Hello everyone. Originally, this post was supposed to be devoted to the year 1978, however something came up, and by something, I mean this 2.2 million-dollar, 5,420 sq ft 4 bed/4.5 bath house in Colt’s Neck, NJ.
You see, usually, when a listing goes viral, I’m content to simply retweet it with a pithy comment, but this house genuinely shook something in me, genuinely made me say “what the (expletive)” out loud. It is only fair to inflict this same suffering onto all of you, hence, without further ado:
Looks normal, right? Looks like the same low-brow New Jersey McMansion we’re all expecting, right? Oh, oh dear, you couldn’t be more wrong.
Guess who’s making a list and checking it twice?
Guess who’s gonna find out who’s naughty or nice?
Guess who’s coming to town?
Guess who’s coming to town to drag your ass into hell?
A gentle reminder that it is not yet Thanksgiving.
But oh. Oh. It continues:
If you’re wondering what’s happening here, you’re not alone, and sadly there is no convenient way to find out via a kind of haunted house hotline or something.
I can’t even label these rooms because frankly I’m not even sure what they are. All I am sure of is that I want out of them as soon as humanly possible.
How is it that a room can simultaneously threaten, frighten, and haunt me? Me, of all people!
My eyes do not know where to go here. They go to the window, they go to the fireplace, they go to the massive mound of fake plant and statuary currently gorging on the leftmost corner of the room, they go to my hands, which are shaking.
“Hello, I would like to get in touch with the Ministry of Vibes? Yes, I’ll hold.”
I haven’t been this afraid of a shower since I went to Girl Scout camp in the fifth grade and there was a brown recluse spider in the camp shower and I screamed until the counselor came in and told me it was only a wolf spider but it turns out those still bite you and it hurts.
I love watching Still Images on my Television Set :)
Nobody make a sound. He’s watching you.
i spy with my evil eye:
:)
Their souls are trapped in these photographs forever :)
Okay, phew, we made it out alive. Here’s the back of the house I guess.
Well, I hope you’re as thoroughly disturbed as I am. Seriously, I’m going to have trouble sleeping. I mean, I already have trouble sleeping, but this is just making that existing problem so much worse.
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Hello friends! I’m back from Chicago (shoutout to all the cool people at the Chicago Architecture Biennial for inviting me to come ogle neat stuff). I spent the better part of this weekend breaking my brain combing through 5 counties worth of McMansions, just so I could give you the gift of what might be the ugliest collection of homes in existence.
Without further ado:
Monmouth County
THE COLUMN GOING THROUGH THE ROOF is PEAK McMansion craftsmanship. Nothing will ever top that metaphor.
Honestly, when you really think about it, this doesn’t actually look like a house at all. There’s recognizable shapes, or symbols like gables, but the cohesive outline resembles nothing at all - a crazy zig-zaggy shape devoid of symbolic meaning. Anyways, Barthes would probably have a field day here.
Bergen County
Bergen County is awesome - I wrote about it in college when going down I-10 on a Sunday (when everything is closed) - totally surreal and apocalyptic. Good stuff.
told ya
this blog is NSFW now. thanks, New Jersey.
Somerset County
The gray sky makes it. Speaking of skies…
[architecture dork joke: me, calling Peter Eisenman Peter Eisenman: hello? me: everything is your fault.]
Morris County
A perennial favorite of mine. Glad to see that some of the houses I saw when first starting the blog are still for sale.
does anyone else find this house extremely punchable or is it just me?
The windows on this house are more hollow and soulless than whoever thinks Sean Spicer was funny at the Emmy’s. (RELEVANT! I’M RELEVANT!!)
Finally… Hunterdon County, the Richest County in New Jersey
the shutters are more futile than my attempts to not be late.
Stay tuned for an overdue Looking Around this weekend, and next week’s New Mexico McMansion!
If you like this post, and want to see more like it, consider supporting me on Patreon! Also JUST A HEADS UP - I’ve started posting a GOOD HOUSE built since 1980 from the area where I picked this week’s McMansion as bonus content on Patreon!
Not into small donations and sick bonus content? Check out the McMansion Hell Store ! 100% of the proceeds from the McMansion Hell store will go to help victims of Hurricanes Harvey & Irma
Hello friends, from my new laptop! Thanks to everyone who donated - you are all my heroes!!!
New Jersey is a special state - so special, I could spend an entire year roasting McMansions in New Jersey alone. One house really doesn’t do it justice. Fortunately for y’all, I’ve selected 10 McMansions out of a million, to prove just how absurd the Garden (more like enormous sea of turf grass) State is.
Because it is so difficult for me to rank these by…rankness, I’ve decided to sort them by the 10 richest counties (in reverse order):
Cape May County
This post may kill me.
Rent and utilities would probs be in the thousands for this house, but I wanted to keep the meme format intact so…
“I love being an idiot. In fact, I am proud of my idiocy.” - extremely america person
Burlington County
there are no pics of the other side of the house. perhaps…there IS no other side…!
human beings were a mistake.
Sussex County
why do all of these houses look like they were run through some kind of horribly programmed procedural generator?
“Romeo! Romeo! Wherefore art thou Romeo?”
“…”
*crickets*
Mercer County
a e s t h e t i c ( ? )
This is one of the sloppiest houses I’ve ever seen. It looks like it’ll crumble and melt at any second!
Speaking of crumbling and melting, that’s what I feel like doing after sifting through five counties worth of sludge. Stay tuned for Sunday’s Looking Around, where we tackle more terms, and PART TWO of the ol’ New Jersey Special. By the way, I’ll be in Chicago for the rest of the week enjoying the ol’ Chicago Architecture Biennial. Come say hi if you’re around!
If you like this post, and want to see more like it, consider supporting me on Patreon! Also JUST A HEADS UP - I’ve started posting a GOOD HOUSE built since 1980 from the area where I picked this week’s McMansion as bonus content on Patreon!
Not into small donations and sick bonus content? Check out the McMansion Hell Store ! 100% of the proceeds from the McMansion Hell store will go to help victims of Hurricanes Harvey & Irma
Every once in a while, I discover an extraordinarily special place. And by special I mean hideous. Bergen County, New Jersey is that place. This will not be the first, nor the last time this county will show up on this blog, as its houses and I have a long working relationship ahead of us.
So where to start? I used this house as an example in another post before (can’t remember which one) but I knew from the first time I saw it, that I needed to dive deeper.
Man, where to start. First of all, the exterior of this house appears to be screaming in two different ways: either the two dormers, or the two “sidelight” windows are the eyes, with the door being the agape mouth. With the absurd windows on the front facade, the silly fake quoins, and the pseudo-Palladian elements scattered all over the place, I have a feeling this place is going to go down in McMansionHell history as a Certified Dank™ Legend.
This house (built in 1988 as we will all soon see) has seven bedrooms and six bathrooms, and is currently retailing for almost 3.5 million dollars.
By far, my favorite McMansions are the ones that are like time capsules. You open the obnoxiously large front door and step into the obnoxiously large entryway and are instantly transported into another era.
In this case, that era is 1988.
Front Entryway
My favorite part about the 80s was how they axed all of the environmental reforms made in the 70s while simultaneously obsessing over having as many house plants as possible.
Living Room (1 of 2)
At least piano makers are thankful that their art is being funded by those who buy large instruments as symbols of wealth.
Study
Fake book subjects commonly include: - Business - Law - Classic Literature
Dining Room (1 of 2)
Seriously I don’t think you guys are prepared for what you’re about to see.
This has to be one of the best worst vintage 80s rooms I’ve ever seen.
Dining Room (2 of 2)
Those poor plants, working like slaves for the man.
The Kitchen!
Who thought that orange was a remotely good idea?? Spoilers: it was probs HGTV.
Living Room (2 of 2)
Luckily for the homeowner, many elements from this room (the furniture and wall color) are coming back in style again, as dark green is all the rage this year apparently.
Master Suite (Part 1)
Shocked that the drapes don’t have the same pattern as the wallpaper.
Master Suite (Part 2)
P sure the hyper-femininity of the 80s and early 90s were what led to the creation of the ManCave during the dawn of the 21st century.
Master Bathroom
This bathroom almost looks like it came out of a Robert A.M. Stern coffee table book from the late 80s. Whoever did this interior was a licensed interior designer. I’m pretty sure those vanities are custom.
On to the last room of our tour! (Somehow there weren’t pictures of the other 6 bedrooms or the other 5 baths…)
The Basement
Seriously the mirrored door is hella choice.
Fortunately, our tour ends on a positive note this week, as the rear of this house actually makes some architectural sense:
Rear Exterior
Well folks, I hope you enjoyed that tour as much as I did. I love these time capsule houses - you can learn a lot from studying the design trends of the past; most notably, when they’re coming back.
Stay tuned for this Sunday’s special post, McMansionHell from A to Z (Part Two) and, of course, next week’s dank McMansion!
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Copyright Disclaimer: All photographs in this post are from real estate aggregate Zillow.com and are used in this post for the purposes of education, satire, and parody, consistent with 17 USC §107.
