I don't like it, from a pure brutalistic view point this obviously doesn't make any sense, it isn't practical and it doesn't make any effort to create a shape that is esthetically pleasing. The urban decay is even more outrageous, the whole appeal of urban decay is that it is "real", it's the thinking about all of people that went through the same structure throughout the years. Of cause it doesn't mean you can't make art about or featuring urban decay, but you have to be smart about it.
If you want to get a feel of what brutalist architecture is like up close, go to the Barbican in london if you can.
Its quite surreal. Very much in-your-face concrete exposure. Yet, to walk and experience it with your eyes is a study of contrasts: a giant, comparitively modern, greenhouse, has a glass roof open to the sky and yet many floors have no light or windows at all. And in the outdoor spaces, like the fountain/canal running through the complex the concrete will sort of be in the background and lets you focus on everything else: the water, the swans and the people around.
Juxtapose that to low hanging exposed concrete roofs and walls in closed passages could make one feel constrained/claustrophobic/yearning for light.
This man poured concrete around a power strip, chemically aged copper with ammonia, rusted rebar with peroxide, faked a damaged cable for vibes, and vibrated out the air bubbles with a dildo. This is the most unhinged and delightful Show HN I've ever seen.
My favorite map is ‘One Need Not Be a House’ by Robert Yang, which was inspired by Louis Kahn's "brick brutalism" masterpieces in Bangladesh and India, as well as contemporary level design like The Silent Cartographer. The artist writes about their process on their blog post, https://www.blog.radiator.debacle.us/2026/01/one-need-not-be...
The map jam is standalone and uses custom assets so you don’t need a copy of Quake to enjoy it. Check the website for the ‘standalone’ variant.
Oh man... I've never worked with concrete, but I would love to make a desk stand that looked like a little montréal métro station. They're all rather brutalist, and have flat tops haha
yeah i really want to try and make something like this. I was thinking of getting some spraypaint and making it look like part of it had been tagged with graffiti. Maybe one edge is broken so it looks like something I just found. I don't have the faintest idea of architecture styles, just thinking what would look cool and contrast with polished, refined, technology like a macbook or something.
Personally I just switched to TKL keyboards (no numpad). While I did use it occasionally, it wasn't often enough to feel inconvenienced without it... All the buttons are still there after all, and if I'm already at home row, it isn't any slower.
May be worth considering too, especially if you're looking for a good keyboard with eg magnetic switches vs shitty rubberdome
Yeah I would suggest you stick some wood on your left side of your current keyboard, for a few days to see if you can adapt... I always used that space as a resting place, so having it occupied totally broke my flow.
(If I needed a numpad I would have it standing alone.. those are easy to find)
I went to https://www.keyboardco.com/ and searched for left-handed and the keyboard in the photo popped up, as well as a bunch of weirder and wonderfuler ones.
It's not clear what the change is, whether it is curation by hand or some other metrics, but it's a positive change, the old Show HN was getting flooded, as recently discussed. ( Although I can't work out how to find that discussion. )
I wonder what the practical limit is on how thin and light you can make concrete for non-structural items? I can see someone selling concrete mugs on Etsy, for example. Maybe with clever use of fillers and thin walls you could have a version of this you could actually lift. It looks great, especially in contrast to a white IKEA-style office.
Re: decay, I regret not taking more photos of the final days of the RBS "Ziggurat": https://www.edinburghlive.co.uk/news/edinburgh-news/stark-ph... ; at the end it had plants growing from much of the upper levels, making it look extremely Horizon Zero Dawn.
People who make concrete counter tops use a lot of fibreglass fillers to get them fairly thin but if you wanted it truly light weight you’d probably need to make it out of a dense foam and coat it with something that looks like concrete.
oh wow that takes me back. I remember touring, i think it was Texas A&M, in HS and they showed off their "concrete canoe" to the group. This would have been in the late 1900s.. 1995 or around there.
At first I thought you were talking about an actual rotating fan, which would be an awesome addition to this. Just a small PC fan running at a very low RPM built into the side in a circular cutout, with that worn metal patina look.
Never mind placing it, bringing it to the place where it should be, er, placed might also be a challenge. Unless you can drive a forklift into your office...
Same method though. There's a plethora of vibrating things to choose from. I suppose you could mold a large silicone tentacle to put on a jackhammer, too, and use that to fish for bubbles in your cement soup. Call the tool what you want, you haven't changed the method.
This is pretty cool looking, I like it, it must be really heavy though.
> For a medium-sized piece like this, a vibrating dildo is actually the best thing to use. Just think of it like any other power tool.For a medium-sized piece like this, a vibrating dildo is actually the best thing to use. Just think of it like any other power tool.
I used work on foundations for warehouses, huge concrete blocks as anchor points and this is exactly how we got the bubbles out, we had a huge metal vibrator they call them high-frequency concrete pokers.
My laptop has little rubber feet, so it dosn't scratch on its underside. But yes, the piece is solid concrete, so you wouldn't want to bash anything fragile against it.
Should have stolen a broken piece of concrete off a street and repurpose it to be a laptop stand. At least that would be authentic, and contributing to urban decay at his location.
Yes, Sam is probably just having a bit of fun here, but I think it's worth presenting brutalism correctly as it's often so misunderstood.
Concrete is simply the mass production medium of the time, many of the patterns and moulds used in Barbican for example feature pretty timber imprints, scalloping patterns, painstakingly pick-hammered textured panels, or pleasing swooping shapes.
Further there is always space for glass, brass, Terrazzo and lighting.
Sam's design does feel cold, unnatural and broken, definitely not what brutalist living is about.
> cold, unnatural and broken, definitely not what brutalist living is about.
This can often be the actual experience of it, though. Part of why it's so divisive. Personally I'm on the "looks great, wouldn't want to actually live there" side.
The Barbican is an example of how good it can be when properly maintained by a community. There are plenty of less prestigious examples where the community cheered their demolition.
My subjective appreciation of building materials depends essentially on how gracefully they age. I find that concrete does not age well... and dislike brutalism for this specific reason.
Most brutalism was never intended to last. It was intended to be a quick/cheap answer to get people acceptable housing in the cities. Then they would build something nicer for people to live in as the economy gets richer. Which is why it so often is associated with decay these days - the structure still stands, but it has outlasted the expected lifespan.
There are burtalism structures that were intended to be beautiful and last. They do that well (well beauty is in the eye of the beholder), but the majority was quick and cheap above all else.
My understanding of brutalism is that it’s an extreme interpretation of “function over form”. The most brutalist laptop stand would be a cardboard box turned upside down, not a slightly impractical block of concrete carefully manufactured to evoke a certain aesthetic.
I love concrete as a medium but that's got to be heavy af and I would manage to smack my elbow on it all the time as well as smash my coffee mug on it.
That's debatable, but it's a moot point; it's pastiche, so it doesn't have the same goals or motivations as the original.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pastiche
Its quite surreal. Very much in-your-face concrete exposure. Yet, to walk and experience it with your eyes is a study of contrasts: a giant, comparitively modern, greenhouse, has a glass roof open to the sky and yet many floors have no light or windows at all. And in the outdoor spaces, like the fountain/canal running through the complex the concrete will sort of be in the background and lets you focus on everything else: the water, the swans and the people around.
Juxtapose that to low hanging exposed concrete roofs and walls in closed passages could make one feel constrained/claustrophobic/yearning for light.
My favorite map is ‘One Need Not Be a House’ by Robert Yang, which was inspired by Louis Kahn's "brick brutalism" masterpieces in Bangladesh and India, as well as contemporary level design like The Silent Cartographer. The artist writes about their process on their blog post, https://www.blog.radiator.debacle.us/2026/01/one-need-not-be...
The map jam is standalone and uses custom assets so you don’t need a copy of Quake to enjoy it. Check the website for the ‘standalone’ variant.
Sorry for derailing! Cool laptop stand!
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Station_Radisson_Met...
I've been looking and looking, but the best I can find is using a narrow keyboard with a separate number-pad only keyboard on the left. I'm in the US.
(It's better for your right shoulder to keep the mouse closer to your body like in the picture.)
May be worth considering too, especially if you're looking for a good keyboard with eg magnetic switches vs shitty rubberdome
(If I needed a numpad I would have it standing alone.. those are easy to find)
[1] https://www.posturite.co.uk/left-handed-mechanical-keyboard
I am indeed a right-handed user, which is why I want my mouse within reach on the right.
found this one as well, don't know the brand: https://www.bloodyusa.com/product.php?pid=11&id=166
It's not clear what the change is, whether it is curation by hand or some other metrics, but it's a positive change, the old Show HN was getting flooded, as recently discussed. ( Although I can't work out how to find that discussion. )
You need a proper Soviet-esque workstation of a laptop to sit on that concrete block - go get yourself a nice, chunky ThinkPad T530.
Re: decay, I regret not taking more photos of the final days of the RBS "Ziggurat": https://www.edinburghlive.co.uk/news/edinburgh-news/stark-ph... ; at the end it had plants growing from much of the upper levels, making it look extremely Horizon Zero Dawn.
You could likely also pour something like this out of aircrete, which would make it a lot lighter even at the same thickness
But I love the hacker feel of it.
EDIT: https://store.steampowered.com/app/870780/Control_Ultimate_E...
The maze level on the original game has to be an all-time best level design.
https://www.amazon.com/s?k=concrete+vibrator
> For a medium-sized piece like this, a vibrating dildo is actually the best thing to use. Just think of it like any other power tool.For a medium-sized piece like this, a vibrating dildo is actually the best thing to use. Just think of it like any other power tool.
I used work on foundations for warehouses, huge concrete blocks as anchor points and this is exactly how we got the bubbles out, we had a huge metal vibrator they call them high-frequency concrete pokers.
Concrete is simply the mass production medium of the time, many of the patterns and moulds used in Barbican for example feature pretty timber imprints, scalloping patterns, painstakingly pick-hammered textured panels, or pleasing swooping shapes.
Further there is always space for glass, brass, Terrazzo and lighting.
Sam's design does feel cold, unnatural and broken, definitely not what brutalist living is about.
https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/gallery/2016/feb/22...
https://www.structuralrenovations.co.uk/portfolio/barbican-e...
https://www.barbicanliving.co.uk/barbican-story/construction...
This can often be the actual experience of it, though. Part of why it's so divisive. Personally I'm on the "looks great, wouldn't want to actually live there" side.
The Barbican is an example of how good it can be when properly maintained by a community. There are plenty of less prestigious examples where the community cheered their demolition.
There are burtalism structures that were intended to be beautiful and last. They do that well (well beauty is in the eye of the beholder), but the majority was quick and cheap above all else.
Imo brutalism is monolithic and unyielding. This is opposite, with the sturdy concrete yielding into plant overgrowth and exposed rebar.
I think a "clean" and "contemporary" version of this would look amazing as well:
Along the lines of: https://www.modustrialmaker.com/blog/2018/8/14/making-an-imp...
Maybe with: (for weight) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foam_concrete (there are plenty of DIY versions of this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z4_GxPHwqkA
Loved the brutalist movie, this actually seems quite nice assthetically.
I appreciate++ the design except for the too-perfect rebar and the exposed wire directly _in_ the concrete. Pros would use a conduit methinks.