If I was in charge of my city, I would.....

[Steely Dan]

.....forever ban the stupid recent trend of painting face brick.

Here's another recent victim in my neighborhood:





What was once a nice, timeless, century-old maroon brick chicago 3-flat will now forever look like yet another goofy victim of the stupid brick painting trend of the late teens.

The whole damn reason the people who built my neighborhood 100 years ago paid for the expense of nice quality face brick (often shipped up here from St. Louis because chicago clay is mostly crap) was specifically so that no one would ever have to worry about painting it, EVER!

And then some idiot flipper who watches too much HGTV buys a classic 3-flat and says, "I know an easy and cheap way to "update" this property".

Hey asshole, it didn't need any fucking "updating" like that. Put your flipper money into actual updates that actually mean something like new MEP.

the only thing you should ever do to brick is get it periodically tuckpointed.

This dumb trend cannot die soon enough.

[/rant]

[craigs]

How about barring people from painting residential buildings black. WTF is appealing about black facades? It's even worse than all the battleship gray buildings.

[JManc]

Can you restore natural brick colors? A few houses around here repainted baby shit green and it's horrible.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by JManc

Can you restore natural brick colors?

not without a good deal of (professional) effort and expense.

which is yet another reason why the trend is so very stupid.

[SIGSEGV]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

not without a good deal of (professional) effort and expense.

which is yet another reason why the trend is so very stupid.

Can't you "just" strip off the surface? Must be more complicated than it sounds of course...

[pj3000]

I don't mind the variety and color that painted brick adds to a neighborhood, but it has to be done right, on the right type of building.

The example you provided is just plain ugly.

[JManc]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

not without a good deal of (professional) effort and expense.

which is yet another reason why the trend is so very stupid.

Indeed very stupid. I couldn't fathom painting a brick house based on a fleeting trend. Yes, I guess you could paint it again in 15-20 years when the current color falls out of style but natural brick is timeless.

If I were shopping for a house, one that was painted brick would be an absolute deal breaker. Now where you live might not be as big of an issue because they appear to be flats and you either rent or own the interior like a condo. Still, they tried to make an 80 year-old building look contemporary and failed. Between the white paint and the windows.

[lio45]

Speaking of that building, it features another popular trend at this point in time (very prevalent in Quebec at least, and likely in Chicago too by the looks of it and therefore probably everywhere else too) that I dislike: black window frames and black doors.

I admit that some buildings can pull that off well, but that number is WAY below the number of buildings that get that treatment.

Random example from my hometown:

After:
https://www.google.com/maps/@45.3929...7i13312!8i6656

Before:
https://www.google.com/maps/@45.3929...7i13312!8i6656

[lio45]

Originally Posted by JManc

Indeed very stupid. I couldn't fathom painting a brick house based on a fleeting trend. Yes, I guess you could paint it again in 15-20 years when the current color falls out of style but natural brick is timeless.

I had to repaint a brick building last year because it was easier (and time was of the essence - the City was on my ass, that's an early 1870s building in a newish city so it's old enough to be remarkable and it's in a top level heritage district) ... and let me tell you, exterior paint isn't cheap at all! A few hundred bucks of paint and I only did a partial repaint.

(In my case, the labor was my own, but if you add labor as well, it's outrageously expensive.)

I shudder to think how many grand these idiots sank into turning that fine ageless timeless natural brick envelope into an envelope of very pricey, not-that-durable-in-the-long-run coat of paint.

The only excuse for painted brick (I own several buildings like that) is "I bought it that way, and since they're rental units I can't justify the expense of paint removal and almost inevitable mortar touch ups."

(That said, one nice thing about painted brick is that you can fix minor mortar problem spots with caulking, which is faster than fixing them with mortar, then repaint over that caulking.)

[JManc]

^ I'm sure in that case, it makes sense. In a rent house more so than a SFH.

Originally Posted by lio45

Speaking of that building, it features another popular trend at this point in time (very prevalent in Quebec at least, and likely in Chicago too by the looks of it and therefore probably everywhere else too) that I dislike: black window frames and black doors.

I admit that some buildings can pull that off well, but that number is WAY below the number of buildings that get that treatment.

Random example from my hometown:

After:
https://www.google.com/maps/@45.3929...7i13312!8i6656

Before:
https://www.google.com/maps/@45.3929...7i13312!8i6656

The windows look good in your example. Nothing tackier than cheap white vinyl windows on a house. Like this.

[lio45]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

.....forever ban the stupid recent trend of painting face brick.

Here's another recent victim in my neighborhood:

While at it, we should also ban mismatched color windows. It's rare, but the building on the left of your pic is guilty of that capital sin!

[lio45]

Originally Posted by JManc

The windows look good in your example.

Wait, you like the "updated" all-black look? I hate it. Those buildings weren't meant to wear black like that. (On something newer, it can work.)

[JManc]

Originally Posted by lio45

Wait, you like the "updated" all-black look? I hate it. Those buildings weren't meant to wear black like that. (On something newer, it can work.)

I think it's because the 'before' looked more worn out. The 'after' looks clean and restored. Probably more earthy tones; browns, tans would have worked better. Black won't age well. At all.

[Double L]

I think that building looks good. It looks brighter and stands out more than the other building and it has a good color scheme.

[SIGSEGV]

I think we're shitting on bad outdoor decoration choices.

I for one would get rid of these ugly ass billboards on top of buildings:
https://www.google.com/maps/@41.8903...7i16384!8i8192

[biguc]

I see we're aiming high.

[MonkeyRonin]

I don't mind painted brick so much, but then Toronto has always had a lot of painted brick historically.

What I do mind is the plague of old brick buildings being reclad in EIFS:


https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exte...nishing_system



But worse yet, facadism passing for heritage preservation:


https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.red...oronto_canada/

[MonkeyRonin]

If I were King of Toronto, my main policy objectives would be to:


- Substantially expand the city's heritage inventory and give heritage protection legislation some real teeth to actually preserve buildings. The City's current heritage regulations are a joke (see above).

- Place a moratorium on land assemblies. Too much of the city's traditional fine-grained built form of narrow lots is being lost to chunky, block-spanning developments that are uninteresting and disengaging at street level. Let developers get creative with smaller lots or redevelop existing large lots first instead.

- Overhaul zoning bylaws to allow up to 5-storey apartments as-of-right citywide (see: https://skyscraperpage.com/forum/sho...9&postcount=13). Also liberalise commercial zoning uses.

- Give the Design Review Panel the ability to actually enforce (and not just recommend) design requirements on new developments above a certain size. We're in a once-in-a-generation building boom that will characterise the city's built landscape for decades to come; let's treat this as a city building opportunity to create an iconic new vernacular instead of letting developers throw up whatever cheap spandrel-covered shit they can get away with.

- Rebrand and improve the city's public realm. Right now our street signs, light standards, traffic lights, street furniture, paving, etc. are mostly ugly and utilitarian. Could use an overhaul with some actual good design.

- And of course, actually build some much needed transit instead of using it as a political football that will just get replaced with a new scheme whenever a new government is elected.

[10023]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

.....forever ban the stupid recent trend of painting face brick.

Here's another recent victim in my neighborhood:





What was once a nice, timeless, century-old maroon brick chicago 3-flat will now forever look like yet another goofy victim of the stupid brick painting trend of the late teens.

I kinda like it.

But then I live in Notting Hill where painted brick is a thing:



https://londonist.com/2016/08/in-pho...ourful-streets


Steely would be more of an Islington kinda guy. Doors still painted, though.

[pj3000]

... ban the illuminated corporate lettering on buildings that defiles Pittsburgh's skyline.

It's terrible here... it seems that nearly every prominent (and not prominent) building on the skyline has mega-sized glowing letters tacked on. Really cheapens the overall look and destroys the design of many of Pittsburgh's tallest office towers.

It's like every buidling has to have a label on it now.