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Today's News - Thursday, June 12, 2008

-- Is "architectural imperialism" treating developing cities as "playgrounds for the leading lights of design?"
-- Secrecy surrounds plans for Israel Navy's new port in Haifa; landscape architects withdraw: "Landscape architecture is a profession of principles…based on values, not just on the financial aspect."
-- M15 asks that detailed security measures not be posted in online planning applications.
-- If Toronto developers are looking for "idiosyncratic architecture," instead of turning to starchitects, why don't they "hire local talent and encourage them to go crazy?"
-- An in-depth look at building-street interface, and its impact on these essential public spaces in San Francisco.
-- London transport schemes go off the rails (shortlist comes up short).
-- Architects and engineers in row over bridge competition.
-- A £250m bonanza of Liverpool projects.
-- Saffron sees good sign in Philadelphia's step to protect historic interiors.
-- Jakarta to make green design mandatory.
-- In New Zealand, a call to make the connection between sustainable housing and affordable housing. -- Contribute your ideas to earth2100.
-- Merrick finds the Copenhagen Zoo's elephant house a "tough and strangely pre-eroded domain" (and "a bolt from the blue" by the Sultan of Seamlessness).
-- Maltzan to take on the College of Creative Arts Center for SFSU.
-- Deadline reminders: World Architecture Festival Awards, and Lifecycle Building Challenge 2. -- AIA COTE issues call for whitepapers relating to COTE Measures of Sustainable Design.
-- Winners all: CCA/LSE 2008-2009 James Stirling Memorial Lectures on the City competition. -- An eyeful of SEGD 2008 Design Awards. -- 2008 International Berkeley Prize.
-- Two days left to view - then bid on - Ban's Artek Pavilion.

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Architectural imperialism: Beijing's rapid modernisation presents a difficulty: should western-style development come at all costs or should progress be held back in the name of historic architecture? It worries me that many fast-developing cities across the world are being treated as mere architectural playgrounds of tomorrow for the leading lights of design. By Mark Hooper [links]- Guardian (UK)

Sea change: ...planning the Israel Navy's new port in Haifa's Bat Galim area...a polynomial..."all the hopes of restoring to the city what the English took from it - the opening of the harbor and the creation of a sea front - are being dashed."...What accounts for the fact that a project of this scale is proceeding so quietly in environmentally-conscious Haifa? -- Greenstein Har-Gil Landscape Architecture- Ha`aretz (Israel)

MI5 asks architects to keep plans secret: ...by publishing detailed security measures in online planning applications, architects and planning authorities could be giving terrorists a 'head start'- The Architects' Journal (UK)

Celebrity architects build on name: Designers making a difference to T.O. skyline...If the goal is idiosyncratic architecture, couldn't developers hire local talent and encourage them to go crazy? -- Daniel Libeskind; Will Alsop; Robert A.M. Stern; Architects Alliance; Quadrangle; KPMB; Kohn Pedersen Fox (KPF); Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (SOM); Yansong Ma- National Post (Canada)

An eye on the street: What’s ailing our residential streets? Urban designer Benjamin Grant examines the building-street interface, and its impact on these essential public spaces...historic patterns of San Francisco’s residential neighborhoods don’t offer especially good models for livable streets. [images]

by Benjamin Grant- San Francisco Planning + Urban Research (SPUR)

Key London transport schemes go off the rails: Transport for London (TfL) has thrown the future of two of the capital's key design-led projects into doubt...John McAslan + Partner's Oxford Street tram proposals and the much-heralded bus shelter design competition...none of the nine shortlisted proposals...were good enough to be taken forward. -- Ian Ritchie; Conran & Partners; Lacock Gullam- The Architects' Journal (UK)

New bridge competition row...has erupted again this week after the Royal Institute of British Architects launched another design competition that excludes engineer-led teams. -- RIBA; Institution of Structural Engineers (ICE)- New Civil Engineer (UK)

Go-ahead for £250m bonanza of Liverpool city projects: St John’s Centre can look forward to the £100m overhaul...A 400-room hotel complex – including a luxury 4-star wing – will be built metres away at Lime Street station. And one of the city’s landmark Victorian dock systems was also granted permission for a huge renovation. -- Thinking Space- Liverpool Echo (UK)

Preservationists once bit, twice shy, over Boyd bill: The problem is that Philadelphia's historic preservation laws are famous for not protecting interiors...Having waited two decades for a law on historic interiors, Philadelphia can surely wait three more months to make sure it's done right. But not one minute more. By Inga Saffron- Philadelphia Inquirer

Green design for buildings to become mandatory: The Jakarta administration is...drafting green regulations for future and existing structures ... Architect and urbanologist Ridwan Kamil said...energy-saving designs were urgent for the densely populated capital as it had little space for green areas.- The Jakarta Post

Op-Ed: Let's do more than scratch the surface on sustainability: Truly affordable houses are cheap to run, not just cheap to buy...the average New Zealand house is dear to run - and many being built today show no signs of improving on our dismal performance in this regard. By Nick Collins/Beacon Pathway- New Zealand Herald

earth2100: ABC News is asking you to help answer perhaps the most important question of our time: What will our world be like over the next one hundred years if we don’t act now to save our troubled planet?- earth2100

Ahead of the herd: Norman Foster redesigns the elephant house at a Denmark zoo: The fact that Foster + Partners created this tough and strangely pre-eroded domain is a bolt from the blue...How refreshingly surreal, then, to juxtapose the practice's "brand" architecture with issues such as the drainage of copious amounts of pachydermic urine through sand... By Jay Merrick [images]- Independent (UK)

Architect chosen for College of Creative Arts Center: ...challenge is to design a space that is both iconic and captures the creativity of the arts. -- Michael Maltzan- San Francisco State University

Deadline reminder: World Architecture Festival Awards - June 20- World Architecture Festival

Deadline reminder: Call for entries: Lifecycle Building Challenge 2: Ideas to improve materials reuse by examining opportunities throughout the entire lifecycle of a building from design to deconstruction or adaptation and component recovery; deadline: July 31 (U.S.)- Lifecycle Building Challenge

COTE: Call For Whitepapers...topics that relate to the COTE Measures of Sustainable Design; deadline: July 1- AIA Committee on the Environment (COTE)

CCA/LSE 3rd International 2008-2009 James Stirling Memorial Lectures on the City competition winners: Robert Mangurian and Mary-Ann Ray for their proposal "CAOCHANGDI Urban Rural Conundrums: Off Center People’s Space in the Early 21st Century Republic of China - A Model for the Momentous Project of the New Socialist Village." -- Studio Works [English/French]- Canadian Centre for Architecture (CCA)

SEGD 2008 Design Awards -- Debra Nichols Design; Electroland; Gensler; Pentagram; Jiyeon Song; Studio/lab; Vanderbyl Design; emerystudio; F!RSTdesign; etc. [links to images]- Society for Environmental Graphic Design (SEGD)

Winners in the Tenth Annual, 2008 International Berkeley Undergraduate Prize for Architectural Design Excellence Competition [links]- Berkeley Prize

Shigeru Ban Pavilion Could Fetch Upward of $1 Million at Auction: This Saturday, Sotheby’s will auction the 1,991-square-foot, portable Artek Pavilion... [images]- Architectural Record

Words That Build: Playing with the Flow of Communication - Tip #3: Use language that playfully enhances the flow of design intentions between you and your client. By Norman Weinstein- ArchNewsNow

-- Tabanlioglu Arhitects: Dogan Medya Center, Ankara, Turkey
-- Installation: Greg Lynn/FORM: Blobwall Pavilion, SCI-Arc Gallery, Los Angeles

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