Archinect - News

AIA Board of Directors files ethics complaint against misconduct accusers

2024-09-26T12:57:00-04:00

The Board of Directors of the American Institute of Architects (AIA) has filed an ethics complaint in response to the now-closed investigation over alleged misconduct on the part of CEO Lakisha Ann Woods and other executive staff in the AIA National office.

The complaint, which is addressed to be answered by the AIA National Ethics Council (NEC), comes against the unnamed letter signers and other "stakeholders" accused of taking part in a "coordinated campaign" to discredit the reputation of Woods and other members of the Board.

"Once the NEC responds with recommendations for the Board, we will act with expediency to prevent future similar destructive behavior that has the potential to negatively impact the health of our organization," the announcement of the action reads.

Previously on Archinect: AIA members decry nepotism and other misconduct claims

No wrongdoing was found after the law firm Miller & Chevalier concluded its outside investigation into the allegations, which includ...

Shigeru Ban on design, ethics, and constraints

2024-07-02T12:03:00-04:00

Q: Is there a design ethic? A: I just hate wasting material, time, and energy. When I started developing structures with humble, recycled, reusable material in the middle of the ’80s, no one—including myself—was considering any ecological and environmental problems. I just do not waste anything.

The Eames Institute's Kazam! Magazine in conversation with Shigeru Ban.

Architects would do well to apply lessons from philosophy in the age of AI, says Nayef Al-Rodhan

2024-07-01T17:39:00-04:00

New AI architecture tools will, in the short term, make good design affordable and accessible. But AI will still fall short when it comes to understanding human nature as well our emotional and dignity needs. Dignity means much more than just the absence of humiliation. It also requires recognition, manifested through nine critical human needs: reason, security, human rights, accountability, transparency, justice, opportunity, innovation, and inclusiveness.

"Looking to the future, tomorrow’s architects will need to be equipped with transdisciplinary tools such as Neuro-Techno-Philosophy, a framework I have introduced to understand the AI-neuroscience-philosophy nexus underpinning our society today," Oxford University's Nayef Al-Rodhan argues in a new treatise on the uses of academic philosophy in today's AI-driven design field. "Doing so will help ensure that the buildings of the future are in tune with our neurobiological predilections, neurobehavioral needs, aspirations and values for collective peace and prosperity."

Architecture is at a critical juncture as disruptive technology is remaking the industry wholesale. A litany of issues (housing justice, etc.) worldwide nonetheless commands its attention. As Foucault famously said in the 1970s, society "must be defended."

Lake|Flato Architects is the latest firm to achieve B Corp status

2023-07-13T17:18:00-04:00

Texas-based Lake|Flato has announced its recent attainment of B Corp certification in a move they say is geared at enhancing the firm’s already-strong social and environmental credentials.

As the first entity in the state to achieve the certification, Lake|Flato joins a vanguard of some 30 others nationwide that have obtained B Corp status following the addition this spring of New York mainstay SO – IL. The 39-year-old firm had already been operating under the International Living Future Institute’s “The Just Label” standards and recently began the important task of self-reporting benchmark data to the organization B Lab, resulting in a positive B Impact Assessment score of 104.9.

Heather Holdridge, the firm’s Director of Design Performance, said: “As the saying goes, ‘if you can measure it, you can improve it.’ B Corp certification requires rigorous documentation and validation of our firm’s environmental performance and equity, diversity, and inclusion practices. Lake|Flato now ha...

Acting Architect of the Capitol fires key former Blanton era staffers

2023-04-07T17:56:00-04:00

Several members of the Architect of the Capitol’s leadership team were fired Thursday, according to an internal email obtained by CQ Roll Call and two aides familiar with the matter, in a further shakeup at the agency after the February removal of its head, J. Brett Blanton. The AOC’s general counsel, chief financial officer, chief administrative officer, CEO for visitor services and chief of staff were removed Thursday, one senior congressional aide said Friday.

Each staffer had been overseen by the now-former disgraced Architect of the Capitol Brett Blanton, who was finally fired in early February after being accused of using his office inappropriately. The new Acting Architect of the Capitol Chere Rexroat was immediately appointed in his absence. She holds a bachelor's degree in Environmental Design and Architecture from Texas A&M University and is a licensed Architect in California.

According to Roll Call, the employees cited were named in a follow-up Inspector General's report that outlined their apparent failures to act on tips alerting them to Blanton's abuse of privileges while in office.

Editors Note, April 8, 2023: An earlier version of this article misstated the number of fired staffers. This has been corrected.

Architect of the Capitol J. Brett Blanton faces questions before Congress amidst calls for resignation

2023-02-10T14:09:00-05:00

Beleaguered Architect of the Capitol J. Brett Blanton shocked members of Congress on Thursday by admitting he was not on Capitol grounds for the tumultuous January 6th attacks during a query into alleged ethics violations while in office.

At a special hearing called by members of the House Administration Committee, Blanton said he was “monitoring developments remotely” during the riots while declining to provide his specific whereabouts in what came as a surprise to committee members of both parties who also took offense to his apparent frequent tardiness from the grounds that continues to this day.

Blanton, who remains the only member of the U.S. Capitol Police Board not to resign in the wake of the incident, also answered questions about his misuse of government-provided SUVs and deliberate misrepresentation of himself as a police officer among other accusations which include giving private tours to “patriots” in the weeks leading up to January 6th, 2021.

Previously on Archinect:...

Congress moves to limit Architect of the Capitol following investigation into misconduct

2023-01-04T15:02:00-05:00

Embattled Architect of the Capitol J. Brett Blanton could be getting one step closer to being forced out of his job after the outgoing 117th Congress finally proposed last-minute legislation that would make it easier for the Trump appointee to be removed from office following an Inspector General’s investigation into the abuse of his title while in office.

CBS News has the latest details on the effort to hold Blanton accountable for his actions, which reportedly included the misrepresentation of himself as a law enforcement official and multiple misuses of his government-provided SUV by him and his family.

Under the proposed new legislation, the formerly term-limited appointment would for the first time be subject to the conditional removal of its office holder via an impeachment or Congressional joint resolution finding either “permanent disability, inefficiency, neglect of duty, malfeasance; or a felony or conduct involving moral turpitude.”

Earlier on Archinect: Trump's Architect...

Trump's Architect of the Capitol is under investigation for ethics violations in D.C.

2022-11-03T12:56:00-04:00

The federal Architect of the Capitol is under scrutiny for ethics violations after apparently using his office to give “patriotic” private tours in the weeks leading up to the contentious elections of November 2020.

The Washington Post is reporting that Trump appointee J. Brett Blanton is now being investigated by the federal Inspector General’s office for allegedly using his office to give family members access to government-owned vehicles and areas of the capitol building that had been restricted due to Covid-19.

The office’s report identified “a significant amount of administrative, ethical, and policy violations as well as evidence of criminal violations throughout the investigation,” including several incidents where Blanton misrepresented himself as a police officer (a class misdemeanor under District of Columbia law) in addition to a campaign of “fraud, waste, and abuse against not only the AOC but also the taxpayer.”

Earlier on Archinect: Architect of the U.S. Capitol detai...

Sharon Prince, visionary force behind Grace Farms, on her career-guiding ethical compass

2022-03-23T16:25:00-04:00

“Think about it. First it was food,” she says, referring to the decades-long push for local, sustainable and ethical eating, as well as reliable sourcing and labeling. “Then came clothing. I’m proposing that shelter will be next.” “Our velocity for good has been established day by day.”

Writer Ted Loos visited the SANAA-designed Connecticut retreat virtually for a profile of founder Sharon Prince, a former fashion retail executive who founded the 80-acre venue in 2009 around the five core principles of nature, the arts, justice, community, and faith.

Prince spoke about her collaboration with new American Academy member and Yale SoA Dean Deborah Berke on a project called Design for Freedom that looks to hold the industry into account for support unethical labor practices by creating a database that is exclusive of firms with a known history of dealing with sordid entities at the front end of the building materials supply chain.

Previously on Archinect: SANAA's Grace Farms “River” building wins latest MCHAP

“At Yale, Sharon provided initial support for a new joint course between the architecture school and the law school that traces the role of forced labor in the building supply chain and seeks to eradicate it from the architectural design process,” Berke explained...

A landmark designation effort backfires in the push to save one historic Los Angeles restaurant from the wrecking ball

2021-06-18T13:23:00-04:00

LA's famed Taix Restaurant on Sunset Boulevard made headlines earlier this month after a strange ruling by the City Council to designate only certain elements of the century-old establishment a historic landmark in an unprecedented move that could have ramifications for preservation efforts in Los Angeles and across the country for years to come.

The LA Times is reporting that efforts to save Taix from an encroaching redevelopment scheme culminated in a unanimous decision to limit the designation to the restaurant’s signage and cherrywood-topped bar.

The decision is unlike any other in recent history in that it eschews almost the entirety of the Norman Revival building in favor of a plan that recognizes only non-structural components as historic landmarks. By limiting the designations to the bar and advertising, critics say Los Angeles City Councilmember Mitch O’Farrell has created a dangerous standard that can be abused by development-hungry business interests where the opportunit...

Bjarke Ingels issues statement explaining meeting with Brazil's Jair Bolsonaro

2020-01-23T14:39:00-05:00

Danish architect Bjarke Ingels has released a statement explaining his reasoning behind the decision to meet with Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro last week.

In the statement, Ingels, founder and creative partner at the multi-national architecture firm Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG), explains that his decision to meet with Brazilian officials was aimed at avoiding "oversimplification of a complex world" while also pushing for "active engagement, not superficial clickbait or ignorance" in terms of the work the firm undertakes. The meeting with Bolsonaro, Ingels explains, came as part of a larger research mission undertaken with the sustainable tourism developer Nomade Group aimed at investigating the possibility of bringing green tourism initiatives to the northeast coast of Brazil.

MIT Media Lab director, Joichi Ito, resigns as extent of financial connections to Jeffrey Epstein widens

2019-09-07T16:46:00-04:00

Mr. Ito stepped down less than a day after an article in The New Yorker described the measures officials at the lab took to conceal the relationship with Mr. Epstein, who killed himself in jail last month while facing federal sex trafficking charges. Mr. Ito sent a copy of the resignation email to The New York Times after repeated requests for comment.

“After giving the matter a great deal of thought over the past several days and weeks, I think that it is best that I resign as director of the media lab and as a professor and employee of the Institute, effective immediately,” Ito wrote in an email to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology provost Martin A. Schmidt, according to The New York Times.

The New Yorker report, written by investigative journalist Ronan Farrow, can be found here.

MIT Media Lab leadership under scrutiny for financial ties to Jeffrey Epstein

2019-09-05T19:00:00-04:00

MIT Media Lab director Joichi Ito has faced pressure to resign after revealing that he took research funding from financier and alleged sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein. But today Nicholas Negroponte, who cofounded the Media Lab in 1985 and was its director for 20 years, said he had recommended that Ito take Epstein’s money. “If you wind back the clock,” he added, “I would still say, ‘Take it.’” And he repeated, more emphatically, “‘Take it.’”

Both Joichi Ito, MIT Media Lab director, and Nicholas Negroponte, the founder of the MIT Media Lab, have come under scrutiny in recent days as news that a portion of the lab's funding was donated by convicted sex trafficking billionaire Jeffrey Epstein, MIT Technology Review reports.

Epstein, who reportedly donated at least $525,000 to the MIT Media Lab, died by suicide in August while awaiting trail for a series of new sex trafficking-related charges.

Cultural offerings at The Shed dry up as fashion week, artists avoid the venue due to developer's Trump donations

2019-09-05T14:30:00-04:00

Hudson Yards’ nonprofit arts center, The Shed, has been shunned by the fashion elite since developer Stephen Ross’ Trump ties were exposed in early August. Sources say that Michael Kors, Vera Wang and the Academy of Art University were all slated to show their collections at the sleek, $475 million venue but have pulled out. Rag & Bone publicly nixed the space, which opened in April, right after news broke of Ross’ Aug. 9 Trump fundraiser in the Hamptons.

Fern Mallis, the mogul who created New York Fashion Week in the 1990s, told The New York Post that The Shed is “kind of over,” adding, “If you know people showing at The Shed, please tell me because I don’t know who is."

The fallout comes after news broke in August that Stephen Ross, one of the developers behind the Hudson Yards development, was hosting a $250,000-a-seat fundraiser for President Donald Trump. The news was met with boycotts of many Ross-affiliated business enterprises.

Former Los Angeles City planning director charged $281,250 for illegally lobbying on behalf of real estate developers

2019-08-20T17:00:00-04:00

Former planning director Michael LoGrande recently admitted to violating city ethics laws by lobbying planning department officials just months after leaving his job running the agency.

This week, the City of Los Angeles Ethics Commission voted to fine former Los Angeles City Planning director Michael LoGrande $281,250 for violating the city’s “revolving door” rules. The fine is the largest single penalty ever levied against a current or former city employee, according to The Los Angeles Times.

Shortly after leaving his post, LoGrande was hired as a consultant by the City of Los Angeles to provide his expertise on unresolved projects, The Los Angeles Times reports. During this time, LoGrande used his influence and relationships with former colleagues variously to curry favor for several development projects he had been hired to lobby on behalf of as a private citizen.

Los Angeles Ethics Commission President Melinda Murray told The Los Angeles Times in a statement, “These are extremely serious violations that illustrate the reason we have revolving door laws,” adding, “Former city officials should not use inside information or personal relationships to try to creat...

Weapons mogul resigns from Whitney Museum board amid artist revolt

2019-07-25T12:41:00-04:00

A vice chairman of the Whitney Museum of American Art stepped down on Thursday after months of protests over his company’s sale of tear gas, culminating in the withdrawal of eight artists last week from the prestigious Whitney Biennial exhibition.

The decision came days after London-based Forensic Architecture joined seven other artists in withdrawing from the 2019 Whitney Biennial exhibition.

Kanders struck a petulant tone in his resignation letter, saying, “The targeted campaign of attacks against me and my company that has been waged these past several months has threatened to undermine the important work of the Whitney,” adding, “I joined this board to help the museum prosper. I do not wish to play a role, however inadvertent, in its demise.”

“Colonizing Experiment in Surveillance Capitalism”: Privacy Expert Resigns From Google-Backed Smart City Project Over Surveillance Concerns

2018-10-26T12:28:00-04:00

A privacy expert tasked with protecting personal data within a Google-backed smart city project has resigned as her pro-privacy guidelines would largely be ignored by participants. “I imagined us creating a Smart City of Privacy, as opposed to a Smart City of Surveillance,” Ann Cavoukian, the former privacy commissioner of Ontario, wrote in a resignation letter to Google sister company Sidewalk Labs.

Smart phones, smart cars, smart cities, but smart for who?

De-Trumping: Museums Today

2018-01-16T15:17:00-05:00

This is demanding and important work that we have done for 138 years, and continue to do with pride and gratitude, each and every day at the Art Institute of Chicago. We need museums, not just “now more than ever”—but always.

The traditional and agreed upon purpose of modern museums is to collect, preserve, interpret, and display items of artistic, cultural, or scientific significance for the education of the public. What then, is the role of the museum in today's cultural and political climate? What are they to present concerning where we are today and who is their public?
How are museums to position themselves and even further, should they?

Museums have historically and commonly aligned with missions that are congruent with the prevailing values of a civilized society, their ethics, and morals and customarily supported by the leaders of the society they pertain to. With our current leader presenting lackluster respect the primacy of facts and logic; the museum's role of fostering respect for the broad spectrum of human culture and humanity as a whole has never been more re-affirmed.

Amanda Levete: the role of public buildings is to unite us

2017-09-19T15:16:00-04:00

There has never been a more important time in society to celebrate what unites us rather than divides us, and that can be through culture and, more simply, through the creation of public spaces where people can come together.

Amanda Levete reflects on the Brexit referendum and the election of Donald Trump. She argues for the responsibility of architects to create spaces of intersections and conversations across thresholds in the contemporary political climate.

Harvard withdraws acceptance offers from students who created offensive memes

2017-06-06T12:36:00-04:00

Students sent each other memes and other images mocking sexual assault, the Holocaust, and the deaths of children, according to screenshots of the chat obtained by The Crimson. Some of the messages joked that abusing children was sexually arousing, while others had punchlines directed at specific ethnic or racial groups. One called the hypothetical hanging of a Mexican child “piñata time.”

Ten students who managed to beat out nearly 38,000 others to gain admission to Harvard lost their chance to attend the university after sharing offensive online memes in a private Facebook chat. After discovering the memes, which ironically were traded over a platform designed by a former alumnus over a decade ago, the College withdrew the students' offers of admission, upholding the institution's strong commitment to ethics.

How much would Trump's wall actually cost? This calculator can help you find out

2017-05-18T12:21:00-04:00

For those not already opposed to President Trump’s proposed border wall for ethical reasons, a big hurdle is its (likely) staggering cost. The sheer length of the thing makes it pricey, and the irregular terrain and harsh climate of some of the regions bisected by the US/Mexico border would raise the price tag even higher.

To get a better feel for the realities of the wall, a team at the The Warsaw University of Technology led by Tadeusz Zwolinski and Mateusz Mucha spent six weeks putting together a calculator.

“Each user can set main parameters like length, height or placement of guards,” the explain. “People interested in greater details could click on ‘advanced mode’ and build ‘own wall’ by setting a size of panels, crane operator's wage or cost of reinforced concrete.”

Some might argue that since the calculator assists in the possibility of constructing the wall, it is itself problematic. But others might just find it interesting to play around with. Check it out here.

...

Tear down that wall (proposal)

2017-03-14T18:09:00-04:00

Rael writes that one of the most devastating consequences of the wall is “the division of communities, cities, neighborhoods and families, resulting in the erosion of social infrastructure.” When we talked, he wondered how we might create something positive from something so horrible: “Can reform happen through borderland investment? If you build 150 libraries along the border, you’d get a very different outcome.”

The RFP for the border wall is out, but the conscience-bearing architectural community is staying in (and trying to imagine alternatives to this xenophobic concrete smear job). In particular, in this New York Times article they're suggesting building anything but walls, suggesting that perhaps investing in communities instead of splitting them apart is the way to go for the political and social benefit of everyone involved.

Duvall Decker Architects combine greater agency and public outreach to benefit Mississippi (and the profession at large)

2017-02-21T18:12:00-05:00

Since they founded Duvall Decker nearly 20 years ago, the Deckers, as they’re known, have focused mostly on neglected corners in and around Jackson, Mississippi’s capital. To pay the bills, the two have redefined for themselves the ambit of a small architectural practice. They have become developers and even branched into building maintenance: a soup-to-nuts strategy that has allowed them more than just financial breathing room.

Helping impoverished Mississippi communities? Check. Making money while creating a business model that empowers you with the decision-making powers of developers? Check. Being notable and effective enough to earn your own profile in The New York Times by Michael Kimmelman? Done, done, and done for Duvall Decker Architects, which also was named one of 2017's Emerging Voices by the Architectural League of New York. What's especially enheartening about this profile is how by virtue of increasing the quality of their own professional lives, the architects have also vastly increased the well-being of their community.

What are the ethics of self-driving cars?

2016-05-19T12:45:00-04:00

Philosopher Jason Millar claims to have originated the idea of the ethically challenged self-driving car in a 2014 paper on robotics... In the “The Tunnel Problem,” Millar’s driverless car (let’s call her Porsche again) is fast approaching a narrow tunnel, the entrance of which is blocked by a child who has fallen in the roadway. The car can either kill the kid or hit the wall of the tunnel, killing the driver (who is really just a passenger).

"Millar insists programmers need to build such scenarios into their code. I imagine them writing something like this:

if (kid_in_tunnel > 16) {
    kill kid_in_tunnel;
lp “We are sorry for your loss.”;
}
  else {
    kill ass_in_Porsche;
lp “Serves you right, schmucko.”;
}"

For more on the fast-approaching world of self-driving automobiles, check out these links:

Bjarke Ingels shouldn't be proud to have the Washington Redskins as a client, according to critic Philip Kennicott

2016-01-22T20:04:00-05:00

To understand how strange this pairing of client and architect is, you have to contemplate two things: the deeply embedded social progressivism that has become the standard worldview of international architectural firms such as BIG; and organizations such as the NFL, a private club for 1 percenters that bullies municipalities and treats its own players’ health with indifference. Can this marriage last? Is BIG motivated by naivete or cynicism?

WaPo's art and architecture critic Philip Kennicott discusses the oddities of BIG's recent commission to design a new stadium for the Washington Redskins — and the team's problematic name is just the tip of the iceberg.

Labor violations affirmed in latest report of NYU Abu Dhabi construction

2015-04-21T20:26:00-04:00

An independent investigation into the construction of New York University’s Abu Dhabi campus has found that despite the school’s best intentions and efforts, about one third of the workforce at the site — roughly 10,000 workers — was not covered by the school’s labor guidelines, and thus faced unfair and exploitative practices [that were reported in previous allegations].

To add to that, construction of the NYUAD main campus is nearly complete and the workers have already moved on to other jobs.

A new ethics of the skyline: the mile-high building is coming

2015-03-24T15:52:00-04:00

The technology of supertall buildings is a bit like genetic testing or nuclear energy: a volatile form of power. Technological capacities have outpaced our judgment. We know we can do it, but we don’t know when not to do it. And so some endlessly wealthy mogul [...] will eventually move into a preposterously expensive penthouse so far above the Earth’s crust that the air is thin and gales hammer at the glass. A mile’s not science fiction. It’s not even an outer limit.

The NYT on prison architecture and ethics

2015-02-17T13:34:00-05:00

Faced with lawsuits and a growing mountain of damning research, New York City officials decided last month to ban solitary confinement for prison inmates 21 and younger. Just a few weeks earlier, the American Institute of Architects rejected a petition to censure members who design solitary-confinement cells and death chambers. [...] What are the ethical boundaries for architecture?

Previously:

China builds its dream island; Qatar controversies continue; the internet slows down: Weekly News Round-Up for September 7, 2014

2014-09-15T20:01:00-04:00

Friday, September 12:

Vincent Scully Prize 2014 awarded to journalist and TV host Charlie Rose: The prize was established by the National Building Museum in 1999, and is named after the famed Yale art history and architecture professor who helped establish Louis Kahn and Robert Venturi. Rose was distinguished by his interviews of leaders in urban design and development.

Thursday, September 11:

Toronto set to unveil first museum of Islamic culture in North America: The museum is backed by Aga Khan, a "lesser-known royal" and spiritual leader of an estimated 15 million Ismaili Muslims, approximately 100,000 of which now live in Canada. The museum is designed by Pritzker winner Fumihiko Maki, and opens September 18.

Wednesday, September 10:

The long-lost design bible of the New York subway is (briefly) back in print: In 1967, the New York City Transit Authority asked designers Massimo Vignelli and Bob Noorda to create a solution to the subway system's inconsistent and confusing identity. Th...

Editor's Picks #380

2014-08-13T20:11:00-04:00

For the latest edition of Student Works: Justine Testado spoke with project architect, Duncan Baker-Brown, about The Waste House, designed/built by faculty and students from the Faculty of Arts and City College Brighton & Hove.

Olaf Design Ninja_ did some quick math "The numbers tell quite the story...an average of 8 people per work week day for the 15 month project duration. Compared to an equivalent wood frame house in the US that could be an entire subdivision. This should tell you how far industry has to go to do the right thing".

Plus, elementary school librarian, Jennette Neville, shared her top 15 recommendations of architecture books for young children.

News

The NYT published a letter To the Editor: Less Ego in Architects by Peggy Deamer, a partner in Deamer Architects and professor at the Yale School of Architecture. Editors saw an opportunity to start a Sunday Dialogue, and a week later published responses and a rejoinders. davvid had a thought "Architecture firms are alrea...