I was so happy after leaving the city. It doesn't feel like a natural environment. We aren't meant to live in a mass-surveillance concrete jungle. Nature is where real life's at.
Today it takes heavy equipment to move giant stone blocks. Yet we're told that ancient builders hauled stones weighing hundreds of tons across mountains and placed them with near-perfect precision using little more than ropes and human labor.. And they say we like conspiracies 😁
The site of Huánuco Pampa is in the middle of nowhere, around 750 miles from Cusco in Peru. The lower wall is cited as evidence that the upper wall was built by the same people 😁
A new word: chromification.
Stainless steel is a useful material that can also be very cool, but it feels like we’re using it too much.
You’ve got the same chrome railings and bollards literally everywhere, regardless of the street or building they’re next to.
It’s actually quite strange to see exactly the same default stainless steel railings everywhere you go: in train stations, outside houses or shops, at museums, inside apartments.
That makes places feel generic, and because the colours are cold it gives everything an industrial vibe that isn’t particularly welcoming.
Plus shiny silver things are very reflective and therefore attention-grabbing, so these railings stand out in a way they really shouldn’t, disrupting everything around them.
You could make the argument that, in the past, identical cast iron railings were also used everywhere.
That’s sort of true, but the differences are a) those railings were painted, so the cold chrome feel wasn’t a problem, and b) they were always designed differently, with varying decorations, so they weren’t actually identical, unlike modern stainless steel railings.
The problem isn't stainless steel itself, which can be extremely beautiful when used properly; the problem is making it the default rather than using it with intention, which is the heart of all good design.
This isn’t about going back to cast iron railings. Stainless steel is more durable and cost-efficient (in the long run) so it’s only right that we should use it… in which case the question becomes how we use it.
And the good news is that these railings can be treated to create a bronze finish (or any other colour) which makes them warmer or more suited to the place they’re being installed.
It’s surely just a matter of time before that becomes more common… but the first step is pointing out the problem!
Infrared and ultraviolet are completely invisible to us. It’s like looking at the world through a keyhole and only seeing a tiny fraction of what’s actually there.
Insta
https://t.co/wLyZUJ2Sk9
Geological timelines and dating systems are not as accurate as we're led to believe. If the base layer of knowledge is corrupted, then every conclusion built on top of it becomes questionable.