights on all four corners top(shining down) and shining up from the bottom 4 corners?The one to the right Bank of New England Building now 28 State would be my #! pix to be re clad.

 

[kennedy]

Yeah, I wonder how much it would cost to give One Boston a glass curtain wall where the windows now are, clad that top box in steel mesh caging, and sandblast all the concrete (or something of the sort to lighten the stone up).

It's not great, but it's better than what's there now.

 

[Lrfox]

It may just be me, but I like One Boston the way it is.

 

[itchy]

I also don't find One Boston all that bad. I'm not the biggest fan of Internationalism in general, but it's not the city's most offensive manifestation of it. First National Bank, One Financial Center and the Federal Reserve Bank are all big-time disasters.

Boston has its share of Internationalist misfortunes that I wouldn't mind seeing replaced by thinner, more elegant high-rises -- but I don't think One Boston is at the top of that list.