Hasta La Ideas

In this week’s comments update, readers lavished praise on Thomas Heatherwick’s recently completed Zeitz Museum of Contemporary Art Africa, marking a shift in reaction compared to his previous architectural efforts.

Lucky Tube: Zeitz MOCAA, South Africa’s largest art museum, was created by hollowing out the inside of a historic grain silo building, and commenters could not hide their appreciation of Heatherwick’s design.

“I know Heatherwick is the guy everyone loves to hate. But this is exquisite. One of those 10-20 buildings per decade that are truly remarkable,” gushed ML.

“Not usually a fan of his architectural forays, but this is seriously remarkable,” agreed Steve Leo.

Alvise Rizzo was already planning a trip to South Africa: “Few other times seeing images of architecture have I had such strong desire to fly to the location, just to plunge in that space, stunning.”

Although Heywood Floyd was worried that buildings impressive appearance would overshadow its purpose: “My hunch is that this architecture would obliterate any attempt to display art within it, so the galleries are all dumb boxes not worth photographing.”

But Kobi made it clear that there was no room for any form of critcism: “Haters, please say something.”

This reader proved you can never truly please everyone.

Is the Zeitz MOCAA Thomas Heatherwick’s greatest architectural triumph? Have your say in the comments section ›

X marks the spot: Apple marked a milestone with the launch of its highly anticipated iPhone X, but readers weren’t convinced by the latest iteration’s new design and features.

“Do they ever see what competitors already accomplished? This camera bump and speaker, that cuts into a piece of the screen, are just ridiculous. It is very, very lazy design,” grumbled Dandy, clearly feeling that Apple had fallen behind.

Lorum-Ipsum felt let down by the established company’s decision to focus on animating emojis: “When there are so many areas of technology development that could be pioneered, the planet’s best engineers gave us animated, talking turds.”

Alex was only half-impressed by the latest model: “The iPhone X looks great from the front and looks like someone stuck something on the back.”

“Like every year, plenty of people will loathe some aspect of the new iPhone. But for once, there’s little doubt the iPhone X will be an absolute bulls-eye product for the high-end market,” wrote M.L, one of the brave few to jump to Apple’s defence.

One reader was less than excited to set up the new FaceID function.

Read the comments on this story ›

In or out of style: fashion designer Katharine Hamnett, famous for her political t-shirts, incited a debate over the EU referendum between readers, with her new design that features the slogan: “Cancel Brexit”.

Atlas believed the designer was failing the recognise the public’s wishes: “There is something very undemocratic about seeking to overturn the result of a free and fair vote and that is precisely what Hamnett is doing”.

“It’s not undemocratic if it is done democratically, as the T-shirt says: ‘If British voters changed their minds…’ The only way to find out if voters changed their minds is by letting them vote again on the same issue,” countered H-J.

Hellen Giblin-Jowett clearly felt the whole public hadn’t had their say on the matter: “The Brexit referendum result can only be described as ‘democratic’ if there is a universal consensus about who is included – and who is excluded – in its scope. So can we please not rely on formulations like ‘fair and democratic’ as though they are self-evidently true?”

This American reader had a message for Dezeen’s British contingent.

Read the comments on this story ›

Go for gold: Édouard François comments about using expensive building materials such as gold and titanium to ensure they are recycled was met with general opposition from commenters this week.

ABruce felt there was a better solution: “I support the intention. But rather than using expensive materials to encourage recycling, we should be educating building professionals and developers on life cycle analysis, paired with legislation mandating recycled content materials on new construction and demolition.”

“We need to educate society on recycling all the materials. Changing to a less cost-effective way of building won’t help on changing people’s minds. This will just support the current trend that sustainability is only for the wealthy,” added Mark.

The French architect’s comments had enraged one reader.

Read the comments on this story ›

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