There’s also the Longaberger Basket building.
Pff
I heard there’s a mall in Iceland that from above looks like a man’s wiggly jiggly bit. Forgot what it’s called but it’s still kinda funny.
Insert Mr. Crabs “Money” meme here.
The Large Hadron Collider and the International Space Stations are amazing wonders. It used to be that humanity’s most expensive projects were religious temples. Now it’s machines for scientific research. Some people apparently have a problem with this, and they’re generally not the sort of people I like to be around.
It used to be that humanity’s most expensive projects were religious temples. Now it’s machines for scientific research.
I wish that were true, but the world spends far more on machines of war than we spend on science.
Those are exceptions. The majority of our (visible) expensive projects today are homages to power and money
This is the Large Halibut Collider
I’m already married but can arrange a quickie divorce if you’ll just
“This meme was brought to you through a single piece of glass several thousand miles long, at the bottom of the ocean”
Undersea cables do have repeater stations, but your point still stands because those are also an engineering marvel.
Undersea fiber optic Internet trunk lines, for anyone who missed the joke
There’s also this.
If I was a rich person, I’d build a pyramid out of concrete in a more modern style, with the peak being made out of glass for maximum view, as a home.
At least it wouldn’t fall over.
It’s not a real rich man pet project if it doesn’t end up in a catastrophe!
A pyramid doesn’t inherently have a wide base. See Transamerica pyramid as example.
According to this, that seems to be the exception to the rule: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/ac/Comparison_of_pyramids_SMIL.svg
They managed to build a pyramid that can fall over.
How do you get an interactive svg like that? I’ve never seen that before.
CopenHill deserves a mention, although it would be nice if it were more of a blueprint for industrial architecture going forward, rather than a wonder unique to one progressive European country.
The Vegas orb thing probably qualifies as a wonder.
Do you mean The Ball or The Globe?
According to google I mean the Sphere, apparently?
Oh, that orb thingy. Got it.
When did humans stop building mega-churches?
You’re not going to believe this, but…
Every giant stadium is about the same.
A monument to the arrogance of some developer (et al), who then bilk the state/city for the cost.
I mean, Sagrada Família im Barcelona is still under construction
It’s going to be funny when China finishes it first and the whole thing goes poof
This is the headquarters of the fishery development board in Hyderabad.
It looks like a fish because they manage the fish there.
First glance I thought someone there was crazy enough to build a home like this. Then I found out it really is a fishy workplace
Nobody is doubting it looks like “a fish”, it’s just it looks like a fish drawn by a 3 years old
🐟
It’s a case of being stupid enough to love it.
I love the Fish building!! We pass it every time on the way from the airport.
Reminds me of Turkmenistan.
Looks like a fish out of water.
Edit: (not directed at OP)
Bro have you seen the size of the bridges, stadiums and skyscrapers we build? Fuck it, have you seen the LHC?
Should we start adding spires and arches to hospitals and train stations to get support from the RETVRN crowd?
Yes we should. Our buildings and public places should be covered in art
We could build more, better, more beautiful infrastructure, or we could buy more bombs and let the free market deal with that.
Bigger but at what cost? So many buildings are boring, flat and lifeless e.g.
Marvels like the Saturn V or JWST should be mentioned here, too.
JWST is insane. Not quite as insane as Apollo or Voyager relative to current mainstream tech, but still, holy shit.
Seriously, we started building things so massive that you literally can’t see all of it at the same time unless you’re in the air, riding in a magical skychair.
That’s cool and all, but not sure if that counts as a thing we built as much as a thing we drew.
Exactly, yes! The LHC is so much more (larger isn’t the right word, maybe massive?). If it was on the surface instead of being buried, and the earth was perfectly spherical, you wouldn’t be able to see it standing in the middle of it, because the ring would be on the other side of the horizon all around you.
…I mean…I wouldn’t mind it if we did.
train stations
Have you seen the metro stations in Moscow?
The ones in DC are pretty inspiring, too, in a Brutalist kind of way.
They’re lit from below, so you can tell when a train is at a platform by the shadow it casts on the ceiling, which perfectly aligns with the recessed concrete blocks that make up said ceiling.
Really impressive.
I looked up photos of about a dozen separate metro stations in DC, and… they’re all the same design. I get pragmatism, but those are downright depressing. The only one I liked was Anacostia because the yellow overhead lights and the bright blue advertisement screen made interesting patterns reflecting off the water-damaged walls.
Compare that to Moscow: underground palaces. Marble, statues, reliefs, arches and columns, chandeliers everywhere. Hate the Soviets all you like, but they knew how to build beautiful.
I even like the ancient 81-series rolling stock, if only because of nostalgia.
Beautiful. I wonder how many famines it cost them to build.
Every day in my dreams.
The simple truth is that you have to justify the cost. Art is expensive and generates no quantifiable income. Capitalism is poison.
I’m sure wondering why they built that.
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