Archinect - News

Preserving the legacy of William Sidney Pittman, the 'first Black architect of Texas'

2024-02-28T12:23:00-05:00

Many of his designs sit within historic Black neighborhoods with African American historical and cultural institutions. At the Glen Oaks Cemetery in South Dallas, Pittman’s grave marker reminds visitors why his buildings are significant points of interest—after all, he was the “first Black architect of Texas.”

The building legacy of William Sidney Pittman, who arrived in Dallas from Washington, D.C., right before World War I, stands at only seven surviving structures. UT Austin School of Architecture assistant professor Tara A. Dudley says: “His arrival provided African Americans in Texas access to a professional architect within the race — as opposed to relying on white architects as most did — and who, as a Black man, understood the needs and requirements of the African American community.”

Pittman, who was also a tremendously incisive polemic writer and early inspiration for Paul Revere Williams, died in March of 1958 with a portfolio of fifteen completed buildings in the state. Dudley and others are now ardently at work preserving his legacy there and in D.C. (where his 1912 Anthony Bowen YMCA design still stands). As she tells Texas Highways, “[His] work needs to be preserved for future generations as a testament to his significance in the profession of architecture in the U.S. in th...

Gensler, PGAL, Muller2 to design new Dallas Fort Worth International Airport Terminal F expansion

2024-02-23T12:58:00-05:00

The team behind the new $1.6 billion Dallas Fort Worth International Airport Terminal F expansion has been announced to include the architecture firms PGAL, Muller2, and Gensler. The three join an eight-member design-build consortium for the delivery of the sixth terminal of the nation’s second-busiest airport that will add a total of 400,000 square feet and 15 new gates with docking spaces located on either side of a rectangular concourse.

Construction will begin in June of this year. The project team says expectations are for completion no later than the second quarter of 2027. The new Terminal F coincides with a “major” redesign and expansion of Terminal C that’s set to finish in 2028, with up to 24 new gates being added to the airport facility in total.

The local NBC affiliate reported the American Airlines-led effort as being a replacement for a larger 24-gate $3.5 billion Terminal F expansion scheme that had been planned for 2025 before a pandemic-caused cancellation.

Related ...

Better Block Foundation, a nonprofit for open-source neighborhood design and ‘wikiblock’ urbanism, is hiring

2023-12-07T12:42:00-05:00

Following last week’s look at an opening for an Architect/Designer at Build Block, we are using this week’s edition of our Job Highlights series to explore an open role on Archinect Jobs for a Landscape Designer at the Better Block Foundation.

The role, based in Dallas, TX, “goes beyond the conventional office setting, requiring a genuine commitment to hands-on, physical work in the field,” according to the company. Among the responsibilities will be delivering site design and presentation materials, material sourcing and ordering, construction documents, and potential public speaking and development roles. “The Landscape Designer should be passionate about new urbanism and willing to swing a hammer, get paint on his/her clothing, answer volunteers’ questions, etc.,” the company adds. “This position is very hands-on.”

Before/After: Collaborative neighborhood placemaking. Image credit: The Better Block Foundation

Why the role interests us

The role at the Better Block Foundation offer...

Austin becomes largest city in the U.S. to dump parking requirements

2023-11-05T09:00:00-05:00

Austin on Thursday became the largest city in the country to stop requiring new developments to have a set amount of parking — a move aimed at both fighting climate change and spurring more housing construction amid the city’s affordability crisis. The Austin City Council voted 8-2 Thursday to wipe out minimum parking requirements for virtually every kind of property citywide. That includes single-family homes, apartment buildings, offices and shopping malls.

As noted by The Texas Tribune, housing advocates, developers, and climate activists have increasingly advocated for the erasure of parking requirements, which have been found to drive up housing costs and fuels a dependency on cars. Cities across the country in recent years, including Portland, Minneapolis, and San Jose, have taken similar actions to scale back requirements. In 2019, the L.A. City Planning Department released its Downtown Community Plan, called DTLA 2040, which included plans to eliminate parking requirements for all of downtown Los Angeles.

Previously on Archinect: Are vacant parking lots affecting the cost of housing? A new study in Boston sheds light on the issue

According to Austin City Council Member and the proposal’s author, Zohaib Qadri, keeping parking requirements contradicted the billions of dollars the city has set out to invest in its public transit system.

Opponents of the move worry that getting rid of parking requirements will redirect parking to near...

SWA and HKS construct park over Dallas highway to reconnect historically divided neighborhood

2023-05-24T11:04:00-04:00

SWA has unveiled the design, undertaken with HKS, for a major urban infrastructure project which seeks to reconnect a historically Black neighborhood in South Dallas. The Southern Gateway Public Green comprises a five-acre park in the Oak Cliff neighborhood of Dallas, built to reconnect a community that was divided by highway construction in the 1950s.

Image credit: HKS

The park will be delivered in two phases, with infrastructure currently under construction to ‘cap’ the highway to allow the landscape to be built overhead. The finished scheme will feature event spaces, a market-style dining and retail area, and lawns.

Image credit: HKS

“SWA’s design was based on public feedback and reflects the neighboring communities that will benefit from it on a daily basis—communities that historically haven’t gotten a lot of say in what happens to them,” the firm said about the scheme. “It will also be home to a variety of native plants and trees, as well as educational exhibits about the histor...

Five major sports and entertainment venues by Populous: Your Next Employer?

2023-01-17T13:30:00-05:00

Following our previous visit to San Francisco-based Mork-Ulnes Architects, we are using the first 2023 edition of our Meet Your Next Employer series to explore the work of global sports and entertainment venue specialists Populous.

Founded in 1983, the firm operates 23 global offices including eight in the United States. Among the 3000+ projects in the firm’s portfolio include commissions for sports franchises such as MLB, the NBA, and the NFL, as well as major sporting events such as the 2012 Summer Olympics in London and the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing.

The firm’s background and culture were further explored back in late 2018 when we sat down with Missy Ragsdale, Director of Human Resources at Populous's Kansas City office as part of our How To Get A Job At ___ series. “Three words we regularly hear staff use to describe Populous are adaptive, energetic, and entrepreneurial,” Ragsdale told us.

Diller Scofidio + Renfro issues update on historic Frank Lloyd Wright theater revitalization in Dallas

2022-12-12T18:50:00-05:00

Diller Scofidio + Renfro has shared new project details and a flythrough animation for their planned revitalization of the 63-year-old Frank Lloyd Wright-designed Kalita Humphreys Theater in Dallas.

The project’s scope revolves around a “faithful reinterpretation of Wright’s original design intent” that calls for the removal of several decades worth of accumulated additions; creation of a new “theater arts complex” outside that includes a new performance venue, two pavilions, and a 100-seat black box theater; demolition of the existing Heldt Building; and further development of the William B. Dean Park with an emphasis on “stitching” the site with the popular nearby Katy Trail and Turtle Creek attractions.

Image courtesy Diller Scofidio + Renfro

According to a press release, the final plans will be submitted to the city no later than December 31st of this year. Chicago-based preservation specialists Harboe Architects is also involved with the planning team, helping to restore the so...

7 featured architecture job opportunities in Dallas

2022-11-18T15:24:00-05:00

Looking for architectural job opportunities in Dallas? Check out this week's curated employment highlight from Archinect Jobs, with a selection of current openings for architects, environmental graphic designers, and sustainability experts in the Big D.

To look up specific job titles from the architectural profession, consult Archinect's Guide to Job Titles series. Also, follow our Archinect Tips series to improve your portfolio, resume, interviewing skills, and increase your overall chances of getting that next job.

Rafael Viñoly Architects seeks an Intermediate Architect/Designer for National Medal of Honor Museum
"Rafael Viñoly Architects seeks to hire an architect with a minimum of 5 years of experience, preferably in the design and construction of museums. The selected architect will work from a site office as part of a team that represents Rafael Viñoly Architects during the construction phase of a signature museum in Arlington, Texas."

RVA is also currently offering a Marketin...

Is the future of airport design on your career radar?

2022-06-08T09:00:00-04:00

In a recent article on the future of airports, The New York Times noted that the average age of an airport terminal is more than 40 years old, meaning many are becoming ill-equipped to deal with modern air travel trends. Unsurprisingly, our editorial has recently featured several aviation expansion projects across the United States as airport authorities respond to a predicted resurgence of the aviation industry following the COVID-19 free-fall.

Last month, Woods Bagot and The Miller Hull Partnership unveiled designs for a timber-focused expansion at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport. In March, Orlando International Airport confirmed that its $3 billion expansion project, including 15 new gates, was nearing completion, while progress also continued at a long-awaited renovation of LaGuardia’s Terminal B in New York. Late last year, meanwhile, it was announced that New York’s JFK ...

Morphosis designs new arts and cultural district master plan at the University of Texas at Dallas

2022-06-07T15:20:00-04:00

A team led by Morphosis is designing a new 12-acre arts and cultural district at the University of Texas at Dallas.

Called the Edith and Peter O’Donnell Jr. Athenæum, the project will bring a second location of the Crow Museum of Asian Art as well as a performance hall and a planned museum for the traditional arts of the Americas. According to the architects, the new athenaeum breaks from the conventional, reserved model of this building type into one that prioritizes porosity, visibility, and informal connections between its users.

The structure will be located at the southeast corner of the University’s campus, organized around a central plaza and flanked by the museums and performance hall on the west and the parking structure to the east. To the north, the plaza aligns with social and green spaces that support the Naveen Jindal School of Management and Davidson Auditorium. On the opposite end, the arts district establishes a new public-facing presence for the University at the...

Wing is setting up its drone delivery service in Dallas-Fort Worth

2021-10-21T16:54:00-04:00

Drones will soon be buzzing overhead in Dallas-Fort Worth, bearing small containers filled with Tylenol and Band-Aids. Wing, a subsidiary of Google parent company Alphabet, is bringing its drone delivery service to the Texas city, its first densely populated market.

Walgreens will be the first U.S. retailer to employ this new service. For now, just one Walgreens in the Dallas-Fort Worth area will be involved, making deliveries to the city of Fresco and the town of Little Elm. The drones will arrive in small containers that serve as hangars from where the aircraft will be deployed. Walgreens employees will be trained to process orders and load packages onto the delivery drones.

Along with the Walgreens location, Wing plans to establish another drone delivery facility in Frisco Station, an urban, mixed-use development north of Dallas.

According to Wing, this type of service in the U.S. has been limited to smaller towns, where land usage is less crowded and complex. The company attributes their automated drone delivery service’s ability to operate in more urban environments to their aircraft’s advanced flight planning and routing capabilities.

Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport has built four new gates composed of prefabricated modules

2021-09-28T14:59:00-04:00

In an unprecedented move, Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport (DFW) has constructed four new prefabricated modular gates for its Terminal C.

The gates replace a 72,000-square-foot extension comprising five gates built in 1988. According to CNN, they were initially intended to be used for only 10 to 15 years at the most, however, due to their central location and constant use, DFW chose not to replace them until now. Their demolition began in February and was finished in March, which is when work on the foundation and underground utilities for the new gates began. This effort was completed in August.

Check out the progress on the High C Gates at DFW!

The new, 5-gate concourse is being built in prefabricated modules, which will be transported to the terminal and put together later this summer. The construction method saves time and money, and is a first for a U.S. airport. pic.twitter.com/zd0P7Ra3AH
— DFW Airport (@DFWAirport) July 13, 2021

DFW worked with construction companies A...

AECOM is moving its headquarters to Dallas, Texas

2021-08-19T14:31:00-04:00

Multinational engineering firm AECOM announced Tuesday that it is relocating its global headquarters from Los Angeles to Dallas, effective October 1, 2021.

AECOM CEO Troy Rudd and select corporate leaders will move to the company’s existing Dallas office, joining the more than 1,200 employees based at the location. The company’s 2,500 employees based in California, across its Los Angeles office and other offices across the state, will remain. As stated in AECOM’s announcement, the move will provide the firm “additional benefits as a corporate hub and talent magnet for the engineering and consulting industry.”

In recent years, the Dallas-Fort Worth area has been an attractive landing spot for businesses and workers. As reported by Construction Dive, since 2010, 140 companies have moved their headquarters to Northern Texas, according to an op-ed by JLL Dallas Managing Director Jeremy McGown. He notes that the metropolitan region has grown faster than any other major city, with nearly ...

Volkan Alkanoglu's new 'Drift' Pedestrian Bridge opens in Fort Worth, Texas

2021-08-05T10:06:00-04:00

Portland, Oregon-based designer Volkan Alkanoglu has installed a new timber and steel pedestrian bridge to showcase the “Plug-and-play urbanism” design strategy that is emerging behind the help of new technologies. The prefabricated off-site and installed in only a few hours, Noah’s Ark-like structure was commissioned by the city’s Public Art program to span an 80-foot-wide culvert in the South Hills neighborhood south of downtown.

The design is meant to resemble driftwood that collects in the creek area, which is also defined by mid-century modern ranch homes that Alkanoglu drew on for an additional reference.

Photography by Jennifer Boomer

Per the architect: “While Alkanoglu originally envisioned fabricating the bridge solely from cross-laminated timber, budgetary constraints encouraged a different but equally innovative strategy. Taking a cue from shipbuilding techniques, he and a team of engineers began with a steel armature, but veered away from tradition by cladding it with CN...

6 Texas-based architecture firms currently hiring

2020-10-16T14:52:00-04:00

From the list of architectural career opportunities on Archinect Jobs, we have selected six current openings for architects, graphic designers, and early-career academics in the Lone Star State.

If y'all need to look up specific job titles from the architectural profession, consult Archinect's Guide to Job Titles series. Also, follow our Archinect Tips series to improve your portfolio, resume, interviewing skills, and increase your overall chances of getting that next job.

STG Design seeks an Architect Project Manager in Austin
"STG Design is looking for an Architectural Project Manager with 10 or more years’ experience in urban multi-family projects to join our Austin office. [...] STG has a 40+ year history of delivering award-winning commercial architecture and interior design. We’re building on that for the future, too. We recently became employee-owned and man are we energized."

Congo Street Initiative by bcWORKSHOP in partnership with Congo Street families, resident volunteers,...

Mansard roof-topped Johnson / Burgee tower in Dallas is for sale

2020-07-29T14:49:00-04:00

A 1.1 million-square-foot office tower complex designed by Johnson / Burgee is currently for sale in Dallas, Texas.

Organized as a trio of conjoined 19-story towers topped with mansard roofs and connected by arch-topped skywalks, the office complex rises behind a low-rise hotel designed in a matching style by the architects. Only the office portion of the complex is for sale, The Dallas Morning News reports. According to the newspaper, the Crescent office complex, as the development is known, was recently renovated and was the largest development project in Dallas history when it was built during the 1980s.

Estimates for the property, which is owned by JP Morgan Asset Management, indicate that it could be worth more than $700 million.

Diller Scofidio + Renfro to restore and expand FLW building in Dallas

2020-02-25T18:54:00-05:00

The Dallas Theater Center (DTC) has announced that New York City-based architects Diller Scofidio + Renfro have been selected to renovate the Frank Lloyd Wright-designed Kalita Humphreys Theater in Dallas, Texas.

According to a press release unveiled by the DTC, the “renovation efforts aim to preserve the theater’s distinct architecture while equipping it to inspire a new generation.” As part of the project, the architects will create a master plan for the nine-acre site that will include new theater spaces as well as a connection to the Katy Trail, a public jogging and cycling path that cuts through part of the city. A goal of the project is to keep up with “Wright’s organic, nature-inspired vision,” by “making the entire site an accessible public space for all,” according to the press release.

The building is the only publicly accessible structure designed by Wright in the state of Texas, it is also the only free-standing theater Wright designed that was built during his lifetime...

Architecture critic Mark Lamster proposes a new pedestrian memorial park for Dallas

2020-01-29T13:16:00-05:00

In a recent column for The Dallas Morning News, architecture critic Mark Lamster proposes a new pedestrian-oriented vision for the district surrounding Dealey Plaza, where President John F. Kennedy was murdered, and where the Dallas authorities are currently planning a new municipal memorial for the victims of racial violence. The memorial will be set in Martyrs Park, a grassy, triangular knoll surrounded on all sides by highway infrastructure and roads.

"Make no mistake: The geography of Dallas is a geography of race," Lamster writes, highlighting that historically speaking, "systematic discrimination forced African Americans into the least desirable spaces of the city—areas prone to flooding, near industry, caught on the wrong side of train tracks and highways, and always ripe for appropriation if and when the need arose" and that the same logic is currently at play with regards to the location of the proposed Martyrs Park memorial.

Satellite view of Dealey Plaza and Martyrs Park ...

6 Texas-based firms currently hiring on Archinect Jobs

2019-12-19T11:00:00-05:00

A notable gem of the Southwest, Texas offers beautiful landscapes, a rich culture, and a one-of-a-kind building history. An area filled with traditional architecture, infrastructure, and eye-catching contemporary works, the state has lots to offer for those searching for work in terms of firm variability.

Below are six Texas-based firms looking to hire the right candidate to join their team.

Edgeland Residence by Bercy Chen Studio. Image © Chase Daniels

In case you missed it, check out last week's Austin job round up in conjunction with Archinect's Spotlight on Austin regional coverage, profiling current employment opportunities at Runa Workshop, Clayton & Little, LEVY Architects, A Parallel Architecture, Bercy Chen Studio, Sensory Interactive, and New Waterloo.

Financial Company Office Space in Beaumon, TX. Image courtesy of Huitt-Zollars, Inc./Architects

Huitt-Zollars, Inc./Architects is offering job opportunities in their Houston and Fort Worth offices
HZ is a leading full service...

Planning for Texas Central High-Speed Rail continues apace

2019-12-17T18:55:00-05:00

A long-in-the-works plan to link Houston and Dallas with high-speed rail is making steady progress as backers for the project announce that they could be one year away from breaking ground.

Earlier this year, Archinect reported that Texas Central Texas Central, the group advocating for and developing the planned train route, had signed a deal with Italian construction giant Salini Impreglio and its American subsidiary Lane Construction to design and construct the train line.

This month, Dallas News reports that Texas Central has submitted environmental and safety documentation to the federal government with the aim of having approvals to start construction by the summer of 2020.

Map highlighting the route to be taken by the proposed train. (Courtesy of Texas Central)

Holly Reed, Texas Central’s managing director of external affairs, tells Dallas News, “We’ve had our heads down working on this for a long time ... The conversation has shifted from, ‘Is this really going to happen?’ to...

Climate change calls for a new stadium in Texas baseball

2019-10-04T11:01:00-04:00

A few years ago, the owners of the Rangers concluded that the sweat-inducing weather was depressing attendance, and decided to build $1.2 billion Globe Life Field, with a retractable roof and air conditioning, right next to their not-very-old and still perfectly good stadium. The residents of Arlington are chipping in $500 million of that cost.

As climate change continues to bestow its work upon the planet, Texas Rangers Baseball are one of the many feeling its effects. Globe Life Field, the new HKS designed baseball park under construction in Arlington, Texas, and due for completion in March of next year, is the $1.2 billion response to the rising heat.

Globe Life Stadium. Courtesy of HKS

As innovations in stadium design continue to progress, the 'inconveniences' of the past will become the luxuries of the future, sweaty patrons now will have the comfort of climate controlled competition.

Texas High-Speed Rail route takes a big step forward

2019-09-16T12:45:00-04:00

Texas Central, the private company developing the Texas Bullet Train, announced it had signed a deal with Salini Impregilo, the Italian construction giant, and its American subsidiary, Lane Construction, to design, construct and install the 240-mile high-speed rail line using Japan’s Shinkansen trains.

The plan to build a 90-minute bullet train between Dallas and Houston still requires a number of local, state, and federal approvals before it can move forward.

Nonetheless, backers of the project are raising funding for the initiative and setting out to complete early design work. Texas Central optimistically hopes to break ground sometime in 2020.

Fight to save one of the few remaining, intact, and occupied “Freedman's Town” in the nation picks up steam in Dallas

2019-08-19T14:00:00-04:00

On August 14, 2019, the Dallas City Council unanimously approved a resolution that temporarily halts the use of public funds on any further demolitions in Tenth Street—an important move given that to date, at least 70 of the district’s 260 homes have been demolished. Thanks to a broad-based coalition effort bolstered by the media attention of the 11 Most listing, this vote removes the immediate threat to the neighborhood and helps advance the cause.

Before "The Tulip," there was Welton Becket's Reunion Tower

2019-07-17T09:14:00-04:00

With a certain bulb-shaped observation tower in the news again, perhaps now is a good time to revisit another seminal observation tower project: The Welton Becket and Associates-designed Reunion Tower in Dallas, Texas.

Crafted as a three-story, lightbulb-studded geodesic dome hoisted atop a series of monolithic poured-in-place concrete piers, Reunion Tower is among one of the more iconic elements of Dallas’s eclectic and neon-lit skyline. The tower rises to 561-feet in height and is topped in part by a panoramic restaurant designed to revolve around the building’s axis once every 55 minutes, creating one of the more remarkable—and still fully functional—high points of 1970s-era architecture. The restaurant, Five Sixty by Wolfgang Puck, according to its website, offers diners “floor-to-ceiling windows offering 360-degree views of the city from the dramatic, revolving dining room.”

View of the Reunion Tower. Image courtesy of Wikimedia user texas_mustang.

Like a New Year’s Eve ball th...

Meet Tanya Ragan, the female real estate developer taking Dallas by storm

2019-07-15T16:50:00-04:00

Her newly resurrected 114-year-old Purse Building features a floor-to ceiling mural of the late Jacobs, an urbanist activist and author of The Death and Life of Great American Cities, superimposed on a downtown street grid. Above Jacobs’ striking bespectacled image, her mantra “New ideas need old buildings” blazes in neon lights.

The Dallas Morning News profiles Tanya Ragan, a Dallas-based real estate developer who is taking on commercial real estate's "boys club" mentality with a Jane Jacobs-inspired approach.

Ragan's Wildcat Management is behind a series of new and forthcoming projects, including the redevelopment of the Liberty State Bank Building, the Purse Building, and others, that aim to repurpose historic buildings in the city's downtown.

Ragan was recently listed among other influential developers by The Business Journals network.

Regarding the difficulty of developing real estate projects as woman in Texas, Kourtny Garrett, CEO of Downtown Dallas Inc., a non-profit development advocate in the city, told The Dallas Morning News, “It’s an uphill climb and you have to be smart and you have to be patient—Tanya would laugh if she heard me call her patient because she knows she’s sometimes not—but in terms of understanding how market cycles go, you have to be willing to hit the pavement every single da...

Philip Johnson's Beck House in Dallas is listed at $19.5M

2019-07-05T17:05:00-04:00

Just North of Dallas' city center lies a lesser known mansion designed in 1964 by infamous architect Philip Johnson. With six bedrooms and seven full bathrooms, this 11,387 square foot home in Preston Hollow, known as Beck House, is the architect's largest home design.

Recreation Room.

Gallery Room.

At first glance, the building appears less like a residence than a museum, office or opera house design, as its design clearly leans on lessons learned from his design for The David H. Koch Theater at Lincoln Center (formerly The New York State Theater), which was completed in the same year, and other public building designs completed by his firm. The home is distinguished by several colonnades, a sprawling library and a palatial double-staircase in a gallery room.

Dining Room.

According to the listing, the home sits on 7 acres which include "a media house, modernist cabana, pool and tennis court." The home is for sale at $19,500,000.

Main Home from garden.

Cabana.

Dallas joins AECOM's Automated Bus Research Group

2019-06-11T10:15:00-04:00

Dallas Area Rapid Transit has joined a national effort to explore how autonomous buses could shuttle people around cities in the future. It is one of about a dozen transportation agencies that are part of the Automated Bus Consortium, which will research driverless buses and run pilot projects to better understand how they could be rolled out nationwide.

The consortium, whose membership includes the transit agencies of Los Angeles County and Atlanta, and the Michigan Department of Transportation, was created by AECOM and aims to begin testing a fleet of 75 to 100 full-sized automated buses in major cities by 2021 or 2022.

Todd Plesko, Dallas Area Rapid Transit's vice president for service planning and scheduling told Dallas News, "My goal is to drive the cost down of operation of this service and increase the safety so we'll have fewer accidents. But it has to be done in a way that we bring the customers along so it doesn't frighten them, so they feel the technology benefits them."

Looking for an architecture job in Texas? Here are 13 exciting new opportunities in the Lone Star State

2019-02-20T14:53:00-05:00

Texas, one of the gems of the Southwest, offers beautiful landscapes and a one of a kind history. As far as notable buildings are concerned, Texas is home to Renzo Piano's Menil Collection, I.M. Pei's Dallas City Hall, and Tadao Ando's The Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth. With structures as captivating as it's sunsets, Texas' architectural landscape showcases giants in the profession. Below are five Texas based firms looking to hire the right candidate to join their team.

Lake|Flato Architects seeks an Intern Architect as well as higher level project architects in San Antonio and Austin
Lake|Flato Architects seeks a forward-thinking, energetic Interior Designer to join our award-winning sustainable design practice in our offices in Austin and San Antonio, Texas. Ideal candidates will exhibit a commitment to excellence in architectural interiors along with demonstrated experience in architectural interiors project workflow. Successf...

How 'smart glass' at airports boosts alcohol sales

2018-04-23T14:21:00-04:00

The tinted world of tomorrow is coming, and airports—mini-cities of steel, concrete and lots and lots of glass—are interested. In a test last fall, Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport outfitted one of its gates with a new type of “smart glass” that can adjust for sunlight exposure. The obvious point is to keep travelers from getting overheated—but the exercise also brought a more lucrative benefit.

A Cornell-led study at Dallas-Fort Worth Airport found that implementing a new type of electrochromatic 'smart glass' at one of its gates not only led to cooler, more pleasant surface temperatures in the waiting area, but the tinted glass, and the resulting dimmer light in the neighboring bars and restaurants, also resulted in increased alcohol sales—by as much as 80%.

More airports have announced plans to upgrade their lounges and terminals with 'smart glass.'

Calatrava's new Dallas bridge further troubled due to cable flaws

2018-02-02T13:28:00-05:00

The Margaret McDermott Bridge was supposed to be open to pedestrians and bicyclists by now, but the arches over the Trinity River remain closed partially over concerns about broken cables. The issue centers around problems with the cables -- and their resistance to heavy winds -- that connect the arch to the base of the Dallas bridge, which was designed by famed architect Santiago Calatrava and his firm.

The $113-million (partially) Calatrava-designed Margaret McDermott Bridge carrying Interstate 30 is part of Dallas' ambitious Trinity River Project.

"City officials are hoping to open the bridge to pedestrians and cyclists in March," Dallas News writes. Meanwhile the finger-pointing between TxDOT, city officials, and the architect is in full swing.