Unpopular places

Some rough thoughts about unpopular places in general, in design and in architecture and why creating negative space is not enough to blend in.

The other day I was thinking a bit about unpopular places. What does this term mean? The most obvious example might be dangerous parts of a city. Or holiday destinations that are apparently risky for tourists. Everybody tries to avoid them – or at least only visits them with very specific reason.

There are also unpopular places on websites. Ideally, users are seeing error messages and similar uncomfortable states as rarely as possible. But that’s idealistic and wishful thinking: sooner or later, everybody will come across them, and as designers we should pay a lot of attention to the screens between screens. 20% notice can easily flavor 80% reputation.

But what made me actually think about this topic is this new building next to the house we’re living in. Not the fact they put contemporary, very Functionalism-influenced prestigious architecture in between all these old houses and created a lot of very expensive living space. From an aesthetic point of view it works quite well, since the very reduced and graphical style blends better with historical facade ornaments than many postmodern buildings with their own ornamental visual language. This new plain and very rectangular white house works a bit like a canvas or negative space for the neighbour buildings.

But what I am seriously asking myself, and what made me start writing this text is: why did this architect not pay attention to detail beyond the big picture (a lot of tourists are taking pictures of that building). Why aren’t they thinking about these unpopular places for example behind the railing to the adjacent area, the gaps in between two houses. Why are they building houses with huge indiscreet windows that are only about 7 meters away from the opposite window?

Spatial closeness is an integral element of urban environments and should be taken into consideration early on. Same with integration into the neighbourhood: how does the result look and feel for people living around the house, not just inside? I’m sure, if they would have shown demonstrative models to the people from around the area and if they would have democratic power to say no, there would have been no chance for this project.

So is it all about the money then? From an economical perspective it is quite clear: the house builder, not the neighbourhood is paying the architect. But shouldn’t there be more than that when it comes to occupation of space? Although the actual estate might belong to someone specific, the visual appearance is still common property. Everybody has to see the house. And everybody has to live with the unpopular places created around the house.