# Brutalist architecture. What were they thinking? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [November 8, 2012, 12:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brutalist-architecture-what-were-they-thinking/640303 "2012-11-08T00:13:03Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 11
**Author:** ![Hippy\_Hollow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hippy_hollow/32/4841_2.png) [@Hippy\_Hollow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hippy_Hollow)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2012, 3:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brutalist-architecture-what-were-they-thinking/640303/201 "2012-11-13T03:48:36Z")
I really enjoy these threads about architecture. I’ve also [previously opined on Brutalism, specifically the Bull Ring Centre](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=15661642&postcount=90) in Birmingham, England. I have nightmares about that place. Brutalism was so en vogue in 1970s Britain - it seemed to be everywhere, and while one can be forgiven for the occasional car park, but when I first saw the [Alexandra Road Estate](http://londonist.com/2012/05/londons-top-brutalist-buildings.php) upthread, I thought it was a football stadium. I cannot believe someone designed that building and expected humans to live in, or around, it. I think a lot of Brutalist buildings looked good the day that the buildings were opened - the [Perry-Castaneda Library](http://www.google.com/imgres?q=perry+castaneda+library&um=1&hl=en&safe=off&client=safari&sa=N&tbo=d&rls=en&biw=1438&bih=784&tbm=isch&tbnid=TiWRlp_K0IiR8M:&imgrefurl=http://alcalde.texasexes.org/2012/01/legendary-ut/&docid=jKSCvyPH3dPxDM&imgurl=http://alcalde.texasexes.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/PCL.1977-1024x608.jpg&w=1024&h=608&ei=e8KhULf1Oc7QqwHDpIHYCg&zoom=1&iact=hc&vpx=4&vpy=308&dur=473&hovh=173&hovw=291&tx=210&ty=68&sig=103758017536528319852&page=1&tbnh=140&tbnw=230&start=0&ndsp=27&ved=1t:429,r:7,s:0,i:95) at my school is pretty cool looking back in the 1970s but hasn’t aged all that well/ ---
**Author:** ![Muffin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muffin/32/4341_2.png) [@Muffin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Muffin)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2012, 4:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brutalist-architecture-what-were-they-thinking/640303/202 "2012-11-13T04:03:04Z")
> [@Malthus](#): > > Heh, whatever one thinks of its aesthetics, it’s a failure as a library and is universally hated by students - try finding a book in a library that is based on a triangular footprint - as I had to. 😃 > > There is a reason libraries are, generally, not triangular. That reason is that finding anything in such a place is really, really hard - since people are used to stuff being arranged in grids. According to legend and wikipedia, Umberto Eco based the library/maze in “Name of the Rose” on Robarts. > > As a student you want to be able to find books easily. Even if an impenetrable maze makes for cool literature, it does not make for a good university library. > > The fact that the place is unbearably gloomy on the inside doesn’t help Let’s compare Robarts to a couple of libraries on campus that were built about a hundred years ago: Gerstein and Hart House. Gerstein uses [daylight and glass floors in the rectilinearly aligned stacks](http://www.flickr.com/photos/ricardipus/4013231480/sizes/l/in/photostream/), so they are quite the opposite of Robart’s concrete wall and floor gloom, in which there are no windows, half of the bulbs have been removed, and the lights are on timers, often stranding one in the dark in a maze. Hart House has [reading nooks surrounded by windows](http://gallery.photo.net/photo/5977695-lg.jpg), [truly comfortable chairs and couches](http://oncampus.macleans.ca/education/wp-content/uploads/05_MG_9407.jpg), and [a fireplace for comfort in the depts of winter](http://hhlitandlib.files.wordpress.com/2009/12/ronna.jpg), all of which are features that are utterly lacking in Robarts. The designer of Robarts missed out on the three primary functions of a library – store books so that they can be easily retrieved, comfortably read, and publicly discussed. Instead of creating a useful and inviting environment, Robarts drives people away. A pox upon its architects. ---
**Author:** ![Mr\_Downtown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Mr\_Downtown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr_Downtown)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2012, 5:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brutalist-architecture-what-were-they-thinking/640303/203 "2012-11-13T05:09:11Z")
**Hippy Hollow,** where do you get the idea that PCL is Brutalist? Just because it’s concrete? It seems like people are throwing every building they don’t like under the Brutalism bus. ---
**Author:** ![Muffin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muffin/32/4341_2.png) [@Muffin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Muffin)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2012, 5:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brutalist-architecture-what-were-they-thinking/640303/204 "2012-11-13T05:39:12Z")
> [@Mr\_Downtown](#): > > It seems like people are throwing every building they don’t like under the Brutalism bus. Brutalism bus? No. Brutalist Landkreuzer P. 1500 Monster. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2012, 5:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brutalist-architecture-what-were-they-thinking/640303/205 "2012-11-13T05:58:00Z")
> [@Muffin](#): > > Let’s compare Robarts to a couple of libraries on campus that were built about a hundred years ago: Gerstein and Hart House. Gerstein uses [daylight and glass floors in the rectilinearly aligned stacks](http://www.flickr.com/photos/ricardipus/4013231480/sizes/l/in/photostream/), so they are quite the opposite of Robart’s concrete wall and floor gloom, in which there are no windows, half of the bulbs have been removed, and the lights are on timers, often stranding one in the dark in a maze. Hart House has [reading nooks surrounded by windows](http://gallery.photo.net/photo/5977695-lg.jpg), [truly comfortable chairs and couches](http://oncampus.macleans.ca/education/wp-content/uploads/05_MG_9407.jpg), and [a fireplace for comfort in the depts of winter](http://hhlitandlib.files.wordpress.com/2009/12/ronna.jpg), all of which are features that are utterly lacking in Robarts. The designer of Robarts missed out on the three primary functions of a library – store books so that they can be easily retrieved, comfortably read, and publicly discussed. Instead of creating a useful and inviting environment, Robarts drives people away. A pox upon its architects. A lot of that’s just good design. I’m no fan of Brutalism, but I love the [library](http://www.library.sh.cn/windowofshanghai/Uploads/Image/43.%20University%20of%20Haifa%20Library/Haifa%20University%20Library%202.jpg)at Haifa University (my alma mater), designed by [Oscar Niemyer](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oscar_Niemeyer); it’s [unapologetically Brutalist](http://weblaw.haifa.ac.il/en/programs/llm/Nolawyers/patent/PublishingImages/305550_10150808780392292_123245002291_11741080_1966225743_n.jpg), but still well-designed, with plenty of [natural light](http://www.flickr.com/photos/dlisbona/2533882498/lightbox/). ---
**Author:** ![Hippy\_Hollow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hippy_hollow/32/4841_2.png) [@Hippy\_Hollow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hippy_Hollow)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2012, 8:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brutalist-architecture-what-were-they-thinking/640303/206 "2012-11-13T08:08:43Z")
> [@Mr\_Downtown](#): > > **Hippy Hollow,** where do you get the idea that PCL is Brutalist? Just because it’s concrete? > > It seems like people are throwing every building they don’t like under the Brutalism bus. I get the idea from here: [QUOTE=Wikipedia] Brutalist architecture is a style of architecture which flourished from the 1950s to the mid 1970s, spawned from the modernist architectural movement. Examples are typically very linear, fortresslike and blockish, often with a predominance of concrete construction. [/QUOTE] Check all those boxes. It’s not as if I stated it was an ugly building; I just don’t think it’s aged particularly well. I’m certainly not “throwing every building they don’t like under the Brutalism bus.” ---
**Author:** ![Huvudtvatt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/d6d6ee/32.png) [@Huvudtvatt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Huvudtvatt)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2012, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brutalist-architecture-what-were-they-thinking/640303/207 "2012-11-13T14:45:02Z")
> [@MEBuckner](#): > > A question for those of you who with actual knowledge about this stuff: Did Le Corbusier _really_ [want to raze Stockholm](http://www.city-journal.org/2009/19_4_otbie-le-corbusier.html)? (And replace it with his own stuff.) Because if so, that’s just monstrous. I was in Stockholm for a week or so this April, and it truly is an “astonishingly beautiful” city. Yes, Le Corbusier made plans for a new city center in Stockholm which would call for the destruction of most existing buildings. It was a response to a competition held in 1932 to redesign the city center. You can see a bit of his plan [here](http://tesugen.com/archives/04/05/le-corbusier-och-stockholm-3). None of the entries in the competition were accepted and realized, but it is clear that the Stockholm city planners _themselves_ wanted to raze the city center, which they finally did during the fifties and sixties in a massive wave of destruction. Maybe you didn’t realize it when you were there, but most of the area around the central station consists of modern buildings. You can see some of the changes [here](http://sv.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stockholmsfotografier_d%C3%A5_och_nu_i_f%C3%A4rg). Look at the pictures labeled “Klarakvarteren 1924 och 2009”. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2012, 5:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brutalist-architecture-what-were-they-thinking/640303/208 "2012-11-13T17:12:48Z")
> [@I\_Made\_French\_Toast\_For\_You](#): > > I wonder: do urban designers get as much flak as architects when the public reacts badly to a project? I feel like you all must have it worse, since you’re working on a larger and more public scale. I’ve heard of William Whyte and his observations of how people interact with their environment. I don’t know too much about him, but it all seems fascinating. Oh, and maybe you’re better equipped to address Schouwburgplein, which was criticized earlier in the thread. > > I’ll try to answer your questions in terms of Brutalism, to stay on topic. Unfortunately the core theory didn’t involve the city, as far as I know, and so stopped at the outer edge of the building (its socialist-utopian underpinnings might apply more broadly to the city though – maybe you know more about it?). Because of this, in general, Brutalism is justly criticized for not taking the context of its environment into account. I certainly think the style works much better as a solitary “object in a field”. > > I also think Brutalism works best when it can take advantage of its strong appearance, monumentality and sculptural character – that is, when it serves as a focal point for the public and its neighborhood, and as foci within a city. Museums, civic buildings, churches and other iconic structures fit the bill. > > It’s hard to say whom the buildings are built for – the audience changes with every situation. The best practices I’ve seen analyze the building through a sort of role playing: what happens when the CEO uses the building? the janitor? the visitor? the person on the street walking by? what do they do and what do they want to see? etc. I believe Rem Koolhaas does this – not sure if any Brutalists did. And I wonder if Whyte would approve? > > Styles come and go, and I appreciate any architect who weathers criticism and innovates, rather than capitulates to dissent. I can’t think of any 20th century movement that wasn’t reviled. Right now, Postmodernism has it worse than Brutalism, I think; the International Style and High Modern architecture are making a comeback. Early 20th c styles (Expressionism, De Stijl, etc.) are seen more as novelties. > > We’d love to hear your thoughts on Brutalism vis-a-vis the city! Ever since the debacle of urban renewal in the 1950s and 1960s, urbanists have been far more reviled as a group than architects. The only difference is that individual city planners tend to be anonymous, while architects trade on the public recognition of their names. The few exceptions, like Corbusier, get it from both sides. Both create similar problems and opportunities in cities. Although there is more appreciation for this today, for an unholy long time neither field seemed to realize that they were applying the thinking and solutions of a specific time to buildings and areas that would stay in place for decades if not centuries. In some ways it’s hard to fault them: what alternative did they have? The future is unknowable, and therefore future uses of a building, future growth of a neighborhood, future changes to culture can’t be anticipated. Corbusier represents this in the city plans he designed. They are unalterable. You can’t imagine plopping down new buildings next door. Like all utopias, they are entirely static. I agree that brutalism works best for iconic structures, but a city has only a tiny handful of those. City planners need to ignore those and concentrate on everything else, which is why so many city designs that focus on a central bit of eye candy fail in toto. For that reason, my personal tastes are against brutalism, which is the embodiment of static design. Both Modernism and Postmoderism have many flaws and many failed structures, but part of their essence in the best cases is that they appear fluid and changeable, with light and angle and weather and distance colluding to pick tricks with the eye. In a more mundane way, concrete brutalism fails whenever the rain falls. Those thick rain stains become the most noticeable aspect of the building, and they look ugly in a run-down industrial neighborhood kind of way. In many American cities, the most exciting new areas comprise plain old brick buildings, which are cheap and malleable and easily gutted to repurpose them for contemporary uses. They are the antithesis of individual design but their long-term value is all the greater for it. It’s interesting that even in places like New York, where the work of individual architects is justly celebrated, the trend is to give pieces of large projects to different architects so that one aesthetic can’t rule over all. This is a huge advance, IMO. I’m really no more than an enthusiastic amateur, though. (Did anybody ever listen to anything I said when I was in government? Of course not. Did the projects I staffed fail exactly the way I said they would? Of course they did. The one section of downtown Rochester that is a spectacular success is the East End, an area that the city planners never laid their grubby paws on. This is not a coincidence.) The Dope has a professional planner, elmwood, and it’s too bad that he hasn’t been in this thread. I’d like to read his thoughts on this. ---
**Author:** ![Diceman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Diceman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diceman)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2012, 6:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brutalist-architecture-what-were-they-thinking/640303/209 "2012-11-13T18:18:33Z")
Late to the party, but the University of Detroit has some interesting quasi-Brutalist buildings. the [Student Union](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:UDM_Fountain.jpg) has a Brutalist second story on top of a red-brick first floor. And the [Life Sciences Building](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:UDMFordLifeSciences.jpg) is not made of concrete, but is certainly Brutalist in spirit. The main part of the building is a nearly-windowless 4-story tower (on the left of the picture.) Somewhere up there is where the biology students dissect corpses, and the soulless exterior provides ample warning to everyone else that you don’t want to go in there. The 1-story annex (center & right of the picture) contains classrooms and a lecture hall, all of which are windowless. The outside wall of the hallway is all glass, and the contrast between this and the windowless classrooms is quite jarring, and serves to make having a class there even more stifling. ---
**Author:** ![Mr\_Downtown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Mr\_Downtown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr_Downtown)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2012, 5:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brutalist-architecture-what-were-they-thinking/640303/210 "2012-11-14T05:25:04Z")
I don’t consider buildings like the University of Texas Perry-Castañeda Library to be Brutalism at all. It’s pretty mainstream Late Modernism, done in exposed-aggregate concrete like many Central Texas buildings of the era. Low-E glass was still unavailable, so you did concrete for the thermal mass and to economically shield the windows from direct sunlight most of the year. About the only alternative during the energy-conscious 70s was reflective glass. You might make a better argument for Jester Center, but of course it’s mostly brick. Just because all Brutalist buildings are concrete doesn’t mean that all concrete buildings are brutalist. And windowless does not equal Brutalism. It’s just absurd to call those University of Detroit examples Brutalism. There are other aspects to High Church Brutalism, as \*\*French Toast \*\*has mentioned: first, a celebration of the concrete as a material, so form marks and the like are celebrated rather than hidden; and second, a rather literal expression of the building’s program in its massing. [Johansen’s Mummers Theatre](http://www.artinfo.com/sites/default/files/mummers1.jpg) in Oklahoma City is a classic example. See how dramatically that differs from PCL? ---
**Author:** ![suranyi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e36b37/32.png) [@suranyi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/suranyi)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2012, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brutalist-architecture-what-were-they-thinking/640303/211 "2012-11-14T19:35:24Z")
> [@Diceman](#): > > Late to the party, but the University of Detroit has some interesting quasi-Brutalist buildings. the [Student Union](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:UDM_Fountain.jpg) has a Brutalist second story on top of a red-brick first floor. And the [Life Sciences Building](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:UDMFordLifeSciences.jpg) is not made of concrete, but is certainly Brutalist in spirit. The main part of the building is a nearly-windowless 4-story tower (on the left of the picture.) Somewhere up there is where the biology students dissect corpses, and the soulless exterior provides ample warning to everyone else that you don’t want to go in there. The 1-story annex (center & right of the picture) contains classrooms and a lecture hall, all of which are windowless. The outside wall of the hallway is all glass, and the contrast between this and the windowless classrooms is quite jarring, and serves to make having a class there even more stifling. Those don’t look like Brutalism at all to me. I think a lot of people are using way too broad a definition of “Brutalism” in this thread, seeming to include almost any modern building that they don’t like. ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2012, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brutalist-architecture-what-were-they-thinking/640303/212 "2012-11-14T20:01:04Z")
> [@suranyi](#): > > Those don’t look like Brutalism at all to me. > > I think a lot of people are using way too broad a definition of “Brutalism” in this thread, seeming to include almost any modern building that they don’t like. This is a label of convenience, because there _should_ be a term for “boxy, concrete, intentionally sparse architecture or architecture that looks like it”, just like there should be a more elegant sounding word meaning “amused and confused” and so people use “bemuse”, or there should be a word for whiny pop-punk and so people use “emo”, even if other people complain, because there’s a lack of a short word for these concepts. (I don’t know what the solution is, in my mind, mind you.) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brutalist-architecture-what-were-they-thinking/640303.md?page=10)