Despite the funding falling through for almost all further education colleges in the country, Oaklands College in St Albans is so desperate to build this beauty that it is going to put up the money itself. The college has already spent £12 million on professional fees and taking the building through a public enquiry (successfully) after the proposal was called in by the secretary of state. Now it wants to spend another £100 million inflicting this strange catherine wheel of a building on the landscape in reality.
I really like how carefully the architect has thought about the parking, so that the building relates to the landscape around it about as well as an American supermall might. This building was called in because it was in the greenbelt. What on earth made the government decide this was ok?
I think someone at Bond Bryan has been spending a bit too much time with his or her mandala.
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Crop Circle Architecture? The latest fad I think.
ReplyDeleteIs it just me, or are the buildings arranged as a giant geoglyphic 'radioactivity' symbol ?
ReplyDeleteMaybe it's a secret re-fuelling stop for passing UFOs.
Did the architect design this while listening to 'Trompe Le Monde' ?
It reminds me of the box lid from MB Games' Game of Life:
ReplyDeletehttp://shop.vintagetoybox.co.uk/images/gameoflife.jpg
why does a college need hundreds of car parking spaces??
ReplyDeleteYeah the plan view makes it look like a radioactive symbol. Very odd.
ReplyDeleteAre those a few pathetic solar panels on the roof lower right, chucked in as a sop to the conscience for all those parking spaces?
ReplyDeleteI am alma mater of oaklands colleg. It is situated in the countryside surrounded by forest. i can't see how anyone can find this architecture in any way asthetic or functional.
ReplyDeletea waste of good money and smacks of corruption.
The design appears to be based on Bentham's Pantopticon prisons of the late 1700s, which allowed the prisoners to be under constant surveillance. Bentham suggested that his Pantopticons provided 'a new mode of obtaining power of mind over mind, in a quantity hitherto without example'. I can see why the architect thought it might be suitable for a college.
ReplyDeleteWhy do I suddenly get the urge to play the children's game Simon when I see that building?
ReplyDelete