The new Como Park Conservatory Visitor Center. See photographic documentation of this atrocity here. Warning: it’s not for the aesthetically faint of heart. The post-modern effete elite culture mafia strike again.
A glimmering shambles, the new Visitor Center sits within view of the classical architectural gem that is the Conservatory itself. It’s an illustrative juxtaposition. The 1915 Conservatory was quite modern in its day, yet evokes classical Victorian traditions while remaining functionally true to its purpose. I believe the classical architectural term best used to describe the Visitor Center is “butt ugly.” It is not merely a pretentiously asymmetrical glass and steel monstrosity, but it has an inexplicable pustule on the top which evokes a completely separate glass and steel monstrosity crashing into the first one. The whole thing looks like it might collapse at any moment, and if we are lucky it soon will, with the architect and the bureaucrats who approved the plan inside toasting their noble modernity with organic wine made from free range grapes.