Archinect - Advanced Architecture Institute of Catalunya

Moneo

2012-05-09T20:02:49-04:00

Rafael Moneo received today the prize Principe de Asturias de las Artes...

full note (in spanish): http://www.elcontexto.net/post/22746458802/cuando-creia-pasado-mi-turno-reconocen-mi-trabajo

urbanized

2012-05-09T02:03:00-04:00

I just saw urbanized...well im still kind of watching it (and i will need to watch it again), one of top moments (there's plenty of nice ideas thrown along the film) is Koolhaas criticizing the "competition" system, kind of saying architects are f*cking up architects... and worst moment? Foster with his omniarchitect pose thinking against some printouts and sketching on tjem while his voice is talking about how technology can optimize human life.... that was so pathetic... anyway, if you haven't seen it, and you read this website and/or blog, go to >> http://urbanizedfilm.com/blog/watch-urbanized-online-now/ and watch it!!

Get Lost in the Line for Free | Happy Sant Jordi!

2012-04-23T12:54:00-04:00

To celebrate Sant Jordi (& the international book day), dpr-barcelona.com & Ethel Baraona is letting us download (FREE ONLY TODAY): Léopold Lambert's "Lost in the Line" visual essay, part of the book WEAPONIZED ARCHITECTURE: The Impossibility of Innocence

Download here (copy to your browser or click on it, whatever works better for you): http://goo.gl/TPH3P

Design Inspiration

2012-04-06T11:52:00-04:00

These days there is plenty of "Design Inspiration" websites, blogs & tumblr, etc.... but i can't understand why all of this "design inspiration" websites show only other designs and finished products, basically consequences of someone else's inspirations, isn't that a bit odd for you? or rather i say, isn't that a bit stupid?

Design Inspiration? show me sun, clouds, light, nature, the tones of a lake, a river stream, handcraft tools, the grass in the hills, the beauty of a feline running free.

I also remember architecture magazines used to be spaces for critic ('critique') & reflexion, but today (and i think this is a sign of our times, meaning this shows us somehow the ideology of today's society), seems every "architecture magazine" is just a tendencies & style magazine.... so boring and predictable.

Now wonder why they say "printed media" is dying....

Fisac

2012-04-01T23:05:00-04:00

Lately i've been interested and literally discovering the work of Spaniard Architect Miguel Fisac, he has different "styles" along the body of her work, but i found interesting how he started experimenting with concrete, specially pouring concrete into fabrics... here are 2 seductive images of Fisac's work....

Today i also found an article in the weekly magazine of El Pais newspaper (el Semanal) about a guy named Joaquín Torres (which i never heard of), an architect that designs & builds all the McMansions for spanish football stars like Ronaldo or Benzema, or the president of Zara and stuff... of course some purists criticize him, cause he's been in a reality show and because the type of mansions he designs, but i dunno... not that i like what he does, but i do like his attitude and how he is on top of his game.

Sometimes i think Architecture has become like Catholicism... it hasn't really evolved, there is so many purist and Architecture as its basics say: "should reflect th...

narrow definition of progress

2012-03-26T13:05:32-04:00

With the Industrial Revolution, basically 5,000 years of progress was thrown out the window…People assume that in the 21st century buildings should be made of titanium, because we have a narrow definition of progress.
Maybe a 21st-century building is made out of dirt used in an intelligent and beautiful way.

-John Ochsendorf, MIT professor of civil engineering and architecture

from >> 40 things you need to know for the next 40 years

..."rants" & rethinking

2012-03-21T03:03:00-04:00

So, i must say in advance, that im very sorry that now that i started again this blog, which has little now to do with a "student blog" it will feel like a big rant in every post...i would really try not to be like that, i also want to let you know i need to do this to let this frustration out of my system....

This said, i would try to put here in words some thoughts i've been having in my head for the last year and a half, and something that surfaced when trying to explain my girlfriend why I thought was stupid that Zaha Hadid recently gave a lecture at Mexico City (where seems young architects and students were excited to go to, and even cheered and yelled her name in the auditorium... WTF¿?).

so lets try to organize my thoughts....

First of all Zaha in Mx City... this just sounded like when for example, Iron Maiden plays at Mexico City...something like "i can't get gigs anywhere else, now i go for latin america), in the case if Miss Hadid is (and this is my very perso...

big words

2012-03-13T14:57:49-04:00

Why do Architects, and architecture students (and all their surrounding machinery) fall so easily for big, fancy, pseudo-interesting pretentious words, instead of actual good pieces of architecture?

Why in order to describe a building and/or an architecture-related topic we need so many stupid and pretentious words?

The faster we put our ideas in simple worlds, the faster architecture would be understandable to 'simple' people (by simple im trying to refer to those without an academic architectural education).

***thinking that while i listen to the livestream of the Congreso Arquine, this lectures are literally making me yawn.

http://www.livestream.com/arquine

i should get back to my project where we try to blur the boundaries between those lines traced in the territory by the interaction of the inhabitants in a terraine vague within the limits of a contemporary metropolis which tends more and more to fade into a 'glocal' condition of de.location of architecture generati...

Thoughts

2012-02-16T13:11:05-05:00

Im thinking to get back in the train of the Archinect Blogs.... i guess this is the first step... hope you would like reading how has it been after school, the rise and fall of the architecture professional... also lets see if this helps to get me back in love w/architecture again or if its a lost cause...

bests...

almost final post

2005-09-16T12:29:24-04:00

so, somehow i would have to put a final point to this weblog that i enthusiastically started and, shame on me, is going to end not as energetic as it began.....

so yeah i had finished my master course here at the IAAC (BCN), and im glad and thankfull to all the people who wrote comments on this weblog and/or my e.mail, also im happy to see that some ppl discovered thios program and got interested in it some of them even applied to... actually im curious to know who knew about it thru this, applied and now is coming next term...anyways someone also should replace me in this weblog from the school....

mmhh ok so, i finished almost 2 months ago the master course, final presentation went great, the project (which i will explain further in a very soon post dedicated only to it) was located in Ljubljana (capital city of Slovenia) in a site known as the BTC city
which is nothing more than a huuuge former military logistic zone bought by private capital and transformed into a huge mall....

day after

2005-07-02T14:19:46-04:00

so, yesterday did my presentation of the final project of the year, and it went very good, got some congratulations and of course some other critiques, but overall it was a very good project, so now im officialy finish with this thing...sorry in did not posted too much the last months but i was loaded w/work, and now i wll be posting this next weeks little by little what i did and what has been done the last months here at the IAAC.... well ppl its always my pleassure and keep checking for the posts and images soon....

hope my schoolblog dont get erased soon Paul, i want to show the stuff... thanks

hello?

2005-04-26T09:06:07-04:00

ok so, the bad side of being a blogger (or maybe good) is that as any diary u dont write when u dont feel like, but then u add the days u have no time, the days u dont feel like u have something interesting to say, etc., so u stop at some point, hehehehehe, no actually im not going to pull out the so-known phrase here "im sorry for being a terrible blogger" cause im actually not, hahaha, see, blogs is like life itself, so, trust me i also spend days out here without talking to no one...i dont know we all need our introspective weeks no???

hehehehe anyways, just wanted to tell u im not dead and to warn u that maybe very soon ill would be trying to catch up w/this and explain u what the heck i've been doing lately...

(ok and also partly cause my mom, she is a very asidious reader of this BLOG, and she says now she doesnt know what the hell i've been doin lately, HI MOM!!! )

ok so....

more to come fellows, see u around...

OH!! before anything??? The Rotterdam Biennale opens on ...

back in [bcn]action

2005-03-11T15:29:56-05:00

so, im back in BCN from 10 intensive days in croatia, there is a lot of stuff that i will comment about this trip hopefully all this weekend and lot of pictures to show u, so keep watching...just one fast thing first...

slovenia and croatia r both 2 beautifull places...

and omg the local girls (perfect)

and what im doing now...

2005-02-23T07:56:45-05:00

so after letting u know what i did the last 3 days of last week, i will proceed to reach today...

first saturday party.ed my heart out at the NORTEC gig @ la Paloma (BCN)...

n after that had been all about bussinnes.... some say in china they have a phrase for this situations:

DELIVER THE MAPS!!!

Almost 2 weeks ago we finished our project for tarragona/reus/salou urban re.development and since then had been non-stop work...

this friday need to finish this competition im doing in ICELAND, i have to finish and send to mexico an article im writing about trans-border urban territories (for publication of it) then by monday we have to present the research we r putting together (cause include some aspects we used from the tarragona project) about the mediterranean coast for the Rotterdam Architecture biennale, and then a day after we will go to Croatia and Slovenia for research about our 'master' project of this year, 10 days there where we will have n average of 3 meetings per day w...

lectures, mexicans, drinks n a lot to do...

2005-02-23T07:21:54-05:00

ok catching up with all the crazy ppl that posted last weekend to avoid being tagged as "abandon blog" i will take some time to tell u what i been up to:

is funny that i sometimes complain about Barcelona lack of "activity" but at the end i always found myself full of stuff to do, watch n do....

all started last wednesday when i received an email/invitation for the opening of a week dedicated to mexican contemporary art at Barcelona, a few known names popped out in the text so i decided to check them out (since i know personally a few of them it was a good chance to say hi and hear some "mexican spanish"), opening night at some gallery in the top floor of n former industrial building just around Meier's MACBA, after climbing up 5 taaaaall floors got there just to find it was fuuuuuuull of co.nationals, some video/short movie was being showed and then the director commented it, but ill preffered to stay at the back closer to the bar n the coronita's...

diagram on how the site looked...

TOROLAB + AMP

2005-02-18T08:50:30-05:00

hey ppl very fast if someone is around barcelona and want to attend this lectures today at IAAC.... for the rest promess to post tomorrow stuff of the last 2 weeks...

first Raul Cardenas|TOROLAB (tijuana-san diego 'trans-border' practice) will lecture here @ 6pm...

and then at 8pm, Martin Menis

update

2005-02-14T05:42:27-05:00

sorry for being away most of last week but it was crunch time n we had a deadline to match last friday, i will post images later and then today we started early in order to use the max time we can... now is going to be 15 intensive days setting up the presentation we will have for the rotterdam biennale...anyway, i will post more very soon...

dont tell me about blood pt.2

2005-02-02T10:39:53-05:00

So this r the lectures for this friday...somehow we r going to have a marathon....u r all invited this r open public lectures:

Friday 4th Feb

18.30h >> ffvp Architects, Barcelona
Carlos Puig + Frank FernÃƒÂ¡ndez + Xavi Vancells

20.00h >> ADD Architects, Barcelona
Manuel Bailo + Rosa Rull

21.30h >> Round table with Manuel Gausa

and ok...heres how u look after spending the night at the hospital with ppl looking inside ur finger, and i wish i brought my camera 2 the hospital cause was ridiculous how much stuff i was on (wires, tubes, bandages, weelchair) just by cutting my hand...and tendon...(is funny how im becoming a true blogger who wishes 2 document anything i find interesting to share w the "comunity")

enjoy my disgrace

dont tell me about blood...

2005-02-01T06:32:27-05:00

last night summary....
after 2 nights of barely sleeping, i was for the first time in days early at home, had a nice dinner and was reading a book with a glass of milk and butter cookies...ok time to sleep...taking the glass and cookies to the kitchen..

try to open the kitchen door w/lights off, crash, the glass shattered in pieces, my hand hurts, turn on the lights, blood all over...f*ck, is that my finger???, fuck... millions of napkins to stop the bleeding...i think this would be a'right in the morning, i just need to wash it.... mmhhh nah somehow this looks pretty deep, and the bleeding dont stop...ok lets go to the hospital again (2nd time in a month, 31 r becoming scary for me), hospital, emergency room, doctor... she takes a look at my cut, she seems to play with it... fuck i had never seen so many colors before when i got dizzy...ok, so, anhestesia, more blood, all the cutters glues and shit of doctors...oh yeah, by the way, u cutted ur tendon too...great....waked up thi...

own bibliography

2005-01-31T13:05:07-05:00

I spent all sunday at home working on my urban project and also re-writing a couple of articles i have on the drawer that i want to finish soon....

it was a lovely afternoon, which i had to see thru my room window:

So, this term besides all the bibliography suggested by the seminars tutors, i build my own list (a list in constant construction, so feel free to recomend anything interesting)... mainly this list is oriented to the kind of stuff i've been interested the last 6 months... but maybe this orientation will change, im not actually expecting to read all, but who knows, anyways, here is it:

- The Society of Mind by Marvin Minsky
- Emergence: The Connected Lives of Ants, Brains, Cities, and Software by Steven Johnson
- 1000 Years of Non-Linear History by Manuel De Landa
- The Rise of the Creative Class: And How It's Transforming Work, Leisure, Community and Everyday Life by Richard Florida
- Emergence: From Chaos to Order by John H. Holland
- Chaos: Making a New Science by James Glei...

morning views

2005-01-27T11:45:07-05:00

so, you wake in the morning, climb up to the roof, cofee in hand and then u watch the view for a few seconds... you analize the weight of the old and the influence of the new...

Then u walk to studio and while u get far from home and closer to studio, u realize the new is always present...

Also u realize all the beauty that any artistical expression can have, even the ones in the street...

and then you just get happy to be living in this city, and to be an architecture/art freak...

sometimes i hate being away to the previously known, but also i realize im lucky and happy to be here...

visca BARCA

Happy birthday Moye!!!

"...i have walk the earth and watched people,
i can be sincere and say i like them,
i want to go to a mountain top,
with a radio and good batteries,
play a joyous tune
and free the human race of suffering..."
- B. GundsmundÃƒÂ¶ttir

I wish u a nice day to all of you... enjoy it's a beautifull day

school life

2005-01-26T12:27:01-05:00

ok, so, here are some pictures of the week's activities here...since i got my new camera, now i will post images than i used before...try to enjoy them...

general panorama of one of the Tarragona studio sessions with Guallart & Falcon:

studio tutoring with Luis Falcon:

people getting the work structure organized:

Saturday 2 a.m., 3 girls working in the studio @ Barcelona??, something is wrong with this picture:

Is cool when ur tutor only can come during lunch time, this way he gets to pay for the chinese food:

hasta la proxima!

rotterdam biennale + instant australia

2005-01-26T11:46:55-05:00

so...mmhh besides been working this week on the project about tarragona, we also received the program and/or characteristics of the work we r going to be asked for the rottaredma biennale which is going to be part of all the analisis we alreayd been doing for the Tarragona project...

the Rotterdam Biennale this year is going to deal with the topic of "water" whatever that involves/mean 2 years ago was MOBILITY i saw it and it was very interesting.... we pretty much will adress the topics of tourism and the spanish coast and how tourism affects the territory...(more on this later)

also, 2 days ago a guy came to give a concert of Dijeridoo (is that the right spell???), cool instrument, never really saw someone playing it at such a close range of me... its a powerfull sound and its amazing also how much they can make different tones/noises with the same "stick"....

mmmhhh... yeah and today im back working and just came back from lunch... here's an image to show this architectural cl...

weekend work

2005-01-23T15:17:20-05:00

So... i hate working 'extra hours' or whatever u can call to work too much in a project, specially when u dont have a clear idea of what to do with it...anyways, so i've spent the whole weekend at studio working until 3 and 4 am (friday and saturday), since the studio space is in a part of Barcelona -not the touristic or the univerity area, but on the other opposite side of BCN- where there r a lot of warehouses, it's also a preffered party area for the locals (mostly cause club owners can rent huge spaces for little money) it was funny to see all that ppl walking on the street and watching us working inside here while they were drunk on the street at 3 am.....

and yeah i was pretty much sick of it this morning, so i decided to take the day off and head to the beach top take advantage of the beautifull day we had in BCN today.... here's a picture of the beach today...it was full of ppl....

Now its 9 pm and im back in the studio to see if i can finish thsi thing for tomorow, but ...

homesickness [proudly mexican 2]

2005-01-19T09:19:56-05:00

Being away from home and separated by the atlantic ocean from the ones you love and care the most, sometimes gives me the homesick feeling, but, i always have my mom to remind me on her e.mails all the reasons why i left my home town, and also i will always have the newspaper on.line to realize that i would get even more MAD of reading this stuff if i was living there....

dont get me wrong, i love my country, i actually think that i have a wonderfull country (in a physical/resources sense) and amazing people too.... but sometimes news like this and the other i posted couple of days ago make me feel fustrated on the ways things are done down there...anyways...my blessings to my paisanos:

(i translated this one w/the help of altavista online translator/babel fish)

THEY ONLY FINISHED ELEMENTARY SCHOOL, NOW THEY ARE MAYORS
Other 15 mayors reveal that they have highschool dregrees
by AdÃƒÂ¡n GarcÃƒÂa

MichoacÃƒÂ¡n, MÃƒÂ©xico (January 18, 2005).- Hardly they concluded the elementary sc...

EPIC 2014

2005-01-18T05:59:03-05:00

After reading this last two books last term:

- The society of mind (by Marvin Minsky)
- Emergence: The Connected Lives of Ants, Brains, Cities, and Software (by Steven Johnson)

and being totally inside of the whole thing about future of networks, and new generation intelligence and stuff like that, this link a good friend of mind gave me yestreday was a very entretaining thing to watch... i totally recomend it:

EPIC 2014

the 2mt houses + a competition

2005-01-17T07:46:47-05:00

So, here is the picture i have from Zacatecas Mexico where i found this kind of 2 meters houses that my fellow blogger from University of Plymouth, would be now dealing with in his studio.. what else???, i haven't seen the calendar by archinect but there's this new competition for a PUBLIC LIBRARY IN GUADALAJARA MEXICO that u might check out...i dunno exactly in the official website u can download the PDF brief, but i know u can download it in spanish in the ARQUINE magazine website...good luck

and here's the 2mt houses (funny than in this small town they dont even have the problems of space that a big urban enviroment would have, i dunno what caused this houses size, maybe land/family troubles)

already in rythm

2005-01-14T10:22:05-05:00

So, as u might know we had been having activity in this part of the world for 2 weeks already, and is reaching lately one of it early peaks of activity (intellectual mostly).

Starting yesterday with a lecture at "colegio de arquitectos" by Josep Luis Mateo, and also a lecture and exhibition opening (of the work he had developed at his teaching studio at the ETSAM, in Madrid) by IÃƒÂ±aki Abalos (Abalos + Herreros). Of course the lecture by Abalos more interesting and funny than the one by Mateo who as good catalan took everything more seriously....also i like the ability in an architect (as in Abalos + Herreros) to criticize himself and accept sometimes that they where just doing something for fun, or did something by accident, or even that their solution was not the most proper one (but at the end they work), i dont know i always appreciate from big names in architecture a bit of self-cristiscism...

Also today, actvities in the studio of IAAC continued with a "pinup" of our urban ...

proudly mexican

2005-01-13T12:15:40-05:00

lol...sorry i couldn't let this article pass by, its very funny and it shows the reality of what goes on in MÃƒÂ©xico in matters of political actions related to build infrastructure/facilities and towards construction in general....sorry that is in spanish but i found myself lazy and busy to translate it, so im sure u will enjoy it if u understand it....

Ordenan demoler edificio nuevo
Inauguran edificio sabiendo que se iba a tirar para la construcciÃƒÂ³n de un distribuidor vial
Por Manuel Appendini
Grupo Reforma

Aguascalientes, MÃƒÂ©xico (12 enero 2005).- Para realizar un nuevo distribuidor vial, el gobierno de Aguascalientes demolerÃƒÂ¡ el edificio de PolicÃƒÂa y TrÃƒÂ¡nsito municipal donde recientemente se inaugurÃƒÂ³ el Centro de Comando, Control, ComunicaciÃƒÂ³n y CÃƒÂ³mputo (C4), cuyo costo ascendiÃƒÂ³ a cerca de los 8 millones de pesos.

De los 8 millones se perderÃƒÂ¡n entre dos y tres, ya que la mayor parte de la inversiÃƒÂ³n del C4 se hizo en equipo de cÃƒÂ³mputo, equipo...

Re: No books at all

2005-01-12T12:17:57-05:00

I love the power electronic media has now in human activities.....

From: Marilyn Sparrow
To: MADianito
Sent: Wednesday, January 12, 2004 5:16 PM
Subject: Re: No books at all

Dear Marias
I am so sorry that the books have still have arrived. We have to assume that they have gone astray. Rest assured that these will be re-sent to you immediately. Now that the Christmas rush is over, I can only hope that these reach you very quickly.
Please accept our most sincere apologies. It is very unusual that parcels go astray.
Yours sincerely,
Marilyn Sparrow

--
Marilyn Sparrow
AA Publications
36 Bedford Square
London WC1B 3ES
Tel +44 (0)20 7887 4021
Fax +44 (0)20 7414 0783
email publications@aaschool.ac.uk
website www.aaschool.ac.uk/publications