There would be one long staircase just going up and one even longer coming down. And one more leading nowhere just for show.
— Tevye, "If I were a Rich Man", Fiddler on the Roof
St custards hav a very interesting history if you are interested in hist which few boys are. It was built by a madman in 1836 and he made a few improvements before he was put in the bin e.g. the observatory to study worms, the fortifications to pot at gamekeepers and that round thing which hav no use at all.
— Down With Skool!, Geoffrey Willans
So the gang sits around for a bit while—Okay, what is up with this place?! That old couple lives here?! It’s like if Flavor Flav redesigned Pee-wee's Playhouse!
— The Nostalgia Critic on the old couple's CRAZY house in Cool as Ice.
Rooms in the castle seem to tumble onto one another with no rhyme or reason - a trophy room backs onto a bedroom that, in turn, hosts a spiral staircase leading into a cellar below. Public rooms muddle against private family rooms. Only a few scattered insignias identify which labyrinthine hallways lead into the court or to the courtyard outside. Staircases wind downward from the main floor onto a landing where a separate stairwell rises to another level two stories above. A maze of rooms, apparently part of a larger apartment, ends in a neglected tower that looks out over the battlements far below. And only those very familiar with the castle can negotiate the hidden passageways that riddle the walls, connecting one odd location with another.
— Vampire: The Masquerade: The Dark Ages - Transylvania By Night
You can hear Daniel talking to... Jacqueline, you think. She's the third person on this floor, which apparently bends the rules of space and geometry into pretzels. Each room borders the other two on two sides? Maybe? Your head hurts.
— Sam Lane trying to understand
the physics of the second Location, Chiasmata
the physics of the second Location, ChiasmataThe architecture of the city follows no recognisable pattern, with streets and buildings varying wildly from one to the next. Mighty stone fortresses, replete with towers and battlements, stand next to crumbling ruins that, in turn, surround rotting, miasmal gardens. Great towers of living crystal float majestically above beauteous palaces of pure, white marble, each festooned with delicate razor-sharp blades. Even the streets themselves exist solely to baffle and mislead, as wide boulevards give way to narrow cobbled lanes or abruptly end in solid walls. Grand plazas stand in the midst of forbidding, crenellated towers with no apparent entrances or exits, and endless stairs reach up toward crowded balconies only to end suddenly at doors that were not there before.
— Black Crusade: The Tome Of Excess
Yeah, this is another one of those rooms with "creative architecture" that was designed for giant spider people, because that's the only kind of person who would find this layout convenient.
— Gordon Freeman, Freeman's Mind
Wow, uh... you trying to run the government, or are you playing Garry's Mod? All sorts of angles and shit stapled on top of each other.
— JonTron on the Scottish parliament building.
It was a castle.
But not the kind of castle anyone would have seen on Earth. Some of the architecture looked recognizable, other parts of it were clearly alien. The structure was spherical, like a planet. Towers, walls, and other edifices radiated out from a central point. It was incredible. Archie could barely stand to look at it for very long.
But not the kind of castle anyone would have seen on Earth. Some of the architecture looked recognizable, other parts of it were clearly alien. The structure was spherical, like a planet. Towers, walls, and other edifices radiated out from a central point. It was incredible. Archie could barely stand to look at it for very long.
This palace is the work of the gods, was my first thought. I explored the uninhabited spaces, and I corrected myself: The gods that built this place have died. Then I reflected upon its peculiarities, and told myself: The gods that built this place were mad. [...] I had made my way through a dark maze, but it was the bright City of the Immortals that terrified and repelled me. A maze is a house built purposely to confuse men; its architecture, prodigal in symmetries, is made to serve that purpose. In the palace that I imperfectly explored, the architecture had no purpose. There were corridors that led nowhere, unreachably high windows, grandly dramatic doors that opened onto monklike cells or empty shafts, incredible upside-down staircases with upside-down treads and balustrades. Other staircases, clinging airily to the side of a monumental wall, petered out after two or three landings, in the high gloom of the cupolas, arriving nowhere. I cannot say whether these are literal examples I have given; I do know that for many years they plagued my troubled dreams; I can no longer know whether any given feature is a faithful transcription of reality or one of the shapes unleashed by my nights.
— Jorge Luis Borges, "Immortal"
"BY THE HAMMER! DESIST THIS ARCHITECTURAL MOCKERY!"
— Victor Saltzpyre on the Citadel of Eternity, Vermintide II (capitalization in the original)
"Takes a lot of effort to get stairs wrong."
— Kerillian, Vermintide II
The Harvester, or "Winchester Mansion of the Stars," is widely accepted as proof that the concept of "lowest bidder" is known and feared throughout the galaxy. The internal layout is confusing at best, bordering on schizophrenic. The craft has more grav-lift wells than it has floors. The southern entryway is completely isolated from the rest of that floor, requiring one to ascend to the first floor then back down to move between them. On the second floor, there is a door that opens to nothing but the floor below.
—UFOPedia's description of the Harvester
description of the Harvester