Archinect - News

The Architecture Lobby's statement on #metoo in architecture

2018-03-26T18:28:00-04:00

The Architecture Lobby released the following statement with regards to the #metoo movement in architecture. The organization invites firms to join their Solidarity Network in support of those who speak up against sexual harassment or abuse.

"We, The Architecture Lobby, stand with victims of sexual harassment and assault in school and in the workplace. We decry in no uncertain terms the use of positions of power to perpetuate abominable conduct. We ask all members of the architectural community to join us, and the many victims of harassment, in calling for fundamental change of our culture.

The issue of harassment in the workplace is not limited to any gender, employment status, or age. It has its roots in the relationship between workers and their bosses, as well as teachers and their students, in the power differential created by that relationship that allows harassment and abuse to go unchecked. For too long we have allowed the architecture profession to structurally elevate me...

Tracing the physical infrastructure supporting the internet

2016-08-23T12:54:00-04:00

Whether or not New Yorkers are paying attention, their digital connectivity can sometimes rely on the finer points of a mess of paint on the street. Some of the markings are orange, others yellow or red. Arrows, lines and letters combine to create a cryptic language of symbols and codes. “It’s kind of scrawly and intense,” said the artist and writer Ingrid Burrington. “Living in New York, you’re trained not to look down, so it’s funny how rich and dense these markings can get..."

Ingrid Burrington is the author of a new handbook to the physical infrastructure of the internet in New York, Networks of New York: An Illustrated Field Guide to Urban Internet Infrastructure.

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Bright nights at TED2014 Vancouver with Chrome-powered aerial sculpture

2014-03-19T17:47:00-04:00

Donning a spectrum of colors and moving beams of light, the "Unnumbered Sparks" installation comes to life every night as it hovers near the site of the 30th anniversary TED2014 world conference in downtown Vancouver, Canada.

Artist Janet Echelman and director of the Google Data Art Group Aaron Koblin -- who both spoke at TED2011 -- collaborated in designing the aerial sculpture just in time for TED2014. Echelman officially introduced the work earlier this week at the conference.

The 745-foot net, which is powered by Google Chrome and other modern web technologies, can be choreographed by visitors using their smartphones or tablets to "paint" the sculpture in real time.

Visitors in the area will be able to interact with Unnumbered Sparks every night until Saturday, March 22.

Check out the video below to see the creative process behind the piece.

Thinking of the city as a system

2012-07-23T18:16:00-04:00

the city-as-a-system approach described earlier can be applied as a methodology to identify how complex problems that may appear unrelated...interact with each other in the context of a given city or threat network. Taking this approach may allow planners to identify emergent patterns within the complex adaptive system of a relevant city, make sense of the system logic, and thus begin to design tailored interventions.

David J. Kilcullen (former Senior Advisor to General David Petraeus in Iraq in 2007 and author of the bestselling books The Accidental Guerrilla and Counterinsurgency) analyzes three megatrends; urbanization, littoralization and connectedness as well as their implications for future conflict.

The "new" model of privatized infrastructure

2012-07-09T19:22:00-04:00

all are really just a smoke screen for a much deeper set of political and even philosophical issues that will impact urban dwellers in the near future, especially as more than half’s the world’s population will soon be living in cities. That set of issues centers around the delicate dance between public and private ownership of space, both in the cloud and on the ground.

Earlier this year Jan Chipchase, Executive Creative Director of Global Insights at frog – the global design and innovation company, wrote "The Networked Urban Environment" which explored a contemporary-future of cloud-urban infrastructures such as; “smart” car, “smart” parking and payment systems, and “smart” cities. While in these days of austerity, recession and crisis public/private partnerships promise, business-efficiencies, they bring possible pitfalls.

Ediciones Vibok awarded with FAD Thought & Criticism 2011 prize

2011-05-31T07:49:07-04:00

Ediciones Vibok has been awarded with FAD Thought & Criticism 2011 prize for the book Collective Architectures, edited by the architect Paula Alvarez FAD Awards (Promoting Architecture and Design) were created in Barcelona in 1958 with the aim of promoting cutting-edge trends and recognize the quality of new approaches and open researches in contrast with traditional languages.

We are pleased to share with you very good news.
Ediciones Vibok has been awarded with FAD Thought & Criticism 2011 prize for the book Collective Architectures, edited by the architect Paula Alvarez

Collective Architectures, Vibok first title, has its starting point in an initiative by Santiago Cirugeda (Urban Recipes) which mobilized dozens of groups to recycle 45 containers-homes from a dismantled temporary settlement, into a multitude of self-built and self-managed spaces that were distributed throughout the Spanish territory. What began as a map of war of the Iberian peninsula, soon became a cooperation network extended to Latin America.

This book captures the whole adventure through a selection of ten projects developed between 2007 and 2010, as well as written contributions from different authors in what constitutes a coral essay on the possibility of connecting politics, life and architecture.

Paula Alvarez's edition commitment it to narrate this experience...