Millions are following in this precise moment one of the most important weddings of the last few years. Officially, Prince William and Kate Middleton are now husband and wife. Watching the Royal Wedding, I think many of you said: “What is that ugly old-fashioned Royal Carriage they are in? I think they need a new one”. Reza Esmaeeli, an architect and designer currently working at Zaha Hadid Architects in London, apparently thought so, and decided to design a new Royal Wedding Carriage that he shared with us! More images and architect’s description after the break.
The forthcoming Royal Wedding perhaps will be the most important or at least the most talked-about event in UK, in 2011. And no doubt that the most memorable part of this fascinating ceremony, for the people of England, will be the wedding procession; most importantly the appearance of prince and princess in public: their dress and their car or traditionally their carriage.
Whereas the bride’s dress seems to be the hottest topic in the World Wide Web, what comes as a surprise to me is that there is no talk or thought about her carriage, and it looks like it is well-accepted that the bride and the groom should always be seen in the same conventional carriage; but why? Why shouldn’t their carriage actually be the most dazzling and glamorous part of their wedding? Can’t we actually picture the carriage in any different way?
I envision the carriage differently. I imagine it like a fairy tale; like a shining bird, a super-fictional transparent globe with a ceremonial tail; something that converts the wedding to a subversive cultural event; a carriage that people of Britain will long talk about: a cutting-edge professionally designed vehicle from which prince and princess will wave hands for them; a romantic magical entity which will fill their hearts forever.
We are in a country which has the most avant-garde designers in Europe. It is worldwide known for its progressive design firms, and has a well-developed construction industry, which it exports to the entire world. Why not to use the best of it? Why shouldn’t the royal carriage be something that shows off all of it?
Just close your eyes and envision a carriage with a sphere-shape glass car, fabricated by British high-end glass manufacturers. It has an elegant curved long tail made from glass-reinforced plastic, and could potentially accommodate a light purpose-made engine to give it a duel functionality in case the journey is long; all in white and decorated with flower-shape patterns and engravings.
Will it be very costly? Maybe not; maybe there won’t be too less of possibility to find manufacturers, designers, and producers who would be willing to contribute, to promote their products and their companies in such a unique occasion.
In this carriage that represents the modern era in which we live, the bride and the groom could whether sit in the car and relax, or push the button, let their bird open up its wings, make their way to the ceremonial platform incorporated in the tail, and wave hands for the audience and be photographed. Could it be any more romantic? Wouldn’t you love to go and see how the tail of princess’ dress is blended into the tail of her carriage? Wouldn’t that then be more like the prince and princess of our fairy tales?
Reza Esmaeeli
With Yevgeniya D. Pozigun
Thanks to: Panagiota A. Goutsou
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- Courtesy of Reza Esmaeeli
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- Courtesy of Reza Esmaeeli
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- Courtesy of Reza Esmaeeli
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- Courtesy of Reza Esmaeeli
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- Courtesy of Reza Esmaeeli
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- Courtesy of Reza Esmaeeli
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- Courtesy of Reza Esmaeeli
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- Courtesy of Reza Esmaeeli
really?
I don’t understand why architects make things unnecessarily asymmetrical merely because it is now ‘fashionable’ for design to appear random with the excuse that it is somehow more natural or expressive. If this carriage were really supposed to apitimise a bird wouldn’t the designer have realised that the features of birds are symmetrical and not just throw down some random waves in a Zaha Hadid style and then try to relate their parti to a bird?
emmm… no
actually the old one looked better…
looks like something from a cheesy 70s sci-fi movie.
Hideous.
Yes, pathological aversion to symmetry. Yes, movie prop quality. There is mainly bad taste here, but there is more.
If this were built, it would always look like a model or representation, rather than a real object. It is only conceived at one scale. There is nothing to zoom in to. This is not a good thing, but it is something I see everywhere.
Designers must learn to respect our eyes and hands: give us real human-scale details to engage.
The overwhelming attention the British monarchy attracts is astonishing. Why people are still enthralled by such an outdated relic of medieval tradition today is beyond me. As for this carriage, it could easily have been intended for anything from trendy sleeping pod to impossible, yet sexy looking, floating city.
“what comes as a surprise to me is that there is no talk or thought about her carriage, and it looks like it is well-accepted that the bride and the groom should always be seen in the same conventional carriage; but why?”
seriously? traditions maybe?
this thing looks awful…
I’d much rather the old version thank you.
I like it. It has the fairy tale air surrounding this wedding, in a contemporary way.
Good job, Reza.
That is terrible… I can’t believe someone would waste their time doing that.
can’t they use a car? or a plane? or a bike? or anything what doesn’t look like a giant octopus
Seriously?
What a disgraceful suggestion, Reza Esmaeeli you really are out-of-touch if you genuinely believe this would fly as a ROYAL wedding carriage.
If you had, instead, made the article as a design for ‘A’ carriage and not ‘THE’ royal carriage, I would have liked it; however you did not, hence the negative feedback.
On a more positive note, your CGI and visualisation skills are rather impressive, keep it up, but improve your design
well, can´t say anything good about this..
Seriously?
Actually, compared to the write-up, the design is nearly tolerable. The fact that Reza writes so lovingly about such a mad pile of feces is the truly sad irony with respect to this train wreck.
next, a redesign of Gothic cathedrals…
The part that’s most depressing is that this particular designer is so publicity-hungry as to create this turd solely as a way of tapping into the media frenzy around the wedding. This kind of slickness makes me nostalgic for the idea that architecture could actually take on potentially political role in rethinking what a society is and can be, rather than just glibly clutching to a shred of potential exposure with some senseless and poorly executed digital chicanery.
Copy lostcompetition-pedicab.jpg into /RoyalWeddingopportunity folder
Open royalwedding.jpg, copy/paste lostcompetition-pedicab.jpg, image>>transform>>skew, file>>save
Create RoyalWeddingopportunity.zip file, email to friend at Archdaily!
Copy lostcompetition-pedicab-bridge.jpg into /LondonBridgeReskinning folder
and so on and so on, you get it..
This makes me want to cry. Horrible design in my opinion. Has no relation to nature in any way I can see.
The question should be “why are they using a carriage instead of a car if we are in the 21 century?” You could redesign the traditional living horse with a fancy robot, the old fashioned gothic westminster abbey or the brittish soldiers’ uniform, but I think that is more health and usefull to question other stuff, like “why are we still doing these religious ceremonies? Why are we still having monarchies? Do these events worth the global attention over other topics?”… These wedding is something that goes beyond design issues. You are improving what you can see in Celebrity Gossip tv shows.
noch!
‘Oh dear’ pretty dreadful really buy why stop with the carriage why not replace the horses and the silly troopers as well with something from star wars. Obviously business is slow!
this is hilarious. the so-called “avant-garde” designing for the establishment.
A sad, sad state of affairs. What an utter piece of tosh.
looks like the egg lady gaga arrived in at the grammys
This has really made my day. The design is so ludicrous – it is hilarious!
I don’t understand how can anyone NOT like this design?