This is my last entry as the Rice university school of architecture administrator for Archinect. I wish I had posted more, commented more etc. I need to launch my own website or look for another blog spot where I can keep throwing things up (ha ha). I'm excited about the future. I feel as though, over the last 8 years of tutorials, crits, reviews and experience, I have been able to really crystallize my architectural interests. So now, post thesis I have a clear avenue of pursuit... and I'm excited. Wish me luck. Bye Rice, it's been ultra violet.
View full entryMy thesis is defended. I had an exceptionally difficult time and taking a look at what I produced, after a three week, post defense detox, I still feel as though it is unresolved. A sad thought but not an entirely hopeless one - I have already spied an upcoming competition that will allow me to... View full entry
In Lagos, every high frequency intersection is an opportunity for trade, so much so that the conduits of flow are filled to a point of stasis; a staccato flow. The geometry of the urban plane is one of hyper congestion and informal organization, massive urban intensity, spontaneity and... View full entry
Thesis is ongoing with the help of Eva Franch Gilabert. The question I am asking myself is - what is the relationship between infrastructure and the city? Infrastructure constitutes the geometry of the urban plan, from the molecular to the massive. An organizing structure and support system. A... View full entry
After a pre - start of semester weekend on the Texas/ Mexico border with my friend Richie, I’m back in H town. Although the first week was a little structure less (no official tutor/professor to meet, no thickness of timetable to build) I feel my thesis semester has officially begun. I... View full entry
I'm working in London for the summer so I was able to pop down to the Slade School of Art, where the Bartlett Architecture School hold their summer show every year. Peter Cook is no longer the dean of the school and I am tempted to say, things are changing there. Not for the better or worse, the... View full entry
So Sandford Kwinter, an associate professor at Rice, released his new book last night– Far From Equilibrium. Sanford spoke to us about the ideas behind the book. He said it contained the answer to a question he had always wished someone would ask him. (Someone) Sanford, what do you think has... View full entry
A gigantic pink and fluffy feather duster came to tickle the RSA this evening.... and it was superb. Sir Peter Cook shared his experimental vision of what could take place under the tree canopies of 'Super Houston'. He romanticized about vegetation and architecture, presenting projects entitled... View full entry
This year’s ACSA conference is being held in Houston. Lars Lerup, the dean of the RSA, gave an introduction to the first keynote lecture by Richard Sennett and Saskia Sassen. Michaele Pride and Dietmar Froehlich - This year's conference co-chairs. Richard Sennett, an urbanist and a... View full entry
Matthew Crnkovich | Quyen Ma | Viktor Ramos |Peter Stanley Rice University won the China lab charrette. There were 22 entries. They are all on the China lab website if you want to check them out.They've put together a pretty interesting future city with the axons of all the entries. It was a fun... View full entry
In Clover Lees studio we are taking part in the China lab Charrette. The brief is not too far from the overall intentions for the semester. We are looking at reinterpreting high density housing. Our site is Tseung Kwan O, Hong Kong. Currently these massive, gated mega blocks are being described... View full entry
antonia wai | gloria chang |lindsey ramos In investigating the concepts of integrations and migrations, the system aims at assisting unhindered mobility and activity throughout the residential community by eliminating conventional, self imposed boundaries of interiority and exteriority. To create... View full entry
These posters are designed by Richie Gelles. I think they are pretty clever View full entry
Film series begins tomorrow! There are more than a few on the list that I haven't seen before. This time around it was compiled by the students instead of faculty and there seems to be a real mixture although a general theme of space, exploration, future, time, travel and dystopia is apparent. Rock! View full entry
We get fellowships. At the end of every spring semester, Rice School of Architecture’s generous alumni and donors give a handful of students the opportunity to do research by traveling abroad – [graduate] students propose research and itineraries, and the faculty decide who’s... View full entry
So here we are finishing up the semester at the Rice School of Architecture program in Paris, and since I haven't posted anything ALL SEMESTER LONG -- here's a rundown of the greatest hits we've seen in Paris so far. Going back to Houston Texas after this is not going to be easy. just some shots... View full entry
On a book tour for his new autobiography/monograph Foundations of Optimism : My Journey from Communist Poland to Rebuilding the World Trade Center, Daniel Libeskind stopped in at the Jewish Community Center of Houston this week for a chat. Rice Dean Lars Lerup served as the interviewer in a... View full entry
So you want a hotwire foam cutter but you can't shell out the $398.99 for one? No problem! We've got the lowdown and we're passing it onto you, lucky blog reader. Here's your shopping list: assortment of bolts (1” to 3” length), turnbuckle eyelets, nichrome hobby wire... View full entry
The theme at this year's party was "Bloody" OR "Muppets." Not necessarily both together. (that's what happens when you think of a theme when you're really sleepy.) Take a look at what came out of that idea. whah?. Hope yours was just as smashing. If you didn't dress up, you're a loser, BUT... View full entry
Manuel Delanda returned to Rice this week - hustling his all-encompassing and all-related and all-divergent version of social science, critical theory, history, economics, city building and computer hackery - after last year's sold-out performance (not really) at the Kennon Symposium. He's... View full entry
For all the panic and stress spent last week, Rita, the jumbo-size hurricane that was supposed to be Katrina part deux, spared Houston. Some people left town in the Hollywood disaster movie-like mass exodus (2 million people on 3 freeways = 30 hours in the car to get to Fort Worth, which is... View full entry
Here's what the administration at Rice is saying regarding students displaced by Hurricane Katrina . . . Students can register for seminars and/or lectures at Rice but as far as studios, it's to the discretion of the professor to decide whether they allow students outside of Rice Architecture to... View full entry
The walls and halls are filling up: here are some images from studios and pinups so far. first pin up with visiting professors Julien De Smedt and Bjarke Ingels from the Danish firm plot. check em out at http://www.plot.dk getting moved in at Professor Will Cannady's studio award-winning rice... View full entry
Welcome back everybody. We're all fresh and clean and we kicked off the semester last week with a nice group keg and edamame (still a few loose ones rolling around the halls). We had a nice presentation by Dean Lars Lerup (that's the 2004 Swede of the Year to you.) Here are a couple lines from the... View full entry
still on vacation . . . i'll be writing more soon. View full entry