Kierby hotel sold

[Big Vinny K]

Sure there are. Agreed.

But stone is the material the would best reflect Burnley's heritage.

Why would stone reflect Burnley’s heritage ?
Red Accrington brick might but why stone ?

Oh and btw how much would it cost do you think ?
Ball park based on build out of random stone since you are such an expert.

[Rowls]

Where have I made it ‘personal?’

And where have I said any of those things? I said it would cost too much. We don’t live in Victorian times.

Here's one example.

You can’t be serious posting this stuff.

I could quote more, but (a) I'm posting from my phone and it's tricky and (b) it might risk you thinking I'm bothered by it. You're most welcome to continue with the personal stuff.

****

It's perfectly possible to build traditional buildings that lift spirits and make a place feel better. There are many examples of modernist monstrosities being replaced with beautiful traditional.archutecture.

We all apparently agree it would be preferable.

What we should be working together on is how to make it happen. That's what the council should doing in conjunction with the new owner - letting them know what is and isn't acceptable for Burnley and the people of Burnley.

Sadly, if it's left to people who are consumed with defeatism or negativity theres a real risk we'll end up with something just as bad as the Keirby.

[ŽižkovClaret]

We're talking like it isn't possible to tint and detail concrete so that it looks stone-like. The Tax office building by the old GUS building being one reasonably decent looking example

[Tribesmen]

Hope it's a stone job , myself and the wife were only saying how impressed we were what Burnley have done to the mills .

[ŽižkovClaret]

Hope it's a stone job , myself and the wife were only saying how impressed we were what Burnley have done to the mills .

Surely we realise its one thing to sandblast existing stone, and quite another to quarry enough for a new 200 bed hotel????

[Rowls]

He's not. There are loads of examples on this forum of him coming out with utter balderdash, and then spending way too much time repeating himself over and over again. Best not to get sucked in, or else you'll be replying to him for days on end.

You either take me at face value, or you don't.
You either understand how vital it is to build beautiful buildings, or you don't.

It doesn't matter whether you understand these matters fully or not. It doesn't matter what you think if me.

But what really does matter, is that Burnley and the people of Burnley deserve a town that promotes a healthy lifestyle with buildings that are beautiful and inspiring.

[Rowls]

Surely we realise its one thing to sandblast existing stone, and quite another to quarry enough for a new 200 bed hotel????

It is indeed.

The new building doesn't need to be a 200 room hotel but the town needs is a landmark building there that is a source of pride for the town.

It needs to be befitting of Burnley's heritage. Something that uplifts us and is beautiful.

[Tribesmen]

Surely we realise its one thing to sandblast existing stone, and quite another to quarry enough for a new 200 bed hotel????

Too be very honest Burnley has not got a lot going for it , now sure people will shout me down but it's true . What i did think is if Burnley comes to the table with cotton town 19th century and works with that you could bring in tourists to see this and not just football tourists .
I think it's an angle to bring the town up and going stone is the way to go .

[ChrisG]

As I keep saying: you can try and make it personal all you like.

You can try and tell people "stone isn't viable anymore" or "building with stone is impossible now". You can try and imply people who say the opposite are "crazy" all you like.

But people can see with their own eyes the beautiful traditional stone buildings that weren't knocked down. And they understand what you apparently don't: that it's perfectly possible to build beautiful buildings that convey a sense of pride and reflect the local.style.

So feel free to keep on trying to make it personal and trying to make it about me if you like.

It's all about what the people of Burnley deserve and we deserve to have far better architecture and far better buildings in the town centre.

I agree with your sentiment regarding better architecture, and using the local vernacular as much as possible, in this case using stone.

But ultimately, market forces drive this, and it's more expensive to use stone as a cladding material (certainly up front, however taking into account whole life cycle costs might produce surprising results)

It can be done though, I'm pretty sure the ACE centre in Nelson is stone clad. A local development plan could be an option to try and push developers down this route, but you need to be careful not to discourage any development.

Either way, good debate this in general.

[Rowls]

We're talking like it isn't possible to tint and detail concrete so that it looks stone-like. The Tax office building by the old GUS building being one reasonably decent looking example

Yes it is possible to disguise concrete for real stone. It can be done well and it can be done badly.

The fact that it is done at all shows how aesthetically pleasing stone is.

[ŽižkovClaret]

Yes it is possible to disguise concrete for real stone. It can be done well and it can be done badly.

The fact that it is done at all shows how aesthetically pleasing stone is.

.....and prohibitively expensive.

As the old saying goes, its Burnley, not Barcelona

[Rowls]

I agree with your sentiment regarding better architecture, and using the local vernacular as much as possible, in this case using stone.

But ultimately, market forces drive this, and it's more expensive to use stone as a cladding material (certainly up front, however taking into account whole life cycle costs might produce surprising results)

It can be done though, I'm pretty sure the ACE centre in Nelson is stone clad. A local development plan could be an option to try and push developers down this route, but you need to be careful not to discourage any development.

Either way, good debate this in general.

Yes, good post. Stone cladding and/or well disguised concrete can be used in place of stone. It needs to be done well though

Market forces are a driving force but we need to more carefully factor in non tangible costs, as well as the durability of the material. If we have to knock down another modernist monstrosity in 40 years any savings made in construction will have been a waste of time. There are multiple non tangible benefits to building with traditional materials in traditional.styles.

Burnley is desperate for better architecture. The 60s and 70s monstrosities really do sap the life and energy out of the place.

[claretonthecoast1882]

Rowls - did you have any input into the budget announced by Kwasi n LIz

[Big Vinny K]

If our skint council insist that any private developer builds the hotel in stone then it will be at best a car park and worst the derelict ugly hotel that stands there today for the the foreseeable future.

It’s not about ambition or lobbying the council - it’s about realism. No developer in the world is going to use expensive stone to build a hotel in the centre of burnley. And there is no council in this current climate who would help fund it or insist on using stone as part of any planning agreement when they have an opportunity to create potentially hundred of jobs.

None of that means it would not be a fantastic thing to have such a building……just like it would to have Sydney Opera House on the side of the Leeds and Liverpool canal near Tesco

[ChrisG]

Yes, good post. Stone cladding and/or well disguised concrete can be used in place of stone. It needs to be done well though

Market forces are a driving force but we need to more carefully factor in non tangible costs, as well as the durability of the material. If we have to knock down another modernist monstrosity in 40 years any savings made in construction will have been a waste of time. There are multiple non tangible benefits to building with traditional materials in traditional.styles.

Burnley is desperate for better architecture. The 60s and 70s monstrosities really do sap the life and energy out of the place.

Absolutely, which is what I was alluding to when I mentioned whole life cycle costing, as stone could work out cheaper long term. The issue is that the current method of funding projects relies on short term yields, with a view to 'flipping' a building after 5 to 10 years.

For a site such as this, you could argue a civic building would be better, but local authorities are need to find the upfront costs from somewhere, and this is the thorny issue. The last thing we want are more PFI schemes. So you're looking at a private developer, funded by a pension fund investor.

It's the wider financial model that is ultimately making our town centres 'identikit'.

[helmclaret]

Rowls could you contact BLM and maybe ask them to fund it?

[aggi]

Not a public building to my knowledge but planning laws mean that a public body will have the power to veto anything and it dictate the style of the building.

What you say about budgets and local authorities us true, but it shows a lack of understanding about how ugly and cheap building actually destroy social fabric and damage mental health. These costs need to be taken into account.

Obviously that's a very simplistic view that isn't the case at all.

But even if it were the case you'd just end up with a white elephant of a site that wouldn't get any development.

But really this just goes back to my surprise that you're not all free market in this area.

[dougcollins]

Surely we realise its one thing to sandblast existing stone, and quite another to quarry enough for a new 200 bed hotel????

Just need to speak to Skipton Properties, they've quarried enough in the last ten years to build a small town.

It's there if you want it.

[Walton]

I like how Rowls became a fan of traditional architecture in roughly the same period the, ahem, "classical liberal" Culture Critic Twitter account took off.

[ŽižkovClaret]

Just need to speak to Skipton Properties, they've quarried enough in the last ten years to build a small town.

It's there if you want it.

They're just giving it away for free i expect, eh?

[Tribesmen]

They're just giving it away for free i expect, eh?

None of us know until you ask i would say .

[Rowls]

https://twitter.com/createstreets/statu ... 6544708054

[Rileybobs]

https://twitter.com/createstreets/statu ... 6544708054

What are you getting at with this Rowls?

[Rowls]

What are you getting at with this Rowls?

Well I don't know how to say any more than the words that are already there Rileybobs.

What I'm saying is the words that accompany the image.

[Rileybobs]

Well I don't know how to say any more than the words that are already there Rileybobs.

What I'm saying is the words that accompany the image.

These houses aren’t really anything unique. You will see new build housing like this up and down the country. Usually on smaller sites or those within conservation areas or sometimes just at a prominent site frontage. A critical person may actually point out that a different batch of brickwork, or maybe a different coloured mortar halfway up the gable wall would prevent this from being a truly beautiful building but I’m nitpicking.

But what is the comparison with a new-build, 4 bed, £800k house in Wiltshire (only the front elevation of which has been built with natural stone) with an 8(?) storey hotel building in Burnley?

[Rileybobs]

Also I’m not sure those windows would fail Part O regs, and I doubt the author does, unless they know room dimensions and building orientation etc. But obviously we live differently than we did in Georgian times, so designing buildings in this style, whilst easy on the eye, is not always the most practical - and the intention of Part O is to create comfortable buildings to live in.

[dougcollins]

What are you getting at with this Rowls?

What I would say is that they look way out of the budget of the majority of people in Burnley.

So what is your point Rowls? You can build nice houses for those that can afford them?

[Walton]

After all this, has anyone seen that there's no big name hotel backer, the plans are pie in the sky, and this will almost certainly never come to fruition?

https://www.burnleyexpress.net/business ... nt-4639323

[BurnleyFC]

Yeah, I have my doubts it’ll ever come to fruition.

Does anybody know who this Mr Hagan is, and what companies he actually already owns?

[Tw@]

Yes it’s Chris Hagan and his company is Unique X.
His mum was a teacher at Ivy Bank when I was there and he often landed in a helicopter near Applecross drive as his parents lived on there.

[Rowls]

What I would say is that they look way out of the budget of the majority of people in Burnley.

So what is your point Rowls? You can build nice houses for those that can afford them?

The point is there in the words that accompany the images.

Some people have become so downtrodden and accepting of bad and ugly architecture that not only are they accepting of it, they even seem to view it as somehow "inevitable".

It isn't. There is a choice here. If enough people have enough courage, they can decide to build something beautiful.

The Victorians did it. So can we.

[Rileybobs]

The point is there in the words that accompany the images.

Some people have become so downtrodden and accepting of bad and ugly architecture that not only are they accepting of it, they even seem to view it as somehow "inevitable".

It isn't. There is a choice here. If enough people have enough courage, they can decide to build something beautiful.

The Victorians did it. So can we.

So are you saying that we don’t build beautiful buildings today? I mean, you’ve just posted an image of a new build house which I’m assuming you think is aesthetically pleasing. Were all Victorian-era buildings beautiful? Have you ever seen Victorian slum houses?

I think you’re making quite a jump from people who don’t think an 8 storey hotel building should be rebuilt in a Victorian style with stone to people who are accepting that it should be re-built ugly.

[bfcjg]

Yes it’s Chris Hagan and his company is Unique X.
His mum was a teacher at Ivy Bank when I was there and he often landed in a helicopter near Applecross drive as his parents lived on there.

Just Googled it, his company is pretty impressive I should imagine he could easily fund the development.

[Big Vinny K]

Bat sh-it crazy thread.

If only we were all courageous enough to not stand for cheap housing. We should all tie ourselves to the railings of the pebble dash factory.

Come and join our protest group and please donate via #juststopbreezeblock

Please donate what you can but preferably make it millions as we will need it to buy the random stone and accoya window frames. Hopefully if we reach £10m we can build 3 houses in Burnley which will go a long way in sorting the housing crisis.

I just wish Rowls was this much of a woke snowflake when it came to other more important things.

[chipbutty]

It's still spelt KEIRBY!

[helmclaret]

I’d love to see Rowl’s sprawling Victorian estate he lives on.

[aggi]

I live in a victorian house and it does have nice features such as the high ceilings and fireplaces. But, in the winter, I can leave the heating on all day and it still won't get warmer than 18 degrees.

[Rowls]

I’d love to see Rowl’s sprawling Victorian estate he lives on.

I'd love for you to try and engage intelligently just once in a while. It seems that the more sensibly I post, the dafter and more personal your responses become. Not just on this thread either.

Why?

[helmclaret]

I said at the start of this thread, building in stone is far too expensive these days for a hotel development of this nature.

You somehow want to believe we can go back to the Victorian times, but unfortunately, it’s not going to happen.

And, no need to get personal.

[Rowls]

The insistence that building something beautiful and traditional is somehow beyond the people of Burnley is as absurd as it is patronizing and also self-limiting.

Here is Dresden, Germany. Everything here is a new build:



Here is an entirely new town in Guatamala:



Here is King Charles' personal project, Poundbury, in the UK:



Here is a website documenting countless examples of newly built traditional architecture from all around the globe:

https://newtrad.org/

Here is an article listing the benefits of traditional architecture grounded in local materials versus the awfulness of modernism and brutalist architecture:

https://aeon.co/essays/the-architectura ... over-again

According to many people who claim Burnley somehow cannot have beautiful or traditional buildings. It simply isn't done. Or it's too expensive.

Yet all of these examples show that's not true. What is needed is something very simple - the will of people to insist that Burnley and the people of Burnley deserve better than shoddy, ugly buildings like the Keirby.

It needs a bit of ambition and it will need a shake up in priorities. But as these examples ALL show, the only thing stopping it from happening is a lack of desire to make it happen.

Let's hope the new owner and Burnley council refuse to let defeatism go unchallenged and instead build something that inspires pride in the town. The people of Burnley deserve so much better.

[Rileybobs]

According to many people who claim Burnley somehow cannot have beautiful or traditional buildings. It simply isn't done. Or it's too expensive.

The problem with your argument is that absolutely nobody is claiming that. Interesting that you prefer to construct your men with straw, which is cheap and readily available, but also not very robust.

[Rowls]

Let's put a picture of the Keirby next to it just so we can see the difference:



Beautiful architecture in traditional styles CAN be built. But first, we need to defeat the defeatism of the naysayers who claim otherwise. If we don't we'll end up with a town full of cheap plastic clad buildings like the St. Peters Centre and Pioneer Place. Chances are, they'll look as grotty as the Keirby in 30-40 years time.

But in contrast those ugly buildings, does anyone imagine the town hall won't still be a grand and awe-inspiring sight in 30-40 years time? No. Of course not. The town hall will be impressive and reflect pride in the town if we're lucky enough to have it still standing in 1000 years time.

That's yet another reason why we need to return to architecture that has a true sense of pride and place - because when you build something like the town hall it could last for hundreds of years. Build another shocker like the Keirby and we'll be pulling it all down again in 40 - 50 years.

[Rowls]

The problem with your argument is that absolutely nobody is claiming that. Interesting that you prefer to construct your men with straw, which is cheap and readily available, but also not very robust.

People most clearly are saying it "can't be done". On this thread.

[Rileybobs]

People most clearly are saying it "can't be done". On this thread.

I don’t think a single person has said that the current Keirby Hotel building can’t be replaced with a beautiful building, have they? Who has said that?

[Clovius Boofus]

Can we please leave this argument well alone. We did it to death upthread. Every time there is new a post on here I open the thread in the hope that there's an update regarding the hotel, and I'm sure I'm not the only one.

[clarethomer]

I could see there being a nice modern glass fronted building looking nice there to be honest with all the new paving and work taking place

May even finish the paths before its built.

Screenshot 2024-05-28 at 19.16.16.jpg (364.37 KiB) Viewed 2134 times

[Roger1960]

It’s fine arguing that a new development should be an architectural masterpiece using local materials such as the town hall but that ignores future obsolescence of the use . Go inside the offices in the town hall as I have and you see how impractical and unsuitable they are as modern office space. To create a building as some people advocate that will last 100+ years is utterly pointless as it will be obsolete within 50 as time and technology move on so developers look at getting a return on their money within the expected timescale of the buildings use usually 25-50 years max and probably less now. Almost anything will be better than the keirby and what replaces it won’t be there for ever so don’t get too hung up on it. Also re it being a brand hotel , any brand specifies with millimetre detail how the internal room spaces are to be laid out and that tends to determine the external shell design

[claptrappers_union]

That whole area needs flattening to be fair. Its an eyesore.

[Goliath]

It’s fine arguing that a new development should be an architectural masterpiece using local materials such as the town hall but that ignores future obsolescence of the use . Go inside the offices in the town hall as I have and you see how impractical and unsuitable they are as modern office space. To create a building as some people advocate that will last 100+ years is utterly pointless as it will be obsolete within 50 as time and technology move on so developers look at getting a return on their money within the expected timescale of the buildings use usually 25-50 years max and probably less now. Almost anything will be better than the keirby and what replaces it won’t be there for ever so don’t get too hung up on it. Also re it being a brand hotel , any brand specifies with millimetre detail how the internal room spaces are to be laid out and that tends to determine the external shell design

Hasn't 'The Landmark' the old building near Sainsbury's been converted into exactly that. A modern shared office space? That's far from obsolete.

[forzagranata]

Have you ever been to Budapest Rowls?

A lot of new builds and refurbs in a beautiful, traditional style befitting the city and its heritage - after 40 years of communist crap and 20 years of cheapo 'western' glass office buildings.

It really can be done.