NEMA Boston | 399 Congress St. | Seaport

vanshnookenraggen said:
Oh wow, they are going cheap and ugly with this!
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Wow? You are surprised? When you can throw up dressed up low income housing and people will pay top dollar ... you get this. Unfortunately common in Boston right now.

cca
 
cca said:
Wow? You are surprised? When you can throw up dressed up low income housing and people will pay top dollar ... you get this. Unfortunately common in Boston right now.

cca
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It also looks so much worse as it sits directly across from Echelon which appears to be shaping up quite well so far from what I can tell.
 
Its going to be an affordable hotel no? Maybe would explain the shit materials
 
"Make it look like a demented pygmy elephant with gastrointestinal problems, then VE it some more."
 
Remember for a moment what VE means - value engineering. In essence, it is considering cost of labor and materials during design and it is an essential element of ALL ENGINEERING. Every building, product, widget, and service in the modern world is value engineered. You sound like morons bandying about the one industry term you know and you don't even seem to understand what it means.

The fact is, the vast majority of people don't pay extra to live in a prettier building. The designers quite literally cannot derive any additional value by using more expensive material, so they don't. Would you? Do you buy stocks you expect to fall in price? Do you buy things you don't want? Do you set money on fire?

The designers are reacting to the market. Value engineering is, by definition, giving customers what they want. What other standard can you suggest that they should use to guide their designs? Your personal whims?

The thing that you think you don't like about developers and architects - this so-called VE problem - is actually something you don't like about the people buying/renting the condos/apartments. So please, when you complain about ugly buildings at least point the finger in the right direction. Complain that your friends and neighbors have lousy taste or really don't care at all. That is the root cause.
 
I actually don't think a whole lot of people on this board/thread are confused about that, and most of us are quite aware of terms beyond VE. You sound like someone who designs ugly buildings frothing at the mouth because someone rightly said your building is ugly. I personally have a degree in economics, so I'm well aware of the things you note in your lengthy screed.
 
I'm not ready to chalk this up as a loss just yet. 3 factors to consider...

1. The quality (and color) of the glass could significantly alter the current appearance.
2. It doesn't quite look like anything else in the city so it's not like we are cloning crap (cough Toronto, Miami, Vancouver)
3. It's right at the moment in time where we typically hate on every new development. Minds can still change.
 
Coyote137 said:
I actually don't think a whole lot of people on this board/thread are confused about that, and most of us are quite aware of terms beyond VE. You sound like someone who designs ugly buildings frothing at the mouth because someone rightly said your building is ugly. I personally have a degree in economics, so I'm well aware of the things you note in your lengthy screed.
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Then why use VE with a negative connotation? Why do people spout off about it as if it were something that A) could somehow be avoided (not a chance) or B) is something vindictive that developers and architects do (which it isn't).
 
There is a school of thought that posits that architecture (particularly of large, prominent buildings) affects more than just the developer and buyer. And while VE may be a net positive for those two parties it is a net negative for the community as a whole, hence the criticism.
 
fattony said:
Then why use VE with a negative connotation? Why do people spout off about it as if it were something that A) could somehow be avoided (not a chance) or B) is something vindictive that developers and architects do (which it isn't).
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Why care so much to write multiple paragraphs because someone on the internet cracked a joke about a building looking like a demented elephant? Do you personally know the architects? Yes, VE is an economic reality, but I like saying things that I find to be humorous about the buildings that result from the process. I'm going to be looking at the thing for a long time, and this is probably the one time I'll apparently hurt someone's feelings by "spouting off about it."
 
At first glance at these pictures, I had the knee-jerk reaction of "oh no, this doesn't look good", but I stepped back and thought the same thing, DZ. Let's see this progress a bit more before we kill it off.

DZH22 said:
I'm not ready to chalk this up as a loss just yet. 3 factors to consider...

1. The quality (and color) of the glass could significantly alter the current appearance.
2. It doesn't quite look like anything else in the city so it's not like we are cloning crap (cough Toronto, Miami, Vancouver)
3. It's right at the moment in time where we typically hate on every new development. Minds can still change.
Click to expand...
 
fattony said:
Remember for a moment what VE means - value engineering. In essence, it is considering cost of labor and materials during design and it is an essential element of ALL ENGINEERING. Every building, product, widget, and service in the modern world is value engineered. You sound like morons bandying about the one industry term you know and you don't even seem to understand what it means.

The fact is, the vast majority of people don't pay extra to live in a prettier building. The designers quite literally cannot derive any additional value by using more expensive material, so they don't. Would you? Do you buy stocks you expect to fall in price? Do you buy things you don't want? Do you set money on fire?

The designers are reacting to the market. Value engineering is, by definition, giving customers what they want. What other standard can you suggest that they should use to guide their designs? Your personal whims?

The thing that you think you don't like about developers and architects - this so-called VE problem - is actually something you don't like about the people buying/renting the condos/apartments. So please, when you complain about ugly buildings at least point the finger in the right direction. Complain that your friends and neighbors have lousy taste or really don't care at all. That is the root cause.
Click to expand...

There is another aspect to value engineering that is being missed here: the tradeoff between first cost and overall long-term payback on a property.

VEd designs often result in designs that age poorly, and result in excessive O&M costs over time. Since the developer is often only concerned with first cost, they make out. But the long-term building owner is left with a maintenance cost nightmare.

This is why a developer that is also going to be the long-term building owner, like Liberty Mutual, will invest in Indiana limestone for their building facade. (Note the term invest.) Where as a developer that is immediately flipping the building will VE for alucobond.
 
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