Thursday, August 24, 2006

Suburban Postmodern


While I was driving around with my dad taking all of the pictures of old, mid 20th century buildings and signs around Fresno, I started to wonder about the destiny of hundreds of hideous postmodern office buildings and strip malls around the city. The older buildings I was taking pictures of were probably unremarkable 50 years ago, but their age and decrepitude makes them interesting.

Inspired by reading some Ballard, I tried to look at some of the contemporary buildings as potential relics of the forgotten present. The example above looks like it must have been built before the second invasion of Iraq--it looks like it was modelled on a presidential palace or secret police headquarters. It's now home to my old eyedoctor and a restaurant. Maybe in 50 years it will be as charming as a Quonset hut.

5 comments:

Charles P. Everitt said...

The true Atgets among us would be taking pictures of suburban strip malls and pseudo-urban shopping centers.

(You know, I think I invented the phrase "pseudo-urban". Maybe Brookings has a position for me!)

kumar said...

haha, that building is a legend in the making. it's visible from 41 between herndon & friant, right? so bizarre.

Nat Hansen said...

Yeah, it's on whatever that road is that you turn right on if you're driving west on Herndon going to River Park and don't want to go down to Blackstone.

kumar said...

if they make another predator movie, that should be its house.

Nat Hansen said...

If that were the predator's house, here's what the interior would look like:

Slates Restaurant