Fenway Center (One Kenmore) | Turnpike Parcel 7, Beacon Street | Fenway

I don't see the over-Pike portion starting? Lets get it going before the post-COVID traffic resumes.
 
Jesus they're not even being subtle about it anymore..

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Architecture loses it's relevance trying to become relevant for Instagram. Maybe it works for marketing for a hip hotel room, but a public walkway?

Luckily I'm seeing no spaces that wannabe-LA-influencers will want to flaunt to for a photo and then leave for the few months it's cool, but having our design leaders dictate more inauthentic spaces that provide mere 'moments' and likes is, put simply, just sad.
 
stefal said:
Jesus they're not even being subtle about it anymore..

View attachment 11670

Architecture loses it's relevance trying to become relevant for Instagram. Maybe it works for marketing for a hip hotel room, but a public walkway?

Luckily I'm seeing no spaces that wannabe-LA-influencers will want to flaunt to for a photo and then leave for the few months it's cool, but having our design leaders dictate more inauthentic spaces that provide mere 'moments' and likes is, put simply, just sad.
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I mean, I'm no fan of the obsession with making everything "Instagram-able," but I also appreciate efforts to improve the aesthetic and experience from a pedestrian standpoint. The problem is often execution - duplicating the "What Lifts You" mural in Keene, NH is certainly inauthentic. But making a place "Instagram-able" by taking advantage of a location's unique view of the skyline, being thoughtful about planting trees/flowers/bushes, or using varied materials and textures is better than simply going with the cheapest/easiest solution (even if the "Influencers" constantly posing are obnoxious). It's not all B.S., it's just that the bad examples are glaringly obvious.
 
Lrfox said:
I mean, I'm no fan of the obsession with making everything "Instagram-able," but I also appreciate efforts to improve the aesthetic and experience from a pedestrian standpoint. The problem is often execution - duplicating the "What Lifts You" mural in Keene, NH is certainly inauthentic. But making a place "Instagram-able" by taking advantage of a location's unique view of the skyline, being thoughtful about planting trees/flowers/bushes, or using varied materials and textures is better than simply going with the cheapest/easiest solution (even if the "Influencers" constantly posing are obnoxious). It's not all B.S., it's just that the bad examples are glaringly obvious.
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Taking consideration of views/context and creating a beautiful place is a central crux of architecture. I'm not dismissing that. Writing out that they wish for instagram-able moments implies that it's a priority. There are numerous critiques on these kind of Instagram-focused spaces and their lack of attention to function and beauty, an ironic representation of the wasteful and lipstick-on-a-pig nature that thrives on Instagram.

I think the "Instagram-ability" of a place should be a side effect of good design, not a project goal. If you're a designer with a conscience working on a space that you expect a lot of people to move through and around, you design with that in mind. Adding the Instagram caveat adds artificiality to the project goal and cheapens the value architects provide, IMO.
 
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xec said:
I like the results overall, except that everything is so monotonously gray. Even more than NEMA in the Seaport. Is gray the current "in" color with architects?
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You haven't noticed? Architecture, interior design, fashion, even vehicles.... grayscale is king. We've been in a 50 shades of gray design universe for almost a decade now (and it feels even longer).
 
Ha! Would you believe I haven't? I'm the kind of guy that could go out to dinner and sit for two hours across the table from you eating and chatting, and if you called me when you got home and asked me what color shirt you were wearing or whether you were wearing glasses, the odds are excellent that I'd have no idea.
 
In low light, viewed from the central courtyard (XEC's pics above), this place doesn't look too bad.

That last pic, in broad daylight, is an aesthetic kick to the face. Not knocking KZ's photographic abilities.
 
HarvardP said:
In low light, viewed from the central courtyard (XEC's pics above), this place doesn't look too bad.

That last pic, in broad daylight, is an aesthetic kick to the face. Not knocking KZ's photographic abilities.
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Agreed. That facade, in its astonishing lack of textural depth, looks like the set-up to a visual gag from a Zucker Brothers movie--some kind of "breaking the fourth wall" kind of scene wherein the characters are interacting with what is supposed to be a solid and authentic 3-dimensional building structure--but when one of them merely touches it with their finger, the whole cheap flimsy 2-d set collapses, reminding the audience that the movie is just a movie, being filmed on a Hollywood sound stage.

We are truly staring at the abyss of VEd precast panel Alucobond hell... and it's ravening for our architectural souls.
 
DBM said:
Agreed. That facade, in its astonishing lack of textural depth, looks like the set-up to a visual gag from a Zucker Brothers movie--some kind of "breaking the fourth wall" kind of scene wherein the characters are interacting with what is supposed to be a solid and authentic 3-dimensional building structure--but when one of them merely touches it with their finger, the whole cheap flimsy 2-d set collapses, reminding the audience that the movie is just a movie, being filmed on a Hollywood sound stage.

We are truly staring at the abyss of VEd precast panel Alucobond hell... and it's ravening for our architectural souls.
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Yeah, it does basically look like a cardboard box with cutesy designs drawn on it.
 
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