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McMansion Hell
21–30 of 80 posts
Re: McMansion Hell
#22I'm convinced that wealth and taste are perfectly orthogonal.
Re: McMansion Hell
#23The envy is palpable.
I envy staring into my neighbors AC units from my living room, since McMansions are built 8 ft apart...
Re: McMansion Hell
#24Earlier quoted context omitted.
For when you have money but no taste. Or modesty perhaps
It's the Keynesian beauty contest - if the exterior or the layout conformed to someone's taste or use case the seller will exclude the group with different tastes. So the outcome is a mishmash that appeals badly to everyone. It's no accident that so many supermodels are from Brazil - the nation is a true melting pot of races, it attracted immigrants from everywhere. If you need a clotheshorse you go to rural Rio Gran…
McMansions don’t appeal badly to everyone: millions of Americans happily live in them.
The more accurate observation isn’t that they’re the product of a Keynesian contest, but they’re the product of distorted real estate and home ownership incentives: homeowners conflate size and apparent luxury with investment safety, and our housing and development policies encourage that conflation.
Re: McMansion Hell
#25Who builds these things and why is BOTH the architecture and workmanship so shoddy? Who opted for this instead of making a well-architected and well built home 2/3rds the size (All you save in fake columns and moldings probably gets you some area back).
Where I live, a new home is always built by the first owner. That is, the first owner together with the architect creates the home including every plan, every material. Is that what happened here, or is it some sort of "developer" that has tried to make a disneyland looking thing to match what they already sold a buyer with sketches in a catalog?
Re: McMansion Hell
#26Earlier quoted context omitted.
> all of these places i'd be besides myself to be living in I think that’s the problem. All these places look purpose built to project wealth and abundance, but they don’t look nice to actually use. None of those rooms feel very welcoming or even remotely practical. And somehow even the largest rooms manage to feel cramped because there’s too much going on. You just can’t feel at ease in a place like that. Or at leas…
For when you have money but no taste. Or modesty perhaps
What I hate is that it seems to be a dichotomy. Small house, simple style. But as soon as it gets to a certain size, you have to put in stupid things like the grand entrance with a showpiece staircase.
Other things have to happen, apparently. The vaulted 20 foot ceilings above the living room. I now have the choice in the winter to heat the upstairs to 80 or keep the living room at 60. Of course, you'll need an ostentatious fireplace that will never be used here in Texas. It has helpfully been placed as the focal point of your living room, where most would want a tv.
I'm continually amazed at how bad designs are on half-million dollar purchases which require 30 years to pay off.
Re: McMansion Hell
#27I like the terriblerealestateagentphotos.com post from earlier, but this feels like a parody of that. So far all of these places i'd be besides myself to be living in.
> all of these places i'd be besides myself to be living in I think that’s the problem. All these places look purpose built to project wealth and abundance, but they don’t look nice to actually use. None of those rooms feel very welcoming or even remotely practical. And somehow even the largest rooms manage to feel cramped because there’s too much going on. You just can’t feel at ease in a place like that. Or at leas…
It reminds me of living in a hotel lobby. So much room for activities, but not really a home.
Re: McMansion Hell
#28I’m not sure there is anything objectively bad about these designs. Does it affect the utility of the house? Or is there some inherent ugliness that comes with affordable and popular things?
Re: McMansion Hell
#29I think this is the architects idea of McMansion hell. My idea of McMansion hell is how closely they build them together AND the placement of them. For example, many of the big communities built here in Central Florida have your living room facing the ACs of your neighbors unit, and your living room windows facing into their bed room windows. If your homes are less than 8ft apart, JUST BUILD TOWN HOMES...
The major issue with many of these houses is their design, features and aesthetic is totally incoherent and shows no restraint.
They put every kind of shape, texture, and material all into one house, in one room.
This kind of maximalist design is trying to seem luxurious. But it ends up being overwrought, shocking to look at, and filled with unusable features like that weird fireplace in the 'dome sweet dome" house.
Re: McMansion Hell
#30I bet a decent number of those homes are cheaper than a 1200 square foot home built in the 1960’s in Cupertino and Mountain View. Despite their issues, I would also bet that the McMansions are much nicer to live in and raise a family in.
McMansion is more than square footage, they are also a hodgepodge of impractical design features. Counterstops made of a material that stains, so many glass fixtures that keeping them dusted is somebody's entire job, weird roof shapes with so many seams that water ingress is a certainty, seemingly zero optimization for the sun since the owner can surely afford to brute force their hvac, etc. American Farmhouse and Ra…
Ranch is fine until 2 of of your 3 kids are teenagers.