Tree House Residence Hall Tower @ MassArt | 578 Huntington Avenue | Fenway

Re: Mass Art Dormitory

I have to agree with datadyne, as a WIT student I personally think the new MassArt dorm is slightly out of scale with its surroundings, plus it blocks the campus from Huntington except for the walkway along 610/West Lot. We are getting a new cafe, fitness center, and health center out of it. No use fighting it now, we live in the city and shouldn't complain about new buildings, i'm actually enjoying watching it being built. I'll post more pictures of the construction later.
 
Re: Mass Art Dormitory

The scale of a neighborhood can change over time.

This is why we don't all live in single story huts.
 
Re: Mass Art Dormitory

"MY VIEWS ARE RUINED!" - datadyne007 responding to the WIT master plan, approved by the BRA, yesterday. (See other thread.)
 
Re: Mass Art Dormitory

My advice to the small percentage of college students that do care about scale of buildings near their campus would be to focus instead on classes and women b/c college goes by in a flash. Your only living there for 3 months in the fall and 3 in the spring and you should really just enjoy the ride while it lasts b/c after college the party is over.
 
Re: Mass Art Dormitory

JohnAKeith said:
"MY VIEWS ARE RUINED!" - datadyne007 responding to the WIT master plan, approved by the BRA, yesterday. (See other thread.)
Click to expand...
You have no idea what you're talking about. Wentworth has not proposed any towers. All the "master plan" is now is fixing up Beatty Hall (a horrible, horrible mess of a building) and adding a glass box on it. The architects don't even know what they're doing. They held a student discussion dinner and they told us they wanted to "address the Ward St. side" with a wall of glass. I hope it's bulletproof, if they end up doing it.

The funding fell through for the 60-year master plan, so instead they're just gonna fix up Beatty and give us the student center we deserve. Eventually, they'll expand Ira Allen to add more science labs, but I'm not even going to bank on it.

GW2500 said:
My advice to the small percentage of college students that do care about scale of buildings near their campus would be to focus instead on classes and women b/c college goes by in a flash. Your only living there for 3 months in the fall and 3 in the spring and you should really just enjoy the ride while it lasts b/c after college the party is over.
Click to expand...
I live in Boston, tyvm. Also, Wentworth has a summer semester. So good try. Know your facts first.
 
Re: Mass Art Dormitory

Pictures from Today

5263604007_83628fce0a_z.jpg

5263603879_087129dc5a_z.jpg

5263603699_6b3681145a_z.jpg
 
Re: Mass Art Dormitory

datadyne007 said:
I live in Boston, tyvm. Also, Wentworth has a summer semester. So good try. Know your facts first.
Click to expand...

Ok so for 8 months (or 2/3's) of 4 years you will call this campus home. Trust me, college living situations are very temporary. It's borderline pointless to worry about the scale (which is very much so an arguable opinion to begin with) of a neighborhood that you will be out of in a figurative flash. The turn over is so quick. Every campus has almost a 100% student turn over every 4 years. And in 3 years from now most the students will not have known the difference anywase. So instead of giving shit about something as uncentral to the college experice as this, I recomend dating as many women as possible and have fun. It's advice the future you would give the present you. Talk to any grad, the fun level greatly decreases after college.
 
Re: Mass Art Dormitory

GW2500 said:
Ok so for 8 months (or 2/3's) of 4 years you will call this campus home. Trust me, college living situations are very temporary. It's borderline pointless to worry about the scale (which is very much so an arguable opinion to begin with) of a neighborhood that you will be out of in a figurative flash. The turn over is so quick. Every campus has almost a 100% student turn over every 4 years. And in 3 years from now most the students will not have known the difference anywase. So instead of giving shit about something as uncentral to the college experice as this, I recomend dating as many women as possible and have fun. It's advice the future you would give the present you. Talk to any grad, the fun level greatly decreases after college.
Click to expand...
Wrong again. For one, I'm partnered and two, I never want to leave this place. As a Wentworth student and employee, I also care about the future experiences of Wentworth students. Wentworth students do care about the skyline/scale because we are an architecture and design school. We're picky people that observe EVERYTHING. You don't seem to understand how we work at WIT. That was obvious from the moment you started suggesting dating as many girls as possible on a campus that is a sausage-fest (82% male, 18% female).

Nothing can be done though and I'm not out there crusading against it. The tower will be built. Like I've said before, all I was doing was stating my opinion and everyone has to come rushing in telling me it's wrong.
 
Re: Mass Art Dormitory

I'm worried just how much this will stand out. What I always liked about WITs new buildings were how contextual they were. I'm not against height here, but I don't like towers in a park. Huntington needs a coherent street wall and this tower concerns me. I will, however, wait to see it in person before I cast judgement.
 
Re: Mass Art Dormitory

vanshnookenraggen said:
I'm worried just how much this will stand out. What I always liked about WITs new buildings were how contextual they were. I'm not against height here, but I don't like towers in a park. Huntington needs a coherent street wall and this tower concerns me. I will, however, wait to see it in person before I cast judgement.
Click to expand...
Pretend the park doesn't exist and the building is aligned with the angle of Huntington. Do you still think the tower is appropriate? I agree with your streetwall notion and WIT has bent over backwards to build contextually.
 
Re: Mass Art Dormitory

^^ Cross the street to NEU. Either way its getting built and next year's freshman won't care. So lets just agree to disagree.
 
Re: Mass Art Dormitory

I personally agree with Data. That said, in my short experience as an arch major at NEU, most of the students don't really care about the future of the campus.

But that's expected when your History of Architecture professors tells you that, unless you graduate out of MIT with a bachelor of science in Architecture, you'll never be a famous architect and will be relegated to designing houses. Ouch. One of the reason why I transferred out and decided to minor in the subject instead.
 
Re: Mass Art Dormitory

KentXie said:
I personally agree with Data. That said, in my short experience as an arch major at NEU, most of the students don't really care about the future of the campus.

But that's expected when your History of Architecture professors tells you that, unless you graduate out of MIT with a bachelor of science in Architecture, you'll never be a famous architect and will be relegated to designing houses. Ouch. One of the reason why I transferred out and decided to minor in the subject instead.
Click to expand...

Really? That influence you to quit architecture? Hate to be the one to tell you but your professor was wrong, you should've gotten a second opinion.
 
Re: Mass Art Dormitory

KentXie said:
I personally agree with Data. That said, in my short experience as an arch major at NEU, most of the students don't really care about the future of the campus.

But that's expected when your History of Architecture professors tells you that, unless you graduate out of MIT with a bachelor of science in Architecture, you'll never be a famous architect and will be relegated to designing houses. Ouch. One of the reason why I transferred out and decided to minor in the subject instead.
Click to expand...
NEU has a horrible architecture program. The studio spaces are pathetic and they can't even hold on to their accreditation most of the time. You shouldn't have believed that professor either. It might be true for a Northeastern trained student, but many co-op employers actually prefer Wentworth students over MIT students. This said, we're not in this to become famous architects. We're in this field because we have a passion for the built environment and wish to continue the development of space (and maybe put our name on it).
 
Re: Mass Art Dormitory

Just wondering what our 2 new members from WIT think: How's the civil engineering program at WIT? I was going to transfer to either WIT or NEU, I'm dieing to get out of Political Science and Economics... They're not bad, but I just don't want to work with just that for the rest of my life... I've always had a great interest in transit, maps, city planning, etc...
 
Re: Mass Art Dormitory

vanshnookenraggen said:
I'm not against height here, but I don't like towers in a park. Huntington needs a coherent street wall and this tower concerns me. I will, however, wait to see it in person before I cast judgement.
Click to expand...

This was my first reaction to the rendering, but I've started to accept the fact that Huntington will always be characterized to some extent by towers in a park (multiple public housing towers, Harvard SPH, MassArt, etc.).
 
Re: Mass Art Dormitory

KentXie said:
I personally agree with Data. That said, in my short experience as an arch major at NEU, most of the students don't really care about the future of the campus.

But that's expected when your History of Architecture professors tells you that, unless you graduate out of MIT with a bachelor of science in Architecture, you'll never be a famous architect and will be relegated to designing houses. Ouch. One of the reason why I transferred out and decided to minor in the subject instead.
Click to expand...

You do realize that architecture professors are notorious for discouraging students from sticking with the program in order to reduce studio sizes? Design schools take in freshmen to pay the bills, then spend the time thereafter doing everything they can do weed students down to the most talented and committed. It's what makes the most sense financially for schools and logistically for professors that don't want to spend excess time each week giving desk critiques and conducting never ending reviews.

Given the rate of unemployment among architects, it would not surprise me in the slightest if faculty were actively attempting to suppress entry into the profession even further.

Also in response to our local Wentworth fanboy, as much as I have a personal and professional issue with certain members of the faculty, NU has held its accreditation and greatly expanded its program the past few years, the same can not be said for Wentworth. There's also been an issue at Wentworth where the studio has not been permitted to operate 24hrs a day at various points as well as facilities related issues with their space. Of course in comparison NU, to my understanding, has had a shortage of both studio/critique space and has a laughable to non-existent model shop/plotting capability.

Don't even get me started on the BAC, MITs back and forth flirtation with relevancy, and the GSDs continued commitment to arrogance.
 
Last edited:
Re: Mass Art Dormitory

Actually that's only a small reason why I quit. The other reason is because architects are one of the least appreciated job on the market for the work you do. I remember reading that most architects make around 60k-80k a year at their peak and only a very few pass the 6 digit figure (if you're really skilled, then you can hit 7 digits). Also, as some of you stated, the job market isn't very big. I decided to choose Economics because there are more jobs available, and a higher average pay.

datadyne007 said:
NEU has a horrible architecture program. The studio spaces are pathetic and they can't even hold on to their accreditation most of the time. You shouldn't have believed that professor either. It might be true for a Northeastern trained student, but many co-op employers actually prefer Wentworth students over MIT students. This said, we're not in this to become famous architects. We're in this field because we have a passion for the built environment and wish to continue the development of space (and maybe put our name on it).
Click to expand...

That is untrue. NEU is ranked 14th in architecture according the Key's Institute. Also, I've seen both Wentworth and NEU's studio space and while NEU's studio may be inside Ruggles, Wentworth is not any better.
 
Re: Mass Art Dormitory

hahahaha. Only 60k-80k a year. It will be along time, if ever, before i reach that threshold. I would be jumping for joy if i made that much.

Don't let anyone tell you there is any money in theater.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top