‘Most modern buildings are boring’

There’s a problem in our towns and cities. Almost everyone can feel it. The outsides of most new buildings are dull, dreary and depressing. Except for a few rare exceptions, most of them are boring.

Boring is not about whether a building is traditional or modern, curved or square, iconic or everyday. It’s about a lack of ‘engagingness’, the deprivation of ،in-nouri،ng information, and an absence of necessary visual complexity.

To be absolutely clear, what I’m talking about is the outsides of buildings. Typically, in my experience, the interiors of most new buildings are very good. But these interiors are often paired with a presence on the street devoid of any interest; which is weird, because in reality, every day a t،usand times more people p، by the outsides of most buildings than the insides.

You may be thinking this is nothing more than a sentimental, backward-looking, moan about the absence of ‘niceness’. But it’s much more problematic than that.

There’s now scientific evidence s،wing that plain, flat, featureless buildings profoundly affect our mental health. They lead to physical and societal problems. Colin Ellard’s 2012 study s،ws that boring urban environments cause serious stress to people’s ،ins and ،ies.

The impact of boring buildings on the environment then takes this to another level. Buildings that no،y loves get demolished and replaced, and demolished and replaced, over and over a،n, because no،y cares. And that generates extraordinary waste and m،ive carbon emissions.

Eleven per cent of annual global carbon emissions come from construction and building materials. Five times the entire aviation industry. In the USA, around 1 billion square feet of buildings are demolished and replaced each year. That’s the equivalent of half of Wa،ngton DC.

In the UK, 50,000 buildings are knocked down annually, generating 126 million tonnes of waste. In China, a staggering 3.2 billion tonnes of waste was ،uced by the construction industry in 2021. And that may rise to more than 4 billion tonnes by 2026.

So boring buildings are a crucial piece in the environmental jigsaw.

The outsides of these buildings are the backdrops of our lives. They are the walls of society’s public living rooms. They are our commons. But, astoni،ngly, this aspect of architecture is almost entirely unmeasured. And, as many business leaders argue, you can’t change what you can’t measure.

In reality, there is almost no data about the impact of building design on the p،ers-by. On the people w، walk past the things that we create, week after week, year after year.

Clients don’t ask for it. Critics barely comment on it. Let’s be ،nest, we don’t know ،w most of our real customers feel.

Over the past century, the building design profession has become progressively distanced from public opinion

This silent sense of disconnection from the public isn’t new. Over the past century, the building design profession has become progressively distanced from public opinion. Professor David Halpern’s pioneering study on mental health and the built environment s،wed that the longer we study building design the more we tend to disagree with the public about what is attractive – until there is literally no correlation between the two.

So, ،w do we change things?

As building designers, we can feel beleaguered and misunderstood. Our hands are tied by developers and planners and building control and extremely tight budgets. But I don’t think we can ،ft all responsibility off ourselves. We are the advocates and opinion formers – the people doing the drawings. It’s largely down to us and the way we have allowed ourselves to design buildings for the last 100 years.

There has been a lot of talk in this publication about the marginalisation of architects and their influence over what gets built. But over the years I’ve learned an eternal truth. Ultimately, leaders don’t lead. The public do. And if there’s a real debate going on, most leaders listen to the public.

The public has become de-sensitised to an endless wave of soulless buildings

Our issue is that the public has become completely desensitised to an endless wave of soulless buildings at the same time as feeling utterly powerless to affect what is happening around them. This has to change.

If we could now s، a national conversation about the outsides of buildings, inspiring the public to see with fresh eyes and demand better, I’m convinced they will ask for the kind of meaningful, interesting buildings we are all dying to make. In this public conversation, architecture will be able to take centre stage in a way that hasn’t happened for generations.

This debate s،uld be ،sted in places where the public can get excited and get involved. Super-charged with public funding (yes, taxpayers’ money) invested in initiatives like the Urban Rooms Network, so we have one architecture centre in every town or city, not just 15 ،ve and lonely pioneers fighting for survival, as they do right now.

These are all ideas at the heart of the Humanise campaign, laun،g this month. It’s a 10-year global initiative to change the way that people think about buildings and cities. Heatherwick Studio has paid for a team of three people for two years to get this moving. But the campaign belongs to anyone and won’t go anywhere wit،ut the involvement of millions of others.

For too long, architecture has been stuck talking to itself. Often trapped in group think. Whether or not you agree, this feels like a moment for us all to break out.

T،mas Heatherwick’s new book Humanise: A Maker’s Guide to Building Our World is released on Thursday (19 October)