Looks like someplace the Jetsons would live.

Who are they?

You don't know the Jetsons?!!

Here is a link that might be useful: Jetsons

I'm glad you started this thread! I have no problem with curves in a modern design as long as the mood is one of strict geometry instead of casual country squiggles. Is that wrong?

As more and more midcentury buildings (particularly residental) get torn down and replaced, we'll have fewer chances to find out.

You know it's not wrong sammie. I had a conversation with a client recently about geometrical shapes and I had a hard time convincing him that a circle was a geometrical shape. What is interesting about this particular curve is its boomerang bend which has the strength that cannot be found in "country squiggles" plus it is in a modernist setting. Often people post pictures of square houses (I mean modernistically square) and want to 'soften the corners' or need suggestions for bed shapes to match, I wonder if this is the curve they are looking for?

Well, Ink, I see your point--combining the best of both worlds--but for me the 50's atomic era association is so strong that I have trouble seeing past it. Not that it's a bad thing, but I see modern...with a retro twist. Maybe this is also caused by the fact that the really seminal buildings of the time still look completely modern to me. Honestly, (excepting Post-modern buildings, which don't count, I think) we haven't gotten so far past the International style, have we? Except for freeform buildings like the EMP and the Disney center...my jury's still out on those--it might be a case of JBYCDMYS.

Here is a link that might be useful: Disney Center

I have a "thing" about furniture. I love it, all sorts of it! I like what any style of it tells us about the time it was created. I'm a bit more "buttoned up" than is my brother when it comes to personal preferences, but good design is good design; and just because I may not want to live with it, doesn't mean I am unable to appreciate it. I have selectively snapped up wonderful mid-century pieces for him for several years now (before they once more became "popular").

The curve is perfectly "modern", yet perfectly traditional in another sense of the word. It's present in interesting coffee tables, seat backs and arms, in the fabrics of the era, in the wall papers, and in the wonderful cut pile rugs that were de riguer. It's everywhere if you make yourself look beyond finishes, colors, and you allow yourself to SEE it. Interstingly, I hadn't thought of it in terms of landscape design until you pointed it out. Maybe it's time to un-do a button, or two!

50's boomerang! That would definitely be funky, all right. ;-) I've never seen that in landscaping, though. When I heard modernist curves, I assumed Antonio Gaudi's let's-do-art-noveau-again-but-on-hallucinogens%20or) or maybe the Smithsonian's new {{gwi:28735}}, which looks to me like a half-melted parking garage.

Yes, that boomerang is all over Danish furniture circa 1960, but in the landscape? My understanding of curves in the landscape is that they are to be organic in form; either simulating the curves of a river, or to mimic the curving paths of animals as they move through a field or pasture.

A boomerang curve is non-organic, more man over nature, like topiary. So maybe we'll see that form (maybe it already exists somewhere) as part of an artificial, restricted landscape; a sort of neo-modern formal garden. Actually, maybe that could be sort of cool and funky.

By the way, reyesuela, that Museum of the American Indian is butt-ugly!

Patty

>By the way, reyesuela, that Museum of the American Indian is butt-ugly!

It is very Artistic inside.

I hate it.

And, yead, it'd have to be in a modernist formal garden. They do TONS in the UK, but I've only ever seen rectangles and circles there...

Do you think a Chinese person would walk under the Museum of the American Indian? Talk about bad Feng Shui! Even I'm creeped out with that overhang, expecting it to come crashing down on my head.
Maybe the architect got the idea from the inverted Christmas tree?

Well, I think it's not a LOVELY building, but it does strongly evoke the look of sandstone cliffs eroded by wind and water (site of cliff dwellings), which I am sure was the original intent. I submit the EMP as an unglier building. It's supposed to look like Jimi Hendrix' exploded guitar, but I kinda think it looks like a pile of entrails...and it pains me to say that because I like to look outside the box of conventional taste. The picture, linked below, is the most descriptive that I could find of the overall shape--and a somewhat common view since you can look down on the building from a number of places in the city.

Here is a link that might be useful: EMP--you'll have to scroll down the page

Sammie, ooo, bummer! I usually like Frank Gehry's work, but that one is, yes, icky. Much prefer his museo Guggenheim Bilbao or the Disney Concert Hall in L.A. -- it even has a nice garden!

Here is a link that might be useful: Walt Disney Concert Hall

Hi catkim, I much prefer the Disney Concert Hall as well. However, it is not without its detractors--mostly the folks who live anywhere near it--apparently, it reflects so much light from the curved metal surfaces that neighboring residents (neighboring is loosely used since some of the affected are pretty far away) are unable to escape the glare and it is causing damage to homes and furnishings. Can you imagine? It's not like the glare from a "normal" building that you see once per day as the sun passes--the curved surface of this building allows some part of it to be glaring at you all day long.

I agree that the Hendrix museum looks like refuse, contrasts unpleasantly with the conventional architecture around it. In another location it might be more appealing. Likewise the success of 'modernist curves' in any particular setting would depend on how they looked with the building(s) and other dominating elements.

>Do you think a Chinese person would walk under the Museum of the American Indian?

My DH did...

Maybe it's a cliff dwelling.

Didn't Diarmuid Gavin use a bunch of curves in one of the garden's he did for "Homefront in the Garden?" zooms off to BBC America to check...

THOUGHT I remembered this episode. There are probably others...but the one linked below is the first I came to. I like some of his work--but sometimes it just puzzles me. (Which is probably the point?) If one works through the before and after pics of tother gardens--one will probably find more curves...

melanie

Here is a link that might be useful: One of Diarmuid's gardens...

I love the MAI building. Best addition to the Mall in a long time. The gardens are also absolutely lovely and well worth touring.

I used to like the show (just never see it anymore) and I liked the fact that his landscape transformations were meaningful as opposed, I guess, to "twee"--it's just that IMO he became a caricature of himself through the overuse of stainless steel eggs, and spheres, and immense hanging steel basket chairs, and "special effects" lighting.

Is his work currently viewed as cutting edge in Britain?

There's something that I want to ask others, but I can't quite formalize what I want to say, so I'm going to make a lot of statements and see if that produces a result. Diarmuid Gavin's work is untraditional. He uses modern materials and traditional materials used in untraditional ways, and materials that aren't traditionally used in the garden. His work is not minimalist. His designs are often at least as organic as they are geometric. Does he represent one "flavor" of modernism? Maybe not quite modernism? Maybe something artistic that isn't modernism?

sammie, he fits right in with post-modernism.

I guess I'm confused as to whether or not to call his work modernist because, although I see some modernist thinking applied, there is also a lot that is innovative but, I think, falls outside the modernist brief. So, what do you call it?

Hi Spunky, Yeah, I get that.

I don't think Diarmuid Gavin is influential in professional circles and most of his work is seen as a "look ma no hands" style entirely suited to entertainment. If you compare the work of Charles Jenks you will find a far more substantial contribution to post modernism. In general I consider his work to be retrogressive as he is making expensive follies immediately obsolete after the show.

I never heard of Diarmuid Gavin before, actually...but googled him and saw some of his works...and recognize it as playfully postmodern...

Never heard of Charles Jencks either, but thank you so much Ink...WOW

I had grown bored with landscape photos, but not anymore.

Garden of Cosmic Speculation: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0711222169/ref=sib_rdr_dp/102-4946435-2268145?%5Fencoding=UTF8&me=ATVPDKIKX0DER&no=283155&st=books&n=283155

Here is a link that might be useful: some photos

just had to pass this on too...

Here is a link that might be useful: incredible landscapes

I'm taking time off from looking at Charles Jencks landscapes to assemble the Harry Bertoia side chairs Fed Ex JUST delivered. Yea!!!!! So happy, beacause I procrastinated about this purchase for some stupid reasons and I've wanted these chairs for a really long time.

Earlier I wrote: "A boomerang curve is non-organic, more man over nature, like topiary. So maybe we'll see that form (maybe it already exists somewhere) as part of an artificial, restricted landscape; a sort of neo-modern formal garden. Actually, maybe that could be sort of cool and funky."

And, there it is, exactly what I had imagined could exist...The Garden of Cosmic Speculation. It's very cool. Thank you so much for sharing Charles Jencks work.

Patty