Postmodern hotels are climate-controlled vivariums sealed off from the city

Evidence

“To say that a structure of this type ‘turns its back away’ is surely an understatement, while to speak of its ‘popular’ character is to miss the point of its systematic segregation from the great Hispanic-Asian city outside (whose crowds prefer the open space of the old Plaza). Indeed, it is virtually to endorse the master illusion that Portman seeks to convey: that he has re-created within the precious spaces of his super-lobbies the genuine popular texture of city life. “(In fact, Portman has only built large vivariums for the upper middle classes, protected by astonishingly complex security systems. Most of the new downtown centres might as well have been built on the third moon of Jupiter. Their fundamental logic is that of a claustrophobic space colony attempting to miniaturize nature within itself. Thus the Bonaventure reconstructs a nostalgic Southern California in aspic: orange trees, fountains, flowering vines, and clean air. Outside, in a smogpoisoned reality, vast mirrored surfaces reflect away not only the misery of the larger city, but also its irrepressible vibrancy and quest for authenticity including the most exciting neighbourhood mural movement in North America).” (Mike Davis, “Urban Renaissance and the Spirit of Postmodernism,” New Left Review 151 [May-June 1985 ]: 112). — Fredric Jameson, Postmodernism, or, The Cultural Logic…, 922

Categorization

• SEED: Angle: the ‘space colony’ reading of mall/hotel architecture — miniaturized nature as class segregation — could anchor an essay on contemporary ‘vertical forest’ towers and indoor ski slopes.
• ADDENDUM: The Bonaventure as a self-contained space colony miniaturizing nature connects to ‘Grafting & Growth: On Trees as Infrastructure’ — here nature is controlled, artificial, sealed off rather than living infrastructure.