Thursday, March 8, 2012

Wonder What the Neighbors Think?

There was a post on the blog Apartment Therapy in January about a pink brownstone in Park Slope. What was creepy about the responses wasn't that some people thought the color was ugly, but that everyone seemed so horrified in a gated-community, block-association, keeping up with Joneses type way:

"I feel it's flat out tacky. Wonder what the neighbors think?"

"when you have to subject passersby to such a bold statement, it seems a bit discourteous. Soon you'll have a street of rainbow houses."

"This is a shameful. The outside of a home should be RESPECTFUL to the context of it's surroundings. This is like giving the middle finger to all of the neighbors."

"I would not buy the house across the street from this house."

"Oh, how dreadful. This horrid should not be allowed in urban environment. If people with no taste want to project their personal “style” onto the exterior of their houses they should move to the country side and do as they’re pleased."

Wait, an urban environment is where it shouldn't be allowed? I thought being exposed to different things is exactly what you should appreciate about an urban environment. Go back to the suburbs, lady!

By contrast, one commentor wrote:

"I've lived near that house since the mid-80s. The neighborhood used to be a lot funkier, with bicentennial-painted fire hydrants, old clawfoot tubs overflowing with plants, "cheap landlord" paint colors, and many of the brownstones in disrepair. Then came the real estate boom, the money, the mass renovation/restoration movement, and the movie-set perfection that is Park Slope today...

Garish as it is (the pic doesn't do justice) it pleases me every time I walk by, and reminds me of what Brooklyn (and life?) used to be like before The Fall (when Eve bit the apple and understood that her pink house was wrong)."

Anyway, this discussion certainly reinforces the idea that people want to live in places like Park Slope so they can fulfill their suburban fantasy and further neutralize the neighborhoods personality to suit their own bland, tasteful, and ultra- expensive aesthetics.

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