My goodness, how ugly those stalls are – and they’re going to be permanent, not set up each morning
Times of Malta’s print edition today has a photograph of one of the new market stalls that will be set up outside Parliament House. It is absolutely hideous.
They are shoddily put together to an execrable design from marine ply, black metal tubing and plastic sheeting, and the bas relief Maltese cross is repeated a full six times right across the front – a sort of horror vacui.
The eight-pointed cross is not a pattern. It is a symbol. Patterns are repeated. Symbols are not.
The kings of lousy taste and horrid no-design have taken over.
Even basic functionality, an essential component of good design, has been laughably ignored. The stalls have plastic sheeting on three sides because of the rain, but then they have a completely flat canvas roof. And we all know what happens to flat canvas roofs in the rain (well, apparently we don’t all know): they puddle up with rain and you have to use a pole or stick to push up from beneath and throw the water off – onto customers and other stalls.
Worse still, these stalls – which are not stalls at all but pop-up shops – will not be dismantled but left in situ permanently, ruining the ‘open view’ concept of the Piano project with their hideousness and obstruction.
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I hope to see Kenneth Zammit Tabona next to Minister Joe Mizzi when he inaugurates those stalls in Ordnance Street.
Like this:
http://www.maltatoday.com.mt/ui_frontend/thumbnail/684/0/img_20141229_110606.jpg
I’m sure that as I write this our Ken Kitten is preparing an op ed for Times of Malta on the matter of the stalls.
You never know – he will be there with the middle finger pointed towards everything that Renzo Piano symbolizes.
You never know, Labour Party supporters and switchers might like the design.
Dawn il-latrini l-ġodda fejn nistaw inpixxu ?
Iva, anke jkakku fihom jispiccaw.
It is.
I really cannot imagine vendors diligently closing off the stall in ‘decorated plywood’ when what they actually do is keep stock inside boxes easily accessible below the main surface around the perimeter.
We’ll have them lined up next to Ferreria AND alongside the theatre up to St.James. Horor vacui’s an understatement.
One gust of the Med’s finest and…
Parking in the ditch and obviously the ‘redesign’ of the kiosks and those concrete shelters next.
Taghna lkoll, Daphne. That we never aspire to anything but this.
One gust of the Med’s finest might do what the good sense of those who clearly do not have it should have done – do away with this horror.
No doubt there would be additions to and improvisations with this grand design, shelves and some sort of counter top perhaps.
But that’s exactly it, absolutely clear vendors weren’t consulted.
And I wouldn’t blame the workers at Marsa garage either, they had some of the best carpenters.
There’s also that other defect of having the stalls lean against each other up the incline.
It’s plausible all of ten minutes were spent on this exercise, and in a very bad mood.
I seem to remember the first lecture of Engineering 101 and something about triangle being the strongest structure.
I can’t see a single triangle.
“No doubt there would be additions to and improvisations with this grand design, shelves and some sort of counter top perhaps.”
That metal structure is sufficiently strong to have a smart meter installed in there. Within a week of their inauguration, it will be Little Armier on Ordnance Street, making it Malta’s most exclusive address.
It will be justified as “the re-population of Valletta, the Capital of Culture 2018.”
Everything that’s happening in Malta confirms Winston Churchill”s uptake on socialism:
“Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the greed of ignorance and the gospel of envy”
Even though years have passed since Churchill’s time the same still applies today.
So that was the cunning plan of the Valletta Rehabilitation Committee.
Michela Spiteri must be proud.
I agree that the stall is hideous. But symbols can be used as patterns. You can see thousands of such crosses used as patterns in St. John’s Co-Cathedral.
Again, my God, who can come up with that sort of junk as a semi-permanent fixture in our capital?
[Daphne – I see another exhausting debate coming up. A shape can be used either as a symbol or as a pattern. Where it is clearly being used as a symbol (as on those stalls), it should not be repeated like a pattern, unless it is in heraldry, as with the fleur de lys. And incidentally, this is an entirely separate argument to the clumsy way in which the pattern has been built. It is so offensive aesthetically that find it actually painful to look at. Aesthetics are like musical composition: every note has to fit with the other to create a harmonious whole. It is not simply a matter of cobbling different elements together.]
Nies tal-ħabba gozz”,
I’d like to see those stalls in the wind.
You won’t. They’ll be somewhere over the rainbow.
No I do not agree, Jozef. The stalls will each be held down by erba kantuni and with coloured nylon rope.
The so called “Maltese Cross” is not even the correct shape and design.
Perit Lewis is more of an engineer / project manager. He is no good in design. Whose bright idea was it to engage him to design the stalls?
Kenneth Zammit Tabona.
Times of Malta gives the project ‘architect’ as Edward Lewis (it calls him William at one point). Is he an architect? Or is he the stand designer who was given a taghna lkoll appointment at MTA?
[Daphne – You need to read this website a little more attentively, Nighthawk: http://daphnecaruanagalizia.com/2015/01/taghna-lkoll-cronyism-update-william-lewis/ ]
Nighthawk, there is no such thing as architecture left in Malta, not when the faculty gives up to the ‘built environment’.
Political correctness cannot withstand truth.
I apologise for my lack of attention. I’m not used to being chastised but out of respect for your greater years I accept your criticism. (“Nighthawk is a bright boy but must talk less and pay attention in class”)
In fairness all these Taghna Lkoll Lewis’ can get a bit confusing.
There is also the Stand Designer Lewis you refer to in:
http://daphnecaruanagalizia.com/2015/01/from-political-appointment-to-permanent-fixture-on-the-state-payroll/
The Times of Malta article refers to the project architect alternately as William and Edward. So is it the stand designer Lewis or the Architect Lewis who has designed the stands? Are they brothers? Do we care? If it’s the architect, did he consult the stand designer?
[Daphne – The ‘stand designer’ you’re thinking of, who used to head Edward Zammit Lewis’s private secretariat, is called Edward ZAMMIT and not Edward Lewis. Edward Lewis does not exist. Times of Malta meant William Lewis but reporters are accustomed to writing ‘Edward (Zammit) Lewis’ and when you’re operating on semi-auto-pilot after an exhausting day, these things happen. William Lewis designed those stands. He is an architect and a Labour Party official. Thank you for clearing up the matter of my greater years. I was under the impression that you’re around 47 yourself. But then you must be another person of that name.]
Were they made in China?
[Daphne – No, they were made by the Public Works Department. If Malta Shipyard or Malta Drydocks were still functioning, they would have had them made there.]
Couldn’t they have at least asked the architecture or design students to come up with a concept design, with winner winning a summer traineeship with a leading architect?
Will the design and architecture students just bury their heads or will they petition for their removal or change.
Let’s not miss the important point. Ordnance Street and the vicinity of Parliament House is no place for a market, whatever the stalls look like.
If a first year student of architecture came up with such a pathetic, kitschy (non-) design it would have been marked F.
So what will happen is vendors emptying these carbuncles morning and afternoon, vans et al, AND still have the things everywhere late evening.
Nice.
Must be what V18 means; keep children away from the monstrous pornography about to beset the place.
Guess where the Krismis market is this winter.
Read Herman Grech’s excellent blog post on the subject:
http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20150130/blogs/the-monti-fication-of-renzo-piano.554033
‘Turning City Gate into a Marrakech market overnight is nothing but a national embarrassment.’
I don’t agree, it’s an intent.
Well perhaps he should have made this sort of consideration before campaigning for a Labour victory.
Ghandi bzonn wahda minnhom ghal fuq il-mansab, ghax il-MEPA qaltli li din li ghandi kerha.
http://292fc373eb1b8428f75b-7f75e5eb51943043279413a54aaa858a.r38.cf3.rackcdn.com/9470eb30b5c097a7404e46c6c5d85a6b954917015-1301581868-4d94902c-620×348.jpg
L-ghira bazwija jghid il-Malti. U hekk hu. Kull progett ta’ tisbieh li sar fi zmien il – PN qieghed jigi rrovinat – jew ma jinghatax attenzjoni misthoqqha jew jaraw kif jiddisprezzawh. Din hi Malta taghna lkoll? Shame on the PL and its leader.
You give them too much credit. I’m sure the bloody amateurs think it looks great. L-aqwa li rridu niddefendu l-kultura mill-Afrikani.
And if Marilwijz does the honours during their inauguration the hamallagni would be complete.
A design intended to denigrate the Maltese cross and the Piano project. Can you imagine the Maltese cross peeping out from behind a pair of crotchless undies? Oh the shame
From now on the answer to the question “what does the Maltese cross symbolise” is “the underwear stalls in front of the Piano Parliament in Malta.”
Is the GRTU OK with this? Is this what we will offer at the entrance of our Capital for Culture in 2018?
“The eight-pointed cross is not a pattern. It is a symbol. Patterns are repeated. Symbols are not.”
A repeated pattern gains additional meaning because it is repeated in unison with others. Example from our own ancestors- the Neolithic, repeated patterns meaning cycles of life:
https://web.infinito.it/utenti/m/malta_mega_temples/stattuet/spiral/spiralls.gif
A repeated symbol reduces meaning to a single, imposing, mindset much like a communist denominator. An example:
http://daphnecaruanagalizia.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/market-stalls.jpg
I know of no market that has its stalls up permanently unless it’s a closed market.
This is Joseph’s UFO project.
Manuel Mallia’s police cabin in Marsaskala was toppled over by the first self-respecting gale force wind.
These stalls will end up hanging off the ‘cheesegrater’ bits of Parliament House by March.
This Labour government seems to be in a state of temporary permanence. The new market stalls remind me of the Wied il-Ghajn Container Police Station.
They want to fix issues with duct tape – “U ijwa, just do something now so that the people will think we are working on resolving pressing issues” – when in fact, these cheap solutions end up costing more in the end.
Labour supporters who watch Super One news will be impressed by how creative ‘their’ government is. That’s what matters in the end cos they are the most loyal voters who will never switch.
This reminds me of the 80s during budget reading when the price of tonn taz-zejt and bulibijf went down by a cent or two. Wonder of wonders, Mintoff’s supporters at our grocer were not interested in the Mintoff-government-machinations of import-substitution and price-fixing. It was the tiny reduction that mattered.
Is a RED eight-pointed cross supposed to be a link to Malta or to Maltese culture?
It is only a link to superlative Maltese ignorance.
The eight-pointed cross of the Order of Malta is white – always and invariably WHITE.
The RED eight-pointed cross is the symbol of the Order of St Stephen of Tuscany. Are the stalls advertising Pisa?
They are a link only to Labour’s abysmal ignorance.
Where can I contact Giovanni Bonello?
The Italians call then ”Vesposiani” , the French,” Pissoirs”.
Nilbsu qalziet ta’ Piano … u n***aw fih.
Words cannot describe just how horrendous they are. I just hope that a strong gust of wind blows them away.
Il-M@d0nn@ xi kruha… those crosses! That’s kitsch taken to a new and unprecedented level.
Really a government of hamalli by hamalli for hamalli.
Back to the 80s. I’m getting images of Now23 cassettes for sale in these stalls (copies, of course). Oh well, il-baqra milli jkolla ttik!
I wouldn’t worry too much about their permanence. It looks to me like a good strong wind will take care of that soon enough.
I can see it coming. Tomorrow a statement will be issued by the Office of the Prime Minister informing us that he has personally intervened to scrap these stalls.
Carlo Schembri’s market-stall design on Facebook – and in Merchants Street. I know which I prefer.
https://www.facebook.com/269977473071993/photos/a.457749807628091.1073741825.269977473071993/608976682505402/?type=1&theater
Doesn’t the Rehabilitation Projects Office have anything to say about this slap in the face to Valletta and the iconic Piano project?
These people never understood the concept behind Piano’s design.
Many here are missing the wood from the trees.
The problem is nott the design of the stalls. Can’t you see that it’s a Joseph Muscat ploy?
[Daphne – I truly doubt that the prime minister would have had hideous stalls designed to veer the discussion off the market being there in the first place, Gahan. In any case, their ugliness just serves to make people angrier about the market being located there – yes, even Labour supporters and others who never gave it a second thought are now commenting on Facebook that it’s a shame they’re putting the market outside parliament house. Not because of the beauty of the building, you understand, but because it’s parliament house. And they have a good point there too.]
The discussion is not about flat plastic roofs, hollow section steel and red eight-pointed cross. It is about an aesthetically blasphemous proposal to have a PERMANENT flea market near a world-class architectural project which was supposed to put Malta on the map of contemporary architecture.
Please note that we were led to believe that the market would not be open on Sundays and would start from Republic Street towards South street.
I could have written that the “designer” made Barry’s mistake because between the theatre and parliament the road is on an incline, and those stalls will be leaning towards Republic Street.