Today’s News - Friday, January 13, 2012
• Feffer posits: "Want to build a new society for peace, justice, and sustainability? Ask an architect" - a fascinating take that entails North Korea's slow steps towards sustainable building and AfH's Open Architecture Challenge re: alternative uses for military bases.
• Hatherley tackles whether the "Skyscraper Index" really does predict recessions - and why "not all towers are built by phallic capitalism": the hospital next to the "ludicrously overpowering, overscaled, overpriced Shard" may be "a mere high-rise. It's made of concrete, it's inexpensive and, worst of all, it serves a useful function."
• Benfield on the Healing Cities Institute's "8 Dimensions of a Healing City": an "intriguing list" that is "about how well cities are working for their residents...it is clearly on to something" (great links, too).
• We're thrilled AJ has made its "Women in Practice" issue available to all, with an interesting explanation of why Barbie graces the cover, while the issue "contains more than 60 non-plastic practicing architects" + Some startling (and some not so surprising) results from its first Women in Architecture survey.
• Dvir does his best to decipher the details re: the one-says/the-other-says drama playing out around Jerusalem's Museum of Tolerance: if the Wiesenthal Center works with another architect using Chyutin Architects' design, "it would be the first time in Israel that a major public structure was built using the design of an architect who was not actively involved in the construction" + The architects claim they still own the design copyright and are ready to go to court (Gehry must be glad he's free of this one!).
• Hume, on a higher note, hails plans for the Pan Am Games 2015 Athletes Village in Toronto's West Don Lands: it's the public-sector investment in green infrastructure that's bringing in private-sector investment (to the tune of about $1 billion).
• Glancey x 2: he cheers A Room for London atop Queen Elizabeth Hall on South Bank + He reviews "a week of happy beginnings and sad departures."
• Weekend diversions:
• An urban planner builds an 80-square-foot scale model of Long Beach, CA, so that residents and business owners "can try their hand at city planning. The process is more than child's play."
• Webb and Heller offer high praise for "Eames Words" at L.A.'s A+D Museum (just a few more days to catch it!).
• As MCNY celebrates Roche's New York, the architect reflects on his road from Ireland to the Big Apple: he didn't set out to be an emigrant."
• King cheers "A Negotiated Landscape: The Transformation of San Francisco's Waterfront Since 1950": "If you're a planning junkie, all this is catnip."
• Balmori and Sanders' "Groundwork: Between Landscape and Architecture" presents "compelling arguments for increasing collaboration between the two disciplines."
• Welton gives thumbs-up to Hicks Stone and the "first comprehensive book on his father's work...raising a new curtain on one of this nation's most original architects."
• Long says "The Art-Architecture Complex" "gently debunks the reputations of a series of ageing architects who probably don't give a damn what anybody thinks any more, while offering little to the rest of us."
• Australian Design Review's top 10 books of 2011.
• "Becoming Julia Morgan" explores the life of California's first licensed woman architect; the Julia Morgan Project hopes to perform the play at Morgan-designed buildings around the state.
• Happy Friday the 13th (it's always been a lucky day for us)!
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Architects of Change: Want to build a new society for peace, justice, and sustainability? Ask an architect: ...architects can be part of grander social schemes...Consider Open Architecture Challenge...to come up with alternative uses for military bases...not only a serious effort, it’s an urgent one...North Korean elite did eventually see the light on energy efficiency...If you build it, they will eventually come? Not exactly. But in this particular field of dreams...they will eventually come around. By John Feffer/Foreign Policy In Focus -- Architecture for Humanity- Huffington Post |
Skyscrapers aren't always about corporate pride before a fall: From the Empire State to the Burj Khalifa, skyscrapers predict recession. But not all towers are built by phallic capitalism...the ludicrously overpowering, overscaled, overpriced Shard is a skyscraper in its purest form; the Guy's hospital tower, next to it, is a mere high-rise. It's made of concrete, it's inexpensive and, worst of all, it serves a useful function. All the record-setting buildings seem to have been equally useless, no matter how seductive their architecture. By Owen Hatherley- Guardian (UK) |
"8 Dimensions of a Healing City": an intriguing list, if not an explicitly environmental one. It is not about how well cities are working with the planet and our natural resources, but about how well cities are working for their residents...Mark Holland/Healing Cities Institute...is clearly on to something... By Kaid Benfield [links]- Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) |
Why we put Barbie on the cover: Even the AIA hailed Architect Barbie as a role model for aspiring female architects. Women in Practice issue contains more than 60 non-plastic practising architects...also launching three new Women in Architecture awards. [links, images]- The Architects' Journal (UK) |
Shock survey results as the AJ launches campaign to raise women architects’ status: Data from the AJ’s first Women in Architecture survey show that 47% of women claim that men get paid more for the same work, and almost two-thirds believe the building industry has yet to accept the authority of the female architect.- The Architects' Journal (UK) |
Wiesenthal Center continues work on Museum of Tolerance after architects quit: ...the center said...they intend to work with another architect to complete the project using Chyutin Architects' design. It would be the first time in Israel that a major public structure was built using the design of an architect who was not actively involved in the construction. The Chyutins said...they hold all the exclusive intellectual, moral, commercial and reproduction rights to the designs... By Noam Dvir- Ha`aretz (Israel) |
Construction of Museum of Tolerance Jerusalem could begin soon: Architectural firm denies that museum owns rights to design, says it will go to court...This is the third time the museum will have to look for an architect. -- Frank Gehry; Chyutin Architects- Jerusalem Post |
Pan Am Games 2015 Athletes Village a winner: Already a river runs through it; but by 2015...there’ll be a lot more than that to go with the flow...it will be because of the work done by Waterfront Toronto over the past decade...“Public investment in green infrastructure leads to private-sector investment...they’re willing to put billions into the project.” By Christopher Hume -- Kuwabara Payne McKenna Blumberg Architects (KPMB); Peter Clewes/architectsAlliance; Renee Daoust/Daoust Lestage [images]- Toronto Star |
A high water mark: artists moor holiday houseboat on London roof: Vessel installed on top of Queen Elizabeth Hall on South Bank...what you see spread out before you as you board the artworld Roi des Belges, also known as A Room for London, is the most compelling, and gloriously wide-angled, panorama of central London... By Jonathan Glancey -- David Kohn; Fiona Banner; Artangel; Living Architecture/Alain de Botton- Guardian (UK) |
Constructive criticism: the week in architecture: Blackpool gets its very own Vegas-style registry office, a Scottish giant goes to the great studio in the sky, and the sad demise of two close-knit London housing estates...A week of happy beginnings and sad departures. By Jonathan Glancey -- dRMM; Isi Metzstein/Gillespie, Kidd & Coia/Andy MacMillan; Peter Besley/Assemblage; Alison and Peter Smithson; Renzo Piano [images, links]- Guardian (UK) |
In Long Beach exhibit, urban planning is art and play: Urban planner James Rojas has constructed an 80-square-foot scale model of the city that residents and business owners can tinker with to illustrate their own vision of Long Beach's future...The curious can try their hand at city planning...The process is more than child's play... [image]- Los Angeles Times |
What Works: "Eames Words" at the A+D Museum distills the essence of Charles & Ray Eames: His pithy comments on the design process provide the text; her gift for color and arrangement breathe life into every corner of the room. By Michael Webb [images]- The Architect's Newspaper |
"Eames Words": I’ll take wisdom anywhere I can get it. Even on a wall...The Eameses’ words are just as potent in the 21st century as they were in the 20th; their insights transcend style, with timeless quotes... By Steven Heller -- Deborah Sussman/Sussman/Prejza; Andrew Byrom; Todd Erlandson; Lara Hoad/(M)Arch [images]- New York Times |
MCNY celebrates Roche’s New York: The immigrants built and continue to build New York City. Few, though, if any, have had quite the impact on how it looks than Kevin Roche. Not that the world-renowned architect set out to be an emigrant...It was the beginning of a glittering and extraordinary career..."Kevin Roche: Architecture as Environment" at the Museum of the City of New York... -- Eero Saarinen; Kevin Roche John Dinkeloo- Irish Echo |
"A Negotiated Landscape: The Transformation of San Francisco's Waterfront Since 1950" tells how S.F. tide turns port into promenade: The best thing about Jasper Rubin's new book...is that it opens a window onto landscapes that do not exist...the basic lesson applies to every large city. What doesn't happen can cast as long a shadow as what does...If you're a planning junkie, all this is catnip. By John King- San Francisco Chronicle |
Breaking New Ground: "Groundwork: Between Landscape and Architecture" by Diana Balmori and Joel Sanders...designers might begin to understand buildings and landscapes as “linked interactive systems that heal the environment...present compelling arguments for increasing collaboration between the two disciplines, a process that can help deal with the growing complexities in the built environment.- The Dirt/American Society of Landscape Architects (ASLA) |
"Edward Durell Stone: A Son's Untold Story of a Legendary Architect": Nothing else about an architect matters as much as his buildings. And Hicks Stone - author, architect and son of the modernist master - has set out to prove the point with the first comprehensive book on his father's work...raising a new curtain on one of this nation's most original architects. By J. Michael Welton [images]- Huffington Post |
"The Art-Architecture Complex" by Hal Foster: ...gently debunks the reputations of a series of ageing architects who probably don’t give a damn what anybody thinks any more, while offering little to the rest of us. By Kieran Long -- Norman Foster; Richard Rogers; Renzo Piano; Zaha Hadid; Diller Scofidio & Renfro; Herzog & de Meuron- Icon (UK) |
ADR’s top ten books of 2011 on architecture, design and urbanism -- "Closer to God: Religious Architecture and Sacred Spaces" by Lucas Feireiss; "20/20: Editorial Takes on Architectural Discourse"; "Living in the Endless City" by Ricky Burdett and Deyan Sudjic; "The Beach Beneath the Street: : The Everyday Life and Glorious Times of the Situationist International" by McKenzie Wark; "Utopie: Texts and Projects, 1967–1978" by Craig Buckley & Jean-Louis Violeau; "A Taxonomy of Office Chairs" by Jonathan Olivares; "CCCP: Cosmic Communist Constructions Photographed" by Frédéric Chaubin; etc.- Australian Design Review |
"Becoming Julia Morgan" by Belinda Taylor explores the life of California's first licensed woman architect...Jan. 13 to 15 at the Sausalito Woman's Club, which Morgan designed and completed in 1918...the Julia Morgan Project intends to perform the play at Morgan-designed buildings- Marin Independent Journal (California) |
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Steven Holl Architects: Cité de l’Océan et du Surf, Biarritz, France |
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