When you first look at the burns building it probably doesn't strike you as very interesting. The out side of the building has quite a simple and structured look to it while the inside can be strikingly similar to a hospital interior. Long empty corridors with a quiet build noise humming though it. The simplicity of modernism is reflected though the building. The facade is unfortunately falling apart and the bottom level is surrounded by scaffolding and a green mesh. The building has a lot of concrete on its facade in a very ordered and simple fashion.
The general feeling towards the building is that of disgust because the down trodden nature of the building with the facade literally falling off. The building has been scheduled for demolition and a lot of people are glad about this. This building feels out of place between the library and a few other much more modern buildings it certainly looks out of place.
This is the view from the side of the union building, in front of the university library i think this shot contrasts the old and new styles between the buildings.
This is another shot from the courtyard to the side of the building as you can see the facade is very modernist with the large concrete slabs on the side.
A shot showing the scaffolding around the building, recently a lot of the facade has been falling off of it so the scaffolding is required to keep it safe.
I think the Burns Building is one of Dunedin's best examples of how not to design a building. There is so much wrong with it:
ReplyDeleteThe coarse cladding surface gets dirty easily and would be hard to clean
the lecture theatres have bad acoustics and sightlines
the foyer is not even big enough to cope with the crowds for the lecture theatres, let alone people walking through it to get to the high-rise part of the building, and it is intended as the entrance to that
The internal corridors are mean and poky
Half the rooms face East and have far too much sunlight in the morning, and the other half face west and are far too bright on sunny afternoons
you can't actually use the balconies
and worst of all, bits of concrete fall off it and are in danger of landing on people's heads and killing them.