GRLaker

The tower is phase II. The first finished product will be the square section.

This location would be perfect for a 12-14 story mixed-use tower. Perfect size land, right behind all of the west side development, and right down the road from GVSU, MSU, and Spectrum Health. Make it happen, Rockford.

Based on the location and the fact that I've yet to meet anyone that actually likes the concept of it, I get the feeling that it won't take long for this thing to go down hill - much like any other Land owned property. I hope I'm wrong.

Upon looking again, it was more of a slight L. The overhang on the top made it look like it stuck out on the street side, which made me think it was T-shaped. Yep - there it is. It's no masterpiece, but I like it more than the most up-to-date design (assuming that is going to be the look).

I don't mean to say that those buildings are products of architectural genius by any means. However, they at least have some shape to them beyond looking like a lego block. The Amway has the angled roof along with the stair-like look on the north side. River House at least has some curvature with the cut-in at the top to give it some shape. It really doesn't take much to make a blah building a little less blah. We may be an architectural backwater - like x99 stated - but honestly, these buildings take zero creativity. Straight lines up and longer straight lines across. Building designed. For this project, I just honestly think they had a better design the first time around. Sure, it was still boxy, but it at least had a T shape, an overhang at the top, and balconies. It was far less blah than the final product. Oh my...I completely forgot about Ransom Towers. That thing is a scourge to our skyline. Also, at this rate, we might be approaching that picture's status soon.

I'm obviously way behind on this project, as the last rendering I had seen for this was the one in MLive. Big disappointment in my book. I'm honestly over these elongated rectangles with zero character that are now dominating the GR landscape. How have we gone from buildings like the Amway Grand, River House, DeVos Center, and the JW to nothing but lego blocks? I was drawing buildings like this in 7th grade when I had dreams of becoming an architect. Now we have actual professionals drawing up this crap. It beats an empty lot...But this was a big swing and miss, IMHO.