the passages of power

The AIA has made critical comments about Wynn's proposed casino design in Everett. They specifically target its lack of contextuality, its poor use of public transit, and its low quality materials. They like the Mohegan proposal for the Suffolk Downs casino more.

This will all mean nothing when the Gaming Commission makes a pick for the operating license. The AIA, like any organization of architects, has very little political influence. Whenever architects talk or write, they're mostly blowing steam (wait a second, does that mean this blog is blowing steam?) and avoiding real work (yes, yes that's true here at towers of ilium). Something that the AIA finds frustrating is that Wynn has recycled this same design over and over with great success. Even though I was critical of this in a prior post, its important to note that large casinos have to function efficiently in order to extract the maximum amount of money from suckers. Wynn may very well have found the terminal design for the casino model. Like a modern supermarket, it works well for a wide variety of users, and makes the staff more effective at their jobs. And all by virtue of geometric layout. The aesthetic aspects of the design may be annoying, but you can be sure that Wynn has never value engineered the number of elevators in his buildings.