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Learning from the last of Louis Kahn’s important sketchbooks

2024-07-13T10:00:00-04:00

The architect who designed some of the 20th century’s great buildings kept a notebook with intimate glimpses into his creative vision. Now it’s his daughter’s final goodbye. [...] We’re reminded of the nuts and bolts of architecture — how legends, too, are susceptible to so-called value engineering.

Sketches for posthumously completed projects for the Yale Center for British Art in New Haven and the Franklin D. Roosevelt Four Freedoms State Park in New York City are included in the recreated facsimile, which Kahn’s daughter Sue Ann put together for the 50th anniversary of his death with help from Swiss publisher Lars Müller.

The result, Sam Lubell writes for the Times, is a "remarkable creation." (It's important to note that these are separate from the Kickstarter-funded push for another facsimile copy of earlier sketchbooks from Designers & Books.)

Conservation work on the YCBA, meanwhile, is expected to wrap up later this year.

Stanley Tigerman Rides Again: Architect's final sketches go on display in Chicago

2019-09-16T20:09:00-04:00

A collection of engrossing sketches created by the late architect Stanley Tigerman are currently on view at Chicago's Volume Gallery. The exhibition, titled Tigerman Rides Again, presents some of the final creative works produced by the iconoclastic architect who passed away in June of 2019.

According to exhibition text, "After a hiatus from his daily drawing practice, Stanley Tigerman picked up his pen and his moleskin notebook in January 2019. He began creating images that harkened back to his early paintings and moved away from the drawings he made to express, explore, and develop ideas on architecture throughout his over five decade-long practice. While he is known for his lively and often colorful collages of buildings and cartoons, these black and white drawings revert to another time. The works produce optical illusions and align with his paintings from the 60’s that reveal influences of his former Yale professor, Josef Albers."

Tigerman Rides Again. Images courtesy of Volum...

This Instagram page draws famous buildings, showing off the sketch process via timelapse

2018-08-31T13:32:00-04:00

Sam Picardal is a New York based artist and architectural illustrator running the Instagram account @21.am, which shows off their sketching process for drawing buildings by famous architects. Capturing their practice via timelapse, the page posts videos of Picardal hand drawing landmark works such as the Art Gallery of Alberta by Frank Gehry, The Tower Bridge in London, Hadid's Heydar Aliyev Cultural Center, and even the Millennium Falcon. Entire cityscapes are given the pen-and-ink treatment as well, as are various spacecrafts and robotics.

A helping hand: Glasgow School of Art receives detailed Mackintosh Building sketches from Ph.D. alumnus, as restoration plan progresses

2015-09-08T18:40:00-04:00

Prospects look promising right now for the Glasgow School of Art as their plan to restore the historic Mackintosh Building from a devastating fire last May pieces itself together. After months of debate about whether to restore or replace the Mackintosh, locally based Page\Park Architects won the competition to work with the school in restoring the structure this past March.

Most recently, the GSA received a gift of 22 architectural drawings of the Mackintosh Building, meticulously drawn and donated by Professor George Cairns from the QUT Business School in Brisbane. They're considered to be the most comprehensive drawings of the building in existence.

George Cairns' drawing of the East Wing Staircase.

Perhaps this was a stroke of luck for the school. Cairns first created the drawings while working toward his Ph.D. at GSA's Mackintosh School of Architecture during the early 1990s. The A1-size drawings, which are mostly drawn at a 1:100 scale, depict the Mackintosh as it was completed i...

Win a copy of the reprinted “ÁLVARO SIZA. VIAGEM SEM PROGRAMA”

2014-08-06T18:43:00-04:00

The popular ÁLVARO SIZA. VIAGEM SEM PROGRAMA book tells the personal stories of renowned Portuguese architect Álvaro Siza through his own collection of drawings. Upon the success of the first edition, Red Publishing recently reprinted the book -- and guess what, Archinect is now giving away five copies to our readers!

To enter the book giveaway, fill out this survey by Wednesday, August 13, end of day. Winners will be chosen at random. Good luck!

The book presents 53 drawings that Siza created over a period of 60 years, beginning in Porto to the end of the 1950s when he made his way into the architecture world. In an interview, Siza talks about his most significant encounters with colleagues and friends, and the lasting relationships that were established.

Authors Raul Betti and Greta Ruffino worked with Siza himself in selecting which drawings to publish from his numerous sketchbooks and diaries. Digitally reproducing the drawings involved an in-depth study on materials and a digital ...

Results of the AIA Philadelphia Napkin Sketch Competition

2012-08-13T14:49:00-04:00

Three category winners and several finalists have been announced at the 2012 SKETCH SHOWDOWN, AIA Philadelphia's annual napkin sketch competition. The organizers received 105 entries from China, New Zealand, and the United States with authors ranging from high school students to architects with over 20+ years of experience in the profession. The entries are now on view in Philadelphia through September 15 at the AIA Bookstore at Washington Square (7th & Sansom Streets).

Editor's Picks #275

2012-07-31T01:01:00-04:00

Orhan Ayyüce featured recent efforts towards preservation, by new owner Michael Chapman who commissioned Barry Milofsky of M2A Architects to design the restoration, to The Lukens House, in Soriano's Glen Lukens House: Back to Life and Happy. Therein he asserted "It is important to add here that Soriano was the architect whom photographer Julius Shulman and his wife selected to design their home. As to why, Mr. Shulman did tell me in an unpublished interview that the decision to hire Mr. Soriano was made because ‘he loved life!’ after drinking few bottles of wine Mr. Soriano brought with him to the empty lot Shulmans bought below Mulholland Drive."

News
Mas Context highlighted the work of David Yoon, a writer, designer, photographer, and self-confessed urban planning geek living in Los Angeles, who started documenting existing streets of Los Angeles and narrowing them to see the effects that his manipulations had on the city. Eric Chavkin claimed "PHOTOSHOP URBANISM This is all ab...

AFH's I Love Architecture Charity Auction Starts Today

2012-06-19T18:29:00-04:00

Over 70 contributions from 50 of the world's top architects and designers are being auctioned. Proceeds will support Architecture for Humanity. Help us reach our fundraising goal of $150,000 by June 30.

Here are just a few selected sketches and design contributions which will become available later today on eBay as part of Architecture for Humanity's I Love Architecture Charity Auction:

↑ Renzo Piano, La scuola a S. José di Costarica. 3/31/12, Pen, Pencil, Marker, & Post It on Trace Paper, 17.5 x 24.5

↑ Richard Rogers | Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners, The Centre Pompidou, Screenprint, 24 x 36

↑ Michael Szivos | SOFTlab, 3D lasercut models | set of 3, Plastic light cutouts, 13 x 19

↑ Moshe Safdie, New Wing Expansion Peabody-Essex Museum, Print Ed. 47/118, 16 x 20

↑ Ball-Nogues Studio, Feathered Edge Test Print. 2010, pigment print on somerset velvet paper, 15 x 23

↑ Richard Meier, The Getty Center / I-Research Institute ed.11/20. Spring 1998, Tyler Graphics Print | Original lithograph print on paper, 20.5 x 28

↑ J. Mayer H., From Dataprotection Pattern Installations. 13.2.2012, Printed on card stock, 11.6 x 16.5

↑ Stéphane Malka, AME-LOT. 2...

Archive of Affinities, a collection of architectural patent applications

2012-05-02T18:35:00-04:00

Archive of Affinities is a very interesting new(ish?) Tumblr documenting architectural patent applications.