Everyone likes the ornate design of this building, surely? I like to imagine it has a hunchback living secretly in the roof space and spires, or the dark, creepy basement I am told exists too.
Structurally sound arches. In a stone or brick building, rectangular windows and doors, are an assault on physics. Beauty and doing it right, have large intersecting sets.
It’s not unnecessary ornateness that is at work here. Generally speaking rectangular windows and doorways are wrongheaded laziness. Done only because they can get away with it.
That would only be a strict rule with brick and stone. But laziness and ornate fakery (eg fake arches holding up nothing) are both bad stuff.
Its a beautiful building alright. Its just so structurally "real". Where is it? We have some of these close to where I am. But we have so many disappointments. Now that I have developed an eye for these things I feel bad about these rectangular openings.
Rectangular doors and windows are almost okay with wood. Not quite but almost. They can never be acceptable with stone or bricks. And their ought not be bricks at the top of the arch. Because the entire magic of it is that granite WILL NOT BE COMPRESSED. A good piece of granite can take all the force from above not matter what. For practical purposes infinite force can be directed into that point.
The arch focuses that force INTO THE KEYSTONE. So at least the keystone ought to be granite or quartz or something else awesome.
But then forces are equal and opposite. So lets get our keystone right, then the forces get angled outwards and down. But once the keystone is right, good, and true, it becomes an artistic consideration how we then morph to lighter, and less expensive stones, and then also to non-stone materials in the rest of the structure. Lets at least get the arch and the keystone right.
Now it might be if a colourblind Philistine such as myself were to try it on I'd make a garish mess of it. But I think we need this experimentation of using multiple materials for the one structure. So the arch is strong, it needs a good quality stone where the keystone is, but we need much of the building to have lighter materials. We need reinforced concrete to take the building really high.
How do we combine all these elements in such a way as to uplift the people when they see it every day? How do we seamlessly integrate what might be expected to result in a Frankensteinian disaster that will make all the children seasick?
I don't think people are experimenting enough with this stuff. There just isn't the intention to detail. People think that research and development always has to be in Silicon Valley and it has to be digital. No way. We have so much of the old stuff that we need to get right for a change.
It's the East side entry into the Old Museum next to the showgrounds in Brisbane.
The building has an interesting history, built in 1891 as an exhibition hall, but subsequently used mainly as a concert hall, then museum and art gallery, and now just for performance and rehearsal again.
It's the home of the Queensland Youth Orchestra, which is why I have been hanging around and inside it for years, while my daughter has rehearsals. (I once snuck up into the enormous roof space, when the stairs going up to it weren't blocked off as they usually are. I did post a photo on here, but it may take a while to find. My daughter says there is also a dark basement area, also normally blocked off, but she did get to go down there once. Don't tell anyone.)
You can see some photos current and old at their website gallery:
https://www.oldmuseum.org/gallery
Apart from being used by QYO, the main hall is hired out for concerts, usually of lesser known artists. (It's where "Hermans Hermits" played a "6 o'clock hop" concert recently - I expect to an exceedingly small crowd.)
The building is owned and maintained by the State government, and seems to be virtually in a constant state of repair. It suffered hail damage to windows a few years ago, and it took forever for all to be fixed. Maintenance or renovations to parts of the exterior are going on all the time - although after I left yesterday, it occurred to me that perhaps no part had any scaffolding around it for the first time since, like, forever - maybe they have finally run out of things to do.
You won't have many buildings like this in Queensland. But actually they are quite common in the Southern Highlands. But your building is exceptionally beautiful because there is nothing obviously wrong with it. Yes I would rather the keystone was always granite and that incredible artistic sensibility was channelled to bring this in line with all the brick. But aside from this carping your building is beautiful because it is excellent.
But take the town hall of Picton. Its got arched windows ... But then its got rectangular windows. Why? Why pollute a fine design by bringing rectangular brick into it?
The Picton Town Hall has got great arches, particularly the doorway arch. But then its got two arches that could have only been held together by the mortar because they were too flat. They are too flat as judged by the human eye. What do you think has happened to them? It was a disgrace from the start, and the immorality was central to the original design. So what happened to the two excessively flat arches?
Well one of them is still all brick. And they have a metal triangle holding up the brick keystone region. Its an eyesore. And completely unnecessary because the arch was too flat. Now the other flat arch isn't supported by a metal triangle. No no. It already broke down and so they went with restoring it with the highest quality rock they could find. But the shape of the arch was wrong from the start and I would say that FOR THE KEYSTONE, and for a few rocks around the keystone .... the best quality rock ought to have been used from the getgo. It might amount to three exquisitely shaped and placed stones. Is that too much to ask?
But further South, you do find buildings where its all brick, all good arches, and nature doesn't lie. Immediately we recognise the truth and beauty of it.
So we beat you Queenslanders because we have quite a few buildings of this sort. But you have a win up there, because your one is the more perfect exemplar of anything that I've seen so far. But we even have train stations that come pretty close.
6 comments:
Structurally sound arches. In a stone or brick building, rectangular windows and doors, are an assault on physics. Beauty and doing it right, have large intersecting sets.
It’s not unnecessary ornateness that is at work here. Generally speaking rectangular windows and doorways are wrongheaded laziness. Done only because they can get away with it.
That would only be a strict rule with brick and stone. But laziness and ornate fakery (eg fake arches holding up nothing) are both bad stuff.
An Orthodox church? It seems to have the trappings of such a building.
Its a beautiful building alright. Its just so structurally "real". Where is it? We have some of these close to where I am. But we have so many disappointments. Now that I have developed an eye for these things I feel bad about these rectangular openings.
Rectangular doors and windows are almost okay with wood. Not quite but almost. They can never be acceptable with stone or bricks. And their ought not be bricks at the top of the arch. Because the entire magic of it is that granite WILL NOT BE COMPRESSED. A good piece of granite can take all the force from above not matter what. For practical purposes infinite force can be directed into that point.
The arch focuses that force INTO THE KEYSTONE. So at least the keystone ought to be granite or quartz or something else awesome.
But then forces are equal and opposite. So lets get our keystone right, then the forces get angled outwards and down. But once the keystone is right, good, and true, it becomes an artistic consideration how we then morph to lighter, and less expensive stones, and then also to non-stone materials in the rest of the structure. Lets at least get the arch and the keystone right.
Now it might be if a colourblind Philistine such as myself were to try it on I'd make a garish mess of it. But I think we need this experimentation of using multiple materials for the one structure. So the arch is strong, it needs a good quality stone where the keystone is, but we need much of the building to have lighter materials. We need reinforced concrete to take the building really high.
How do we combine all these elements in such a way as to uplift the people when they see it every day? How do we seamlessly integrate what might be expected to result in a Frankensteinian disaster that will make all the children seasick?
I don't think people are experimenting enough with this stuff. There just isn't the intention to detail. People think that research and development always has to be in Silicon Valley and it has to be digital. No way. We have so much of the old stuff that we need to get right for a change.
It's the East side entry into the Old Museum next to the showgrounds in Brisbane.
The building has an interesting history, built in 1891 as an exhibition hall, but subsequently used mainly as a concert hall, then museum and art gallery, and now just for performance and rehearsal again.
It's the home of the Queensland Youth Orchestra, which is why I have been hanging around and inside it for years, while my daughter has rehearsals. (I once snuck up into the enormous roof space, when the stairs going up to it weren't blocked off as they usually are. I did post a photo on here, but it may take a while to find. My daughter says there is also a dark basement area, also normally blocked off, but she did get to go down there once. Don't tell anyone.)
You can see some photos current and old at their website gallery:
https://www.oldmuseum.org/gallery
Apart from being used by QYO, the main hall is hired out for concerts, usually of lesser known artists. (It's where "Hermans Hermits" played a "6 o'clock hop" concert recently - I expect to an exceedingly small crowd.)
The building is owned and maintained by the State government, and seems to be virtually in a constant state of repair. It suffered hail damage to windows a few years ago, and it took forever for all to be fixed. Maintenance or renovations to parts of the exterior are going on all the time - although after I left yesterday, it occurred to me that perhaps no part had any scaffolding around it for the first time since, like, forever - maybe they have finally run out of things to do.
You won't have many buildings like this in Queensland. But actually they are quite common in the Southern Highlands. But your building is exceptionally beautiful because there is nothing obviously wrong with it. Yes I would rather the keystone was always granite and that incredible artistic sensibility was channelled to bring this in line with all the brick. But aside from this carping your building is beautiful because it is excellent.
But take the town hall of Picton. Its got arched windows ... But then its got rectangular windows. Why? Why pollute a fine design by bringing rectangular brick into it?
The Picton Town Hall has got great arches, particularly the doorway arch. But then its got two arches that could have only been held together by the mortar because they were too flat. They are too flat as judged by the human eye. What do you think has happened to them? It was a disgrace from the start, and the immorality was central to the original design. So what happened to the two excessively flat arches?
Well one of them is still all brick. And they have a metal triangle holding up the brick keystone region. Its an eyesore. And completely unnecessary because the arch was too flat. Now the other flat arch isn't supported by a metal triangle. No no. It already broke down and so they went with restoring it with the highest quality rock they could find. But the shape of the arch was wrong from the start and I would say that FOR THE KEYSTONE, and for a few rocks around the keystone .... the best quality rock ought to have been used from the getgo. It might amount to three exquisitely shaped and placed stones. Is that too much to ask?
But further South, you do find buildings where its all brick, all good arches, and nature doesn't lie. Immediately we recognise the truth and beauty of it.
So we beat you Queenslanders because we have quite a few buildings of this sort. But you have a win up there, because your one is the more perfect exemplar of anything that I've seen so far. But we even have train stations that come pretty close.
This is the thing about you lefties. There is no logic to what you are about. But you often have good instincts for things.
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