China’s top 10 ‘ugliest’ buildings ‘hall of shame’ listing kicks off

China’s ‘ugliest buildings contest’ to recognise bizarre architecture

A bizarre poll has been initiated in China, which identifies the ‘ugliest’ buildings within the country. This shortlist includes skyscrapers, museums, hotels, and sports facilities, with “unusual shapes” and “tactless ornamentation” that may have contributed to China’s reputation for bizarre architecture.

A ‘hall of shame’ listing of China’s top 10 ‘ugliest’ structures has 87 unusual patterns in the running.

China’s top 10 'ugliest' buildings 'hall of shame' listing kicks off

Over the past 11 years, a Chinese architecture website, archcy.com, has invited people to vote in the cheerful annual competition that it believes will inspire people to reflect the elastic notion of beauty.

The Public Poll

One of the CNN reports mentioned that the Xi Jinping government issued a direct calling for an end to “oversized, xenocentric, weird” structures. A public poll was created, which will remain open until December 2021, to know the public opinions on the same. A five-arched gate tops this list at Zhejiang University in Hangzhou.

87 nominations

Some other nominations include a museum that was once compared to a pot with instant noodles and a 1.5 Km stretch of Shanghai towers connected by a single roof. The buildings will be evaluated based on whether they are plagiarized or disharmonious with the surroundings, with public voting, which accounts for 40 percent of the final decision.

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In June 2020, China’s Ministry of Housing and the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) had issued a circular which urged to stop plagiarising buildings and skyscrapers designs taller than 1,640 feet with a policy document that “strictly prohibits” the construction of “ugly” buildings to favor those that are suitable. According to the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitats, there are only five skyscrapers of that height.

According to Fei Chan, a senior professor of architecture specialization in urban politics at Liverpool University in the UK, those new guidelines provide a new framework for building structures in the cities. From these guidelines, the architectures take the benefit of designing the buildings.

Many great variations can be made in architectural standards around the country to highlight the Chinese characteristics. However, the government has warned not to demolish the historical buildings.
She further added that on the east coast of China, architectures have better designing skills than those in the inner cities. The architects of the interior cities still copy the designs from others, which do not provide good results.

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