Are these Taiwan’s nicest looking petrol stations?
Day to day architecture in Taiwan is pretty hit and miss, featuring by far more misses than hits.
Outside of the nation’s artistically gorgeous temples and the well-known landmarks, what you’re left with is a drab moldy mess of raw concrete and bathroom tiles.
Not to be completely written off though, on occasion Taiwan still manages throw a diamond in the rough your way.
One such example was this pair of CPC petrol stations I stumbled across in the northern reaches of Miaoli’s Jhunan Township:
Situated literally in the middle of nowhere on a service road between Gongyi Road (route 13) and the West Coast Highway (route 64), the two stations are pretty much identical to eachother and boast a distinct German looking design.
I’m not sure if “German looking design” is the correct architectural term, but when I look at them I can’t help but think “old style Euro-pub”, which is what I guess the owner was going for.
And while they might not win any design awards anytime soon, I think the “wtf” factor the two buildings brings to the area cements them as attractive landmarks in their own right.
Too bad you’ve got to go out into the sticks to see buildings like this! Why the greater population at large put little to no thought into the buildings they live and work in I have no idea…
February 25th, 2013 at 1:43 pm Olaf(Quote)
“Too expensive” – at least that is the reason I often hear, when I ask why something isn’t made nicer. The first priority is “cheap”, not “nice” or “good”.
February 25th, 2013 at 1:47 pm Oz(Quote)
I’m no building expert but surely you can leave the “cheap” interior intact and spend not all that much to make the outside not look like an unfinished cement box?
I’ve seen more attractive construction sites of regular buildings that weren’t even finished yet compared to Taiwan’s boxes.
February 25th, 2013 at 3:14 pm mike(Quote)
Wife: “Darling, shouldn’t we save what little money we have? As long as we have a roof over our heads, that’s what counts right?”
Husband “No! We must extend our indebtedness further to make our house look like “German Looking Design”, or at least to not look like an unfinished cement box, so that we may not mildly vex or unnecessarily furrow the brows of the future foreigner English teacher known as “Oz” of Ozsoapbox blog.”
Something like that.
Anyway, the “unfinished cement boxes” tend to be the older houses that were built in the (I guess) ’50s and ’60s when cost really was the overriding concern. Down here in the south, there are lots of new (i.e. last couple of years), relatively cheap terraced houses that follow the same basic layout as the older houses they replaced but which have more modern facades and look similar to modern houses in the West.
Even before those, there were apartment buildings built during the ’80s and ’90s that had some obvious finishing to them precisely in order to look more attractive. I’ve lived in two of them: one in Kaohsiung and one in Tainan.
It may be that, for a variety of reasons, there are less new houses and apartment buildings built in the north. Not sure.
February 25th, 2013 at 4:08 pm Chububobcat(Quote)
I am not sure about the greater Taipei area – well pretty much the entire northern half of the country, but in Taichung and if you look for them as far north as Taoyuan there are a lot of more modern western influenced houses.
Where I lived before in Taichung the houses in the entire community were like some french chateau although they were much smaller. Their interiors on the other hand were your basic white walled insane asylums spin offs, but after you added some effort and did a little repainting they were too bad.
Now if you really want to see what should be considered a concrete box, you need to go to mainland China. There even the most expensive houses are concrete boxes with pretty paper laid over them. Taiwan has good reason for building houses the way they do, with typhoons and earthquakes being about as common as a cold, the houses need to be able to stand up to the high winds and strong enough to shake off an earthquake.
China doesn’t have those problem, their issue is they don’t take pride in ownership other than the “look at me I have enough money to BUY a house (read apartment/condo).” they don’t have the same respect for the house as a home that we in the “western” cultures have.
I really feel bad for Chinese people because they can’t afford to have better houses, and can’t understand the reasons for not living in a large prison cell style house.
If I could figure out how to post pictures I could show you what Chinese houses are like… for the average person.
February 26th, 2013 at 1:01 am CPC(Quote)
CPC themselves can’t be doing too badly financially – what is their excuse for shabby and outdated looking gas stations? They look like they are way overdue for a new and modern look. They also have a 1970′s look to them.
February 26th, 2013 at 1:54 pm Oz(Quote)
@mike
Up north apart from the luxury condos going up there isn’t so much new development as a whole bunch of rennovations going on. I figure it’s not like you’re strapped for cash if you’re rennovating your place.
And not just a paintjob either, they go the whole nine yards and have a construc team there for a week or more ripping the place apart.
Yet when it’s rebuilt outside is just a vivider shade of grey.
Dunno what they’re doing inside but rennovation/remodelling of one’s home rarely seems to include the exterior. And it’s a shame because for all the planning they do on the streets and with parks and what not, 99% of the buildings look like moldy slums.
I’ve actually starting collecting examples of particularly dirty buildings I come across (big ones), so look out for that in a future article.
You can link to the pictures or use HTML to embed but that’s bad badnwidth manners it’s not your hosting.
And surely disaster proof doesn’t mean aesthetic design goes out the window? I’ve taken to gardening (indoor and outdoor) to try and alleviate some of the drab.
No idea. Most of them look like regular stations I’d have thought (or maybe I’m out of date?).
One thing they haven’t really capitalised on though is the whole “mini convenience store” thing. Although I think that might have to do with them still having pump service.
Encouraging people to park and stay at petrol stations in Taiwan probably isn’t a good idea. Other than that though, what else are they lacking behind in?
February 26th, 2013 at 4:54 pm Chububobcat(Quote)
I’m not defending the crappy outlook of their houses, just saying that they put more effort into prevention than presentation. Still some of them in the south are really nice, and a few places that turned out to be custom built are really decent. The problem is finding these places.
Actually as you said I have been taking pictures of houses that I consider a detriment to human society as whole by even considering them houses. And was planning to places them in my blog as well. I try not to hotlink other people’s content because of bandwidth issues.
February 26th, 2013 at 6:02 pm mike(Quote)
You need before/after pictures to evince your point, Oz. I can’t recall ever seeing a single example of a house rennovated into a “vivider shade of grey”. Here in the south quite a few of the older concrete-box type houses are painted in strong colours (blue, orange, green, yellow etc) but these are mostly out in the countryside (e.g. on the Pingtung peninsula).
A broader point: aesthetic enjoyment arises through a reflection of integrated values. A car, for example, is a reflection of integrated values: the owner’s efforts that were necessary to buy it, the freedom of movement it bestows and maybe the owner’s personality (what type of car and what colour).
Nobody takes the time to paint their toilet an unusual colour, like blue for instance. Why? Because a toilet does not reflect an important integration of values, but is usually regarded instead as a mere functional requirement of a house.
By the same token, it may simply be that most Taiwanese people don’t paint their houses pretty colours because… they regard houses as large, expensive but necessary instruments by which living becomes easier.
February 26th, 2013 at 10:16 pm mike(Quote)
Or it might simply be that, among those people who do care about the aesthetics of their house, they simply choose an easier and cheaper method than wholesale rennovation, e.g. buying plants.
February 27th, 2013 at 11:41 am lemmiwinks(Quote)
That’s (sort of) Tudor style. It’s also an abomination!
February 27th, 2013 at 12:17 pm Oz(Quote)
@mike
Imagine your typical grey block house, surrounded by other block houses (which are really multi-story apartments).
Now one day the rennovators rock up, tear everything down, cover it up with plastic sheets etc. Work goes on for a few weeks loud as hell and when they’re done, everything is shiny and new… but it’s still just a grey box.
I’m not talking about houses that are built, I’m talking about people putting in the effort to renovate their places but still wind up with just a newer looking grey box.
That’s what I don’t get. It’s almost as if a grey non-descript boxes as a design is desirable here.
That said, architecture in the south of Taiwan sounds a lot more creative than the north.
February 28th, 2013 at 4:18 pm jet(Quote)
Those petrol stations look pretty horrible to me. Kind of like a theme park. I will never understand why someone would care what other people’s houses look like!!
March 11th, 2013 at 12:31 pm TaiwanTeacher(Quote)
Ok… there might be no accounting for taste nor practicality amongst those posting here, aside from Mike and Chubu. I think Oz has stumbled upon something rather pleasant. None of you have seen the Dutch windmill styled place in Hualien, have you? It’s nice enough.
And, I’m rather surprised that Mike didn’t pull out his “Editor-in-Chief” hat and point out that the phrase is “lagging behind” not “lacking behind”, along with Oz’s error of “using a preposition to finish a sentence with.” LOL (Obviously, Oz is tired and needed a break in the action. Congrats to him for taking some time off.)
March 12th, 2013 at 11:15 am Oz(Quote)
Ah yeah that’s supposed to read “lagging”, dunno what happened there.
March 12th, 2013 at 12:04 pm TaiwanTeacher(Quote)
As for me, I NEBER type so fadt taht I make mistaks! LPL!