Derby Assembly Rooms up for demolition

[PlanktonSideburns]

I hate those giant TV screens. There was one in Walthamstow when I was living there. Such a waste of electricity (hardly anyone was watching it) and it felt like noise pollution. I don't think anyone would stand and watch for more than a few seconds. Getting rid of that giant television would have helped reduce energy consumption and made Walthamstow centre a nicer place to walk through, it felt like being part of some dystopia every time I walked past the giant television. And now they are putting one in Derby.

Agreed

[drummersaredeaf]

There are nicer bits. Or was it particularly the County Oak which made you feel like that?

The place was generally quite dispiriting I found - always dark, and the concrete hell of the campus was just too much. County was especially bleak though. I was in Fylde when it looked like council flats.

Didn't help that I was pretty much the only person on my corridor paying my own rent, and there was nothing to do but drink. Being in the 'sporting' college meant there were lots of cunt rugger buggers to contend with when doing that too.

Even now when I go up the west coast on a train I start to feel dread as I notice the building materials change just after Manchester.

[Stoneage Dinosaurs]

Like a bit of brutalism, some of it doesn't work so much but I do prefer it to soulless floor to ceiling glass wank or that annoying committee approved quirky shit of 'let's make it all lime green and covered in hexagon motives and get a load of students to live in it'.

Only brutalist buildings I've ever spent a lot of time in close proximity are these ones on the Leicester University campus:



I remember quite liking them actually, and they were by far the least depressing things about the campus/overall uni experience. The first one in particular was very cool, on account of having this mad mechanical elevator that you that was constantly moving and you had to hop on and off it without getting crushed by the floor/ceiling. Great fun

[Captain Z]

Hiya Derby Assembly Rooms mate. You up for demolition?

Yeah I'm up for that, sounds good.

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

this mad mechanical elevator that you that was constantly moving and you had to hop on and off it without getting crushed by the floor/ceiling.

They're cool. Also yes, uni campuses are the sort of places where Brutalism works very well.

[Cursus]

Sadly, they removed the Leicester paternoster a couple of years ago.

[steveh]

I hate those giant TV screens. There was one in Walthamstow when I was living there. Such a waste of electricity (hardly anyone was watching it) and it felt like noise pollution. I don't think anyone would stand and watch for more than a few seconds. Getting rid of that giant television would have helped reduce energy consumption and made Walthamstow centre a nicer place to walk through, it felt like being part of some dystopia every time I walked past the giant television. And now they are putting one in Derby.

Thankfully they're getting rid of it, the kids playground and a chunk of the square and park that were donated to the borough by a Victorian philanthropist so they can extend the shopping mall that already can't find enough tenants and build a pair of 27 and 34 storey tower blocks that are completely out of scale with all their surroundings.

[greenman]

They're cool. Also yes, uni campuses are the sort of places where Brutalism works very well.

Zee you at the party Rhitor.

[Jockice]

Sadly, they removed the Leicester paternoster a couple of years ago.

I think the one in the arts tower at Sheffield University is still working though. I used to use that! I wouldn't dare nowadays.

[Icehaven]

The previous central library in Birmingham was a Brutalist legend/nightmare:







I worked in it for 6 months, it was awful, no ventilation, very little natural light and a ridiculously inconvenient layout. People who'd worked there for years had a strange pall and demeanour. Prince Charles even said it looked more like the kind of place books were burnt rather than kept.

Then they knocked it down..



Haha, and built a new one...





...which isn't universally loved but I like it, it's way more user friendly and at least you can see what you're doing inside without needing a torch.

[Neomod]

The previous central library in Birmingham was a Brutalist legend/nightmare:

Then they knocked it down..

Haha, and built a new one...



...which isn't universally loved but I like it, it's way more user friendly and at least you can see what you're doing inside without needing a torch.

The design process was relatively short I'm guessing..

[Pauline Walnuts]

A verted ziggurat.

With the old one you went in the lending bit, walked past that, up some escalators, walked 50m or so, only to double back on a single escalator that was always breaking down to only walk back 50m till you get to the reference section, then keep going up escalators, at least one would be broken.

And it was dark and dingy. I liked outside main bit, but the back of it, the attachment to the art gallery, the never used bus station lurking underworld, horrendous.

It didn't work as a building. The new one seems to have the same problem with over reliance on escalators.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ei2Hv4yQc98
Yeah, whateva

[idunnosomename]

I mean there's a reason they always used to build ziggurats the verted way! Too much mucking about with things!

[Icehaven]

The design process was relatively short I'm guessing..

It's frequently been called a wedding cake as well.
Believe it or not there was even a hoo-ha about the ring design on the outside. When it first opened (and was renamed Library of Birmingham) it was decided that that pattern was now going to be used on all branding and promotional materials for the library, including in the email signatures of staff that worked there. However Community Libraries staff were all sent a stern reminder that the motif was to be used for anything relating to the Library of Birmingham only, and we were not to use it for anything to do with Community Libraries, which went down really well. Obviously most of us didn't give a flying fuck, but there was a minor kick off from a few who did and didn't appreciate being further made to feel like the poor relations while all the money and attention was poured into the behemoth. Can't even remember how it was resolved but I think they changed tack and said it could be used for other libraries too in the end. I still work for them and I can't even remember if anyone does, shows how much I care.

[Icehaven]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ei2Hv4yQc98
Yeah, whateva

Neither the video nor the commenters below it bemoaning the library's demolition mention the fact that due to cost cutting during construction the outside was never finished properly and there were chunks of concrete dropping off it within a few years of it being open. It had huge nets around large swathes of it for years to stop bits falling onto the pavement below.

[pancreas]

A friend was telling me about how they can't use one of the buildings because all the windows were falling out. (Committing suicide.)

[chveik]

i always find it very satisfying when they demolish stuff. tear da derby assembly rooms up!

[Sebastian Cobb]

A friend was telling me about how they can't use one of the buildings because all the windows were falling out. (Committing suicide.)

Aberdeen uni leased their iconic Marschial College to the council and apparently parts of it were properly dilapidated, trees growing in rooms etc.

I think I took an exam in it once but can't say with complete confidence which is a bit worrying.

[Dex Sawash]

They're cool. Also yes, uni campuses are the sort of places where Brutalism works very well.

I'm sad that the bins don't flip as they go around the top/bottom. Still would though.

[buttgammon]

The talk of university architecture has got me thinking about some of the rooms I've taught in, including this one (apologies for the tiny picture). A lot of these rooms have escaped our refurbishment programme (though they may have a stripe painted on the door now), and look like this, despite being situated on an achingly beautiful campus. There are things I really like about the building, but not in rooms like this.

[A Hat Like That]

I once tried to take a short cut through into the old library and found a path that wound its way over what could have been deliberately a water feature but also could have just been a puddle. It was like an urban Blair Witch, though, proper sense of dread and 'no, you're not meant to be here'.

Here we go:

[Icehaven]

Yep I know what you mean, in the decade I lived in Brum before the library was demolished I went to that spot by accident precisely once and made a point of never doing so again.

[Neomod]

Limited edition of 50. £250 unframed mate.