Unbuilt Architecture and City Plans

[Rhinocrates]

An informative primer on architectural engineering, looking at how tension in an inverted model can be used to model compression in a completed structure and how it generates new, elegant forms. Admittedly this isn't about unbuilt architecture but it follows on from my posts on Wren's St Paul's. He doesn't mention that St Paul's actually has circumferential iron chains at the base of the masonry dome acting in tension to resist the outward forces produced by the weight above, along with all the cleverly concealed buttressing.

We really see the technique bloom with Gaudi, though I was annoyed that some on the illustrations of the Sagrada Familia models are hideous AI creations.

Name drop: New Zealand architect Mark Burry is mentioned. He's actually been at RMIT in Melbourne for decades now but back in the day he taught me here in NZ. He would spend several months each year in Barcelona directing construction. His lectures on how they modelled the complex hyperboloid forms and used those models for computer aided manufacturing of cut stone were fascinating.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iRv_syz2DAc

 

[Graham1973]

A video covering another unbuilt Melbourne transport project.

View: https://youtu.be/uDdJdDF3KSg?si=42B2-DseJCmmmUTk

 

[Graham1973]

View: https://youtu.be/nu-spaMi_mw?si=oeMtj5cKDX8_hTAn

 

[Rhinocrates]

It's not appropriate to comment on this news article (don't mention the war), but it reminded me of this collage by the Austrian architect, Hans Hollein, which was a kind of spoof of Le Corbusier's argument that the ocean liner was the exemplar for mass housing.

Russian aircraft carrier crew sent to frontline in Ukraine

Russia has formed a mechanised battalion from the crew of its only aircraft carrier, the Admiral Kuznetsov.

ukdefencejournal.org.uk

 

[Graham1973]

An incomplete freight transport project in the Australian state of New South Wales.

View: https://youtu.be/kj8wwcM70xk?si=59GTygPBipp_HwGO

 

[Sundog]

Lebbeus Woods was a pure paper architect. In this video, Dami Lee offers a good explanation of the role of paper architecture and its presence in popular culture with a discussion of the manga BLAME! and Woods' work.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ynSG5GLoQ0


Her channel is here, and the videos are enjoyable and accessible:

DamiLee

Architecture and design with Dami

www.youtube.com

Interestingly, the older ones are about making a living as a young architect and the more recent ones look at fictional and theoretical architecture.

I've always enjoyed Lebbeus Woods' work and I remember when I saw the movie Twelve Monkeys and thinking he worked on it, only to find out they simply ripped off his image (below) without his permission. He won the lawsuit.

 

[Sundog]

I wonder how much of Project NEOM will end up in this category? They've already radically reduced the length of the Line from 100 miles down to ten miles, IIRC.

 

[Michel Van]

I wonder how much of Project NEOM will end up in this category? They've already radically reduced the length of the Line from 100 miles down to ten miles, IIRC.

we discuss that hubris here:

https://www.secretprojects.co.uk/threads/neom.37091/#post-575464

 

[Rhinocrates]

Legendary but never built: 10 unrealized masterpieces of architecture

From Gaudí’s skyscraper for New York to Libeskind’s Potsdamer Platz, we've selected 10 projects that, even without ever seeing the light, have made history.

www.domusweb.it

Sketch of a hotel proposed by Gaudi to be built in New York.

 

[martinbayer]

Legendary but never built: 10 unrealized masterpieces of architecture

From Gaudí’s skyscraper for New York to Libeskind’s Potsdamer Platz, we've selected 10 projects that, even without ever seeing the light, have made history.

www.domusweb.it

Sketch of a hotel proposed by Gaudi to be built in New York.

View attachment 742885

Very vaguely looks like a 3STO VTO RLV to me...

 

[Rhinocrates]

Very vaguely looks like a 3STO VTO RLV to me...

Now if Gaudi had met Tsiolkovsky...

 

[Arjen]

Very vaguely looks like a 3STO VTO RLV to me...

This leaves me looking at the Sagrada Familia in a new light.

 

[Justo Miranda]

Pulp Fiction

 

[Justo Miranda]

Post-2

 

[Justo Miranda]

Post-3

 

[Justo Miranda]

Alex Raymond

 

[Justo Miranda]

The cartoonists who made science fiction illustrations during the golden age created fantastic cities with the buildings surrounded by spiral ramps with an inclination impossible to use on foot or in some kind of car.

 

[Justo Miranda]

Post-2

 

[Justo Miranda]

But tonight, going through my Flash Gordon collection, I found the origin of the myth: a rocket-powered train... Can you imagine the centrifugal force?

 

[Graham1973]

A 1970s proposal to change the rail map of London.

RingRail – the 1973 railway plan that paved the way for the London Overground

In 1973, a plan for a new RingRail around London was proposed, and although it was never built as planned, it sort of did get built much later, as the London Overground.

www.ianvisits.co.uk

 

[Graham1973]

A 1700's proposal to canalize the Thames

Unbuilt London: Straightening the River Thames

The River Thames is a rather curvy beast, especially around the Isle of Dogs, but had a plan in 1796 been carried out, it would be considerably straighter.

www.ianvisits.co.uk

 

[Graham1973]

London Transport's abortive plans to construct express tube lines.

View: https://youtu.be/RVUqtOgPb0w?si=88aFxiWGHbXdc5Ll

 

[Michel Van]

Little bit off-topic but it explain allot about Architecture

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CYxnW6jF2d4

 

[publiusr]

Learning from nature

Dragonfly wing pattern reinforces vaults and domes better than ancient Roman and tech-generated methods

Skoltech researchers and their colleagues from the University of Granada, Spain, have determined the most efficient ways to reinforce vaults and domes in architecture. The team compared how well various traditional and unconventional patterns of stiffening ribs enable a structure to withstand...

techxplore.com

Odd

The Enduring Mystery of the Loretto Chapel Staircase

This staircase and its construction have dumbfounded visitors for decades.

www.atlasobscura.com

 

[Graham1973]

A proposal to duplicate part of the Victoria Line of the London Underground...

View: https://youtu.be/g1bLIJfGUQc?si=t7EvG1Y4zYe4i3Cm

 

[Graham1973]

Legendary but never built: 10 unrealized masterpieces of architecture

From Gaudí’s skyscraper for New York to Libeskind’s Potsdamer Platz, we've selected 10 projects that, even without ever seeing the light, have made history.

www.domusweb.it

Sketch of a hotel proposed by Gaudi to be built in New York.

The hotel was created using CGI for the 'Fringe' TV series alternate universe.

View: https://youtu.be/9FbSB0mprdc?si=Bua_tPH27fP6NvTs

 

[Siberia]

A late 1940s/early 1950s proposal to completely reshape Chicago.

[SNIP]​

Thank the gods we avoided that, and only a small part was inflicted on Detroit.

Some of the broad claims about Chicago in the early part of the video made me raise an eyebrow though, to the extent of questioning the accuracy of the whole.

Frank Lloyd Wright’s mile high skyscraper.

[SNIP]​

Not a fan of its design towards the peak where it's narrowing but then you get the two wings, or that most illustrations have it sited over the fountain in the middle of Grant Park.

 

[Michel Van]

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TSPh14m-jUo

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Zs6OLLZWcU

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TCT3Um-ozFE

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y5zvKhdhFHw

 

[Rhinocrates]

Mies' 'Brick House.' The long walls would have been somewhat like planted avenues in a baroque garden. The red lines indicate lines of sight linking interior spaces and external vistas. The coloured rectangles represent functional spaces that overlap though open planning instead of being separated by doors.

 

[martinbayer]

Mies' 'Brick House.' The long walls would have been somewhat like planted avenues in a baroque garden. The red lines indicate lines of sight linking interior spaces and external vistas. The coloured rectangles represent functional spaces that overlap though open planning instead of being separated by doors.

You were saying Brick House? Behold:

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rrBx6mAWYPU

 

[Antonio]

excavations progress rapidly at mukaab, saudi arabia's monumental cubed skyscraper

www.designboom.com

 

[63gehark_]

has anyone got anything on the the unbuilt germania?

 

[Antonio]

has anyone got anything on the the unbuilt germania?

Welthauptstadt Germania – Wikipedia

de.wikipedia.org

Just Google it. Internet is full of information

 

[Archibald]

Now if Gaudi had met Tsiolkovsky...

Would have made a gaudy rocket (run for cover)

 

[Rhinocrates]

has anyone got anything on the the unbuilt germania?

Albert Speer wasn't Hitler's only architect but the master plan for Germania and most of the significant buildings (and a lot of the details, such as streetlamps) were his responsibility.

Leon Krier is the living champion of Speer's architecture and was advisor to now-King Charles III, when he was, um, Prince Charles. The town of Poundbury, in the Duchy of Cornwall (owned by the Prince of Wales, whoever they may be - now it's William) was master planned by him.

Krier authored this book on Speer's architecture - and before you click 'Buy,' check the price! Then have a cup of tea and a lie down. Architecture school libraries are the ones likely to have copies (mine did). You may be able to get it via Interloan through a local library.

https://www.amazon.com.au/dp/1580933548?ref_=mr_referred_us_au_nz

As Antonio said, there's plenty of information on the Internet. Try using 'Albert Speer' as a search term, but most of what you get will be memoirs and biographies (he was a complicated and obviously controversial figure), so add 'Germania' or 'architecture'.

For pretty good fictional depictions of Germania, Robert Harris' counterfactual novel, Fatherland, is good (there was a film adaptation too, starring Rutger Hauer) and the TV series The Man in the High Castle also did it well in a later season.

 

[Rhinocrates]

Some documentaries by Jonathan Meades on totalitarian architecture.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iQJZD9USbM8&list=PLg2FiAx8csPvXOD0IkI2OwZD149v7s2Q8&index=44&t=7s

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QPBc5h5AcyU&list=PLg2FiAx8csPvXOD0IkI2OwZD149v7s2Q8&index=20&t=3s

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a0y_zmtquh8&list=PLg2FiAx8csPvXOD0IkI2OwZD149v7s2Q8&index=4&t=63s

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vmvPyI6kCAc&list=PLg2FiAx8csPvXOD0IkI2OwZD149v7s2Q8&index=2&t=13s

Notable points, common to all, are kitsch, vast scale, anti-cosmopolitanism. Meades' discussion of Soviet 'style' is quite illuminating - as 'Stalinism' meant whatever Stalin said on a given day, to save their hides, architects threw everything at their buildings in the hope that at least some would be in favour when they were completed. Hence the 'wedding cake' appearance of many Soviet buildings.

Another crucial point of Soviet architecture is that because many of the competition projects for the main state buildings were so grandiose, you could be forgiven for thinking that they were never meant to be built. And you'd be right. Because the utopia of communism was always in the future, everyone's suffering now could be construed as striving towards that future, so if anything was completed, then the future had arrived, so why was everyone still suffering? Stalin was educated as a priest...

One-upmanship would also have been part of it - competition among officials to outdo each other in sycophancy to the leader is universal. Speer, IIRC, described in his memoirs something like this happening with weapons specifications: every official in turn would say, 'it has to be bigger!' to gain Hitler's favour until they became quite ridiculous (the Ratte is an example). Then in his role as Minister of Armaments, Speer would quietly cancel each project when Hitler's attention shifted elsewhere.

 

[Michel Van]

I have allot stuff and insane Ideas from that little annoying painter
But i will not post those megalomaniacal ridiculous crap here...

Instead something from Le Corbusier

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OMODJiBFWjs&pp=ygUhdW5idWlsdCBhcmNoaXRlY3R1cmUgbGUgY29yYnVzaWVy

 

[Rhinocrates]

The ransacking of Britain: why the people finally rose up against ‘sod you architecture’

Inspired by Swiss-born architect Le Corbusier, who believed streets fostered disease, a vision of Britain was cooked up that would see historic city centres flattened for flats and ring roads. But the public decided they’d had enough – and took to the streets

www.theguardian.com

London was no exception, although progress on Patrick Abercrombie’s 1944 plan was slow in starting. Like Liverpool, it was based on the thesis that the existing city was obsolete. Traffic volume forecasts demanded five rings of motorways and 10 radials, destroying more houses than had been lost in the blitz. Apart from selected “villages” and famous buildings, most of the centre would be cleared. Whitehall was to be demolished from Downing Street to Westminster Abbey. A tunnel would run from Parliament Square to Aldwych. Also set to be demolished were Carlton House Terrace, Piccadilly Circus, Covent Garden, Fitzrovia and Bloomsbury. Shopping hubs would be replaced with large traffic gyratories. A glimmer of humanity lay in the proposal for a green belt and “green wedges”.

 

[martinbayer]

Would have made a gaudy rocket (run for cover)

Hello Archibald, as a very dear close to my heart frenemy of mine, being an extremely blunt German I'd really urgently recommend you to drop the lame pun/run for cover strategy and instead invite you to join the have it out in the open drag out discussion in your face brawl instead .

 

[Rhinocrates]

being an extremely blunt German

Do you have some Yorkshire ancestry?