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Architecture is a type of art. Proportion and style create a pleasing picture. She's pointing out the artistic flaws in these designs.
Personally, I LOVE columns and arches and gingerbread and turrets. But I also like balance and a pleasing whole.
My biggest problem with McMansions is they look ridiculous on their tiny lots. I'm much happier in my 1200 sf home on 3 acres than I would be in a monster shoved up against the neighbors.
Architecture is a type of art. Proportion and style create a pleasing picture. She's pointing out the artistic flaws in these designs.
Personally, I LOVE columns and arches and gingerbread and turrets. But I also like balance and a pleasing whole.
My biggest problem with McMansions is they look ridiculous on their tiny lots. I'm much happier in my 1200 sf home on 3 acres than I would be in a monster shoved up against the neighbors.
There's columns and there's columns. Since when do double height skinny columns look good on a suburban house entrance? They just look damn silly.
When we were renting a little 2-bedroom 800 sq ft mill workers' house built in 1949, in an area that is being taken over by McMansions, my kid and I noticed that almost all the McMansions had these white pillars, sometimes just 2, often 4 or 8 or even 12.
We concocted a plan to go to Home Depot and buy some white 6" PVC piping to mount on our porch, to "keep up with the Joneses".
But then we got unceremoniously evicted, and the house was demolished to build a truly hideous skyscraper of a McMansion.
The new place actually doesn't have pillars, if I recall correctly from our drive-by a few months ago. Maybe we'll go ahead and glue some PVC to the porch late some night, to give them the de rigeur pillars. It would be a fun school project to undertake, and write a report about.
There's columns and there's columns. Since when do double height skinny columns look good on a suburban house entrance? They just look damn silly.
Exactly! It’s about proportion, placement; supporting an actual visible beam or structure (columns dying into a flat ceiling- wrong!) spacing and, unless it is an unusually short column or square, entasis. You don’t need to be an architect (or critic) to intuitively know when something is just not right, even if you can’t exactly put your finger on it.
And skinny azz cheap fake shutters slapped beside every window, including bowed, picture, Oriel, Paladianesque and ganged configurations (I’m looking at you New South and suburban New England) look ridiculous.
I love her moxie, declarations based on knowledge and funny website, she and I are of the same tribe. I don’t think she takes herself that seriously, it’s mostly just a gentle and fun rant.
Since the end of WWII when building homes in large developments to house the returning service men and women and their families, home get larger with every generation. Today 20 to 30 percent of all new homes built for mass consumption are in the 3,000 to 4,000 sq. ft. size. They are being built for average Americans that can afford them. They are not built to be mansions, but to satisfy the demand for larger homes. Another generation, and the 3,000 to 4,000 sq. ft. will move up once again to 4,000 to 5,000 plus sq. ft.
My wife and I live in a completely custom high quality home. It is 4 levels without a basement. I do not mean 4 stories, but 4 levels and has a big footprint. It sits on 5 rural acres, with our property starting at the county road that separates the best part of our town from the county. Our home is 3,700 sq. ft. living space, with an attached oversize double garage.
The living room has a 25 ft window wall, with one of the most spectacular view of the Rocky Mountains which are 96 miles away. The air is clear enough here that a hundred mile view is very sharp. We have 3 set of stairs, to the different levels. As my wife and I are both in our late 80s, we use chair lifts to get between levels. It is 3 bedrooms, and 3 baths. Our windows are not vinyl, but metal exterior and wood interior top end Andersen windows.
It is the only very contemporary home in the part of the country we live. It is 25 years old, and in perfect condition as we maintain it that way.
We like to stretch out, and not feel confined in a tiny apartment. When different parts of our family come to visit, we can convert two family rooms (1 on garden level, and 1 on top level), using sofa beds into guest quarters. Lower family room only gets used when we have extra overnight guests. The upper one has convertible Sofa, and other end is set up with a large screen TV, Sound System, and is powered by a dedicated Tower Computer where we can stream movies, play games, etc., in the evening for our own entertainment.
Our combined costs for Insurance, Taxes, Maintenance, housekeeper coming in 3 days a week, a young man who maintains our acre of landscaping using our tractor mower, and other tools, is less than what it would be to rent a decent apartment.
Winter the mower is removed and a blade is put on the tractor to allow him to plow the snow in our 150X25 ft. parking area and driveway. We also have a 500 ft lane down to the county road, that he mows the sides of and plows in the winter.
We figure our home is a good investment. It has appreciated 10% to 12 1/2% yearly the past few years. When we reach the point we can no longer live in and enjoy our home, we will sell it. However we have enough in the bank to support us the rest of our lives, so we don't need to sell it to live. Our 3 living kids, will get what is left when we are gone.
I am telling you about our home, as it is an example of a quality 3,000 sq. ft. home. Every generation, the size of typical homes increases. Someone that hates larger homes, has dubbed larger homes being mass constructed today, as McMansions. Sure they are 10 feet apart, but that is what is needed today, to conserve land for future building. Putting them on 5 acre parcels is not practical, and would drive the price through the roof, so working families could not afford to buy a home. I understand this, as I spent from 1972 till I finally retired as an investment real estate broker. I have developed land, and had homes built to my order. Today many cities dictate the size of the lots, to conserve land for the future. That is a major reason, that those larger homes fill the lots and end up 10 to 20 feet at the most apart from the one next door. The same would be true for 1,200 sq. ft. homes as the larger ones were after WWII.
Today 20% to 25% of all new homes are 3,000 plus sq. ft. size. By 2035, they will be another 1,000 sq. ft. larger. And they are not built to mansion standards. They are just tract homes for families to live in. Our home is in that size, built over 25 years ago, to highest standards with superior materials, built by a contractor as his own personal home. It is not a Mansion but just a large nice home.
I actually agree with the point of the video, although I think it is a little snobby. I keep up with real estate in my immediate area, and I know that if you wanted to buy a more expensive house, your selection of newer homes would be limited to McMansions, most of which are simply ugly.
Some of the two story homes in my immediate area seem badly designed as well.
I also agree that many of these homes are built too close together, with shallow front yards and tiny backyards.
I think several factors drive this stuff, including increased building costs and people’s desire for status affirming homes. I mean, there would not be a market for them, if people didn’t want them.
We went from living in a brand new house that we bought in 2001 that was a 1,700 sqft. poorly constructed
cookie cutter home in central California. We were young this was our first time home buying, and people were buying up houses like crazy, going way over asking prices, so after losing out on a few houses for not having unlimited funds, we decided to buy new.
We moved in and immediately found issues with the house. They were slapping the houses together so quickly that they forgot to put insulation in our attic. No one caught that mistake, but we got it fixed. Only after we lived in our house for a number of years did we find out that our sinks we're not level, that we had a small hole hidden behind a door, our fireplace was put together shabbily, the freezer wouldn't open all the way because the enclosure was too close to the pantry wall and on and on.
It was so bad that the development was sued and they ran away, eventually though they had to pay out to all of the residents. My point is that just because a house is or isn't a "McMansion" doesn't mean there is quality work. It's up to the buyer to get things checked out beforehand which we didn't do because we thought a new house would be a good house.
Our second and current house is huge. It's 3,800 sqft on half an acre of land. It has a finished livable basement so that's where half the square footage comes from. This house is a quality built house. Despite it's size it is very well insulated so heating it doesn't cost even as much as it did in our old house. Granted energy costs are lower where we live now.
The quality of the work is seen inside and out. The family that built this house took their time.They made the house to last, and they used quality materials and the workmanship shows. We don't have pillars, or weird windows, or strange rooflines. We have solidly built house that will serves us well until we either die, decide to sell, or have to move into assisted living in our old age.
I just think everyone should buy what is right for them regardless of what others think. People hate carpet and prefer hardwoods in houses these days, we love carpet. People hate baths lately, and are big on showers, I love my jetted tub. Things go in cycles, do what's right for you, and who cares what the lady on some blog thinks, she's no one to you. She can hate McMansions all she wants, makes zero difference to me.
Oh and one more thing to add. My brother-in-law bought this big house on five acres of land a few years ago. It looked all pretty on the inside, granite countertops, fancy cabinets, and frills, but after moving in they found out that the flippers did a poor job and it was all just a facade and the age of the house became a liability.
The air conditioning vents were messed up, the wiring was old, the paint began to flake off, the garage was falling apart, the fifteen palm trees were infested with rats and expensive to remove etc.
Things are not always what they seem. Have your house checked out by a professional before you buy anything to make sure it's a solid house, regardless if it's a tiny house, a McMansion, or somewhere in between.
It looked all pretty on the inside, granite countertops, fancy cabinets, and frills, but after moving in they found out that the flippers did a poor job and it was all just a facade and the age of the house became a liability.
The air conditioning vents were messed up, the wiring was old, the paint began to flake off, the garage was falling apart, the fifteen palm trees were infested with rats and expensive to remove etc.
Things are not always what they seem. Have your house checked out by a professional before you buy anything to make sure it's a solid house, regardless if it's a tiny house, a McMansion, or somewhere in between.
Good point. Personally, I would much rather have a mediocre McMansion than an old, rotting, poorly-updated-and-then-flipped older home that has "architectural appeal".
This chick will always have source material because people continue to buy them and support their existence. As was mentioned before, these McMansions (which seems to refer to large suburban tract housing) as "bad" architecture-wise as they are, are often in blue ribbon school districts that have low crime. If you are a family and don't particularly care about misplaced turrets, windows, and whatever the hell, then the McMansion's "faults" mean not one iota. Space, schools, and crime are far more important. McMansions still sell because of where they are constructed - again, schools. They aren't being built for the Wagner chick, they're built for families - one earner, or dual earner who don't want to live in their smallish city rental or house any longer. Personally, I don't really care for boxy homes on postage stamp sized lots, but I'd definitely buy one to gain entry into a quality school district. I'd rather that than a Tudor in a gentrifying part of town with poor schools. And yes, someone in the 150-300k income group doesn't have enough for a large mansion in the elite closer in parts of town. With McMansions, you get your cake (and probably a new house to boot) in exchange for certain people making laughs and possibly a longer commute (though the rise of telecommuting negates that for many).
I think it's just another suburb vs. inner city debate. Let people buy whatever makes them happy. We own a 28 year old suburban home, on a half acre. Before that, it was a boxy tract house. I like my house and that's all that matters.
I grew up in a McMansion on a "lake" (code for huge man-made pond). It was very much a keeping-up-with-the-Joneses kind of neighborhood where people tried to show whatever "wealth" they felt compelled to display.
The funny thing is, as I grew up there and spent time in nearly every house on our lake, I realized just how much of a facade it all was. The exteriors would be beautifully, professionally landscaped with marble fountains and the like. A Range Rover/Jag/other status symbol vehicle perfectly perched on the apex of the driveway.
Then, you'd walk into these homes and instead the interior matching the exterior, it was just the opposite. People who literally had card tables in their dining areas. Nothing in the fridge except condiments and hot dog buns.
I don't have a problem with someone wanting to live in a McMansion if that's what they really want in life. It is a free country, after all. But I do have an issue with the cheap quality and unsustainablilty of materials used, as well as the hypocrisy and it often being financially irresponsible.
For me, personally, I love homes from the 1920s and prior. Not all of them are "rotting" lol and they have a level of quality and architectural charm that is of a bygone era. If anything, those McMansions will be the first to rot seeing what they are built out of of. Also, what good is a 4,000 square foot house if you can hear every squeak, creak, and tiny movement since the walls and flooring are so thin? My place was built in 1928 and bombs could literally go off outside, I'd still be sleeping like a baby.
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