#1 ·
I was walking through my old neighborhood the other day and ended up staring at this massive, brutalist concrete structure for a good ten minutes. It’s objectively eyesore territory—lots of heavy, gray, aggressive shapes—but there’s something about that specific kind of mid-century design that hits different. It feels permanent in a way that all these modern glass-and-steel boxes just don't.
Lately, it feels like every new development is designed to be "inoffensive" and sleek, which honestly makes everything look identical. I miss that era where architects weren't afraid to be a little polarizing or use heavy textures to try and soften a massive footprint. There’s a certain soul in the grit of older, weirder buildings that you just can't replicate with modern minimalism.
I know most people hate the heavy concrete look, but I can't help but feel like we're losing a specific kind of character in our cities. Do you think we've moved too far into the "clean and safe" design era, or is brutalism just a relic that's better left in the past?
Lately, it feels like every new development is designed to be "inoffensive" and sleek, which honestly makes everything look identical. I miss that era where architects weren't afraid to be a little polarizing or use heavy textures to try and soften a massive footprint. There’s a certain soul in the grit of older, weirder buildings that you just can't replicate with modern minimalism.
I know most people hate the heavy concrete look, but I can't help but feel like we're losing a specific kind of character in our cities. Do you think we've moved too far into the "clean and safe" design era, or is brutalism just a relic that's better left in the past?