I'm not crazy about this rendering, but it really concerns me that buildings like this and the MAC/Hufft proposal on Armour have become proxy arguments against building contemporary architecture in historic settings. Europe is littered with amazing combinations of old and new, yet Kansas City seems to be stuck in the mentality that if there is a historic area, only ersatz historic buildings will work as infill. That is a complete failure of imagination. Worse are the local neighborhoods working on a "I'll know it when I see it" approach to acceptable development design. In two cases, OHP has rejected a design, then rejected the new design that addressed their concerns. If you're a neighborhood leader and have an opinion about the character of development, do the world a favor and create a zoning overlay district for your neighborhood. That way developers and architects will know what you consider acceptable, instead of trying to guess what you're thinking. Or, in this case, guess what the "appropriate look and feel" should be.
Demosthenes wrote:FangKC wrote:I worry this design will not age well.
No it will not. It already looks dated and hasn't even been built. What materials do you imagine this building will be made of? Looks like concrete or stucco or something equally appalling. It irritates me because in your freshman architecture studio you are taught to think more about a site when creating your work of art. Was the architect not moved by this site? Look at the beautiful park across the street! Seriously one of the most beautiful parks I've ever seen. And yet this is what he/ she comes up with. This building is serviceable, but really plain. This architect is seriously lacking in creativity.
At least use better materials.
DRAW Architecture are the design architects. You may not care for their work, but they are not without creativity:
http://www.drawarch.com/.
As for the materials, I would guess that they won't be using concrete. Perhaps stucco, which is used on a huge number of older buildings in the city, including the 1923 house I grew up in and the 1909 house I currently own.
Are there specific improvements you would make? I would like to see larger porches and a better color palette. Less gray, specifically. If the wood porches weather into gray, the building would be pretty drab. The overhangs could be bigger - they look a little timid to me. But the facade of the building moves in and out, which to my eye had more of a relation to historic buildings than postwar buildings.