CHICAGO | 375 East Wacker (Arquitectonica Tower) | 840 FT / 256 M | 76 FLOORS | PRO

[Alliance]

Originally Posted by honte

The potential of a 1000+' Loewenberg building is so... captivating.

Like if Aqua was 1000ft you wouldn't sh*t in your pants. It would easily be the most visually progressive supertall ever constructed. Arqui is going to be a fine building too...mark my words (though hopefully significantly taller than Aqua).

[honte]

^ Ummm, you missed my point. Do you guys think I was actually being serious?

And no, Aqua doesn't get me going like the rest of you.

[Tom Servo]

Originally Posted by honte

The potential of a 1000+' Loewenberg building is so... captivating.

HAH!!! holy shit dude! that was exactly my sentiment after reading the last page.

and yeah, i really don't understand why people are shitting their pants over aqua either. i think a huge point that everyone seems to overlook in this whole LSE east development thing, is perhaps aqua looks cool, and however this building turns out might look cool or something, but these are still loewenberg buildings. they are value engineered, not well crafted, and just poor pieces of architecture... however cool the design may be... so yeah, i don't get the love affair either.

[aaron38]

Originally Posted by AdrianXSands

and just poor pieces of architecture... however cool the design may be...

That sounds like an oxymoron, to me the architecture IS the design.
By design you mean concept, and by architecture you mean actual implementation?

[Tom Servo]

Originally Posted by aaron38

That sounds like an oxymoron, to me the architecture IS the design.
By design you mean concept, and by architecture you mean actual implementation?

well, to me, a good design can only mask a bad building. i think what makes a good building is how well crafted it is and how flawless the details are. and by design, i was referring to the final thing that we all see. but at the same time, that might be a poor choice of woods, because a design also includes EVERYTHING about how a building comes together and functions. but in this case, i was only talking about what it looks like.

...but i was thinking about it, and i think i might not be giving this building enough credit; i may or may not feel the same way when i see it finished.

[Alliance]

Originally Posted by AdrianXSands

...but i was thinking about it, and i think i might not be giving this building enough credit; i may or may not feel the same way when i see it finished.

I dont think you are. I did the diagram for it, and scruitinzing the render for a few hours really shows a lot of detail.

..but, you'll probly hate it anyway, if not for the tabula rasa you've denied Lowenburg with LSE.

[Nowhereman1280]

What evidence to you have that the buildings in LSE are poorly crafted? Most of them actually seem to be of a very high quality.

[Tom Servo]

Originally Posted by Nowhereman1280

What evidence to you have that the buildings in LSE are poorly crafted? Most of them actually seem to be of a very high quality.

none. but i have a strong notion of how this building will be diluted of any strong qualities it may or may not even have. i'm not even convinced arquitectonica does stellar work, i actually don't really know their work. but i know loewenberg. and it's hard to trust anything good could ever come from a loewenberg involved project.

[Nowhereman1280]

Oh come on now, its hard to believe anything good comes from a loewenberg project? You always seem to completely ignore the urban planning perspectives of things. You have to admit that even the biggest piece of shit building like Grand Plaza, have some good. I mean the simple increase in density is good for the city and provides more people and more tax revenue, even if its beige and will look even crappier in 15 years...

How do you think they would VE this building? Make the hole smaller or turn it into just an indentation in the surface? Aqua didn't really get VE'd that much...

[honte]

Originally Posted by Nowhereman1280

What evidence to you have that the buildings in LSE are poorly crafted? Most of them actually seem to be of a very high quality.

If you go over there and look closely at most of the stuff that was done earlier, you will see some very unpleasant aspects on the early Loewenberg buildings and also the DeStefano ones. They're just built on the cheap and not well detailed. 340 is the exception and really is a high-quality building. The fact that it's entirely clad really goes a long way to tightening up the facade, obviously.

There is one place on the Lancaster in particular that really makes me cringe... the forms must have been off by more than an inch, because things don't align correctly and they had to do some massive compensation. It's been a long while since I looked at it, but I was pretty disturbed.

Craftsmanship also applies to the architectural design work itself. No self-respecting architect would call those designs well-crafted. Matters of taste aside, they're generally just very lazy.

[Nowhereman1280]

There is no question that a few of the early LSE towers were crappy, but a lot of the more recent ones, Regatta and Tides I think, are pretty well finished as well, even if you don't like the design very much.

[Tom Servo]

Originally Posted by AdrianXSands

none. but i have a strong notion of how this building will be diluted of any strong qualities it may or may not even have. i'm not even convinced arquitectonica does stellar work, i actually don't really know their work. but i know loewenberg. and it's hard to trust anything good could ever come from a loewenberg involved project.

*EDIT... i just realized something. i thought you were talking about the arquitectonica building itself, not all of LSE. so to re-answer your question, just go look at the buildings finished in LSE so far. they're absolutely awful. they looked slapped together, in typical fashion, and poorly constructed. not to mention they're ugly and represent a trend in architecture in this city that in no way we should be proud of, rather, we should all be appalled. the buildings in LSE are a continuation of the same developer driven, profit maximizing crap that we've been seeing since the start of this building boom. the only thing that separates this new bunch from the crap built north of the river is the increased use of glass... wow... this is world-class architecture at its finest, huh?

[Tom Servo]

Originally Posted by Nowhereman1280

There is no question that a few of the early LSE towers were crappy, but a lot of the more recent ones, Regatta and Tides I think, are pretty well finished as well, even if you don't like the design very much.

i'm not being condescending, but bro, if you can honestly look at the regatta and tides and tell me they are anything other than crap, i'd be inclined to think i had an inability to see what you see... the tides, specifically, is embarrassingly bad.

[Alliance]

Tides, I think is passable. Its in an zone of acceptability to me, but not really into appreciation.

If you want to rail against Regatta, Chandler, Lancaster, etc. Be my guest.

[Nowhereman1280]

I'm not saying that the architecture is great or anything. I merely cannot see how you guys think the Tides and Regatta have shoddy finishes. They aren't great, but they are at least average. They are infill buildings, there aren't going to be super luxury finishes on them. In 30 years they will either all be cheaper, middle class housing, or completely refinished into luxury housing with nicer finishes in much the same way the Malibu Towers in edgewater are getting completely rehabbed.

Lancaster and Chandler on the other hand are bad, but nowhere near as horrible as that old thing to the east of 340 OTP with the semi-brutalist, faux rocks on the top of it...

[honte]

^ There is a big difference between finishes and architectural detail. They can put whatever marble they want in their units, but it's not going to make it a nice building.

[Nowhereman1280]

Originally Posted by honte

^ There is a big difference between finishes and architectural detail. They can put whatever marble they want in their units, but it's not going to make it a nice building.

I am not referring to the interior finishes, I'm referring to exterior finishes... The Malibu towers are not getting refinished on the inside, they are literally ripping the balconies apart and recasting them as well as putting on new, nicer, railings, refinishing the lobbies and repainting them a better color as well as repairing the brickwork.

[honte]

^ Oh, that's a shame. I like(d) the Malibu towers a lot... will have to go see what they're up to.

In any case, it's about detail and craftsmanship, although materials have something to do with it too.

[wrab]

^ Okay, now I better understand your take. Yeah, the LSE ensemble is cringe making. Sloppy fit & finish. The glass on the Regatta alone would sink just about any building.

Still, since none of us have anything but preliminaries on 375, all of these critical takes- both positive & negative- strike me as kinda premature.



(Edit: I hasten to add that the "sloppiness" I cite above stems from Lowenberg's product, not the crews)

[honte]

^ Definitely premature. I think that with Arquitectonica involved, we can hope for a better performance. Still, however, even Studio Gang appears not to be immune from the Loewenberg performance.