Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, a production of
Speaker 1: I Heart Radios How Stuff Works. Hey, are you welcome
Speaker 1: to Stuff to Blow your Mind? My name is Robert
Speaker 1: Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick, and we are back with
Speaker 1: part two of our exploration of of architecture in the mind.
Speaker 1: That's right. In our first episode, which we do encourage
Speaker 1: you to go back and listen to if you have
Speaker 1: not already, we discussed the natural world, and then we
Speaker 1: discussed the architectural world, this world of artificial shapes and
Speaker 1: objects and designs and layouts that that we've made out
Speaker 1: of that natural world, and in many cases we find
Speaker 1: ourselves living almost exclusively within those environments. Uh, and the
Speaker 1: environments of cities especially. Yeah. We discussed studies about the
Speaker 1: psychological and cognitive impacts of different types of interior spaces,
Speaker 1: things like uh, color of interior spaces, ceiling height, and
Speaker 1: all kinds of stuff like that. Today we're taking a
Speaker 1: turn into the cursed realm. That's right. So, to best
Speaker 1: to understand the typical functionality of a healthy brain, scientists
Speaker 1: often study cases of illness and injury. So perhaps to
Speaker 1: help us understand better understand the impact of great architecture
Speaker 1: and uh and even like the different attributes of attributes
Speaker 1: of every day architecture, we should also turn, uh, you know,
Speaker 1: away from the world of vaulted cathedrals and pyramids and
Speaker 1: zigaratts uh uh and instead look at to the dark
Speaker 1: sorcery of architecture, cursed architecture, if you will. By the way,
Speaker 1: if you do a web search for cursed architecture, you'll
Speaker 1: find a lot of examples of of terrible, usually quite
Speaker 1: quite insane home and building designs. Uh. This what was
Speaker 1: this a Twitter account you shared with me? I think
Speaker 1: cursed cursed architect or cursed architecture is a Twitter thing.
Speaker 1: But also if you just look around for like worst
Speaker 1: renovations and so forth, that there are a number of
Speaker 1: different websites that will include a host of these photos,
Speaker 1: a lot of them hosted on like Pinterest or Instagram.
Speaker 1: But I swear I was looking at some of these
Speaker 1: less Friday, and I was just I was by myself
Speaker 1: laughing out loud so hard at them, and sometimes I
Speaker 1: couldn't even really quite put a finger on why. Yes,
Speaker 1: but the I know exactly what you mean. I was
Speaker 1: also laughing really hard at this stuff you sent me. Uh,
Speaker 1: the one. I love the ones where there is like
Speaker 1: a ledge that cannot be accessed in any way. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's almost like the places where there's like, you know,
Speaker 1: a room with the high ceiling and then against the
Speaker 1: wall up above you know where the second floor would be.
Speaker 1: There's like a hallway, but there's there are no stairs
Speaker 1: leading to it. Yes, stairways to nowhere. Um, you know,
Speaker 1: weird weird doors to nowhere or doors in the middle
Speaker 1: of walls, you know, anything where stairs have been have
Speaker 1: been altered drastically or are a great source of hilarity
Speaker 1: in these shots. And it it's again it's weird to
Speaker 1: try and like figure at exactly why some of these
Speaker 1: are funny, because you know, sometimes people just doing the
Speaker 1: best with the limitations of an old building, right, an
Speaker 1: already weird layout, say, or an older, larger building that
Speaker 1: has been sliced into apartments. I remember visiting London with
Speaker 1: my wife like fifteen years ago. I think it's staying
Speaker 1: you know, weird old hotel where the first thing you
Speaker 1: did when you entered the room was walked down a
Speaker 1: flight of stairs. You know, things like things like that.
Speaker 1: But but then again, like given the limitations of the building,
Speaker 1: perhaps that was the best way to go about it.
Speaker 1: Oh I I recently stayed in a in a building
Speaker 1: in Paris with a hilarious staircase. It was like a
Speaker 1: spiral staircase. It wasn't quite a spiral. It was like
Speaker 1: a rectangular spiral staircase. And there was no stair there
Speaker 1: that was flat. I mean it was angled one way
Speaker 1: or another, even outer in and I imagine going up
Speaker 1: those things after after a night out on the town
Speaker 1: might be might be quite perilous. We had a work
Speaker 1: trip we had to do to Chicago once we stayed
Speaker 1: in a hotel. If I'm remembering this correctly, on every
Speaker 1: floor there was a short stairway, stairway to a wall
Speaker 1: going nowhere, going nowhere except to a painting I think,
Speaker 1: like a painting of a creepy fairy woman. Yeah, it was.
Speaker 1: It was weird. So that sort of stuff. There's that
Speaker 1: sort of stuff. But then there are other examples where
Speaker 1: it's like so clearly somebody just did not care or
Speaker 1: did not have time to care, and did not look
Speaker 1: back to corrected things, where like a toilet can no
Speaker 1: longer close because there's an overhanging the way. You know,
Speaker 1: weird cases where a water faucet comes out over the
Speaker 1: edge of a small sink or does not come out
Speaker 1: far enough to actually empty into the sink. Uh. Some
Speaker 1: of them just had gross implications. I think there was
Speaker 1: one I was looking at that was just like a
Speaker 1: bathroom with a ton of urinals and like a thick
Speaker 1: shag carpet or yeah, any kind of carpeted bathroom scenario
Speaker 1: is h it is awful. But yeah, I love the
Speaker 1: ones though, where where not only did whoever you know
Speaker 1: renovated this, because clearly there's not really design elements they're
Speaker 1: not not only did they fail, but someone did this
Speaker 1: and thought close enough they just leave right um And
Speaker 1: and this gets back to this idea of design though,
Speaker 1: like there is this ideal version in mind where an
Speaker 1: architect is consulted. Uh, you know, they're they're architects, they're engineers,
Speaker 1: and there's this there's this process of intentional design before
Speaker 1: something is built. But of course, historically and even sometimes contemporarily,
Speaker 1: that's not always the same. For instance, I was talking
Speaker 1: with a friend of mine recently about how that when
Speaker 1: they were younger, they were you know, they were they
Speaker 1: had this job and they were helping somebody build some buildings,
Speaker 1: and uh, there was just kind of the sense of
Speaker 1: like where we're just gonna throw it up. We're just
Speaker 1: gonna throw up some walls, and you know what goes
Speaker 1: into a building. You gotta have a floor, you gotta
Speaker 1: have walls, roof, you know. Yeah, and and so I guess,
Speaker 1: you know, certainly with older buildings, and it's going to
Speaker 1: vary in different parts of the world. You know, there
Speaker 1: may be less intent in what is being built. It
Speaker 1: may be more about we need a structure at the
Speaker 1: end of the week, let's build a structure. And maybe
Speaker 1: the individuals building and are not not quite you know,
Speaker 1: the craftspeople that the task requires. But it's you know,
Speaker 1: it's one thing to screw up a renovation or to
Speaker 1: you know, moment monumentally fail on a toilet installation. It's
Speaker 1: quite another to actually design and construct an entire building
Speaker 1: or multiple buildings that have a debilitating effect on our
Speaker 1: mental well being. And the world is is full of
Speaker 1: examples in which a stark or a less traditional architectural
Speaker 1: design draws the ire of local inhabitants right often due
Speaker 1: to the fact that it replaced a more traditional building
Speaker 1: and or stands alongside traditional examples. Um, And you can
Speaker 1: pretty much you can. You can drive around any major
Speaker 1: city and you can see that you can see all right,
Speaker 1: traditional building, traditional building, weird modern building, and you can
Speaker 1: be almost positive that at some point, uh, the neighbors
Speaker 1: were upset about this, or maybe are still upset about this.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah. It seems like every major city, if you
Speaker 1: talk to the locals, they'll have like the one ugly
Speaker 1: building that they hate. Yeah. Uh. And and blogs are
Speaker 1: devoted to this sort of thing as well. Now, for
Speaker 1: my money, I sometimes find this a bit dumb. Sometimes
Speaker 1: someone builds a cool modern home alongside a bunch of
Speaker 1: traditional little boxes, and people with a more traditional taste
Speaker 1: they get bent out of shape over it, And I
Speaker 1: think we have to realize that someone us want to
Speaker 1: live in weird gothic concrete apocalypse bunkers, and that's ultimately okay. Um.
Speaker 1: But then I go back to the McMansion example we
Speaker 1: mentioned in the first episode, the idea that you know,
Speaker 1: developer comes along and builds a colossal house, as much
Speaker 1: house as as possible in a given a lot, and
Speaker 1: that kind of thing I do find obnoxious. But then again,
Speaker 1: like when somebody comes along it's like, yes, that's it.
Speaker 1: That's the exact amount of house I want, and I
Speaker 1: don't want to mow al on. So to a certain extent,
Speaker 1: some of these concerns are a bit ridiculous to even
Speaker 1: get too wrapped up in it. I mean, it's just
Speaker 1: people's tastes are going to vary. Some people want traditional,
Speaker 1: some people want modern, some people want ultramodern, and some
Speaker 1: people maybe want to piss off the neighbors. Oh sure,
Speaker 1: I mean the spite houses are a whole wonderful thing
Speaker 1: on their own. Uh, we could come back to that,
Speaker 1: but yeah. I mean, I think one thing that's important
Speaker 1: to keep in mind as we go forward and think
Speaker 1: about the subject is the difference between just like our
Speaker 1: esthetic preferences and what actually has psychological effects on people,
Speaker 1: Like the difference between what kind of school building seems
Speaker 1: nice to you versus what kind of school building actually
Speaker 1: has measurable outcomes on children's performance in in their education.
Speaker 1: Absolutely so, in figuring it out and trying to decide, like,
Speaker 1: you know, how much of it is, uh to what
Speaker 1: ex soon is there's some sort of intrinsically debilitating aspect
Speaker 1: to certain architectural styles or approaches versus this idea of
Speaker 1: just personal taste. One has to visit the topic of
Speaker 1: brutalist dark texture. Brutal soccer architecture emerged out of Switzerland,
Speaker 1: I believe, in the nineteen fifties, was especially popular in
Speaker 1: the fifties and sixties, and you can find it around
Speaker 1: the world, but especially in the UK, the US, Canada,
Speaker 1: Western Europe and the Eastern Bloc and in UM the
Speaker 1: former Soviet Union, and generally with brutalist architecture, you're dealing with, um,
Speaker 1: you know, stark, imposing geometric designs built with lots of concrete. Uh.
Speaker 1: It is often stark, and some of what's classified as
Speaker 1: a brutalist I see as as as beautiful, creative or
Speaker 1: even evocative. Uh you know some some of them the
Speaker 1: designs feel very just ultra modern in in a way,
Speaker 1: or sometimes ultra modern kind of like a retro fashion,
Speaker 1: you know. Um. Other examples are are harder for me
Speaker 1: to love. But again, your mindleage is going to vary
Speaker 1: when it comes to brutalist architecture. A lot of what's
Speaker 1: most recognized in brutalist architecture are these large surfaces of
Speaker 1: exposed concrete, and in fact that's where the name comes
Speaker 1: from the name of brutalist architecture, does not come from
Speaker 1: it somehow being brutal, like a like a brutality in
Speaker 1: Mortal Kombat? Is that a thing? Brutality? Okay, you're the
Speaker 1: m K expert here um, But no, it comes from
Speaker 1: the phrase betem brute, which means raw concrete. And that's
Speaker 1: because he has very often has these large raw concrete features.
Speaker 1: One example I think we mentioned in the last episode
Speaker 1: is Boston City Hall, which I think is, you know,
Speaker 1: one of the most famous brutalist structures, which personally, I
Speaker 1: think is extremely esthetically pleasing. I like it a lot,
Speaker 1: though I know a lot of people hate it. It's
Speaker 1: apparently just a controversial building. I was saying, one of
Speaker 1: the things I like about it is um, at least
Speaker 1: from some angles of the building, there are ways that
Speaker 1: it has sort of like a variable structure that can
Speaker 1: be like horizontally uh permeated, but then sort of spreads
Speaker 1: out as it goes up. And in a way to me,
Speaker 1: it is a concrete structure that sort of mimics a forest.
Speaker 1: Something about it look kind of like organic, like a
Speaker 1: copse of trees that you could walk into. Uh. And
Speaker 1: I really like that about it. Yeah. I look at
Speaker 1: this image of it, and it it defies sort of
Speaker 1: easy identification, Like I look at it and I would
Speaker 1: not be able to turn and necessarily draw it. You know. Um,
Speaker 1: there's something that you it asks you to map it out.
Speaker 1: You know. It feels like an environment of concrete as
Speaker 1: much as you know it is a structure of concrete. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and I think it incorporates some of the elements that
Speaker 1: we're talking about in the last episode that make for
Speaker 1: good structures, Like it has some pattern and complexity it.
Speaker 1: It has this organic feeling type of variability in the structure.
Speaker 1: It's somewhat looks like trees. Yeah, there's a sort of
Speaker 1: mcs er vibe to it to a certain instant, A
Speaker 1: little bit that too, Yeah, but not in a way
Speaker 1: that makes it functionally confusing, right, but not in a
Speaker 1: way where it seems to break the laws of nature,
Speaker 1: physics or anything. So when when we're when we're dealing
Speaker 1: with architecture of this, I think there are a few
Speaker 1: things we have to to realize. First of all, and
Speaker 1: we'll come back to this later, is that architecture does
Speaker 1: not exist in a vacuum like a building. Uh, even
Speaker 1: just a highly designed building. It is not does not
Speaker 1: exist independent of say, what that building is for, It
Speaker 1: doesn't exist independent of history, etcetera. But another big problem
Speaker 1: is that architecture is an art form, a design medium,
Speaker 1: and a product or practice. It's not just about form
Speaker 1: and function and art since it is in part art
Speaker 1: is not just about making you feel good. I'll admit
Speaker 1: that most of my favorite visual artists have have you know,
Speaker 1: typically not been concerned with making people feel good? Um,
Speaker 1: I think of like Irving Norman or hr Geiger or
Speaker 1: Brugal Bosch. You know, I love these artists and you
Speaker 1: might love them too, But do you want them influencing
Speaker 1: the power of your physical environment? I mean, I suppose
Speaker 1: on some of you do if you're attempted to frame
Speaker 1: a print of it on your wall, But are then
Speaker 1: you But would you inflict it upon the neighborhood which
Speaker 1: you looked at, upon a whole city? Do you want
Speaker 1: to live in a Bosch painting? So I wanted to
Speaker 1: discuss a few examples of unpopular buildings, or buildings that
Speaker 1: at least have been very unpopular with segments of the population.
Speaker 1: One of them, and I would consider this an extreme example,
Speaker 1: is the House of Soviets in Kaliningrad located UH in
Speaker 1: Kaliningrad Oblast, an exclave of Russia on the Baltic Sea.
Speaker 1: And this is a historically Prussian area, but again is
Speaker 1: it was part of the Soviet Union and is part
Speaker 1: of Russia today. The House of Soviets is built on
Speaker 1: the grounds, but not the exact site, of the former
Speaker 1: Konigsberg Castle, which was destroyed during the Second World War.
Speaker 1: But the House of the Soviets, built in the seventies
Speaker 1: does not look like a Teutonic castle. Uh. Instead, it
Speaker 1: looks It is frequently described as looking like the head
Speaker 1: of a giant robot that has been buried up to
Speaker 1: the neck in the earth. It looks like almost kind
Speaker 1: of a gigantic concrete battery. Yeah, yeah, yeah, maybe huge
Speaker 1: concrete air conditioning unit with eyes. Yeah. It does appear
Speaker 1: to have eyes and kind of a mouth and even horns. Perhaps.
Speaker 1: Some locals have also called it the monster in the past. Again,
Speaker 1: it's the House of Soviets. If you look it up online,
Speaker 1: you'll find plenty of pictures of it. I will note
Speaker 1: that you will find two different versions generally, and that's
Speaker 1: because it used to have more of a concrete dark appearance,
Speaker 1: certainly more brutalist, like clearly brutalist in its appearance, because
Speaker 1: it is often held up as a great example of
Speaker 1: brutalist architecture. But it was in two thousand five, i believe,
Speaker 1: which also coincided with a visit by Vladimir Putin, that
Speaker 1: it was paint painted in new color. So now it
Speaker 1: has this awful blue color, which is even worse because
Speaker 1: it's it's it's not even it's like you're hiding the
Speaker 1: fact or covering up the fact that it's brutalist. You know,
Speaker 1: it's like it's not rack concrete anymore. It is raw
Speaker 1: concrete that has been painted the color of an easter egg.
Speaker 1: So again, critics consider it one of the worst examples
Speaker 1: of Soviet architecture, though it has also been held up
Speaker 1: as a solid example of brutalist architecture, and it's it's also,
Speaker 1: i should add, it's a little unfair to completely judge
Speaker 1: it even based on the older pictures you'll find of it,
Speaker 1: because it has never truly been finished. It is technically
Speaker 1: an unfinished building. It fulfills no purpose as a building
Speaker 1: to this day. Yeah, so um, again, we have to
Speaker 1: realize that architecture is business. Architecture does not exist, uh
Speaker 1: in a vacuum. Um, it doesn't exist in its own bubble. History, politics,
Speaker 1: and culture. Color are perceptions of them in its conception.
Speaker 1: The House of the Soviets was perhaps designed to be,
Speaker 1: you know, either symbol of modernity or progress progress, but
Speaker 1: it might also be viewed as a tombstone symbolising Soviet
Speaker 1: or Russian rule over historically German city, that sort of thing.
Speaker 1: Or you might look at it and realize that does nothing.
Speaker 1: There's nothing going on in there because this was never finished.
Speaker 1: This is a testament to an unfinished project. But not
Speaker 1: everything considered brutalist is like a monster level of of
Speaker 1: of of ugliness, etcetera. One I think, great example that
Speaker 1: kind of you know bucks. The stereotype for brutalist architecture
Speaker 1: is Montreal's Habitat sixty seven complex, which was designed by
Speaker 1: Motion Savty, which you need to look up a picture
Speaker 1: this as well, because I can only describe it so well. Uh.
Speaker 1: It looks like a long horizontal row of randomly stacked
Speaker 1: boxes at different angles. Um, and it it's it's quite
Speaker 1: interesting to look at in my opinion, and was actually
Speaker 1: designed with some of the problems of high density living
Speaker 1: in mind, I think it actually looks kind of interesting.
Speaker 1: I mean it, I mean, to me, it's somewhat fulfilled.
Speaker 1: Is that, you know, it has some complexity on the
Speaker 1: exterior surfaces, it has it has a kind of organic
Speaker 1: nature to it. It feels more like a natural environment. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's basically and I'm this is like a very crude
Speaker 1: summary of it. I'm sure that the the the architect's
Speaker 1: original words about it. We're far Uh, it's far better
Speaker 1: expression of it. But it's kind of like, if I
Speaker 1: have to live right on top of where someone else
Speaker 1: is living, well, can't I live a little west, little
Speaker 1: sideways or a little little after the little of the right,
Speaker 1: And likewise, does the person above me? Could they maybe
Speaker 1: be a little further back, a little to the side.
Speaker 1: Maybe there's some room in all of this for a
Speaker 1: little courtyards, a little porches. And so it does have
Speaker 1: that kind of zigarot feel. It has this kind of
Speaker 1: it looks kind of like it was made by by
Speaker 1: space age insects. Uh. It turns concrete box living spaces
Speaker 1: into something more like a you know, like a like
Speaker 1: a bush of thorns, which that doesn't sound very inviting,
Speaker 1: but it looks very cool. Actually, yeah, absolutely, um and
Speaker 1: I if I'm remembering correctly, I don't think it was
Speaker 1: mentioned in the book Future Shock, but I think the
Speaker 1: kind of campy television adaptation of Future Shock that was
Speaker 1: hosted by Orson Wells, I think they pictured they used
Speaker 1: images or footage of habitat sixty seven talking about like
Speaker 1: living spaces of the future. Another quick example that sometimes
Speaker 1: brought up concerning brutalist architecture from the nineties seventies. Uh,
Speaker 1: the it's what Naive nev Brown brutalist department in Rowley Way, London,
Speaker 1: which has a kind of terrorist look to it, and
Speaker 1: I think looks quite beautiful. It looks it looks kind
Speaker 1: of like a stadium turned into apartments, you know. Um
Speaker 1: and and I rather like it. But again it's one
Speaker 1: of these where it's not that stereotypical idea of brutalist architecture.
Speaker 1: But again not everyone likes it either. Now a huge
Speaker 1: example of detrimental modern but not brutalist architecture that is
Speaker 1: often brought up was the is what was known as
Speaker 1: the Pruitt Ego Housing complex in St. Louis, Missouri. This
Speaker 1: was built in the nineteen fifties and designed by Minoru
Speaker 1: Yamasaki of a World Trade Center fame, and the complex
Speaker 1: consists of consisted of thirty three apartment blocks, each eleven
Speaker 1: stories high, and uh, you know it, it actually sums
Speaker 1: up a lot of the things that Habitat sixty seven
Speaker 1: was trying to get away from. Like if you look
Speaker 1: at an aerial picture of what this looked like, I
Speaker 1: mean it looked like a graveyard for giants. It's just
Speaker 1: big slabs of apartment buildings with these big empty spaces
Speaker 1: in between. And uh, it's it's just, uh it's it's
Speaker 1: just it's tough to look at. As described by Michael
Speaker 1: Bond in The Hidden Ways that Architecture Affects How You Feel,
Speaker 1: written for BBC Future, the complex quote quickly became notorious
Speaker 1: for their crime squalor and social dysfunction. Critics argue that
Speaker 1: the i'd open spaces between the blocks of modernist high
Speaker 1: rises discouraged a sense of community, particularly as crime rates
Speaker 1: started to rise. As as a result, these bleak, prison
Speaker 1: like slabs of housing were demolished in nineteen seventy two.
Speaker 1: And this is an example that that is often discussed
Speaker 1: when people talk about like what's an example of architecture
Speaker 1: that has a detrimental effect on the people that have
Speaker 1: to live with it, right, that not necessarily may well,
Speaker 1: I mean I don't want to describe ill intentions to
Speaker 1: the architect, but like that is that is not properly
Speaker 1: tuned with the well being of its inhabitants in mind, right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: and it's as Yeah, it's also worth pointing at the
Speaker 1: architect does not have sole power over like where a
Speaker 1: building is constructed or whiant is constructed there. Uh, you know,
Speaker 1: certainly getting into critiques of segregation of course, involving aside
Speaker 1: like this, but yeah, it also just comes back again
Speaker 1: that buildings do not exist in their in their own bubble,
Speaker 1: They don't exist in a vacuum, and they can certainly
Speaker 1: contribute to or antagonize existing social problems. So these are
Speaker 1: just a couple of examples. There are certainly loads of
Speaker 1: ugly and or joyless buildings in cities around the world,
Speaker 1: and we keep building them. Uh. I mean, if you
Speaker 1: look at the current skyline of New York City, you'll
Speaker 1: see the full spectrum. You'll see uh, exciting buildings, nostalgic buildings,
Speaker 1: modern buildings that are quite interesting to look out modern
Speaker 1: buildings that make you a little bit angry to look at,
Speaker 1: and plenty of other buildings that you barely see it
Speaker 1: all because they're they're just so lukewarm that your mind
Speaker 1: cannot even hold them. But again, coming back to something
Speaker 1: we talked about in our first episode, um, the importance
Speaker 1: of having nearby access to green space with natural vegetation.
Speaker 1: Uh there. I mean you kind of can't think about
Speaker 1: the architecture of New York City, or certainly think about
Speaker 1: the architecture of Manhattan without thinking about Central Park. Central Park.
Speaker 1: I mean, there's a reason that almost every photo you
Speaker 1: see of Manhattan has something to do. You know. You
Speaker 1: either get the skyline down from below or you're looking
Speaker 1: at part of Central Park. Yeah, or you get a
Speaker 1: shot that has the river in it like that. You
Speaker 1: have to have that that natural element. And moving water
Speaker 1: is another one that is sometimes factored into these these studies,
Speaker 1: like it, can a body of water be seen by say,
Speaker 1: patient's recovering in a hospital, et cetera. All right, on
Speaker 1: that note, we're going to take our first break, but
Speaker 1: when we come back, we will get further into this question.
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Speaker 1: we're back. So we've been talking about brutalist architecture. Houses
Speaker 1: that are in homes and buildings are architectural structures and
Speaker 1: creations that some may criticize as being ugly or imposing.
Speaker 1: So I would like to imagine imagine that you know,
Speaker 1: you you tell go walk in your own neighborhood and
Speaker 1: suddenly you see that overnight, like the castle from Kral,
Speaker 1: the monster, the House of Soviets, has has emerged in
Speaker 1: your neighborhood. Um, and you might wonder, well, is this
Speaker 1: this is? This may be ugly, I may not like it.
Speaker 1: I may uh have questions about what happened to uh
Speaker 1: you know the park that it that was formerly in
Speaker 1: that space. But but is it going to actually damage
Speaker 1: my health? Is it actually going to have some sort
Speaker 1: of tangible effect on my mental well being? And uh?
Speaker 1: In looking at this, we've discussed some of our sources
Speaker 1: here already. I think I already mentioned Michael Bonds, BBC
Speaker 1: Future two thousands seventeen article The Hidden Ways that architecture
Speaker 1: affects how you feel. But another source I was looking
Speaker 1: at is a piece in The Guardian from sixteen by
Speaker 1: Emily Reynolds titled could bad buildings damage Your mental health?
Speaker 1: Reynolds points to some basic stats about urban living, and
Speaker 1: this came from a twenty ten meta analysis. First of all, UH,
Speaker 1: people living in urban environments in large cities percent more
Speaker 1: likely to experience an anxiety disorder and thirty nine percent
Speaker 1: more likely to experience mood disorders UH. And then Reynolds
Speaker 1: also points to a two thousand five study that said
Speaker 1: people who grew up in a city where are twice
Speaker 1: as likely to develop schizophrenia as those who grew up
Speaker 1: in the countryside. Furthermore, a two thousand and eleven Central
Speaker 1: Institute of Mental Health at the University of Heidelberg study
Speaker 1: pointed to a link between urban living and greater stress
Speaker 1: responses in the amygdala and the singulate cortex linked to
Speaker 1: emotional regulation, depression, and anxiety. So this could have a
Speaker 1: lasting effect on brain development and mental illness suceptibility, she writes.
Speaker 1: As Bond points out, this points to the idea that
Speaker 1: quote urban living can change brain biology and some people
Speaker 1: resulting in reduced gray matter in the right dorso lateral
Speaker 1: prefrontal cortex and the paraguinea anterior signulate cortex, two areas
Speaker 1: where changes have previously been linked to early life stressful experiences.
Speaker 1: Now Reynolds also acknowledges the rather subjective nature of all
Speaker 1: of this, such as, you know, drastically conflicting studies on
Speaker 1: open office spaces like we discussed in our first episode.
Speaker 1: You know, do they promote pro social working or are
Speaker 1: they bad for productivity and well being? Depends on which
Speaker 1: study you consult. Uh. If you consult me, however, I'll
Speaker 1: tell you that that hell is an open space office.
Speaker 1: Now it's the way. But I mean, don't you want
Speaker 1: to collaborate in hell? Don't don't you really get get
Speaker 1: your your Jimmy's uh collaborating with the other imprisoned souls. No,
Speaker 1: I mean I take a more of a Dickensian view
Speaker 1: of hell. Where the hell is where you experience the
Speaker 1: chain that you forged in life. It's not about sharing
Speaker 1: your chain with other people. But of course, things like
Speaker 1: this or it's often a careful balance, right. You know,
Speaker 1: consider co housing, in which private homes are clustered around
Speaker 1: shared spaces The idea is that unlike dreary apart and towers,
Speaker 1: they can foster a sense of community through shared spaces. Uh.
Speaker 1: In some space studies report this, others those say residents
Speaker 1: can lose their sense of individuality and privacy. Uh. It
Speaker 1: kind of comes into the ore varied demands for a
Speaker 1: natural environment. Right, Sometimes we want a place to hide away.
Speaker 1: Sometimes we need a place to, uh, you know, delight
Speaker 1: in the sun and share with others. And the natural
Speaker 1: environment tends to provide us such variety. But once you
Speaker 1: you have a like an apartment complex plan in place
Speaker 1: like that is the environment. And I think this is
Speaker 1: again another area where you have to take into account
Speaker 1: the careful balance, uh, you know, among the different types
Speaker 1: of personalities out there, the ups and downs of human moods.
Speaker 1: You might want to stand in the sun, rejoice in
Speaker 1: the sun one day, but then you may need to
Speaker 1: hide in the shadows on another. And as just the
Speaker 1: ups and downs of life. Sure. Reynolds also quotes Layla McKay,
Speaker 1: director of the Center for Urban Design and Mental Health,
Speaker 1: whose think tank has tackled complex nature of this problem.
Speaker 1: H And you know, try to figure out what are
Speaker 1: some what are what are some basic tac comes we
Speaker 1: can we can acquire from it, and she says the
Speaker 1: following are key uh to having a quality architectural design
Speaker 1: UH in a living space. First of all, access to
Speaker 1: nature or green spaces. We talked about that a good
Speaker 1: bit in the last episode. This is just a no
Speaker 1: brainer and just it just ties into to study after
Speaker 1: study after study. Also, she stresses public spaces that facilitate
Speaker 1: physical activity and encourage social interaction. Oh yeah, this is,
Speaker 1: for example, one thing people have talked about in the
Speaker 1: history of city design when cars became ubiquitous and cities
Speaker 1: suddenly that streets were no longer a place where people
Speaker 1: would gather and meet and talk, but instead there were
Speaker 1: places that were introversible because they were fast moving vehicles
Speaker 1: going back and forth all the time. Yeah. Absolutely, Yeah,
Speaker 1: it just needs to be a place where we can
Speaker 1: move around and interact with people if we want to. Now,
Speaker 1: another thing, she stresses living and working in spaces that
Speaker 1: feel safe, which on one hand is obvious. We don't
Speaker 1: want to live or work somewhere where we do not
Speaker 1: feel safe, But that can apply to a lot of things.
Speaker 1: You know, you can certainly apply that to say, a
Speaker 1: whole neighborhood layout, but you can also apply to things
Speaker 1: like in our own building, the building in which you
Speaker 1: and I work. There is our office and then there
Speaker 1: is an extremely long, largely featureless hallway that goes to
Speaker 1: the elevator bank. It's sort of a John Carpenter hallway.
Speaker 1: I often think, when watching people walk down and ahead
Speaker 1: of me, that there should be a Carpenter soundtrack, kind
Speaker 1: of a doom doom me me, Me, Me me Yeah.
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm not saying that the whole way that
Speaker 1: hallway makes me personally feel unsafe or in danger, but
Speaker 1: it is unnerving and I feel like it. It does
Speaker 1: mess with my my perceptions a little bit about potential threats,
Speaker 1: you know, like like if someone else is coming down
Speaker 1: that hallway and I don't want to interact with them,
Speaker 1: I have no choice. I'm just I'm on a train
Speaker 1: and I'm gonna walk past them, and it makes me
Speaker 1: feel weird. It makes me want to a void that
Speaker 1: hallway because on some level I don't feel safe there.
Speaker 1: Maybe I feel nine percent safe there, but I would
Speaker 1: rather feel safe, if possible, in the building in which
Speaker 1: I work. No, I mean, you're what you're saying sort
Speaker 1: of connects to what I mean. It feels like a
Speaker 1: you know, follow the yellow line and escape from New
Speaker 1: York kind of hallway. I'm also reminded a friend of
Speaker 1: mine was telling me about this um the Atlanta based
Speaker 1: neo futurist architect John Portman, who is generally best remembered
Speaker 1: for very large, impressive atriums in hotels, which they that
Speaker 1: this was also something that was fairly controversial because you
Speaker 1: walk into a big hotel and then someone would look
Speaker 1: up and say, look at all this wasted space. This
Speaker 1: is not how you build a hotel. Hotel was supposed
Speaker 1: to be. Uh, you know, wall to wall rooms, seeing
Speaker 1: you get to get the maximum out of the space
Speaker 1: and uh, and that's certainly not what you find in
Speaker 1: his in his his buildings, these are the sort of
Speaker 1: atriums that you'll sometimes find, uh in science fiction films
Speaker 1: where they they've clearly filmed it in a in an
Speaker 1: enormous atrium in a hotel. I tend to think these
Speaker 1: things look really cool. Yeah, I love them as well.
Speaker 1: They are very This kind of design is very much
Speaker 1: about the interior world, however, and some apparently criticized John
Speaker 1: Portman for using like internal halls and the kind of
Speaker 1: tunnels to connect buildings to one another rather than using
Speaker 1: open areas and exposure to nature even but that does
Speaker 1: make me wonder if there was true nature to expose
Speaker 1: people too, or if it was a situation where you're
Speaker 1: cutting them off from like a dreary street. Yeah. Well,
Speaker 1: and one thing I like, you know, in in some
Speaker 1: of these big buildings like hotels that have large atriums,
Speaker 1: I mean sometimes they will have vegetation within the atrium,
Speaker 1: having like trees inside there, which is great. Yeah. Absolutely, Yeah,
Speaker 1: There's certainly ways to bring nature into an indoor environment. Um,
Speaker 1: and some are very extreme. Like I'm reminded of the
Speaker 1: the oprus Land Hotel in Nashville, Tennessee, where they have
Speaker 1: that the one that's got the rainforest. Yeah, it's like
Speaker 1: island running. It has the big, big Remember I went
Speaker 1: there when I was a kid. I loved it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: because it's also kind of like going to um really
Speaker 1: Wonka's chocolate factory. I think I remember believing it possible
Speaker 1: that I could catch a poisoned dart frog the sou
Speaker 1: in the In this article by by Reynolds, Reynolds points
Speaker 1: to a frequently studied example Barbican estate in London. So
Speaker 1: this is a brutalist development of terrorist blocks and towers
Speaker 1: built from the nineteen sixties through the eighties, and it's
Speaker 1: it's barely frequently criticized for all the normal reasons people
Speaker 1: criticize brutalist architecture, but McKay points out that it actually
Speaker 1: checks off all the boxes that we mentioned above, you know,
Speaker 1: the nature in the green spaces, the public spaces, uh,
Speaker 1: living and working in spaces that feel safe, etcetera. Uh.
Speaker 1: They do mention, however, that darkness is sometimes a luxury
Speaker 1: in in a place like this, which is also interesting
Speaker 1: to consider, coming back to that idea that sometimes you
Speaker 1: want the shadows, sometimes you don't want the wide open spaces.
Speaker 1: And uh and certainly, I mean I I've certainly lived
Speaker 1: in places where I feel like there's just way too
Speaker 1: much light pollution and it's kind of hard to find
Speaker 1: that dark corner in which to actually just sleep at night. Still,
Speaker 1: one of the I think the keys here is this.
Speaker 1: All of this suggests that a building can be ugly
Speaker 1: and still be good for mental health, but the design
Speaker 1: is still key. I think likewise, it sounds like it's
Speaker 1: very possible to have an outwardly built a beautiful building
Speaker 1: that is would be depressing to live within. Oh well,
Speaker 1: this goes with something that we were talking about the
Speaker 1: Sarah Williams Goldhagen emphasized in her book that we discussed
Speaker 1: a little bit in the last episode. It was that, um,
Speaker 1: you know, architects often end up thinking most of all
Speaker 1: about the overall form of buildings, you know, like the
Speaker 1: broad sort of like shape and profile of it. But
Speaker 1: that in fact, for people's direct enjoyment of buildings and
Speaker 1: you know, the their their emotional reactions to buildings, what
Speaker 1: are actually more important are smaller scale things like surfaces
Speaker 1: and materials and textures and features. So I think it's
Speaker 1: possible you could actually have a building that a lot
Speaker 1: of people would look at the overall form of from
Speaker 1: the outside and think it's ugly, but it might be
Speaker 1: a better place to live in in terms of interior
Speaker 1: surfaces and features and that kind of thing. In addition
Speaker 1: to the major points we were just talking about with
Speaker 1: like access to green space and social interaction spaces and
Speaker 1: all that. Yeah, the health advantage of having access to
Speaker 1: a scenic environment. Reynolds also points out that neglected environments
Speaker 1: contribute to mental ill health, making us feel unsafe and
Speaker 1: they may also quote contribute to anxiety and persistent low mood. Uh.
Speaker 1: That's from a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention study
Speaker 1: by Jackson at All and others have pointed to the
Speaker 1: signs of social ills such as graffiti and vandalism as
Speaker 1: potentially contributing to this as well. So I think we
Speaker 1: have to be careful not to veer directly off into
Speaker 1: the like the broken windows the aory of policing in
Speaker 1: criminal behavior right. Well, A lot of graffiti is fantastic,
Speaker 1: and there are there are great graffiti artists. There are
Speaker 1: parts of Atlanta that are known for their graffiti that
Speaker 1: uh it, you know, provides a beautiful kind of character
Speaker 1: to the place. There have been some fabulous public art
Speaker 1: programs that have been aimed at at bringing like large
Speaker 1: scale murals to particularly areas with problems as an attempt
Speaker 1: to just kind of like beautify things and basically have
Speaker 1: the beneficial side of these effects we're talking about work
Speaker 1: their way on the inhabitants, and they they're they're generally
Speaker 1: been very well received. High rise living Reynolds rights might
Speaker 1: seem like a great idea, because of course it can.
Speaker 1: It can afford that killer view. Right. You can see
Speaker 1: the river, you can see the park, you can see
Speaker 1: green spaces in the distance, etcetera. Uh, you know what,
Speaker 1: wealthy penthouses deliver this. But then also someone in community
Speaker 1: housing would be able to look out of the river
Speaker 1: as well in a high rise environment. But the flip
Speaker 1: side of this is that locations like this can contribute
Speaker 1: to isolation. It's something where more it's an area where
Speaker 1: more study is needed. But again it shows that you
Speaker 1: can't just have the view of nature. You know, they
Speaker 1: are all these other factors as well. Uh. And if
Speaker 1: your view of nature is coming from an isolated tower, uh,
Speaker 1: it's only going to do so much good, especially if
Speaker 1: you're you're you're not having the social interaction, you're not
Speaker 1: having any of these other boxes checked off for you
Speaker 1: by the design. And of course this leads us to
Speaker 1: shopping centers and malls, which we might think of them
Speaker 1: as sol draining places, but according to the restorative potential
Speaker 1: of shopping malls ten by Rosenbaum at all, uh, many
Speaker 1: of these actually have quote mentally restorative qualities because think
Speaker 1: about it, they're safe, they're open. Uh. You know, essentially
Speaker 1: there are a lot of them are like large, uh
Speaker 1: you know, enclosed environments, the sort of classic mall um
Speaker 1: which hopefully people are still getting to experience outside of
Speaker 1: just viewings of stranger things and shopping mall. I mean,
Speaker 1: some actually have greenery in them, vegetation, and there they
Speaker 1: may be well maintained. But then the flip side is
Speaker 1: that is that they are also places that are highly controlled.
Speaker 1: And obviously there are places where uh, retailers are using
Speaker 1: all of their tricks to try and control your behavior
Speaker 1: influence your behavior as well, and so that can have
Speaker 1: ultimately an effect on anxiety and other factors. I also
Speaker 1: can't help but imagine, I mean, when you go to
Speaker 1: a shopping place, you're going there to engage with decision fatigue,
Speaker 1: like whatever your mental state is going in. No matter
Speaker 1: how nice the greenery, no matter how cool the architecture is, uh,
Speaker 1: no matter how pleasant the music is maybe uh, you're
Speaker 1: still going to potentially find yourself in that situation where
Speaker 1: like I have no idea what to buy anymore, my
Speaker 1: brain is depleted, and the shopping mall almost by definition,
Speaker 1: provides a lot of buying options, and having a lot
Speaker 1: of buying options often contributes directly to those negative feelings
Speaker 1: associated with shopping exactly, So Reynolds, ultimately, you know rights
Speaker 1: that with increased awareness of mental health issues and more
Speaker 1: work in this design area, quote, buildings and public spaces
Speaker 1: are being designed or at the very least critically analyzed,
Speaker 1: with mental well being in mind. Now. In Michael Bond's
Speaker 1: seventeen piece, it's not maybe that doesn't quite echo as
Speaker 1: much optimism for the present, but does seem hopeful about
Speaker 1: the future, writing the quote, urban architects have often paid
Speaker 1: scantic attention to the potential cognitive effects of their creations
Speaker 1: on a city's inhabitants. But he did point out that
Speaker 1: there's a h every year. The Conscious Cities Conference takes place.
Speaker 1: In seventeen, it took place in London. I read that
Speaker 1: in twenty nineteen place in New York City, with a
Speaker 1: focus on building resilient communities, healthy child development and parenting,
Speaker 1: reshaping later life, and urban design for mental health. If
Speaker 1: you want to learn more, you can check them out
Speaker 1: at the c c D dot org. That's the Center
Speaker 1: for Conscious Design. Yeah. So, Bond points out that that
Speaker 1: recent studies have used actually wearable devices such as bracelets
Speaker 1: that monitors monitor skin conductivity, a marker of physiological arousal
Speaker 1: and smartphone technology just see how we're responding and where
Speaker 1: we're responding to architecture. And so this makes sense. You
Speaker 1: can strap people up, send them out in the city
Speaker 1: and you can see like what's spiking their activity? Yeah, right,
Speaker 1: where are people walking when they're getting stressed and stuff
Speaker 1: Like do they tend to be walking past this one
Speaker 1: horribly ugly featureless building and that's making them more kind
Speaker 1: of uh yeah, the the factor and that's that's exactly
Speaker 1: what they were looking for. Colin Ellard, who researches the
Speaker 1: psychological impact of design at the University of Waterloo in Canada,
Speaker 1: is one of the researchers that's using this kind of technology.
Speaker 1: And they found that building facades had a huge impact.
Speaker 1: And they specifically pointed out a quote dead zone of
Speaker 1: quote long smoked glass frontage of a Whole food store
Speaker 1: in Lower Manhattan. All Right, so this Whole Foods is
Speaker 1: directly ruined people's quality of life's story, not so not solely,
Speaker 1: but yeah, so they walk past this storefront with the
Speaker 1: frosted glass and like the you are detecting physiological signs
Speaker 1: of stress and anxiety and unhappiness. Yeah, and it's not
Speaker 1: because it's like crazy weird architecture. It's not brutalist, it's
Speaker 1: not it's not covered with graffiti or anything. It's not
Speaker 1: like you feel unsafe. It's just it's just there and
Speaker 1: it's dreary, and it's it's like what you see everywhere.
Speaker 1: It's it's been pointed out as one of the potential
Speaker 1: threats of of you know, the loss of you know,
Speaker 1: mom and pop stores for sure, but also just places
Speaker 1: with individual identity. As street level at any rate, cities
Speaker 1: turn more and more into you know, chain chain restaurant here,
Speaker 1: and here's the big box store here. And there's the
Speaker 1: sameness to everything and the lack of variety. Uh, you know,
Speaker 1: it takes us out of the sort of variety that
Speaker 1: we would need in the natural world and would also
Speaker 1: historically find in a more vibrant city environment. Certainly, Like
Speaker 1: that's what you think of when you think of of
Speaker 1: walking the streets of New York, right right, that's the cliche.
Speaker 1: Not seeing a block of of storefront for you know,
Speaker 1: whatever your big box store happens to be. No, you
Speaker 1: you're expecting to see weird thing here, weird thing here,
Speaker 1: strange little store here, Uh, something up and coming over here.
Speaker 1: You know, it's we want that kind of experience. We
Speaker 1: want the same sort of height through the wilderness experience
Speaker 1: even in our urban environments. Of course, again we're living
Speaker 1: in a time though where you know, there's more and
Speaker 1: more consciousness about mental health though, and we have decades
Speaker 1: now of of studies about the impact of design and
Speaker 1: things we can do to to to help to have
Speaker 1: like a you know, an actual benefit on our mental
Speaker 1: well being. For instance, when it comes to social interaction
Speaker 1: human interaction. UH. Sociologist William White was a key advocate
Speaker 1: in the nineteen seventies of design that pushed people closer
Speaker 1: together and encourage social interaction, and one of his colleague,
Speaker 1: Expond Rights, founded the Project for Public Spaces, which made
Speaker 1: key moves such as deploying benches to make certain public
Speaker 1: spaces more inviting to the public. Put some benches there,
Speaker 1: make it seem like people are supposed to be here,
Speaker 1: and then by being here, they will interact with one
Speaker 1: another UH in various ways. And another important aspect of
Speaker 1: city design, brought up by Kate Jeffrey, a behavioral neuroscience
Speaker 1: scientists at the University College London, is that more. The
Speaker 1: more lost you feel in a city, the more out
Speaker 1: of sync, isolated and potentially afraid you feel. And this
Speaker 1: is also important inside of a building. So when you
Speaker 1: walk into the building, do you feel lost? Do you
Speaker 1: feel like you're in a maze, Because that's not good,
Speaker 1: because the interior of space should be more like a labyrinth,
Speaker 1: the place that is maybe complex, that is interesting to
Speaker 1: behold and experience, but there is not a sense of
Speaker 1: anxiety about where you are going. When you enter a
Speaker 1: true labyrinth, you will always go to the sin for
Speaker 1: the labyrinth and back out again. You will always go
Speaker 1: exactly where you need to go. A maze is the
Speaker 1: edifice in which you become lost and possibly consumed by
Speaker 1: a minotaur. I don't think I was aware of that distinction.
Speaker 1: I've just used them. So they're often used interchangeably, even
Speaker 1: by the the best of writers, So I don't. I
Speaker 1: try not to get a bit out of shape when
Speaker 1: I'm reading something and they say maze when they need labyrinth, etcetera.
Speaker 1: It's not as elegant to say pans maze, pants maze.
Speaker 1: It's not as good. Labyrinth feels more appropriate. All Right,
Speaker 1: we're gonna take one more break. But when we come back,
Speaker 1: we're going to explore the world of hostile architecture. Than alright,
Speaker 1: we're back now, Joe, you're the one who turned me
Speaker 1: onto this idea of hostile architecture. I was, I was
Speaker 1: blissfully unaware of this. Well, it's not something I ever
Speaker 1: had a deep knowledge about. It's just something i'd I'd
Speaker 1: seen in a few places, and I, you know, I
Speaker 1: was just reading a little bit about it online. The
Speaker 1: idea that sometimes architectural signs that you would use us, say,
Speaker 1: defending a fortress against an invading army, can be turned
Speaker 1: inward and can be used within a society itself, even
Speaker 1: within the city itself, in ways that are both interesting
Speaker 1: and sad. Right, yeah, using these features against residents of
Speaker 1: the city itself, especially the homeless. So one of the
Speaker 1: older examples of this sort of thing, uh is probably
Speaker 1: the flint cone. A number of you've seen this. I'm
Speaker 1: going to describe it, and a lot of you will go, Okay,
Speaker 1: I know what you're talking about. This is just deployed
Speaker 1: in the nineteenth century in Norwich, England, along with other
Speaker 1: designs to curb public urination in the city because basically,
Speaker 1: men walking about through the city would need to urinate,
Speaker 1: and having few options, they would turn to you know,
Speaker 1: a handy, dimly lit corner in the exterior of a
Speaker 1: stone building, and that's where they would peet. But such
Speaker 1: urination course creates an odor and it even damages materials.
Speaker 1: So building oders employed a few different strategies. Again it's
Speaker 1: public urination, such as gates around such little corners and
Speaker 1: nooks and crannies, or even more drastically filling those corners
Speaker 1: in with brick and mortar, sometimes in the shape of
Speaker 1: a cone. Right, So where you would have a recess
Speaker 1: that would normally just be a little corner where you
Speaker 1: could face into the corner and no one would see
Speaker 1: what you were doing with the front of your body. Instead,
Speaker 1: there's a you know, human height shaped cone of bricks
Speaker 1: and stuff. Right, that's gonna guess cause your urine to
Speaker 1: flow back towards your feet, right, But also just doesn't
Speaker 1: give you any privacy, Whereas normally this corner would have
Speaker 1: allowed privacy. Now there is no way to be private there. Right.
Speaker 1: Of course, you might not have much of an issue
Speaker 1: with this, right, you're probably not a huge fan of
Speaker 1: public urination. But here's the thing. It does not address
Speaker 1: the route problem. There are people in the city with
Speaker 1: nowhere to pee. Public toilets were not readily available. Transforming
Speaker 1: these corners didn't actually solve the problem. It just redirected
Speaker 1: it to other places, like other other corners that didn't
Speaker 1: have cones implanted in them, and and it, you know,
Speaker 1: ultimately made life even more miserable for the Norwich wanderers
Speaker 1: who had full bladders. Now, the city eventually made public
Speaker 1: restrooms more available, but many of these structures still remain,
Speaker 1: especially the cones, because they are rather permanent in their construction.
Speaker 1: Sure now, lack of a place to leave oneself can
Speaker 1: still be a problem for the urban homeless today, though
Speaker 1: this is a problem that is addressed to a large
Speaker 1: extent by public restrooms, which are deployed with varying degrees
Speaker 1: of success depending on which city you're looking at and
Speaker 1: where you are in that city. But like just yesterday,
Speaker 1: I was outside our own city zoo and in an
Speaker 1: individual walked up and asked me where the nearest bathroom was,
Speaker 1: And naturally there's one inside the zoo, but that requires
Speaker 1: a membership or a ticket to get into, And I
Speaker 1: said there was one at the instrants to an adjacent park,
Speaker 1: but I wasn't sure if renovations were affecting it. And
Speaker 1: then he said that he tried that one and he
Speaker 1: couldn't get into it. And then my only suggestion was
Speaker 1: said to tell him, well, there's a coffee shop across
Speaker 1: the street. And of course a coffee shop is the
Speaker 1: sort of place where one usually encounters a customers only
Speaker 1: policy for restrooms, and in some areas you even have
Speaker 1: to have a key or the receipt code off of
Speaker 1: receipt to get in there. So the problem still remains.
Speaker 1: The homeless also need a place to sit and to sleep,
Speaker 1: a situation addressed to some extent by shelters and other initiatives.
Speaker 1: But what about these public spaces, these green spaces we've
Speaker 1: been discussing that have such a benefit for all of us,
Speaker 1: Like these these places have an important impact on our
Speaker 1: mental wellness and UH and certainly access is even more
Speaker 1: vital for individuals on the margins who may also very
Speaker 1: well be struggling with depression, anxiety, and or mental illness.
Speaker 1: But unfortunately there's often an effort then to prevent the
Speaker 1: homeless from using such areas, and to be fair of
Speaker 1: a public spaces is overrun by homeless individuals that you know,
Speaker 1: I guess it can certainly become less desirable for some
Speaker 1: members of society. Uh And but the result is we
Speaker 1: see other examples of what critics have dubbed host aisle
Speaker 1: architecture also known as defensive design in our modern cities.
Speaker 1: And here are just a few examples. First of all,
Speaker 1: park benches with arm rests down the middle right, so
Speaker 1: they the goal there is to make a bench that
Speaker 1: you can sit on, but you can't really lay down on.
Speaker 1: Another one, spikes or bolts installed on stairs or on
Speaker 1: areas of the pavement itself. This is something I've only
Speaker 1: seen photos of. I don't think I've seen this in
Speaker 1: in real life, but yeah, just the idea of like, well,
Speaker 1: here's a place where one could lay here's some stairs
Speaker 1: someone could potentially lay on, but we're gonna put spikes
Speaker 1: there instead, which which is a drastic solution. Another one
Speaker 1: gates around various fountains, specifically around the the the edge
Speaker 1: of the lift of the fountain where one might normally
Speaker 1: set uh. The placement of boulders or other objects such
Speaker 1: as bike racks or other structures in place of benches
Speaker 1: or in spots there were previously popular gathering places for
Speaker 1: the homeless. Or here's another one, sprinklers that at least
Speaker 1: allegedly been placed to deter squatters, like in parks. Yeah
Speaker 1: so some of them. And then as far as benches go,
Speaker 1: we mentioned the bench with an arm or us down
Speaker 1: the middle. But some of the designs that have been
Speaker 1: utilized are really quite elaborate and you might not even
Speaker 1: recognize their true purpose at first glance, as with the
Speaker 1: South Philadelphia Transit authorities, modern chrome ribbed like benches that
Speaker 1: that look cool. They look they look like I said,
Speaker 1: like this weird space curvy rib thing. But as I
Speaker 1: read in What's behind the Uptick and Hostile Architecture by
Speaker 1: Elizabeth Wallace published an architectural digest, the intention here is
Speaker 1: to create benches that are difficult to sleep on. Ye
Speaker 1: they're not flat, They've got these ridges in them that
Speaker 1: will sort of cut into you if you try to
Speaker 1: lay down. Yeah. So it's probably a worthwhile exercise, especially
Speaker 1: for anyone out there who uses like public transportation and
Speaker 1: visits urban public spaces. Like the next time you see
Speaker 1: a weird bench or even abut a full bench, ask yourself,
Speaker 1: could Could I sleep on this? Could I lay down
Speaker 1: and sleep on this? Could I even set up and
Speaker 1: sleep on this? And then what does that say? Um?
Speaker 1: Another example, London's concrete Camden benches have often been criticized
Speaker 1: for this. Uh and you can there just again this
Speaker 1: kind of like weird bench design that is like you
Speaker 1: look at it and you ask yourself, could I lay
Speaker 1: on that? And the answer is not not comfortably at all.
Speaker 1: And you also see variations of this sort of design
Speaker 1: when it comes to anti skateboarding uh features as well
Speaker 1: that have been retro fritti fitted on things I've noticed
Speaker 1: the others I've never noticed anti skateboarding stuff. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: wonder what that's like. Um. Basically, it's like like little
Speaker 1: like metal ridges, metal bars, things that are added to
Speaker 1: and I don't have any skateboarding um lingo in my brain.
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, but the thing just call everything ali the okay,
Speaker 1: the thing where they ali along the side of the
Speaker 1: like the yeah or the bench or the concrete by
Speaker 1: the fountain. Put a metal are somewhere there to disrupt
Speaker 1: such activity, you can't ali. Yeah. Uh. So obviously, hostile
Speaker 1: architecture has angered quite a lot of people, inspiring social
Speaker 1: media campaigns and even sticker and graffiti efforts against the
Speaker 1: features because these effects are by their very nature, uh,
Speaker 1: not only anti homeless, but just anti human. As critics
Speaker 1: point out, you know what about older members of society,
Speaker 1: homeless or not, who simply might need to sit down
Speaker 1: more often? What if they, they or anyone else you know,
Speaker 1: has a health episode you need to lay down, But oh,
Speaker 1: you can't lay there because there's spikes coming out of
Speaker 1: the concrete for no reason. Like you're like you live
Speaker 1: in a Mortal Kombat game. Yeah, there's a really depressing
Speaker 1: lack of compassion evident in those though at the same time,
Speaker 1: I mean, to be fair to I guess the people
Speaker 1: who would install things like that. I mean, like, the
Speaker 1: problem is that there, you know, there are people without
Speaker 1: a place of their own to to lie down or
Speaker 1: to sleep or something like that. And like the one
Speaker 1: owner of a building or something can't individually all of
Speaker 1: the problem, right, give every one a place to live, uh,
Speaker 1: And so like they're just forced to individually deal with
Speaker 1: their own problem, which is that people keep laying across
Speaker 1: the doorstep of my building. But it's sad to see
Speaker 1: that problem dealt with by just like trying to make
Speaker 1: things even harder for the people who end up sleeping there. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: certainly to your point that the individual store owner is
Speaker 1: not going to solve the wicked problem of homelessness. We
Speaker 1: call it a wicked problem because it's something with a
Speaker 1: number of different factors involved, and it's very difficult to
Speaker 1: address and to solve. It's the kind of effort that
Speaker 1: people devote their lives to trying to deal with. Oh,
Speaker 1: but I mean, I think there there are clearly things
Speaker 1: you can do to reduce homelessness. I think I think
Speaker 1: the evidence is there, certainly. But but in terms of
Speaker 1: the individual store owner, they can't. They can't do it themselves.
Speaker 1: But you know, ultimately that the issue is, you know,
Speaker 1: benches that you can actually sleep on are not going
Speaker 1: to fix anything. But but neither does the presence of
Speaker 1: hostile architecture, even though it may allow some people to
Speaker 1: better ignore the underlying problems in society. And and that's
Speaker 1: the thing, like it's about making Ultimately, it makes the
Speaker 1: problem less visible two segments of the population and without
Speaker 1: actually solving the actual problem. Yeah, it wouldn't make any
Speaker 1: sense to to blame the the homelessness problem to begin
Speaker 1: with on the individual store owner or homeowner or whatever
Speaker 1: that's putting these measures in place. But I mean it
Speaker 1: does seem like, I don't know, this is the kind
Speaker 1: of thing where you really need collective action, the action
Speaker 1: through large nonprofits or through the government to try to
Speaker 1: intervene to solve homelessness more systemically and like actually connect
Speaker 1: people with places to live, rather than than trying to
Speaker 1: come up with ways to make the problem less visible. Right. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Ultimately I would I would say that metal spikes are
Speaker 1: never the perfect answer to any given problem. So we
Speaker 1: we bring all this up not to not to end
Speaker 1: this two part or on a really negative note, but
Speaker 1: ultimately again to think about the power of architectural design
Speaker 1: and the power of architectural objects in our environments. Well, yeah,
Speaker 1: and to emphasize again one of the many ways I mean,
Speaker 1: this is what we've been exploring throughout these episodes is
Speaker 1: that um is that the designs of cities, and the
Speaker 1: designs of buildings, and the designs of public spaces are
Speaker 1: not necessarily neutral neutral, not necessarily in a moral sense,
Speaker 1: and not necessarily in uh in a public health sense.
Speaker 1: They're not just a matter of aesthetic preferences. The design
Speaker 1: of buildings in public spaces in many ways have public
Speaker 1: health outcomes, they have cultural outcomes, and they have moral implications. Yeah. Absolutely,
Speaker 1: And we live in these environments. So if it is
Speaker 1: an environment where there are spikes on the stairs, I
Speaker 1: mean imagine like growing up seeing that every day and
Speaker 1: that being is part of your world and you have
Speaker 1: to like and asking like why are there spikes on
Speaker 1: the stairs, mom, And they're like, oh, that's so people
Speaker 1: don't set on the stairs. That is a weird message
Speaker 1: to drive home. So hopefully these episodes we've explored, you know,
Speaker 1: the various ways that that's certainly design can make an
Speaker 1: environment and artificial environment uh more imposing and more negative,
Speaker 1: but also the ways that they can make make it
Speaker 1: more positive and ultimately more in line with the natural
Speaker 1: world that we evolve to thrive in. Totally. My my
Speaker 1: take is less spikes, more trees. Yes, less spikes, more trees.
Speaker 1: Big atriums are great, um as long as they don't
Speaker 1: have spikes all over. I don't know, it's some atrium
Speaker 1: type type spikes can be cool, like like, especially if
Speaker 1: they're like spikes within the vegetation. I want to go
Speaker 1: back to Mortal Kombat and there was that one stage
Speaker 1: in the second game where they had the spikes on
Speaker 1: the ceiling and you would punch someone up into the spikes.
Speaker 1: But that's a much better design because if someone can
Speaker 1: still lay on the floor, it's fine, You're not. No
Speaker 1: one's gonna trip over something and fall on the spikes.
Speaker 1: Much better design. Let's let's do a finishing move on
Speaker 1: this episode. Yes, we're gonna have to call it here obviously.
Speaker 1: You know, there's so much we could have talked about additionally,
Speaker 1: concerning architecture and the different style us of architecture, the
Speaker 1: way different things impact our mind from you know, you know,
Speaker 1: sharp angles to spirals, uh and so forth, but we
Speaker 1: only have so much time. In the meantime, we'd love
Speaker 1: to hear though from it. Certainly any architects out there
Speaker 1: that happened to be listening to the show, or people
Speaker 1: who have experience with any of the architectural styles, features,
Speaker 1: or specific sites that we've mentioned on these episodes. We
Speaker 1: we invite listener feedback all the time right in. We'd
Speaker 1: love to hear from you. In the meantime. If you
Speaker 1: want more stuff to blow your mind, head on over
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Speaker 1: always to our excellent audio producer Seth Nicholas Johnson. If
Speaker 1: you'd like to get in touch with us for any
Speaker 1: of the reasons we talked about in this past couple
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