Archinect - News

Buildings Speak: NPR special will explore the impacts of women on American architecture for International Women’s Day

2024-03-06T13:57:00-05:00

For this year's International Women’s Day on March 8, NPR is airing a special one-hour documentary produced with help from the Beverly Willis Architecture Foundation (BWAF). The piece aims to shed light on the overlooked contributions of women in architecture to an American mass audience for the first time.

Narrated by the great Oscar-winning actor and producer Frances McDormand, ‘Buildings Speak: Stories of Pioneering Women Architects’ is a collaboration with producers The Kitchen Sisters. The special draws three of the figures (Julia Morgan, Amaza Lee Meredith, and Natalie de Blois) featured in the BWAF’s unmissable New Angle: Voice podcast series, the third season of which also premiers on International Women’s Day with a special focus on the architecture of the 1970s.

Tizziana Baldenebro, the new executive director of the BWAF, commented: “They are trailblazers, groundbreakers, skyscraper visionaries — women who changed the skyline and the built environment that surrounds us tod...

Lana Del Rey is right: There is a tunnel under Ocean Boulevard

2024-02-01T13:10:00-05:00

With days to go until the 2024 Grammy Awards, one nominee in the running for Album of the Year contains an unexpected architectural overture.

Lana Del Rey’s Did You Know That There’s A Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd, nominated in three categories, contains a song of the same name that dwells on an abandoned piece of infrastructure in Long Beach, California.

View this post on Instagram A post shared by lanadelreyInfo (@lanadelreylnfo)

In the song “Did You Know There's a Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd,” Del Rey draws on themes of being forgotten and underappreciated in the future despite current fame. The lyrics draw a parallel between Long Beach's Jergins Tunnel under Ocean Boulevard which was closed to the public in 1967 and has since been largely forgotten, a historical fact Del Rey entwines with her own foreboding of one day being unappreciated and overlooked.

View this post on Instagram A post shared by Emily B (@chimesatmidnight)

Constructed in 1927, the su...

MAD Architects' LA office seeks Head of PR to oversee growing international projects

2023-10-25T17:54:00-04:00

Following last week’s look at an opportunity for the next Howard E. LeFevre ‘29 Emerging Practitioner Fellowship, we are using this week’s edition of our Job Highlights series to explore an open role on Archinect Jobs for a Head of PR (International & US) at MAD Architects.

The role, based in Los Angeles with remote possible, calls for an individual to lead press, media, and editorial campaigns in order to increase MAD’s online presence and "represent the firm’s branding and voice." Among the requirements for the role are a Bachelor’s degree in architecture, communications, or a related field, as well as a "proven track record for delivering online growth and engagement" for media outlets and social media.

Lucas Museum of Narrative Art by MAD Architects. Image taken in August 2022. Image credit: Ron Raffety via Flickr (CC BY-SA 2.0).

Why the role interests us

The open role at MAD offers us a chance to review some of the recent international projects outside of the firm’s native China...

'Hollywood of the Midwest': $100 million media campus in Chicago's South Side breaks ground

2023-02-14T15:42:00-05:00

The City of Chicago and Mayor Lori E. Lightfoot are celebrating the groundbreaking of a 380,000-square-foot, seven-acre enclosed media campus and sound stage development in the heart of the city’s South Side. Called the Regal Mile Studios Campus 1, the privately funded project is sponsored by investment bank Loop Capital, which supports Mayor Lightfoot’s INVEST South/West investment initiative.

The $100 million development is located in the Stony Island neighborhood and intends to reimagine the pre-existing Regal Theater and 79th Street Corridor, with designs led by Chicago-based practice Bauer Latoza Studio. The scheme will include three film studios, office space, staging areas, and adequate parking space. All of these components will be divided across three areas within a triangular site. The studio will feature a central internal portion that will act as an open flex space for staging and staff access.

Aerial view of the project site. Image: Bauer Latoza Studio

The project’s eq...

BIG designs film studio as ‘dynamic vertical village’ on the Brooklyn waterfront

2023-02-03T10:58:00-05:00

Bjarke Ingels Group has designed a new movie studio to be constructed along the Brooklyn waterfront. Commissioned by production company Samson Stages, the Red Hook Studio is imagined as a “dynamic vertical village, where the building structure is created from the stacking of eight stacked stages.”

Image credit: Samson Stages

The 330,000-square-foot building is projected to cost $400 million to deliver and will include green terraces, parking, and a new public park. Internally, the building will feature a cafe alongside the eight stacked stages.

The Brooklyn studios project is separate from the BIG-designed Wildflower Studios development currently under construction in nearby Queens. Designed for the Robert De Niro-led Wildflower Development Group, the Queens project shares Red Hook’s approach of a vertical film studio, with two levels of sound stages.

Image credit: Samson Stages

News of the studio comes weeks after BIG and Safdie completed a jagged new tower in Quito, Ecuador, as well...

Squint/Opera announces merger with Journey as the industry-leading experience designers look to scale up digital production

2022-11-02T13:54:00-04:00

3D experience pioneer Squint/Opera has been acquired by the digital agency Journey in a move announced on November 1 by the newly-formed entity.

The merger will enable both to pursue an expansion of their services at a time when the industry is seeing an increase in demand thanks to the advent of metaverse design and other forms of media.

“The opportunity to join Journey was momentous.” Julius Coke, the CEO of Squint/Opera, explained in a statement. “Over the last few years Squint has experienced significant growth, as the demand for immersive 3D experiences grows and new platforms and technologies enable a new level of creativity tapping into our storytelling, virtual production and creative media skills.”

Previously on Archinect: BIG and UNStudio's investment in co-working platform SpaceForm signals a tide-change in architectural practice

Founded in London in 2021, Squint/Opera has since then, it has garnered a reputation through groundbreaking projects like The Observatory at The ...

New media crackdown in Russia forces censorship of open letter signed by country's architects and urban planners

2022-03-04T20:43:00-05:00

The open letter by architecture magazine Project Russia, which included over 6,500 signatures of Russian architects and urban planners opposing military strikes in Ukraine, has been removed and replaced.

The original text from their open letter, which can be found in Archinect's previous coverage, is now replaced with the image of Picasso's "Dove of Peace" and the following statement:

Here was a letter on behalf of the architects and urban planners of Russia, expressing their position on the current policy of our country from February 26, when it was published, until March 4, 2022, more than 6,500 people signed it.

Unfortunately, under the threat of criminal liability under the law that came into force today, we were forced to remove the text of the letter. We are for peace!

The magazine's now erased statement was a bold expression of revolt against Putin's invasion of Ukraine. Posts from the magazine's Instagram and Facebook as well as the use of the "Нет войне!" (No war!) graphi...

BIG designs $600M film studio with Robert De Niro in Queens, New York

2022-02-15T12:24:00-05:00

Bjarke Ingels Group’s Wildflower Studios has been given the green light for construction in Queens, New York. Designed for the Robert De Niro-led Wildflower Development Group, the new seven-story building will contain a vertical commercial film, television, and creative studio.

Located in Astoria, Queens adjacent to the manufacturing warehouse of the highly-prized Steinway Pianos, the 775,000-square-foot complex will contain 11 main stages, supported by production areas, open and private offices, a fitness room, cafes, and lounges. Externally, the five-acre former industrial plot will contain 310 off-street parking spaces and a waterfront public realm.

Image credit: SYNOSIS

The stages within the building measure 18,000 square feet, with dimensions 150 feet long, 120 feet wide, and 60 feet high. Due to the site’s limited area but generous height allowances, the internal program has been arranged as a vertical film studio with two levels of sound stages, which the team believes to ...

Fallen Journalists Memorial: AECOM and Paul Goldberger will help materialize a new site of remembrance to commemorate journalists who made the ultimate sacrifice

2021-07-01T08:00:00-04:00

On June 24th, the Fallen Journalists Memorial (FJM) Foundation announced its partnership with global engineering and infrastructure firm AECOM, Pulitzer Prize-winning architecture critic Paul Goldberger, and the Levinson Group on a new site that pays homage to journalists worldwide. The FJM Foundation commits to memorializing and amplifying the work of these individuals whose lives were lost while in service to pursue the truth.

The memorial is "the culmination of dedicated work by the Fallen Journalists Memorial Foundation to honor the reporters, photojournalists, producers, editors, and others in the field, who have died while performing their jobs as journalists," shared Claire Sale, AECOM's project manager overseeing the memorial project. "We are honored to have a role in bringing this memorial to life."

The initiative stemmed from the Fallen Journalists Memorial Act that Congress passed in December 2020. The bill authorized the planning and development of "a commemorative work...

Autodesk and the Associated General Contractors of America launch media library to boost diversity in the construction industry

2021-06-29T18:16:00-04:00

Autodesk and the Associated General Contractors of America (AGC) have launched the Construction Diversity Image Library, a joint initiative that aims to increase representation and attract a more diverse AEC workforce.

The library is a collection of photographs, for use by media outlets, featuring diverse individuals in the construction workforce. Photos are of real construction teams on real job sites. The library launched with an established collection of photos provided by several AGC member firms. Autodesk and AGC hope to attract and encourage more organizations across the design and building industry to submit their own workforce photos.

This photo was sourced from the Construction Diversity Image Library. Photo: James Kim Photography + PC Construction in Accokeek, Maryland.

As noted in a press announcement, in 2019 and 2020, the annual workforce survey conducted by the AGC and Autodesk highlighted a growing demand for more talent. Eighty percent of contractors reported that th...

Archinect's Virtual Event Guide for the week of June 16-20th

2020-06-16T12:01:00-04:00

This week's featured virtual event happenings, from Archinect's Virtual Event Guide, address collaboration, manifestos, architectural media, Adolf Loos, games, female architects of color, public space post-pandemic, bamboo architecture, Syria, and more...

Are you hosting a virtual lecture? Presentation? Tour? Interview? Happy Hour? Submit it for consideration by clicking here.

Are you an expert in an arena that's especially important right now? Let us know if you would like to work with Archinect to host an online event.

Knowledge is Power
Tuesday, June 16, 2020 | 5:30 PM – 6:30 PM BST
New London Architecture's Curator-in-Chief Peter Murray interviews architect Clare Wright on the power of archives and special collections in illustrating the enduring Church-State relationship against the backdrop of Lambeth Palace Library.
Click here to attend and/or register

With Power comes great Responsibility
Tuesday, June 16, 2020 | 6:30 PM – 8:00 PM BST
There has never been a more important time to...

Bloomberg Media acquires CityLab as The Atlantic slashes staff

2019-12-13T18:23:00-05:00

Following news earlier this week announcing the sale of urban design innovation vertical CityLab to Bloomberg Media by The Atlantic, news reports today indicate that the publication's entire staff has been laid off.

Nieman Lab reports that the acquisition is the first for Bloomberg Media in over a decade, following its purchase of BusinessWeek in 2009. The sale comes as Bloomberg Media founder and 90% owner Michael Bloomberg undertakes a presidential campaign. Bloomberg has stepped away from day-to-day operations at the company and has vowed to either sell or enter the company into a "blind trust" should he win the presidential election.

Regarding the sale, Bloomberg Media CEO Justin B. Smith tells Adweek, "What’s really exciting about the addition to CityLab to our portfolio is that it can be introduced into that model as a new multi-platform, global sub-brand that is super-serving a niche that we care about a lot, that we think is very valuable."

As part of the transaction, The...

Swiping right (or left!) on the architectural future of the city of Santa Monica

2017-01-24T19:54:00-05:00

Combining the swiftness of contemporary dating with the decades-long process of urban planning, the city of Santa Monica has introduced "CitySwipe," an app that allows you to comment on everything from transportation to building design to the availability of fine dining in Santa Monica's downtown.

You don't even have to live in Santa Monica to weigh-in (there's a swipe for that). As civic data gathering goes, it is definitely more fun than the census, and more pictorially honest than most hook-up apps.

Iran purposefully building "sexy" structures to attract media attention

2016-12-13T13:55:00-05:00

In this eye-candy survey of Iran's newest architectural projects and prevailing trends, Architectural Digest takes a closer look at how the country's architects and architecture is shifting to not only attract more media attention, but to create a new visual identity:

"Right now, the massive trend in Iran is to design and build structures with the goal of being recognized by the media,” says Hooman Koliji, associate professor of architecture, planning, and preservation at the University of Maryland. “Therefore, there is an implicit effort and competition to create forms that look different and, dare I say, sexy.” This approach to modern architecture has garnered great results for Iranian talents such as Leila Araghian, whose design of Tehran’s Tabiat Pedestrian Bridge took home the prestigious 2016 Aga Khan Award for Architecture, bestowed every three years. Certain elements of Araghian’s bold, modern design incorporate motifs of Iranian architecture dating back centuries. With its c...

Mind the Gap: constructing a new (media) vision of architecture with Devin Gharakhanian of SuperArchitects, on Archinect Sessions #80

2016-09-08T15:43:00-04:00

We're joined this week by Devin Gharakhanian, co-founder and co-creative director of the super popular Instagram account and online platform SuperArchitects, to discuss his work in architecture media and community-building, alongside issues troubling architecture education and the public's perception of the profession.

Gharakhanian was inspired to start SuperArchitects to share architecture theses globally, feeling they are under-appreciated and underexposed. Frustrated by the gap between education and practice he experienced after graduating from Woodbury, he left traditional architecture to focus on exposing architects and their work to as wide an audience as possible, mostly through social media platforms.

I'll be on a panel covering architectural media with Gharakhanian, Benjamin Bratton and others next Wednesday, Sept. 14 at SCI-Arc, moderated by Bruno Juricic. Details here, drop by!

Listen to episode 80 of Archinect Sessions, "Mind the Gap":

iTunes: Click here to listen, and click...

Bay Area media ban together for homelessness advocacy

2016-05-16T13:01:00-04:00

Next month, media organizations in the Bay Area are planning to put aside their rivalries and competitive instincts for a day of coordinated coverage on the homeless crisis in the city. [...] “We want the full force of the Fourth Estate to bear down on this problem” [...] “You will not be able to log onto Facebook, turn on the radio, watch TV, read a newspaper, log onto Twitter without seeing a story about the causes and solutions to homelessness”

A fascinating effort in "solutions-oriented journalism", coordinating efforts across 30 media organizations to fully devote one day of coverage to the Bay Area's homelessness problem. While some organizations will report on the issue as they otherwise might, others will propose direct hypotheses for solving the problem, then investigate their potential efficacy.

Related on Archinect:

Giving Props: AIA Launches Media Engagement Series to Ensure Architects Get Credit

2015-09-04T11:59:00-04:00

If you come across an article that wrongfully excludes the name of an architect, send a link to props@aia.org.

I fear this poor author, Matt Tinder, is going to be inundated with emails. We've all seen the article in the local newspaper announcing a new development along with a gleaming rendering of the building with the credit tag "Artists rendering". This makes steam come out of my ears!

Matt's article tries to approach this all-too-common situation in a calm, logical way: Playing the Long Game. Hopefully the tips in the series will help our profession begin to strategize how we can move media outlets towards more frequently including the fact that someone designed that object that is the focus of the article.

As this is the beginning of a series, it will also likely cover the concern that by bringing to a reporter's attention the omission of an architect's name we reinforce the perception of architects as raging egomaniac artistes. (<sigh> It often feels like we're damned if we do, damned if we don't). By "taking the long view" we can potentially design a way to make sure that credit for ...

Get a peek inside Pratt's new Film/Video Department building by WASA/Studio A

2015-07-10T19:58:00-04:00

After occupying a lower-level space in one of Pratt Institute's athletic buildings, prospects are looking bright and shiny for Pratt's Film/Video Department as it settles into its new home on 550 Myrtle Avenue in Brooklyn. The 15,000 square-foot facility was fully gutted and redesigned by WASA/Studio A, whose project team happens to include Pratt alumni like Jack Esterson as lead architect; senior associate Sebastian Touzet as partner-in-charge for design; and project architect Brian Dobrolsky. The $4.5 million renovation began last July.

Built using free-span trusses, the new space has 23-foot ceiling heights and no internal columns. Pratt Architecture Professor and artist Haresh Lalvani created a series of perforated metal panels that wrap around the entrance lobby and cover the walls of the first and second floors. The customized panels display Lalvani's signature eye-popping patterns that are typically seen in his sculptural works.

Formerly known as the Prattstore building, the ne...

Daniel Libeskind launch guest editor of new CNN Style platform

2015-07-01T19:23:00-04:00

Today sees the launch of CNN Style, a new online destination for intelligent, stylish content spanning the worlds of fashion, design, architecture, art, autos and luxury. Throughout July, CNN Style welcomes renowned Polish-American architect Daniel Libeskind [...]. As guest editor, Libeskind has commissioned a series of pieces about architecture to be published through July, given an exclusive video interview to CNN Style and written about the interplay of architecture and emotion.

CNN Style launched today with the inaugural editorial piece by Daniel Libeskind, "We mustn't forget the deep emotional impact of the buildings around us."

In the network's announcement, Libeskind is quoted: "I feel very lucky to be CNN Style's inaugural guest editor. It's a brilliant opportunity to communicate ideas about architecture and cities in an exciting new format. The spirit and emotionality of architecture is at the core of my practice [...]."

About Detroit's too often skewed media coverage

2015-01-12T14:25:00-05:00

In Detroit, the American Dream has become an American Paradox: Corporate-backed revitalization downtown belies the continued deterioration of sprawling neighborhoods of single-family homes; [...] white newcomers trickle in by choice, just as many black natives have no choice but to stay where they are. What’s that? It doesn’t sound like the up-from-the-ashes, post-industrial renaissance Detroit you’ve been hearing about of late?

For more about Detroit, take a listen to episode 11 of Archinect Sessions, and our chat with Mitch McEwen:

Building a collaborative jig-saw pavilion at the Media and Architecture Biennale in Aarhus

2014-12-09T20:51:00-05:00

"Programming Natural Affect" was one of the collaborative workshops during the Media and Architecture Bienniale 2014 last month in Aarhus, Denmark. Organized by Anna Ulak and Philipp Rahlenbeck of openconstructs, the workshop focused on fusing the organic properties of nature and the built urban environment through new media and architecture.

Participants learned about combining analog and digital production methods as they worked with each other and the organizers in building a small prefabricated pavilion. At the end of the workshop, the pavilion was displayed in the Main Exhibition during the Bienniale.

Ulak shared further project details below:

"Rather than trying to fully control/manage the relationship between the natural and built environment with computation (and its metaphors), this proposal sets out to augment the natural world. Thus creating artificial environments that evokes the organic. An architecture that artificially amplifies the experiences of nature that is diminish...

Apple Maps Is Painting Our World Strange

2014-03-26T14:19:00-04:00

The Rendering Eye: Urban America Revisited presents 3D screenshots of the urban US as they appear in Apple Maps: deserted streets, post-apocalyptic buildings and industrial plants, melting harbors. Cars and boats turn into shadows, trees into sculptures, containers into wax.[...] The cityscapes captured by artist REGULA BOCHSLER for the publication are abstract, machine generated, and cold. And yet they are poetic, not least because of their “mistakes,” which give them a painterly composition.

DataAppeal's new app helps turn data into 3D images

2013-10-30T14:53:00-04:00

DataAppeal’s newest release allows our 3D data-maps to be imported into other 3D modeling and vector-based software programs including AutoCAD, Sketch Up and 3ds Max.

A vast improvement from histograms and scatter plots, data analytics and visualization company DataAppeal now enables its users to export their data into other modeling softwares. DataAppeal's Nadia Amoroso (featured in Archinect's Working out of the Box back in April) told Archinect that this will essentially make the data appear more lively, consequently making it easier to understand and more impactful.

3D printing done by “Draft Print 3D” Toronto-based company

Marshall McLuhan, Media Theorist, Is Celebrated

2011-07-25T18:58:24-04:00

All seems to have been forgiven. Last week events in Europe, Washington and three Canadian cities honored the centennial of the birth of the man who is now widely credited as the world’s first media theorist and who introduced ideas like “the medium is the message” and “the global village” into everyday use. The festivities have helped renew debate over the meaning of his often dense and cryptic, yet challenging, work.