Archinect - News

The Netherlands moves closer to leaving gas and diesel cars in the dust

2016-04-19T18:47:00-04:00

The parliament of The Netherlands has passed a motion which would require that all new cars sold by 2025 will have to be electrified in some way [...] The Dutch government hasn't yet banned gas and diesel-powered cars, however, and the motion does allow for hybrid cars to be sold beyond 2025. [...] Although localized governments have sought to ban public cars from urban streets in a number of European cities, the Dutch Labor Party's motion is by far the most aggressive campaign

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Money, gas and death: the insanity of America's car worship

2016-04-13T20:24:00-04:00

Cars conquered the daily culture of American life back when top hats and child labor were in vogue, and well ahead of such other innovations as radio, plastic, refrigerators, the electrical grid, and women’s suffrage. A big part of why they’ve stuck around is that they are the epitome of convenience...Convenience (some might call it freedom) is not a selling point to be easily dismissed [...] In almost every way imaginable, the car, as it is deployed and used today, is insane.

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Is Tesla having its "iPhone moment" with the launch of the Model 3?

2016-04-13T12:50:00-04:00

On March 31, [Elon Musk's] Tesla Motors unveiled its long-promised Model 3, a $35,000 electric car that will go 215 miles per charge. The market response suggests to some the potential as a category killer, not just in electric vehicles, but mainstream cars in general: in the week since, more than 325,000 Model 3s have been pre-ordered by people putting down $1,000 per reservation, the company said April 7. Even deep Tesla skeptics call this demand unprecedented.

For more on the auto industry and car culture:

The extra-architectural ventures of Zaha Hadid

2016-03-31T20:46:00-04:00

Zaha Hadid will rightfully go down in history for the tremendous mark she made on architecture. But buildings weren't the only things she designed.

In fact, for the majority of her career, she worked at smaller scales, whether with painting, furniture design, or some other venture. One of her first realized projects, from 1985, consisted entirely of furniture, shelves, and other additions to a pre-existing International Style home in London at 24 Cathcart Road.

Her interest in the expanded field of design, including interiors and the objects that fill them, continued throughout her career. For some, this work indicates a crass and unapologetic commercialism. Philip Kennicott, for example, wrote for the Washington Post earlier today, "She spoke the airy language of architectural theory, with all its utopian overtones, but she vigorously branded consumer products from candles to tableware to neckties."

ln any case, her influence exceeds architecture – extending to the runway, the showroo...

Lake Flato Architects splits reservation cost for Tesla Model 3 with employees

2016-03-23T12:39:00-04:00

San Antonio-based Architecture firm Lake Flato announced that it took upon itself to offer to its employees the opportunity split the $1,000 cost of the reservation deposit for the Tesla Model 3. "As our Teslas and TSLA have been very good to us for the last 3+ years, we felt that it would be a great time to contribute more broadly to the adoption of sustainable transport." -Lake Flato Partner

Health care, a decent salary, and a pretty good deal on one of the globe's most environmentally friendly (and svelte-looking) automobiles: Lake Flato Architects is setting itself apart in the benefits department by offering to go in on the deposit for a new Tesla with its employees. No word on who's called shotgun yet.

What else is happening with Tesla? Well, all of this:

Renault issues Coupé Corbusier: a concept car to explore "a new way forward", inspired by Le Corbusier

2015-10-26T13:12:00-04:00

Le Corbusier, who died 50 years ago, is widely recognised as one of the founding fathers of modern architecture. Renault tells us this long, chamfered concept was “inspired by the architect’s modernist principles and theories”, and references the “golden era of the automobile of the 1930s”. Top Gear is no historical expert, but does not remember seeing anything like the Corbusier concept in photos from the Thirties.

Would Le Corbusier have chosen "suicide doors"? Renault whipped up the design for part of an exhibition put on by Centre des Monuments Nationaux in France, “Cars for living: the automobile and modernism in the 20th and 21st centuries,” which focuses on the history and legacy of the heyday of French automotive manufacturing in the 1930s. No word yet as to how it actually drives.

The Coupé doesn't seem to take much from Le Corbusier's Minimum Car, which exists only as sketches, and was born out the architect's obsession with the manufacturable precision of the automobile industry.

h/t Highsnobiety

More on the ongoing influence of Le Corbusier:

Q&A with Kati Rubinyi, author of The Car in 2035: Mobility Planning for the Near Future

2013-12-16T15:13:00-05:00

“The people who design the cars and the people who design the roads never talk to each other,” according to Kati Rubinyi. With a background in architecture, urban planning, and fine arts, Rubinyi wants to enrich mobility planning by bringing everyone involved to the same table. Her book, The Car in 2035: Mobility Planning for the Near Future, includes essays from the different viewpoints of planners, policymakers, architects, and car designers [...].