What a surprise -- an architecture critic hates big box stores.

Enthusiasts of big-box shopping will retort that this is so much elitist prattle. We're not interested in architectural delight; we want that $999 plasma TV -- and any niceties that raise the store's overhead are unnecessary and even unwelcome.

I think he's right about the architectural horrors of the big box, but I think he's off the mark by buying into the assumption that stores like Costco or Wal-Mart look that way because aesthetic "niceties" would raise the operating overhead. Look at the enormous parking lots of these places -- real estate is pricier than designers. No, the monumental inhuman ugliness is a deliberately engineered part of the big-box shopping experience. What stores are big and boxlike? Stores that purport to offer bargains. It's the same psychological trick that causes packaging on "generic" and store brands to be ugly. What, did you think they looked like that because puke green ink is cheaper than a nice burgundy color?

The innate unpleasantness of the experience is reassurance that you're getting the best possible price. You're making sacrifices, to get a bargain!

Oh, and speaking of architecture, I like the EMP, and hate the new Seattle Library. Which puts me in a small minority of...I don't know. Maybe five people?

But I have my reasons. My reasons for liking the EMP: it's completely weird, not even trying to be a normal building, and I respect that. It's made up of interesting curvy shapes and pretty colors. In spite of the weirdness, the interior seems fairly functional, and I feel comfortable when I'm inside it. That's pretty much all you can ask of a building.

My reasons for disliking the new library: it looks like any other mid-size office building, except more angular and hostile. The signature colors are all hot and insane. There were portions of my library experience where I felt completely swallowed by the color. Maybe I'm oversensitive, but I don't really want to get inside an elevator interior made entirely of pulsing yellow-green reminiscent of radioactive pus, or walk down a narrow hallway of lurid tomato-vomit red. Also, the actual books in the new library seem not merely an afterthought, but actually horribly out of place. Their rough earth tones clash with the color scheme, jarring against all the slick designer shapes, like an embarrassing and smelly old uncle crashing a hip New York loft party. It's a post-book library, a library for the Fahrenheit 451 dystopia.

There is no comfortable space in the interior -- nowhere to sit, work, or even stand. I felt anxious and alienated the entire time I was inside it, and after I had seen everything, I left immediately.

On a final note: I have finally decided that I would rather own a Craftsman than a Victorian, should I ever be in a position to purchase a house.