The Last New Wave with LoHi Mag

Nostalgia is an Abandoned Water Feature 

Owning a perfect piece of 1980s luxury furniture may not seem like an accomplishment to most, but to a millennial amid another housing crisis, it just might mean everything. As generations burdened by debt are mocked for their nostalgia, it’s no secret that most young adults will struggle against a pervasive fear that they may not ever really be able to own anything. Combine this psychological surrender with an increasingly sterile, post-pandemic world, it's no surprise that we’ve double-downed on sentimental stereotypes. 

Nostalgia is the abandoned water feature in your local dead mall. It’s the neverending infinity of the self-eating snake. It’s the warmth of a summer day with no responsibilities. It's a phenomenon that both recalls memories you've collectively shared and simulates ones that have never existed. A powerful tool for reimagining, nostalgia is often the lucid dream you don’t want to wake from. 

As we brave an accelerated future, it’s important we pause and realize the roles nostalgic influences play in our lives. Life without glass blocks, Art Deco architecture, and 80s luxury furniture just wouldn’t be the same. 

We Don’t Want This 

Violet Sky, driving a 1992 Camaro with an Instagram bio that reads “23 & livin’ like it's 1989, takes nostalgic fantasy to the next level. A living mannequin for the fashion trends of the decade of decadence, Violet sports Reebok Club Cs and acid-wash jeans as she hunts down lost designs of Americana’s past. Since her early teen years, she’s been blogging as @Glitterwave80s, dedicating every day to what she’s dubbed ‘the lifestyle’.

“I’ve cried over a McDonalds renovating before,” she laughs. 

Lamenting the recent demolition of an infamous postmodern lobby on Wall Street, New York, Violet describes her desire to explore these lost spaces. 

Wholly grasping the concept of mallstalgia, for Violet, the deader the better. “These malls that aren’t renovated, I’ll go there just to experience them, not to shop”. Her social media videos are hazy perfection, often picturing Violet and her friends prancing through liminal spaces that feature neon, skylights, and ornate columns. “It's the closest I'll ever be to standing in the 1980s. I value that so much in a world I feel kinda disconnected from.” 

Despite the odds, their romanticization is socially an element of rebellion, already majorly influencing today's commercial markets. 'Trust me, nostalgia sells', Violet protests online, referencing an untouched memphis-style Taco Bell lobby. She tags the fast food giant, hoping they'll notice the youth's plea to preserve one of their few remaining retro interiors. 

Living in a slightly delusional reality of vintage opulence seems to be working just fine for Violet and her friends. The old adage ‘if it's not broken, don’t fix it’ comes to mind. Do we really need so many obscure advancements that nobody seems to be asking for when the basics aren’t being addressed? The collective retro-dedication of today's youth appears to be screaming, “If this is the future you’re serving, we’re not buying it.” 

Florida is Heaven’s Postmodern Waiting Room 

A delulu fantasy in and of itself, Florida holds a reputation for being a place of escape—a paradise where one can enjoy an inexplicable atmosphere of urban beauty. If the state were to be personified as an interior, Florida is pretty much Heaven’s postmodern waiting room. 

Florida's real estate offers a diverse array of architectural styles, ranging from Art Deco to Neoclassical, Brutalist to Victorian, and Tropical Modern. Featuring single-family homes, coastal hotels, churches, and more, the state's built environment has long been celebrated for its dreamy charm. Every design style seems to take on our own quintessential, subtropical twists. Literally, we’ve popularized the sunroom to such a degree that it’s now universally known as the ‘Florida Room’. 

There’s a psychology to everything, even buildings. Architectural nostalgia recalls the familiarity of the corner store, the identifying features of your neighborhood. It provides a rooted sense of place in an increasingly isolating world. It gives context to our individual memories, from adolescence to now and beyond. 

The ‘Florida Gold Coast Rush’ is the term I’ve dubbed for the post-pandemic real estate craze afflicting the state. While Florida is no stranger to historic development booms, its development has arguably never been so ugly before. Without thoughtful planning, our neighborhood's local vernaculars continue to be replaced by homogeneously modernized, unremarkable structures.

Working with the state's politicians, foreign developers who know nothing of the needs of the places they’re transforming, are recklessly building Jenga-style while our infrastructure wobbles, perpetually one symbiotic block away from toppling. 

Boring is cheap. Massive multi-unit buildings without architectural significance are built for function and fill every inch they’ve been allotted, directly upon the busy streets. Under the guise of positive social change (cough, affordable housing, cough), we’re on the fast track to a forever-renter economy of tiny living. 

It feels as if we are being led towards the bizarro darkside of the American Dream. The Netflix subscriptionfication of our land. A world where only the affluent can own assets, including anything beautiful, green, or touching a ground floor.

Anti-Cube 

Despite the meta-ethical dystopian future that many proclaim is inevitable, like our tubular friend Violet, there is an impressive amount of skillful dreamers who are challenging the notion that our only option is to just accept this lesser-quality life than what our parents had. 

An architectural antithesis to what many have dubbed the soulless, modern white box, the ‘anti-cube’ is of huge interest to Johnny Laderer of the South Florida architectural firm Studio-Shell @studio_shell_. He operates the firm alongside his partner, Noah Garcia. 

“The ‘anti-cube’ inspiration came from something that would be a viable alternative to the pervasive modern white box. Rather than a structure with no sense of place, the anti-cube would embrace critical regionalism or vernacular fused with modernism—where Florida modern left off,” states Johnny. 

This vision is particularly important to Coconut Grove, an area that’s seen a total decimation of the bungalows and Bahamian cottages that once dominated its landscape. To win over the modern box invading the area, Johnny had to ensure the anti-cube could compete with the competitive market. 

“People want and need larger homes, but it's important to strike a balance that allows for urban canopy, and also embraces local culture. Something that actually fits into its environment.” Studio Shell reclaims natural materials whenever they can in their projects. Their star anti-cube project is in the process of being designed for arborist Ian Wogan, an important community activist and owner of TreeSources, a company that champions green infrastructure in a modern environment. 

The Last New Wave 

Buildings have feelings. They are master collectors of stories, built by humans, whose efforts transfer into its infrastructure, occupied by thousands over its lifetime. Buildings form community, community creates history, and history shapes culture. They are the visual historians of our cities.

Like you, myself and my postmodern cabinet live in a building, which lives in a neighborhood. Like all neighborhoods, it is constantly changing—but that doesn’t mean it should change without purpose or heart. 

Tell your family, friends, neighbors—anyone who will listen; ‘don’t sell your land to the man’. Institute trusts that will help keep your properties in the hands of the right people. Allow them to be used for community centers, educational institutions, and historical societies. Give the gift that keeps on giving: a safe place that can’t be taken by anyone. 

We deserve beautiful spaces, we deserve homes, we deserve our traditions. We have the right to convene, hold our meetings, and form memories together. Recall the landscapes you grew up in that have formed who you are today. Weaponize your sentimentality, and use nostalgia as a utopian guide to build a future that makes sense to you and your peers. Visualize your dream interiors, homes, and cities. Manifest your everyday environments into something you actually want, something recognizable and meaningful. Don’t let the opps tell you what is impossible or out of reach. 

Hug your buildings tight, and give your neighbors a big smile when you see them. Don’t fear change, embrace it. Change is not something we have to be passive agents in. We can guide change, and with collective effort and a little delusion, we can put our dreams into motion and transform what was once seen as a nostalgic fantasy into our full-fledged reality. 

United, we are generations of escapists for social change.