The McMansion Is the Big Mac of Suburbia

McMansion is a derogatory term for a large, showy neo-eclectic architectural style home, usually built by a developer without the guidance of an architects custom design. The word McMansion was coined in the 1980s by architects and architecture critics in response to the many over-sized, poorly designed, expensive homes being built in American suburbs. The word McMansion is cleverly derived from the name McDonalds, the fast food chain restaurant. Think about what is offered under the golden arches of McDonalds  Ã¢â‚¬â€ big, fast, tasteless food. McDonalds is known for mass producing super-sized everything in huge quantities.  So, a McMansion is the Big Mac hamburger of architecture — mass produced, quickly built, generic, bland, and unnecessarily large. The McMansion is part of the McDonaldization of Society. Features of a McMansion A McMansion has many of these characteristics: (1) over-sized in proportion to the building lot, which is usually a defined space in a suburban neighborhood; (2) poorly proportioned placement of windows, doors, and porches; (3) excessive use of gabled roofs or a bizarre mixture of roof styles; (4) poorly planned mixture of architectural details and ornamentation borrowed from a variety of historical periods; (5) abundant use of vinyl (e.g., siding, windows) and artificial stone; (6) unpleasing combinations of many different siding materials; (7) atria, great rooms, and other grand open spaces that are rarely used; and (8) quickly constructed using mix-and-match details from a builders catalog. McMansion is a snarky word used to describe a certain type of house, for which there is no absolute definition. Some people use the word to describe an entire neighborhood of overly large houses. Other people use the word to describe an individual house of new construction, more than 3,000 square feet, that has replaced a more modest house on the same lot. A very large house in a neighborhood of mid-century modest homes would look disproportional. A Symbol of Economic Status Is the McMansion anything new? Well, yes, sort of. McMansions are unlike the mansions of yesteryear. In the Gilded Age of America, many people became very wealthy and built opulent homes — usually a city dwelling and a country house, or cottage as the Newport, Rhode Island mansions are called. In the early 20th century, large, rambling homes were built in Southern California for people in the movie industry. No doubt, these homes are objects of excess. Generally, however, they are not considered McMansions because they were individually built by people who really could afford them. For example, Biltmore Estate, often called the largest private home in the United States, was never a McMansion because it was designed by a well-known architect and built by moneyed people on many, many acres of land. Hearst Castle,  William Randolph Hearsts estate in  San Simeon, California, and Bill and Melinda Gates 66,000 square foot house, Xanadu 2.0, are not McMansions for similar reasons. These are mansions, plain and simple. McMansions are a type of wannabe mansion, built by upper-middle class people with enough down payment money to show off their economic status. These homes are usually highly mortgaged to people who can afford the monthly interest payment, but who have obvious disregard for architectural aesthetics. They are trophy homes. The leveraged McMansion becomes a status symbol, then — a business tool that depends on property appreciation (i.e., natural price increase) to make money. McMansions are real estate investments instead of architecture. Reaction to McMansions Many people love McMansions. Likewise, many people love McDonalds Big Macs. That doesnt mean theyre good for you, your neighborhood, or society. Historically, Americans have rebuilt their communities every 50 to 60 years. In the book Suburban Nation, Andres Duany, Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk and Jeff Speck tell us that its not too late to untangle the mess.  The authors are pioneers in the rapidly growing movement known as New Urbanism. Duany and Plater-Zyberk launched the groundbreaking Congress for the New Urbanism which strives to promote the creation of pedestrian-friendly neighborhoods. Jeff Speck is the director of town planning at Duany Plater-Zyberk Co. The firm is noted for designing pristine communities such as Seaside, Florida, and Kentlands, Maryland. McMansions are not in their visions for America. Old-fashioned neighborhoods with walkable roads and corner shops may seem idyllic, but New Urbanist philosophies are not universally embraced. Critics say that pretty communities like Kentlands, Maryland, and Seaside, Florida, are as isolated as the suburbs they try to replace. Moreover, many New Urbanist communities are considered pricey and exclusive, even when they arent filled with McMansions. Architect Sarah Susanka, FAIA, became famous by rejecting McMansions and the notion of what she calls starter castles. She has created a cottage industry by preaching that space should be designed to nurture the body and soul and not to impress the neighbors. Her book, The Not So Big House, has become a textbook for 21st-century living. More rooms, bigger spaces, and vaulted ceilings do not necessarily give us what we need in a home, writes Susanka. And when the impulse for big spaces is combined with outdated patterns of home design and building, the result is more often than not a house that doesnt work. Kate Wagner has become the go-to critic of the McMansion form. Her commentary website called McMansion Hell is a clever, snarky personal assessment of the house style. In a local TED talk, Wagner rationalizes her animosity by suggesting that in order to avoid bad design, one must recognize bad design — and McMansions have a plethora of opportunities to hone ones critical thinking skills. Before the economic downturn of 2007, McMansions proliferated like mushrooms in a field. In 2017 Kate Wagner was writing about The Rise of the McModern -  McMansions persist.  Perhaps its a byproduct of a capitalistic society. Perhaps its the notion that you get what you pay for — small houses can cost as much to build as larger houses, so how do we rationalize living in tiny homes?   I believe, concludes Sarah Susanka, that the more people put their money where their hearts are, the more others will realize the validity of building for comfort, and not prestige. Source The Not So Big House by Sarah Susanka with Kira Obolensky, Taunton, 1998, pp. 3, 194

Consider This Before Purchasing an Electric Chainsaw

John B. Updikes Short Story Trust Me - 980 Words

John B. Updike is a novelist, poet, short story author, playwright, children’s book author, literary critic, art critic, and essayist. Updike is one of the world’s most versatile, serious, and prolific writers. Though his writing style and subjects vary greatly, he is committed to addressing the moral, social, and cultural conditions of his generation. Updike was born on March 18, 1932 and raised in a small town by the name of Shillington, Pennsylvania, right outside of Reading. He lived there as an only child, until the age of thirteen. As he grew older, he attended Harvard University, where he majored in English and contributed to and later edited the Harvard Lampoon. In 1955 he married his first wife Mary Pennington, with whom he†¦show more content†¦In the story the main character, Harold, was married twice and in Updike’s life he was married twice. John and Harold also both only had children with their first wives. John Updike grew up in the northeast part of America, as did Harold. As John Updike’s children grew up with divorced parents I’m sure there were many trust issues within the family, this relates back to â€Å"Trust Me† because Harold’s children had trust issues with him on account of the divorce from his first wife as well. There are many ideas this story portrays that lead the reader back to the idea that John Updike’s â€Å"Trust Me† is really about his own life. Being known primarily as a fiction writer, Updike’s readers may believe that everything he writes has no relation to his life or the people in it. Just because he is known as a writer of fiction doesn’t mean that’s all he writes. Having wrote over 50 books and short stories, I’m sure at least one of his ideas were about his life in some way. Since â€Å"Trust Me† was written in the time period of the twentieth century, and all of Updike’s related works were fi ction and made up readers believed that â€Å"Trust Me† was as well. People believe â€Å"Trust Me† is a made up story that has no correspondence to Updike’s real life. Since Updike is one of the greatest American fiction writers of his generation, and he was the most written about living American novelist of his time, people believe that he onlyShow MoreRelatedANALIZ TEXT INTERPRETATION AND ANALYSIS28843 Words   |  116 Pagesthat may prove helpful. PLOT The Elements of Plot When we refer to the plot of a work of fiction, then, we are referring to the deliberately arranged sequence of interrelated events that constitute the basic narrative structure of a novel or a short story. Events of any kind, of course, inevitably involve people, and for this reason it is virtually impossible to discuss plot in isolation from character. Character and plot are, in fact, intimately and reciprocally related, especially in modern fiction

Is the Monster good or evil Essay Example For Students

Is the Monster good or evil? Essay Mary Shelley started to write Frankenstein in 1816 when the idea to write it came to mind when her husband Lord Byron, Polidori and herself were reading ghost stories on a rainy day, Lord Byron, was the one who said We will each write a story. They all thought of one except Mary. She wanted to make one which would dread the reader to look round, and to curdle the blood and quicken the beatings of the heart. She was asked and asked if shed thought of a story, but the answer was always negative. When Shelley went to bed one night she had a terrible nightmare of a Pale student and a Hideous phantasm and saw someone working on something with Signs of life. This nightmare gave her a story, one that would make the readers blood curdle, it started with the words It started on a dreary night of November and became Frankenstein. A modern readers expectations of a horror story are; that they have to be gruesome, twistful and has to have monsters, strange characters, blood, and of course a storyline. The modern expectations of a monster are that they have to be strong, ugly, dead, gory, evil, and huge. But the monster in Frankenstein is different to these expectations because the monster in the story is capable of feeling human emotions, it has the potential to be good and help people, it can also speak, feel, read, and fend for itself. It wants acceptance, love and companionship. The main plot of Frankenstein is that Victor Frankenstein creates a monster with dead corpses body parts and electricity and then he abandons it. The monster seeks revenge by killing Victors Dad, Elizabeth, Henry Clerval, and frames Justine for the killing of young Willy, which results in her death as well. It ends with the death of both Victor and the Monster. In the 1700s scientific progresses were Concerned with using electricity to make things move. In 1802 Galvani wanted to use electricity to make a frogs legs move. And also in 1803 Aldini attached a battery to a corpse of a criminal and the body began to move and twitch and an eye opened along with the legs, which set in motion. Now we are in the 21st century we can do more with science than in the 1700s, We can transplant hearts, livers, kidneys and lungs; pigs valves can be put into human hearts. Moreover you can have plastic or steel hips and shoulders, skin can also be grown in laboratories, there is now artificial blood and limbs can be amputated, cut of, sewn on, and you can even have a new leg that is mechanical. If a twenty-first century person read Frankenstein they might think its a Murder story not a horror story because in our modern days society we get much more scarier films and books with more imaginative creatures in it. But if someone from the same era as the book read it they would find it fascinating, intriguing and horrific because they were uneducated about the possibilities of electricity and scientific progresses. The book begins with Robert Walton writing a letter to his sister. The letter describes the first time he sees the monster. He uses the words Strange sight which gives me the impression that he thought what he saw was strange and different and that he has never seen anything quite like it. Also Walton describes the monster as a gigantic stature which tells me that the monster is an abnormal size and that its huge and from there tells me that its powerful, and muscular. A savage inhabitant, is what Robert writes to his sister, which gives the impression that the monster is uncivilised, wild and animal like. In chapter five when the monster first come to being, Victor Frankenstein describes him as having yellow skin which makes a picture in my head that he is disgusting and dead-which he is I think this because well yellow skin is dead skin. .u3be6066076115f239a74ba759b1c5d10 , .u3be6066076115f239a74ba759b1c5d10 .postImageUrl , .u3be6066076115f239a74ba759b1c5d10 .centered-text-area { min-height: 80px; position: relative; } .u3be6066076115f239a74ba759b1c5d10 , .u3be6066076115f239a74ba759b1c5d10:hover , .u3be6066076115f239a74ba759b1c5d10:visited , .u3be6066076115f239a74ba759b1c5d10:active { border:0!important; } .u3be6066076115f239a74ba759b1c5d10 .clearfix:after { content: ""; display: table; clear: both; } .u3be6066076115f239a74ba759b1c5d10 { display: block; transition: background-color 250ms; webkit-transition: background-color 250ms; width: 100%; opacity: 1; transition: opacity 250ms; webkit-transition: opacity 250ms; background-color: #95A5A6; } .u3be6066076115f239a74ba759b1c5d10:active , .u3be6066076115f239a74ba759b1c5d10:hover { opacity: 1; transition: opacity 250ms; webkit-transition: opacity 250ms; background-color: #2C3E50; } .u3be6066076115f239a74ba759b1c5d10 .centered-text-area { width: 100%; position: relative ; } .u3be6066076115f239a74ba759b1c5d10 .ctaText { border-bottom: 0 solid #fff; color: #2980B9; font-size: 16px; font-weight: bold; margin: 0; padding: 0; text-decoration: underline; } .u3be6066076115f239a74ba759b1c5d10 .postTitle { color: #FFFFFF; font-size: 16px; font-weight: 600; margin: 0; padding: 0; width: 100%; } .u3be6066076115f239a74ba759b1c5d10 .ctaButton { background-color: #7F8C8D!important; color: #2980B9; border: none; border-radius: 3px; box-shadow: none; font-size: 14px; font-weight: bold; line-height: 26px; moz-border-radius: 3px; text-align: center; text-decoration: none; text-shadow: none; width: 80px; min-height: 80px; background: url(https://artscolumbia.org/wp-content/plugins/intelly-related-posts/assets/images/simple-arrow.png)no-repeat; position: absolute; right: 0; top: 0; } .u3be6066076115f239a74ba759b1c5d10:hover .ctaButton { background-color: #34495E!important; } .u3be6066076115f239a74ba759b1c5d10 .centered-text { display: table; height: 80px; padding-left : 18px; top: 0; } .u3be6066076115f239a74ba759b1c5d10 .u3be6066076115f239a74ba759b1c5d10-content { display: table-cell; margin: 0; padding: 0; padding-right: 108px; position: relative; vertical-align: middle; width: 100%; } .u3be6066076115f239a74ba759b1c5d10:after { content: ""; display: block; clear: both; } READ: Dramatic irony, pathetic fallacy and humour EssayAlso the book says the monster is like a Demoniacal corpse, which makes me, think he is evil, demon like, ugly and hideous I think this because demoniacal is demon like, and demons are known to be described as this. Finally Victor describes it as A miserable wretched monster which says to me that the thing is, sad, evil and distraught. My opinion of the monster is that it is very ugly from what the book says and very different. When Frankenstein meets the monster on the mountain the monster is described as a Man advancing towards me with superhuman speed. This makes the monster seem supernatural, strong, fast and superhuman and therefore dangerous. Also the monster is described as Its unearthly ugliness rendered it too horrible for human eyes- which shows that the monster is too ugly for him to look at. The monster is made to seem evil by the way Victor refers to him as an evil being. He implies this by saying that the monster is a devil; the quote make the monster seen evil because devils are always seemed to be evil creatures. There are things that the monster said to Victor to stop him killing him, they are How dare you sport thus with life? , do your duty towards me. I think this means that the monster is trying to make a point that Victor shouldnt play with life he cant kill him at his disposal he has no right and he isnt God. The monster then says Victor has a duty like a father. Further more the monster describes his situation, he says, everywhere I see bliss, from which I alone am irrevocably excluded. What I think the monster is saying is that he is excluded from love, care, joy, and happiness. Frankensteins response to this is Be gone I will not hear you. The monster at this point appears honest and willing to be good because he says I was benevolent and good: misery made me a fiend. Make me happy and again I will be virtuous. This is a contrast to how Victor portrays him as he isnt totally evil. When the monster ran away he ran to the forest and found shelter, where he slept. He wakes in the night and cries because he is alone. The monsters eyes catch the moon and it enchants him. Gradually after days and nights in the forest he starts to distinguish between his senses. He discovers the law of fire and cooks his food. He finds and enters a hut but the owner runs away and the monster eats his dinner. The monster has a love for nature and in real nature his love is the moon and stars they enchant him. But then he has a love for the nature of love, happiness, and family, as he watches one, one in a cottage. From this family he discovers language and learns their thoughts and feelings and understands what the family is saying.