Yes, Las Vegas is hardly known as the bastion of great architecture, but thought I would show you a photo of the new Cleveland Clinic Lou Ruvo Center for Brain Health being built on the corner of Bonneville and Grand Central Parkway. It was designed by Frank Gehry.
No, this is NOT a joke photo, this is the construction that is underway. I think it is a work of art, but others think it is an eyesore. You decide.
It is actually a pretty amazing intersection, with the Premium Outlets on one corner, the Clark Count Government Center on another, and the World Market Center on another corner - I list this as a go-to in my Cheap Thrills section of my website, should you want to remember this when you come to Las Vegas to visit.
You know what? A building should not be “interesting” and “thought provoking.” This is a brain hospital. There’s nothing wrong with building an aesthetically pleasing or even beautiful structure, but if I need to consult a fucking neurosurgeon I don’t want to be wheeled down a series of twisting corridors modeled by crumpling up big pieces of sheet metal.
A good architect designs buildings which meet the needs of their occupants while looking good. You know why Frank Lloyd Wright was a shitty architect? Because a lot of his buildings, while beautiful from the outside, are gigantic pieces of shit. Take a tour of Falling Water some time. In addition to all the cantilevers that nearly fell over, you’ll notice the whole place has too-low ceilings, weirdly angled internal walls, a bathroom the size of porta-potty, and mold caused by having a waterfall in the house. Sure, it’s pretty, but would you want to live there? As a home, it utterly fails to perform it’s function.
Frank Gehry is even worse. His buildings are all failures, but they don’t even pass muster as works of art. They are fugly beyond description. They create huge amounts of unusable, wasted internal volume with all their annoying curves. They stick out like a sore thumb’s sore thumb. Several of his buildings heave leaky roofs and ventilation problems, because, guess what, you can’t fucking properly drain a roof that was designed by having a fat guy jump up and down on a pile of Legos!
You know what an ice dam is? Ask the lucky folks at MIT, the nation’s premier engineering institution, who were stupid enough to build one of these Gehry monstrosities in which to educate the future brilliant minds of the world. Yet despite the utter disaster that is the Stata Center, people still come to this nincompoop to design yet another public space debacle.
Let’s save conceptual art for people who can be safely ignored by those of us who want to contribute something to society. If you’re going to design public buildings in which normal people are expected to function, you should know how to actually do that instead of being an egomaniacal bastard bent on ruining the art and science of architecture.
Well, I certainly wouldn’t go as far as your first post, and though this one echos my sentiments, it’s still a bit harsher than I feel.
I think Gehry is a brilliant man to be able to design a structure with that shape that can be feasibly built, but I also think a) it’s totally the wrong fucking thing to build for a brain center and b) it’s not going to be a problem-free construct once finished and c) it’s going to waste a ton of space (and money) that could have been better utilized on, ya know, patients and research.
I like wacky buildings, but I don’t like them all and I don’t like them just because they’re wacky.
Oddly enough, as unique and creative his buildings are supposed to be, after seeing several they all tend to lookprettymuchthesame. This new center doesn’t break the mold, it’s yet another twisty building with shiny stuff. Maybe they’re trying to drum up business by making people’s brains hurt.
Well I googled around a bit and couldn’t find any linkage to internal pictures of Mr. Gehry’s work, so I can’t comment on anything but the stuff I’ve seen of his from the outside. I still think it looks fabulous and I do like buildings that are “interesting” and “thought-provoking,” and am perfectly fine with folks that don’t. But it would be great if we had a contrasting article on how awful, non-functional and damaging his designs are.
The only Gehry building I’ve been in is the Weisman Art Museum at the University of Minnesota. It was rather normal inside. The tin-foil stuff is a facade. I used to live in the residence hall behind it, and they didn’t even bother with the facade for that side–it was just a very plain red brick building.
I think the design works for an art museum, but that brain center looks a bit disconcerting.
Gehry’s buildings do not age well-the MIT Stata center leaks and is already deteriorating-I predict the dump will wind up being torn down within 20 years.
Also, the buildings are far from ‘green’ -they are energy hogs, and impossible to cool. The roofs will probably be problematic as well-tons of leaks from those long creased seams. All in all, impractical and bizarre-contrast the Stata Center withe the old main MIT buildings (built ca. 1900)-which will be around in AD 2100?
Kind of surprised so many people really hate this.
I have driven by it and maybe you have to see it in person, but it does have a major “wow” factor going on. I think it is really interesting and can’t wait until it is finished to go in and see what that front part of the building looks like from the inside.
