ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on the controversial idea that contemporary built environments are being developed in a way that is failing to provide the places and experiences that will contribute to the well-being and happiness of their inhabitants. Whilst acknowledging that people might personally hold different ideas of what is beautiful, the participants in this ethnographic study felt strongly about the importance of beautiful built environments for the bettering or improvement of society. The sculpture Musselled Moore by Simon Poulter Starling speaks to both surfaces and carbuncles. The Carbuncle Awards were established in the year 2000, by architectural magazine Urban Realm, in order to provoke debate and catalyse better architecture. These carbuncles of the sea become a lively opening-up of the sculpture's body to the sympathy and empathy of those that behold it and to the interchange of materials with its environment.
