Seems like it would be a little difficult to relax in the living room when you’ve got a featureless figure lurking just around the corner.
Let’s check out some other part of the house.
Ahh, much better. Although I’m not really sure what a shot of a table with some flowers on it is really supposed to tell us about the house itself…
Bonus feature: Apparently it’s no biggie if you flood the bathtub.
Oh…oh…I have ruptured something giggling…
Lurch there in the first picture was amusing, but the flooded, overflowing bathtub sent me into fits. The faucet appears to be still turned on, as the water cascades merrily down the side of the tub and across the floor toward the camera-person.
WHO IS TAKING THE PICTURE AND NOT TURNING OFF THE WATER!
Hee hee hee….snortle….
Prepare yourselves, fellow Looney-ites, my “Oh *Please*…” button has been pushed. Read on only if you dare…
Ah, high concept architecture with a pretentious listing text, no-doubt written by the pretentious architect himself. Or one of his fawning minions. (I say “him” and “his” because female architects almost never put up with fawning minions.) Why must otherwise talented designers make themselves so unpalatable by vaunting their egos, when they should let their work speak for itself? Or not.
There are some rather nice spaces, though with certain questionable elements. E.G., it’s not so much the lurker, it’s the unusable, hideous space behind it (aka Pretentious Design Element, or PDE #1) that’s troublesome. I see no point for the space to exist, other than as a by-product of oddly (or poorly) placed load bearing walls. And is that trash near the lurker’s feet? WTF?
While the living/dining space is impressive, we don’t need 8 pics of it, especially since there’s not a single image of the kitchen, save a glimpse in the distance in Pic 7. More importantly, I’m not convinced all of the exposed I-beams are structural. In Pic 4 there’s a smaller beam passing through the large one. I thought at first it was abutting the larger one via a weld, bolts, or both. But you can see more of it peaking out the other side of the large one, just at the top of the drapery. Rule #1 for steel beams – if you want them to have structural integrity you do not punch holes in them. Hence PDE #2.
About that bathroom, there are cool art photos and then there are weird art photos. Who shows a bathtub overflowing in a house they’re trying to sell? It raises disturbing questions… Is the faucet broken? Is the drain clogged? Is there an overall deficiency in design and/or execution of the plumbing? If this is, more likely, staged, has it caused any permanent damage to the surface materials and/or structure? In other words, are the current owners and/or listing reps just *really* stupid? And, if so, what else have they screwed up in a place for which they want almost $5M?
We also have a clear example of showboating in that same bathroom. Look at the counter top – it runs *through* the shower stall glass (PDE #3). Sure it’s handy to have a shelf in your shower stall, but this is ridiculous. (I bet the contractors just loved working out that little detail – not.) And what’s with the other bathroom, the one with the claustrophobic sink nook that looks like it’s intended for some secret society’s ablutions? Talk about a place that needs a shelf – they’ve put the candle on the floor!
PDE #4 – the two story door that opens with a mid-height overhang projecting through it. I’m thinking someone forgot about the actual meaning of the “over” part of “overhang.” And what’s the point of having an overhang if it has holes in it, anyway? Oh, wait… so it’ll look cool. Gotcha.
And yet the place also features a singularly unimpressive fireplace and utterly conventional clipped hedges. For all the “Yeah, but it looks cool” PDEs going on, those are two huge missed opportunities.
I do like the amount of light and connectedness that wall’o’windows provides, but I wonder what it takes to heat the place in winter, or how psychologically affecting that much concrete and steel might feel with day after day of overcast view. Marty, that shot of the flowers on the table certainly makes for a better image than the huge amount of cloud cover one would more likely see on many a day. The one possible counter to the full-metal sky is the bedroom in Pic 14. Lots of bright whites and bright colors with whimsical style throughout. Who knew you could even get oriental carpets in those shades? And a home-style crazy quilt? A nice touch considering the tony concept furniture elsewhere. I also love the rabbit painting and the bentwood boxes. Nice to see some light yet warm wood tones, even if they do cost an arm and a leg. Each. I have to wonder if the same designer that did the rest of this showpiece also did this nice cozy bedroom. I’d guess not.
I think what amused me second-most was the phrase that this “stands as a breakthrough project for master architect whozit.” With the addition of JMixx’s analysis, I can now endorse my intuition that this meant “Break on through to the other side,” as evidenced by the punctured beams, door, etc.
Most amusing, of course, goes to the stone human figure obstructing the useless, unfinished hallway – apparently set there to warn you not to break on through to the other side.
In Japanese gardens, I’m told that a wrapped stone left in the middle of a path silently directs the visitor to turn back from an area the gardeners wish left undisturbed. In view of the purposefully outlandish qualities of this property, I would suggest any visitors take the hint… since it may not have been the architect who set that statue there…
@Emerald63: Next time don’t hold back. Tell us how you really feel.
Heh.
@Emerald63: Good stuff. I’m with you.
I work in a nice enough office that has a great view of the factory that I administrate. I don’t want to come home and look at more of the same.
As a man, I have to say that the photo over the fireplace seems a bit piggish. When first viewing an attractive woman, that image captures the range of a young man’s natural focus. As a man matures, he learns that there are beautiful parts of a woman besides her torso. I, for one, like to see a woman’s face. I like trying to figure out how she thinks and feels about things. As such, that photo is really unsatisfying and a bit annoying. It doesn’t tell me a story that I would like to live with, and share with my family and guests, every time I walked into my living room… and dining room… and kitchen…
I thought it was one of those infinity tubs at first.
@Marty E.: I meant to say JMixx AND EMERALD’S analysis, of course. *Headslap*
Anybody else remember that Warner Bros cartoon called “The Last Mohican”? The cartoon Mohican–who appears to be amazingly short–lives in a tiny teepee in the corner of his giant mansion. He does everything in the mansion that one would expect a Native American to do in a pristine wilderness–including hunting a tiny moose he has had shipped in a crate for the occasion.
The river in the mansion is, of course, an overflowing sink…
@anodean: Hmm… do tell, with what are such stones wrapped? Interesting custom. Another is that in Japan you should never step directly on a threshold, but always over it. The transitional area/phase/time is considered to have magickal properties (no, that’s how I meant to spell it) in many cultures. Doorways are a common example. Also in Japan, never give cut flowers as a Get Well gift, as they’re doomed to die shortly; living plants only, thank you. Putting on a kimono, hapi coat, or the like? Always place the left side over the right, as the right over the left is reserved for the dead.
Honestly, my font of (almost) totally useless factoids is endless. How is it I remember this crap from my college days but can’t remember to take my pills every day?!
@Marty E.: OK! Good to know – will do!! :D
@JMixx: So what you’re telling us is that there’s a tiny Indian In The Cupboard?
@B5SnowDog: Infinity tubs… Um, B5… I think there’s been a misunderstanding. See, there are pools, then there are tubs . . . :O . . . LOL
@Frodo: Good Sir, I love you. if I were not married, I would propose. I know of no good reason a man of your mature tastes and sensibilities should not be married as well. If you are not, there is something very, very wrong with the world. Wait… sigh.
The only saving grace about that particular image is that it did not shy away from or say, “Ewww…” about a less than perfectly svelte figure. Funny that, as it still managed to objectify and depersonalize the woman. :\
@Emerald63: Thank you! My wonderful wife would agree, I think. :) She does let me help decorate the house.
I had hoped merely to find again the picture of the wrapped stone in the path, but instead found this lovely, reflective explanation:
https://medium.com/hi-narrative-mapping-1/bfbdbca6b1af
Frodo, you are indeed an expressive gem.
I recall some flash-in-the-dotcom-pan who hung a brutally crude line drawing over his desk where visitors would have to look at it while speaking to him… presumably to exult in the newly minted power of such young turks over the suited minions of previous paradigms. I realized while looking at the picture that my own response would have been to cooly ask him if he’d mind interpreting his symbolism… essentially because I wouldn’t want to mistake which part of it was meant to be him, though I likely wouldn’t have said that bit out loud.
Frodo would likely have placed his remains in a small matchbox before exiting said office. :D
@Frodo: Please give her my regards. She is one lucky lady. :)
@anodean: @anodean: Thanks for the article. It was quite informative. Apparently, The Ginza is not the only visually overrun area of Japan. More’s the pity, given their rich tradition of design.
I must ask, to which dotcomwannabe were you referring? And I simply must know… which gender was depicted in the line drawing you mentioned? Was he being semi-autobiographically egotistical (or perhaps that should read egotestical)? Or was he being even more objectifying of women than the artwork in this listing? Both are equally offensive, I simply would like to express the appropriate form of offense. :P
@Emerald63:My best guess is that the picture of the rude young turk’s office decor (I’m fairly certain it ran over some article about his amazing dotcom exploits) would have appeared in the late 1990s. At that time young industry publications existed to burnish the edgy, circus atmosphere of the “new era” – so he’d likely have been either a soon-to-be charter member of the Legion of Failure or one of the early online porn emperors (or both) – people who stopped being newsworthy about a century ago in internet years.
The “art” was a large, brush-line drawing on stretched canvas of male part approaching female part (hence my mental question “And which one would you be?”), which, as I understand symbolism, would be about like shouting “Blood!” or “Gold!” – symbols so fraught with possible contextual variation as to be rendered nearly meaningless without interpretation.
@anodean: What a sad state of affairs, that anyone can actually fail at porn (pun intended).
Ah, now I get your “which one” reference, hehe. Another pertinent question – is the approach mutual, or at least mutually agreeable? Or is the male looking to make a conquest? By force perhaps? Of course he’d deny it, but I’d always suspect it was at the back of his mind, if not the front.
@Emerald63 There are infinity tubs as well as infinity pools. http://www.houzz.com/infinity-tub
@Emerald63: There are infinity tubs as well as infinity pools: http://www.houzz.com/infinity-tub
@B5SnowDog: Ohhh…. Oh my…. Oh my, oh my, oh my….
Sorry, gotta go rework the plans for my dream home….
And thanks!
@B5SnowDog: On the one hand, I keep thinking, “Awesome! I want one of those!” On the other hand, in the back of my mind I keep thinking, “Soap scum, mold, mildew, oh my!” How many strange crevices there must be for stuff to hide?
@Emerald63: You’re welcome. :-) My favorite is it water streaming from the ceiling.
@Frodo: Good point!
@Frodo: I dunno… Maybe if the water flows often enough that’s not a problem? There’s a reason they say to drink only from running water sources if you’re caught in the wilderness – it’s cleaner. Not necessarily clean, but cleaner.
Since the water can’t always be running though, perhaps a well thought out design would assist in keeping the problem to a minimum. Of course that would require a designer considering utility, as well as the “Awesome!” factor.