December 2008 | Eyesore

Commentary on architectural blunders in monthly serial.

The Nesting Dolls shop on Route 9-D and Dutchess Co. Route 28, Hughsonville, NY. Like all highway commercial shlock, this enterprise is designed to attract maximum visual attention from the passing motorist. For the motorist, there is the saving grace of not having to look at it anymore once you've whizzed by. For the the people who have to live near the establishment, there is only chronic neurological assault. It has the further effect of both numbing and dumbing us down, so that we learn to accomodate visual aggression and then become, collectively, too dumb to know how corrosive it is for both individuals and the community. This would tend to not happen in a mainly pedestrian environment. If nothing else, vandalism would be the logical response. Someone would paint people having sex on top of those flourescent green cartoon mountains.

Thanks to James L. McIlhinney on New York City for the shot.