Driving past a new house yesterday drove home point.  The new house, built with a spectacular view of a corner gas station, was at least 6,000 square feet.  It was a monster, the appeared to max out the buildable area on the lot.  It had the requisite double-height, palladian-windowed front entrance that has symbolized for the past decade that the resident has spent a great deal of money.  It was a monument to bad taste.

I concede that taste is personal, and don’t think that I am the final arbiter of good taste (though my taste is meticulous, as far as I’m concerned).  But we aren’t talking about housing styles that fall with a normal ambit; No, no.  This is about the faux Château, modeled after some nightmarish misconception of what Louis would have built if his snuff brought a 10 year mandatory minimum.  With faux stone, and faux cornices, and faux flying buttresses, and a little faux Emperor standing in the middle, admiring how important he must be.

There is a road in a neighboring Village that was one of the most charming around, filled with large, old colonials and farmhouses, each somehow unique in its presentation.  These homes were surrounded by mature trees and natural fauna that made one feel a rural attitude that is so rare to find this close to New York City.  Then, some wily developer got his hands on two homes on the road.

The developer tore down that charming farmhouses, stripped the land of growth and opened gaping wounds on the landscape.  But it appeared, at first, that he was building some extremely large shingle-style houses.  Large has its issues, as does the destruction of mature trees, but at least the house style wouldn’t conflict with, and scar, the other homes along this road.

Then one day, the shoe fell.  The front of these apparently shingle colonials grew faux stone.  It was reminiscent of a roadside diner of modern vintage.  A very large roadside diner.  The neighbors, many of whom I know, were aghast.  I was aghast.  More than that, I was deeply saddened by the loss of the roads character.  These new homes would be the most obvious on the road, because they were designed for “curb appeal” whereas most other roads could barely be seen from the road, with only the impression visible and the detail obscured. 

And what’s wrong with this?  The developer will (he hopes) soon sell these diner-like structures to some family that has far more money than taste, and walk away.  The neighbors will remain behind, to see the developer’s handiwork on a daily basis.  They must live with his choices.  It’s not unlike the old builders who would deliberately offend a neighborhood’s sensibilities to drive the old timers out and profit from their misery. 

The problem struck me as I read the Sunday Times real estate section story about “Teardown Country” (link to be provided when they post the story tomorrow now added).  It’s another Times story that disturbs me because they ask realtors and developers to express their views on the merits of smaller homes and the destruction of historic structures.  Shockingly, both state that the opposition to their teardowns is overblown, and that their McMansions are the cat’s meow.  Another example of careful reporting.

Homebuilding trendiness has become an artform, where developers have figured out precisely what sells to whom.  These structures are intentionally designed to appeal to people who have just come into substantial sums of money, but lack the sensibility to appreciate the beauty of form and design.  They want to show off how wealthy and successful they’ve become, and they damn well want a house that rams their importance down everyone’s throat.  To this end, they demand really big and butt ugly houses.  These are the houses that “rich people” live in, for those who have no clue about rich people.

And in the process, we lose the bucolic atmosphere and history that enriches our lives and the lives of our children.  All so somebody can show off.  But can I blame the developers for doing whatever they can to make a buck off these patsies?  Rationally, no, for that’s their job, even if it requires the sacrifice of things bigger than a quick buck. 

When the housing market decided to implode, it was my hope that it would put an end to this blight. Or at least slow it down.  To some extent, it has, with the smarter builders holding off to see where the market was heading.  Unfortunately, this leaves some of the dopier builders, or the less astute, still hard at work.  Building their super-sized diners where once charming neighborhoods once existed.  And the realtors think this is just fine.

Update:  A comment from a friend who know about this stuff:  “Do you ever notice that the builders who build these monsters never try to explain why they build what they build.  It’s not that builders have any taste, but they know very well, before sinking their investment into a property, that it’s much easier to sell obvious pretentiousness than to subtlety and good taste.  While good taste varies from person to person, ugly has universal amongst tasteless, tacky people.”  Like I said, he knows from whence he speaks.