NationStates Jolt Archive

Do you find buildings of national heritage to be of great importance to your nation/state, especially if they are in your local community. I personally think they are of great importance, I am quite proud of my city, Hobart, because it has kept just about every colonial era building and refurbished them etc, also this and how they have blended them in, business and public institutions are modern inside but keep the heritage building outside look.

Is this important to you? Personally I find most 'modern' buildings ugly as all hell.

Is this important to you? Personally I find most 'modern' buildings ugly as all hell.

There seemed to be an 'ugly period' in the few decades after the war, but I think we've entered a new time now when there is some genuinely interesting and attractive architecture about.

It is nice to keep old buildings in as good a condition as possible. As was said in the Cutty Sark thread the other day, nothing connects you to history quite like something that was actually part of history.

I'm a Northantonian nuff' said (as in I'm sick to death of them and wish they would level are town)

There seemed to be an 'ugly period' in the few decades after the war

ugh red bricks do not make houses, didn't they have LEGO color rules back then!? :p

Do you find buildings of national heritage to be of great importance to your nation/state, especially if they are in your local community. I personally think they are of great importance, I am quite proud of my city, Hobart, because it has kept just about every colonial era building and refurbished them etc, also this and how they have blended them in, business and public institutions are modern inside but keep the heritage building outside look.

Is this important to you? Personally I find most 'modern' buildings ugly as all hell.

I agree that a lot less effort is put into aesthetics nowadays (either that or architects have lost all taste), but there are bigger things for a nation to worry about than architectural style.

It's somewhat important, but sometimes it's just not worth preserving them. For example, the Campbell's soup company is a big employer in Camden, New Jersey. They want to expand, but it means tearing down the old Sears building. Some locals want to preserve the building even if it means Campbell's will relocate and jobs will be lost. Camden can't afford to lose jobs. It's like a third world city already.

but there are bigger things for a nation to worry about than architectural style.

health and safety?

I agree that a lot less effort is put into aesthetics nowadays (either that or architects have lost all taste)

not at all, i really love modern architecture (well, i certainly like minimalism a lot)

, but there are bigger things for a nation to worry about than architectural style.

that is also true.

that being said i think it's quite important to conserve heritage buildings, we have somer really nice ones in my area.

health and safety?

I'm not sure what you mean. Is this a joke about being unable to look outside the context of buildings? :confused:

Here's kinda one picture, it's parliament.
http://www.tasmaniasouth.com/hobart/images/parliament.jpg

I'm not sure what you mean. Is this a joke about being unable to look outside the context of buildings? :confused:

no its about building safety (asbestos, crappy wooden beams holding the building together etc)

London has to one of the best places for preserving buildings. The mixtures between old and new give the city a fantastic character. Going from St. Pauls to the 'Gherkin' from Parliament to the London Eye, they eclecting mix of architecture does give the city style.

Even Brunels large stations (waterloo and Bristol Temple Meads) have large imposing gothic facades, with a glass and iron cathedral to industrialism behind them...

Even Brunels large stations (waterloo and Bristol Temple Meads) have large imposing gothic facades, with a glass and iron cathedral to industrialism behind them...

I think you mean Paddington. :)

no its about building safety (asbestos, crappy wooden beams holding the building together etc)

OK... I was actually talking about things outside of the context of buildings (but not excluding them). I agree, however, that functionality must be achieved before aesthetics can be considered.

I think you mean Paddington. :)

Your right, its just I was in Waterloo today getting home, and that has the huge frontage as well...

Heritage buildings are typically very difficult to shrinkwrap. *nod*

Is this important to you? Personally I find most 'modern' buildings ugly as all hell.

Well you would have a problem here then, where Heritage and Modern overlap.

If it was designed by Oscar Niemeyer, it is manages to be Heritage at the same time as being a modern monstrosity.

I love old heritage buildings, they're interesting and have so much character to them. Going through the buildings of the Vatican was an experience that could never be matched by any modern building. I hate nearly all modern architecture, so bland and sterile. Shame we still don't build like they did in the old days....

i don't care about their importance to 'my' nation and i wouldn't claim any cultural connection to their builders, but as an archaeologist i find old ruins and otherwise ancient buildings fascinating. one of the great untold tragedies of the iraq war (for me anyway and obviously far lesser tragedy than the horrific loss of innocent life in the region) is the almost complete obliteration of the relics of the first ever cities and states in the world through bombing and general warfare.

I think, assuming the owner of a building wants to keep the historical building in it's heritage state, that's fine (otherwise, let the owner do what they want with their property). If the town/city/state/etc, wants to keep the house in its original state, but the owner wants to modernize it, the town/city/state should offer to buy the house (although eminent domain should not be used, if the owner refuses to sell).

My old hometown (Lebanon, CT) seems to be stuck in the "heritage" era, when it comes to buildings near the town green. I remember that someone had bought some land around the green, had a building plan laid out (a modern style building, with modern double pane windows, solar heat, etc), and a group of snobby, arrogant people from the historical society went and got an injunction to stop work on the home (even though the home wouldn't be visible from the street). That house never did get finished. This is the same group that blocked an owner from painting their house any color other than the color the group picked (the color was "period correct" for the age of the house), and the same group that stopped an electrical upgrade to one of the historical houses, even though the upgrade would take care of the bad wiring in the house.

So, these (and other) examples are reasons why, if I ever get enough money to build a house, I'll make sure I can build the house I want, not the house the town/city/state/historical society/etc wants me to build.

Architectural preservation is very important to me. I don't think they really make buildings as nice as they used too. Yeah, the really ugly period's mostly over, but still, I haven't seen any modern buildings as beautiful as the Doe Library or San Francisco City Hall.

In my hometown, preservation was a very important issue. Due to this, there are a lot of really old buildings there (for California, meaning, mid to late 1800's). The house I grew up in was built in 1899.

What?

I think preserving heritage buildings is very important. They give real character to towns/cities, and once we knock them down, they're gone forever.

we hold the land itself sacred and try to preserve places that feel a certain way.

we do abhore the wastefullness of demolition and would rather see any structure remodled and updated, modified, added onto, and so on, then torn down and replaced, certainly by any less convoluted or interesting.

there's no old versus new, nor superiority of either about it otherwise though.
of course that's just a cameroi perspective and we wouldn't dream of imposing it on other nations.

our paved streets, wherever there once were them, other then a few relatively short stretches of historical highways, or where there simply wasn't the means or resources to do so, have all been long since de-paved and replaced with park strips, hosting gardens, bycicle pathes, and narrow gauge tramways.

in many rural areas, portions of what were once highways have been squatted upon and used as foundations for small residences and other structures.

but then cameroi architecture is an architecture of convolution, and sometimes ad hoc whimsy, and not that of severity or ego aggressiveness that so typifies much that is old and new both, in so many other lands on worlds such as earth.

(so a more direct answer to the poll question would be, not in and of itself, but primarily in the sense of avoiding the replacement of a more interesting constructed space with a less interesting one. exoticness in new construction IS, as already, i hope, made clear, highly encouraged)

=^^=
.../\...

It's somewhat important, but sometimes it's just not worth preserving them. For example, the Campbell's soup company is a big employer in Camden, New Jersey. They want to expand, but it means tearing down the old Sears building. Some locals want to preserve the building even if it means Campbell's will relocate and jobs will be lost. Camden can't afford to lose jobs. It's like a third world city already.

good ol' East Philly :rolleyes:

i think preserving historic buildings is important its a change to learn about the past and portals to lost worlds