Archinect - News

Blue Check Homes installs Twitter-style blue checks on houses for "authentic public figures"

2021-02-09T14:02:00-05:00

According to its satirical official website, BLUE CHECK HOMES offers clients a verified blue badge on their homes. "The blue verified badge on your house lets people outside know that you're an authentic public figure. To receive the blue check crest, there must be someone authentic and notable actively living in the house," the site explains.

Simply provide your first name and all of your social media accounts and BLUE CHECK HOMES wait for a review and interview with the company's board. If you are approved, pay the fee and get a crest installed.

Pricing? For verified homeowners, "the BLUE CHECK HOMES installation team will secure your home's very own plaster baronial crest for a fee of $2999.99."

The jokester behind this is artist Danielle Baskin. In a postscript on the website, she writes, "If you thought this was a full-fledged service, please investigate the things you read on the internet! And if you're an artist making jokes on the internet, we should consider adding disclaim...

The internet’s most wicked staircases

2019-12-31T14:25:00-05:00

Need some troll-ish ideas for designing your next staircase? From vertigo-inducing carpet to confusing angles to optical illusions no one asked for, this Twitter thread — aptly titled "Stairs designed by a serial killer" — might spark some inspiration, if not a chuckle or a scoff.

Photo via Twitter.

While we're at it, feel free to add any staircases from hell that you've encountered in the comment section below.

This artist trolls investors with fake real estate billboards

2019-10-22T15:47:00-04:00

A Berlin-based artist who put up billboards advertising fake real estate projects in protest against runaway property development received more than 200 calls from would-be investors who didn’t get the joke. [...] At a distance, the adverts look plausible but closer inspection of the images visualising what the new properties would look like reveals odd details.

Treptown Visions, billboard in public space, Treptow, Berlin, 2019 by Dorothea Nold. Image: Dorothea Nold/aussenwelt

"Citizens are not being asked for their permission when investors make
such drastic changes in their city, that’s why I thought it is okay to
put them without permission up to give attention to this issue," Berlin-based artist Dorothea Nold, the creative mind behind the anonymous aussenwelt billboards, said in a recent Pop-Up City article.

Chicago architects launch parody campaign to build a golden border wall for Trump

2019-01-15T15:59:00-05:00

The architects behind the Flying Pigs on Parade project—which planned to install four golden pig-shaped balloons in front of the infamous Trump Tower Chicago sign—are back with another anti-Trump parody, this time mocking the President's proposed border wall.

New World Projects, the Chicago-based firm known for creating visual commentary on the ridiculous nature of our current political environment, has released renderings and an accompanying GoFundMe campaign for a prototype wall that would surround the Mar-a-Lago resort and golf club in Palm Beach, Florida.

Mocking Trump's penchant for ambitiously gaudy design, the proposal promises a 30-foot tall, gold finished picket fence on one side, that would be electrified on the other by six new coal plants built along the border. The project's website cynically describes, "the bad guys on the other side can look through and imagine the riches and moral integrity of being American."

Image courtesy of New World Projects.

Throughout the hyp...

Betsy DeVos’s summer home resides in McMansion Hell

2018-08-09T14:16:00-04:00

Two weeks ago, somebody untied Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos’s $40 million yacht from its mooring. It got me thinking about another opulent display of wealth owned by DeVos: her 22,000-square-foot nautical-themed summer mansion, located in Holland, Michigan. Just a few more years of climate change and it’ll be floating too.

Kate Wagner critiques Betsy DeVos’s Michigan summer mansion on her humor blog McMansion Hell. Wagner unpacks not only the architectural design but also the greater social implications of why the education secretary's McMansion is so horrendous. The essay is dedicated to "all of the public school teachers who taught [Wagner] how to write".

Betsy DeVos's summer home on McMansion Hell. Image: Kate Wagner/Advance Media/Barcroft Images.

Betsy DeVos's summer home on McMansion Hell. Image: Kate Wagner/Pricey Pads.

A Texas McMansion Hell bracket approaches, check out the 8 contenders

2018-07-03T17:38:00-04:00

I’ve been poisoning my brain the last couple of weeks narrowing down 2000 prospective McMansions to 16. Please give me a round of applause for this immense personal sacrifice. Instead of ranking them myself like I usually do, I will be doing a bracket at the end of the next post where you can vote for the Most Terrible in Texas! (After all, everything’s bigger in Texas!)

McMansion Hell, a bi-weekly blog delighting in architectural education through ridicule, now brings us a Texas bracket. The top 8 worst McMansions of Texas suburbia have been chosen and properly mocked. Now it's your turn to choose which belongs at the innermost circle of hell.

Here are a few of the contenders:

Montgomery County (House 3) (AKA Cascading Nope)

Denton County (House 5) (AKA Mt Nub)

Collin County (House 7) (AKA The Triple Can)

Check out the full lineup at McMansion Hell and get ready to cast your vote!

Want to learn more about McMansion Hell? Check our our conversation with McMansion Hell's author Kate Wagner, from a previous episode of Archinect Sessions...

A satirical look at the homelessness and housing crises by McSweeney's

2018-05-10T16:09:00-04:00

Homelessness in America has reached crisis levels and I am determined to do everything in my power to fix the problem as long as it doesn’t involve changing zoning laws or my ability to drive alone to work or, well, changing anything, really. I’m more than happy to give a hungry man a sandwich once a year and then brag to my friends about it as long as he doesn’t sit down anywhere in my line of sight to eat it. Same goes for hungry women because I’m also a feminist.

A superb piece satirizing the homelessness and housing crises by McSweeney's writer Homa Mojtabai. From a privileged and entitled point of view, Mojtabai highlights extreme issues on how problems are being "solved". This is of course an exaggeration—but by how much?

Swedish train gets officially named "Trainy McTrainface"

2017-10-19T17:11:00-04:00

It’s happened again. A public vote to name four trains running between the Swedish cities of Stockholm and Gothenburg has resulted in one of the four being called Trainy McTrainface in an echo of the name chosen by the British public for the new polar research vessel.

Last year, the British public voted to name its new polar research vessel "Boaty McBoatface"—a decision that the British government quickly overturned in favor of the less comical name "RRS Sir David Attenborough."

Hopefully, Boaty McBoatface's legacy will live on in Sweden, where the public voted to name one of its trains, running between Stockholm and Gothenburg, "Trainy McTrainface"

"We saw pretty quickly that Trainy McTrainface was in the lead in the popular option. There was a bit of international attention on the vote, and I imagine that some people were quite delighted to get some revenge for the Boaty McBoatface thing," said Swedish rail company MTR marketing chief Peter Nasfi.

Proving to have a better sense of British humor than the UK government, neither the train company, nor the Swedish government, repealed the popular vote.

Bro, Do You Even Quoin? A conversation with McMansion Hell's Kate Wagner

2017-07-13T16:41:00-04:00

On this week's episode we’re joined with Kate Wagner, the author of McMansion Hell, a blog that balances serious essays on architecture and urbanism, with brilliantly funny analysis of the absurd trends in American suburban architecture. Kate has recently emerged, triumphantly, from a widely publicized threat from Zillow to stop using their imagery. As reported on Archinect recently, Zillow withdrew their legal threats after the Electronic Frontier Foundation responded on behalf of Kate, and McMansion Hell is back in business, with a larger following than ever.

A taste of what McMansion Hell offers

Listen to "Bro, Do You Even Quoin?":

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Download: this episode

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Comedy meets architecture as Michael Ian Black chats with Deborah Berke

2017-04-06T12:18:00-04:00

Although certain architects have attempted to inject humor into the profession, architecture is generally not known for its slapstick and wry timing, which makes the pairing of interviewer Michael Ian Black (formerly of classic comedy show The State) and Yale Dean of Architecture Deborah Berke just...unusual, but great. You can listen to their talk about the role of architecture in everyday life here.

While you're at it, take a listen to Archinect's podcast conversation with Deborah Berke...

Sadar + Vuga declare, "Humor is a rare quality in architecture" in a new documentary on the influential Slovenian firm

2017-03-16T18:32:00-04:00

Rejecting self-serious notions in favor of playful, experimental, and bold architecture, Slovenian architects Sadar + Vuga have made a name themselves in the twenty-one years since they founded their practice.

Sadar+Vuga’s Air Traffic Control Center (ATCC) in Slovenia

One of the few firms to openly state that their work is "intentionally imperfect and awkward, robust, and ambiguous," Sadar + Vuga's work is now profiled in a documentary entitled "Sadar + Vuga XX." Watch the trailer below.

From the architects...

Focus of Sadar+Vuga XX documentary by director Damjan Kozole is the design process behind one of the most influential Slovenian architectural studios of the new generation, Sadar+Vuga.

The documentary Sadar+Vuga XX explores the production and communication of the Slovenian architectural firm Sadar+Vuga established by Jurij Sadar and Boštjan Vuga in Ljubljana in 1996. Individual reflections and talks with Slovenian and foreign architects, architectural critics and policy-makers, co...

“Good Walls Make Good Neighbors, Mr. Trump” — the verdict is in

2016-10-10T13:40:00-04:00

Architects around the globe got to show some Internet meme-worthy snark in Reality Cues' latest installment, the “Good Walls Make Good Neighbors, Mr. Trump” ideas competition. Based on Donald Trump's xenophobic plans to make the historically controversial U.S./Mexico border wall into a reality, the charrette invited architects to do one thing: Design a wall that separates Mr. Trump from the rest of the U.S.

Here are a few of the top entries:

First Runner Up: Taco Truck Block Party by Rajiv Fernandez

Second Runner Up: The Future is Bleak by Rob Anderson

Honorable Mention: Cleansing the Earth by Aly Perez

Honorable Mention: Shhhh, Don't Tell Richard by Daniel Rogers

(cover image) Best Overall Image: FIREWALL - You're Fired...Just Kidding, You're Stuck Here Forever! by Zachary Wilson

Find the rest of the winning submissions on Bustler.

You can buy Leonardo DiCaprio's beachfront home for $10M — but will it alleviate the crushing weight of existence?

2016-09-21T14:18:00-04:00

Movie star Leonardo DiCaprio's Malibu dream house hit the market on Friday, listing for $10.95 million. Leo purchased the midcentury California bungalow... back in 1998, and the three bed, two bath home is a beaut. It's on star-studded Carbon Beach, the views are killer, and the interiors are gorgeous. But the truth is, life is probably meaningless and there is a strong chance that we all die alone. Could buying this house change any of that?

LAist: Hi! Love the house!! Just a few questions. Albert Camus once said "At the heart of all beauty lies something inhuman." This house is obviously super beautiful—do you think there is anything inhuman about that beauty?

Redfin: Um, wow, that wasn't the question I was expecting. I think with this house in particular, with where it sits especially, it's an absolutely breathtaking home. I do not think there is anything inhuman about this house. I think it's a representation of the oceanfront property that it sits on.

For more on the intersections between architecture and celebrities, check out these links:

The Onion takes on the 'Tiny House' movement

2016-08-16T17:13:00-04:00

The Onion has once again skewered an architectural trend, this time honing in on the 'pro's and con's' of tiny houses, aka 'micro-houses'. Pro's include: "paints inability to afford a real home as positive life choice"; "allows you to live the simple life your ancestors did everything in their power to escape"; and "4’-by-3’ velvet Allman Brothers Band poster gets the decorating job done on its own" among others. Meanwhile, the con's include: "anxious pacing route severely restricted"; "lack of diversity in a neighborhood composed entirely of other people whose novels didn’t sell"; and "have to live there".

Desperate for more laughs? Follow these links:

Denver is “Baroque-a-colas” and “CAD-itecture” galore

2016-04-20T16:19:00-04:00

If Donald Trump were a building, he’d be Baroque-a-cola: It’s bombastic, pretentious, clumsy, tacky and absolutely over the top, just like he is. Most Baroque-a-cola structures are in the form of showy townhouses or McMansions, but downtown Denver has been unlucky enough to have witnessed the erection of several high-rises of the type...

Denver does have its historic architectural gems, but several recent developments in the city have been dull, if not straight-up hideous (What's with all the random patches of brick?). Writer Michael Paglia dives into Denver's “sea of awful architecture” and lists the city's “Hateful Eight” buildings.

Previously on Archinect:

How Denver is failing at Good Design

Jeff Sheppard calls downtown Denver's new housing developments "meaningless, uninspiring"

300-mile wall "proposed" for the Bay Area to exile Burning Man festivalgoers, forever

2015-08-07T18:26:00-04:00

Comedy troupe Cultivated Wit takes a humorous jab at megaprojects, outlandish crowdsourcing, and how much San Franciscans loathe Burning Man in a cheeky mock campaign that would support the construction of a 300-mile wall around the Bay Area to keep Burners out, forever. And all at a reasonable cost of $7 billion. Set up like a Kickstarter page, Cultivated Wit's MegaGoGo — "the funding platform for large-scale infrastructure"— is complete with those much-needed backer rewards and a satirical campaign video.

The host of the campaign video details the world-changing benefits of a Burner-wall: "We can make a whole new way of life, as long as we just adhere to a couple principles, like inclusion. If this project is anything, it's about bringing people together — together to lock people out...We've got to be mindful of the environment. That's why we can't leave a single trace, aside from the giant wall."

You can check out the entire video below.

h/t sfist.com

Famous architects flipping the bird

2014-10-28T13:44:00-04:00

It was just a matter of time before this Tumblr emerged... feeding off the buzz of Frank Gehry losing his cool the other day, "Supporting Frank Owen Gehry"

US student is rescued from giant vagina sculpture in Germany

2014-06-23T13:37:00-04:00

On Friday afternoon, a young American in Tübingen had to be rescued by 22 firefighters after getting trapped inside a giant sculpture of a vagina. The Chacán-Pi (Making Love) artwork by the Peruvian artist Fernando de la Jara has been outside Tübingen University's institute for microbiology and virology since 2001 and had previously mainly attracted juvenile sniggers rather than adventurous explorers.

New Trump City

2014-06-18T21:30:00-04:00

"I got to say Chicago I think this is on you. Did you not think Donald Trump was going to put his name on the building you let him build? It's what he does. Have you been to New York? Or, as you'd think it would be called from the buildings, 'New Trump City'"

Last night, John Stewart weighed in on the clash between Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Donald Trump.

If We Talked About Architecture Like We Talk About Writing

2014-05-14T13:45:00-04:00

“Where do you get your ideas for buildings?” “Oh, I could never do what you do — you know, get up in the morning and go to my job and do my job there.” “Sometimes I feel like I have a building in me.” “What’s your favorite building to re-look at?” “Oh, I’d love to design an office complex, but I’m just so busy.”

Everyone’s an architect: 11 jobs common only in romantic comedies

2014-02-10T21:05:00-05:00

Lonely male architects star in The Lake House (Keanu Reeves), The Last Kiss (Zach Braff), Three To Tango (Matthew Perry), Sleepless In Seattle (Tom Hanks), My Super Ex-Girlfriend (Luke Wilson), Love Actually (Liam Neeson), Just Like Heaven (Mark Ruffalo), and It’s Complicated (Steve Martin)—apparently, architecture is a good cipher for “sensitive, but not girly.” Few of those men ever worry about the job market...

Ten new year's resolutions for architects in 2014

2014-01-10T12:07:00-05:00

Remember that buildings shouldn't burn things, windows should let in light and copying others is fine – but just try not to annoy the skateboarders

Eco-Porn Competition results expose the sassy side of green architecture

2013-12-20T14:29:00-05:00

Participants in Reality Cues' cheeky Eco-Porn Competition got to have some fun with the green architecture trend. But since there weren't enough submissions to go through with the full judging process, only Honorable Mentions were given.

Here's a handful of the entries that piqued our interest:

Floramorphism: Bloominating Inorganic Objects by BanG studio – Babak Bryan & Henry Grosman

If Robert Moses had his way in 1941… by Ida Tam

Tower of Babel by Feliks Bochenek

The Green Roof Trope by Eric Karasek

Zaha Hadid Says Al Wakrah World Cup Stadium Doesn't Resemble Vagina

2013-11-25T12:05:00-05:00

Zaha Hadid, the world’s best-known female architect, is none too pleased with critics like Jon Stewart, who have mocked her Al Wakrah Stadium—designed with AECOM for the 2022 World Cup in Qatar—and likened her to the “Georgia O’Keeffe of things you can walk inside.” “It’s really embarrassing that they come up with nonsense like this,” Hadid tells TIME exclusively. “What are they saying? Everything with a hole in it is a vagina? That’s ridiculous.”

Previously: Unnecessary Muffness; Jon Stewart discusses Zaha's "f**kable buildings"

Penis church, vagina stadium: Can genital-shaped architecture really be accidental?

2013-11-23T12:00:00-05:00

"Sometimes,” wrote Charles Lindbergh in his 1953 flight memoir, The Spirit of St. Louis, “the world from above seems too beautiful, too wonderful, too distant for human eyes to see.” And sometimes, it looks like a bunch of genitals.

Recently: Unnecessary Muffness; Jon Stewart discusses Zaha's "f**kable buildings"

15 Mid-Century Modern Dream Homes that will Kill Your Children

2013-04-08T13:36:00-04:00

Do you know what I love more? My children. And that is why I will never live in my MCM dream home. Because mid-century modern architecture is designed to KILL YOUR CHILDREN. (Also, moderately clumsy or drunk adults).

Red arrows show the direction of travel of children’s bodies

It is pretty certain that none of these children reached adulthood intact.

Cutty Sark wins award as worst new building in Britain

2012-09-13T13:37:00-04:00

The architects, Grimshaw, have taken something delicate and beautiful and surrounded it with a building that looks like a 1980s bus station. Clumsy and ineptly detailed, their new glass greenhouse around the Cutty Sark totally ruins her thrilling lines, obscures much of her exquisite gilding and cynically forces anyone who actually wants to see her to pay their £12 and go inside.

Ask The Concept Of Phenomenology In Architecture As Developed By The Norwegian Theorist Christian Norberg-Schulz

2012-06-12T13:46:00-04:00

Architecture (insofar as architecture is an art) should contain within it the potential for the revelation of that which is unknown. Changes in our physical environment, particularly in the structure of our cities following the Second World War, have resulted in a loss of a sense of place, as well as a subsequent "empty space" within our perceived experience of our world. This can only be remedied by a renewed sense of human settlements as urban foci...

The Onion has an advice columnist! Found via Archinect member The Great Northern in this discussion thread.

Secret features of Apple's new headquarters.

2011-06-13T12:05:20-04:00

One ring to rule them all