Archinect - News

Rural China rediscovers its vernacular architecture

2021-03-29T16:39:00-04:00

After 20 years of frantic city-building, rustic China is in a death spiral. Now architects are helping to reverse the exodus – with inspirational tofu factories, rice wine distilleries and lotus tea plants

Oliver Wainwright, The Guardian's architecture critic, on the new crop of Chinese architects seeking to create a renewed sense of local pride and cultural identity across the country's vast rural areas.

"After an era of foreign architects using China as their playground," Wainwright quotes design critic Aric Chen, "we’re seeing a new generation of Chinese architects defining their own approach [...]."

Editor's Picks #294

2012-12-18T12:58:00-05:00

For the latest in the Student Works series Archinect featured The Petropolis of Tomorrow: Drift & Drive...a proposed solution for Petrobras...to relocate workers offshore...Thayer-D was curious "What kind of job do students who do this kind of work expect to do?" and amphibious agreed "For me, the real problem with this project is its weakness in experimentation, substance, and form. What is radical here really?"

For the latest in the Student Works series Archinect featured The Petropolis of Tomorrow: Drift & Drive. Joanna Luo, Weijia Song, Alex Yuen, students at Rice School of Architecture completed the project working with their advisor Neeraj Bhatia.

Consisting of a system of floating islands strategically located along the natural drift current of the Brazilian coast, the project is a proposed solution for Petrobras, the Brazilian petrochemical company, to relocate workers offshore, as rigs are established ever further from the coast, increasing the transportation cost of both workers and oil.

Thayer-D was curious "What kind of job do students who do this kind of work expect to do? I know it's the schools that promote this stuff, it's no different than when I went to school 20 years ago, but it still strikes me as academic malpractice" and amphibious agreed "with most of the comments here and I think they point out a deeper problem in this project. I am a truly believer of ex...

Top Architects Go Local

2011-12-30T03:20:14-05:00

People are searching for something more authentic, says Kenneth Frampton, a British architect and critic and professor of architecture at Columbia University, who helped define this movement as "critical regionalism." Mr. Frampton says these houses are a reaction to the past couple decades of "compulsive uniformity," whether it's McMansions or the proliferation of "white box" modern houses.