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Originally Posted by felixg
Hello everybody I’ve frequented this page for over a year now and have decided it’s finally time to make an account!
I don’t mean to pontificate but I must side with palmloverking here— midcentury/international architecture absolutely has all the charm and beauty of deco or anything else preceding it, and especially as both those qualities are entirely subjective. Charm isn’t something that universally looks the same, it’s unique to interesting or good examples of architecture from any era. I too remember driving past the COB in awe as a little kid, I still do to this day, it reminds me of federal buildings in Los Angeles.
Part of this might have to do with age, I’m under 20 years old so naturally modernist styles have characterized and long preceded my own childhood. I was born about 40 years after this style really began to die, just as it seems many of its critics were born about 40 years after the neogothic, classical, and deco styles of the 1920s. I’m not meaning to assume how old you are bob rulz, I’m just offering a possible explanation for our differing views of the same style. I personally happen to dislike the weird postmodern architecture we see in the One Utah Center or Wells Fargo Building, this rationale would explain that also. But I don’t think postmodern buildings don’t have “charm”. I think they’re eclectic and feel that I don’t understand their intention, but I trust somebody else does and feel open to understanding what makes them unique
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Welcome, Felixg!
You stated this wonderfully, and I think your hypothesis for the polarized opinions on COB is sound. I was born in ’99 myself, and I first discovered skyscraper page forums when I was 7 or 8. Having kept an eye on the world of high-rise architecture over the internet since the late 2000’s, I have definitely grown tired of some of the redundant and overused themes of my time, an era of squeaky clean all-glass facades. I think my response naturally has been a yearning and appreciation for 20th-century styles, pre-1980’s for the most part.
Because of this, I can somewhat sympathize with the fact that what some 2000’s towers are for me, might be what 60’s and 70’s brutalist towers are to many of the forumers on here who are a little older than I am. With that being said, I think mine and felixg’s coming from the same generation and sharing mutual sentiment over the Church Office Building would testify against the following notion:
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Originally Posted by bob rulz
I don't think there will be the same such appreciation for this architecture in 50 years as there is for early-century or 19th century architecture today.
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The COB is already appreciated by younger generations who are too young to recall any memory of the 20th century, and I'm willing to bet the appreciation is only going to deepen in subsequent generations if it's left alone.
In any sense, the point of my statement was not that the Church Office Building is the apex of all skyscraper design, despite how much I personally enjoy it, my point was that I think city skylines should be allowed to remain eclectic, varied, and show their history. Are there buildings in Salt Lake City and other U.S. cities that I think are hideous? Of course, like the handful of 1980’s squatty tan buildings with black windows that resemble parking garages east of state street in SLC. Despite not finding charm in them, I would much rather time, energy, and money be put into new high-rise developments around these buildings that one by one make individual “ugly” buildings less conspicuous in the skyline, than to see those buildings demolished or altered. Sometimes things age a lot better than you think they will, and taste in high-rise style is like previously stated, highly, highly subjective. I definitely have to put in effort to keep my mouth clamped about the glass-dominated towers that seem to be stuck with us for eternity. I’m sure “this is ugly and outdated anyways” is exactly what 20th-century developers told themselves when they bulldozed 19th-century buildings in SLC to build parking structures. I think it’s okay for ugly buildings to exist, especially in a place like Salt Lake City where nothing is taller than 500 feet yet and half the city is still a parking lot. Given SLC’s rapid growth and high prospects for the future, I think there’s plenty of opportunity for everyone’s most hated buildings to be covered up and obscured in the sea of future high rises.
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