I think the bulk of what people complain about is not the repetition but the materials of choice.  People what architecture to look and feel substantial and durable.  So when you stick build and do vinyl siding yeah you get some snobbish responses.  Vinyl looks ok from a street level but up close it feels flimsy and cheap.  Hardi-board siding doesn't get the same hate for instance despite being architecturally similar at a distance.  Same thing with brick façade versus "real" brick.

There are also plenty of complaints about color.  Architecture as an art should be a little expressive but business choices drive developments to choose very bland repetitive color palates like from off white to tan which admittedly suck a lot of joy out of it.  One development that has bucked this trend would be Newtown St. Charles which i would submit as being pretty nice architecturally despite being very repetitive in form and style.  Say what you want about the choice of location, but he more vibrant color pallet really allows for some variation despite the repetition in design.

Third there is plenty of debate about style preferences which are kind of silly.  Generally speaking though alot of people feel that copying past styles using modern faux materials is a pale reflection of those venerated structures.  They just don't build them like they used to is true.  So why pretend.  Think pointless analog clock towers on the Orion in CWE.  Personally i have mixed feelings here and i really don't feel like modern architecture is appealing for residential purposes but i can see the point regarding the clock tower.

Lastly and maybe most importantly any building or street looks 10x better with mature trees and landscaping.  So in 50 years if they remain well maintained they will be much more appreciated.

framer wrote: ↑

Jan 25, 2023

I don't think many of the apartment buildings going up today are expected - or even intended - to last 50 years. 

With proper maintenance there is no reason they can't.  If you keep sealed from water infiltration and control against pests the structures should be fine.  Claddings may need replaced.  Systems upgraded.  But the structures should last.

Don't be too confident in the decline of construction standards.  We hit a low point in the 50s but its been a steady climb since then and many of those hack jobs are still standing 70 years later. Also we are one major earthquake away from all those brick beauties being reduced to rubble, something for which stick builds should be more resilient.

_nomad_ wrote: ↑

Jan 25, 2023

STLEnginerd wrote: ↑

Jan 25, 2023

framer wrote: ↑

Jan 25, 2023

I don't think many of the apartment buildings going up today are expected - or even intended - to last 50 years. 

With proper maintenance there is no reason they can't.  If you keep sealed from water infiltration and control against pests the structures should be fine.  Claddings may need replaced.  Systems upgraded.  But the structures should last.

Don't be too confident in the decline of construction standards.  We hit a low point in the 50s but its been a steady climb since then and many of those hack jobs are still standing 70 years later. Also we are one major earthquake away from all those brick beauties being reduced to rubble, something for which stick builds should be more resilient.

I think we tend to forget that there was plenty of bad construction in the past, we just tend to forget about it because most of the poor quality structures didn't withstand the test of time meaning what we see today isn't really representative of the full range of buildings from past eras.

Good point actually.  I wonder if that could be quantified.  There is so much trash that was built post world war 2 that it probably skews the perception since a lot of it is still around.  But even that demonstrates that poor construction properly maintained will last way longer than it has any right to.

I will say that when a structure is stone/brick built it will last a lot longer without maintenance than something stick built.  Not livable but recoverable albeit at significant expense.  It is amazing how long much of old St. louis has hung on despite decades of neglect.