The sad beige aesthetic: why has the world suddenly turned taupe?
theguardian.com
theguardian.com
I immediately notice the difference in my mood walking into a modern office where the walls are essentially giant glass windows vs a building in an office park built over the last few decades. Old brick buildings with tiny windows on college campuses feel claustrophobic compared to the newer ones. Modern coffee shops are airier and cheerier compared to the dark caves of yore. Even homes are being built with larger windows now.
Not everyone likes this trend (and many people who code still prefer dark rooms), but for me I think it’s great. I thrive on a lot of sunlight.
Perhaps the bright and varied colors of the past were more so a counterbalance to the lack of sunlight? With more natural light available, muted color schemes feel more appropriate.
https://commons.m.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Penn_Station_conco...
It doesn't have to be like this specifically, but it demonstrates the point: https://duckduckgo.com/?q=moscow+subway&iax=images&ia=images
A common approach for this sort of big low-ish train station is a partially or completely glass roof, ideally not flat, and that can look okay, but obviously not an option in this case.
But big windows are technology-driven rather than fashion-driven to an extent; most people like them, so they'll probably stick around.
A typical triple-glazed window can maybe hit R-8 (U 0.125). A typical wall can be R-20 (or greater).
There is no surmounting, relative to other assemblies, the suckiness of glass as an insulator.
But few people want to live/work in an bunker with no windows if they had a choice, so we accept the compromise. But make no mistake it is a compromise when it comes to energy efficiency.
What are really awesome are office buildings constructed before electric lighting was ubiquitous. They’re designed with shallow floor plates or inner open spaces so that (unless you break them up too much with cubicle walls) every desk can be fully illuminated with natural light.
I recently saw a special glass which is warmer to touch and has way less thermal conductivity, but even with that, the savings are ~20% at most. A brick wall with isolation adds minimum of 25% savings when compared to the same wall provides without isolation, which is way better than the glass to begin with.
There are two things in play here: the first is, as you mention, the insulation quality (R-value / U-factor) of windows is abysmal, both in absolute terms and relative to other wall assemblies. Heat leaks out of windows in winter in high amounts (and then you also have to deal with unwanted thermal gain in summer, raising AC costs).
The other thing is mean radiant temperature:
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mean_radiant_temperature
Many folks think that if the thermostat reads the correct temperature in a room, you're done: that is not the case. The thermostat reads the air temperature, and air temperature is often only half of what you feel in a room: the other half is what is radiated from all the surfaces around you.
A camp fire, fireplace, or radiator feels warm because it is at a temperature higher than your skin, and so the energy goes from it to you. But if there is something that is lower than your skin temperature, the energy will go from you to it and you will feel cold—regardless of what the air temperature is.
This is why in offices, even though a thermometer / thermostat reads 20C/70F in both summer and winter, people feel cold: the giant office windows work as "anti-radiators", where energy wants to move from your body/skin to them.
I was one of these (rather confused) folks who failed to understand why this was happening. Thanks for the info!
† Very cold and very sunny generally go together: the air is too cold to hold moisture, so there are no clouds, so you get the sun.
What's the R-value [1] / U-factor on all of those windows? In offices, even though a thermometer / thermostat reads 20C/70F in both summer and winter, people feel cold: the giant office windows work as "anti-radiators", where energy wants to move from your body/skin to them.
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mean_radiant_temperature
I also find the first thing that what many folks do is pull down the blinds on windows in offices so they can actually see their screens. :)
I don't believe the lack of sunlight is the reason for vivid colors of the past. If anything, the colors were darker, though more saturated. Also, while tiny windows did not allow for a lot of sunlight, it is the opposite at night, where modern lighting is much brighter thanks to cheap, powerful and efficient LEDs. Here, I think it is just fashion, nothing technical.
I think it's the opposite: glass is really cheap, which makes up most of the window. Less expensive than rebar and concrete and the labour for the form work and such. Certainly the frame can be pricey, but most of the surface area is glass.
So glass is a popular facade because it saves the builder money: CapEx. But of course glass sucks an insulation the other side of the equation is heating/cooling: OpEx, which the builder may not care about.)
Man, these influencer people are exhausting… it’s hard to believe that some people think this way
The date I had said "maybe we should push her in the river?".
(They didn't last. Neither did we. At least ours was over a disagreement on a statistical model on an academic paper though)
I'm sure that response was cleverly edited (or a masterfully self-aware joke), but it sure demonstrates how the decor reflects their attitude. "If I don't survive, tell my wife 'Hello'", indeed.
What makes a man turn neutral? Lust for gold? Power? Or were they just born with a heart full of neutrality?
My wife and I worked with a designer for our house, and we agreed that we would not leave a single wall white. The results are fantastic, and the house has so much more personality than would be possible with a neutral pallet. But the color and wallpaper choices were very deliberate and considered, not to mention how expensive the whole process was.
As long as we don't go back to the nightmarish patterned carpets of the 1970s...
The modern equivalent is Hello Kitty rugs.
*Well, usually. If you shopped at a reasonable store, and had decent tastes. If not - horribly and ugly things have been available in every era.
I would definitely go to the hotel featured in "The Shining" if it wasn't for the murders.
It is: Warmer, softer and cosier!
"Joa Studholme, a colour advisor for Farrow & Ball, thinks the proliferation of beige is a reaction to grey – sometimes dubbed “millennial grey” thanks to its association with a generation of renters out of ideas . . .
It’s a neutral with warmth – beige shades are softer, cosier and a little less hard-edged.”
that combined with limited luggage space meant I left my colorful clothes behind and am wearing a lot of white, black, beige. hope I don't get judged too harsh!
I don't think it was a weather thing. There was a "cold" spell here over Christmas. Probably 20 to 24C, which for us westerners is basically wear whatever you like weather. For Vietnamese it's winter time though, locals are all bundled up!
This incident was probably somewhat coincidental, but I have noticed several times previously in the cafe, with less people, it's all black, white, and grey.
Btw have a great trip! I was a western tourist too around 8 years ago and ended up never leaving. Life is good here, challenging and different.
but I have a total of 2 shorts and a bunch of boring t-shirts for 25C+ weather - simply because I rarely have incentive to expand it :)
And not in their architecture, it's seems to be more about the youth scene. Pilsen in Czech republic is a mostly grey boring city, but the people wear much more colorful clothes than in similar cities. The main difference I saw is more nature and a healthy pub culture.
At least it's good for jokes that I finally introduced some colors.
Perhaps in a few years you will go from Wink the Grey to Wink the White (just hope you don't need an encounter with a Balrog to accomplish it).
Hackers were ahead of the fashion curve.
Good luck being weird or even different in the world that enforces unanimity.
I haven't found any negative side effects other than the lost feeling when I accidently wear grey and the world somehow feels different.
The world is going to shite, let's have some vibrancy and colour to counter things.
[1] https://static.cozycozy.com/images/catalog/bg2/horizontal-ab...