after viewing his new web site, i'm sure, and i was pretty sure before- that wes jones hates me. the flashing and the colors, and the flashing- and the flashing colors- and how many times do i have to click before i can see a damn picture? i'm color blind AND i'm prone to headaches.
garpike. mindarch is about to ask you to display your work, and then criticize you, or your website, for not being as good, or as clever- and i believe there is a difference- as wes jones'. i'm pretty sure about this, because i've seen it happen on archinect before.
I'm afraid I must agree with TSCOMG on that one, no matter how much i like Wes Jones's work I find his website unbearable. Loud, pretentious and a real pain in the ass to use.
That new site is horrible! I couldn't even get to the work (ok, I gave up quickly, but I shouldn't). I love some of his work and surely have more patience looking over websites than most.
That's the reason people think Flash is bad, imho. Blinking things with no real prupose.
Maybe I'll go back and look, if folks say there's some new/good work on there.
i like the site, and i like wes jones work. i have yet to read any discourse, but i am sure it will confound me on some level. i did have the opportunity to see a lecture in the middle 90's at NJIT, he was just starting with Hillier, and he talked about the Astronaut Memorial. i thought he did a good job of explaining his idea about the project, and even why it failed to work the way he intended....i like the snippets and the "exam" on the site about BOSS, i can relate to alot of it. my interests in surgery, early 70's and 60's Mopars, body modification somehow just seem to connect.
I like the work, although the "taste test" was a bit ridiculous, especially considering that it's geared toward potential clients...eh, i dunno, maybe that's the point...
mindarch..
i agree with garpike on this one.. i don't understand why someone
can't make a comment regarding someone elses work without
having their own work called into question... i'm a fan of wes'
work but i find his websites incredibly frustrating to navigate.
they load slowly and seem to be more about image and superfluous
details that have nothing to do with his work...and trying to actually
find images of his work isn't worth the search...which i figured is
what the website should be all about.
i think it's a fair criticism of wes that he tends to care more about
image and eyewash than actual built work..although i find what
has actually been built to be quite intriguing
an alternate take on the difficulty in finding images of the work:
-jones partners does'nt want the image to be the most important thing.
-the message of the site is that it takes a certain kind of client and that the design solution will spring from a relationship between the client and jpa.
i found the site both annoying and strangely addictive, like bad tv. i couldn't stop the taste test, even after i had lost patience with it. despite what i think the goals behind the site might be (stated above), i think the reality of it will end up alienating more clients than it snares.
I wish Wes were still in the Bay Area-- i've been told that the architecture scene here was so much more vibrant when he was here.
I liked Wes a lot as a critic when i was in school-- he's smart, engaging and knows how to direct students to use their best abilities without forcing his agenda on them. And he's a good speaker with a solid grasp of phenomenology and all that fun Heidegger stuff-- he's an intellectual but an equally solid designer-- in terms of the critic/ practitioner in architecture, they don't come better than him.
Wes was my thesis advisor at SCI_Arc, and I cannot overstate his effectiveness as an educator.
I went into that environment with a high level of naivete, oblivious to professorial politics and agendas. Now that i'm graduated and gone, I think it's safe to say that I'm now familiar.
When Wes was first suggested to me as an option for advisor, I was hesitant. Like other sciarc'ers, he has a very clear, rigorous focus & aesthetic, which happens to be dissimilar to my own. But unlike some others, and to his credit, there was no attempt whatsoever to impose any of it.
What he provided was consistently razor-sharp evaluation and guidance, with no bs. His insight was invaluable - i think that semester did more for my development than the rest combined.
As for his own work, glad to see more getting built.
As for the website, it's a welcome respite from the cesspool of stark stuffy minimal hyper-serious-ism that is 99.9% of architects' pages.
Appleseed - just browsed through the new book at B&N. Really nice. At $60, I'm not likely to pick it up soon, but I totally love the work.
This kind of bothers me though: built work: what, three houses and a Sci-Arc gallery install? What happens along the way to all that work that prevents it from getting built? You guys are modeling every bolt in Rhino, and it's all totally believable and eminently buildable, right? Like the Rhino model practically has the shop drawings right there? What's the deal?
While I wouldn't argue that there isn't enough of this stuff out there, there's more than three houses and a gallery install. AMF, UCLA CoGen, San Jose Rep, Conflucence, etc. There's some big and critical projects. Every (non-built) project has it's own sob story as to non-completion. Some of that is outlined in the project descriptions in the new book. One iteration, gets chosen over the other (we did three versions each of the Silverlake and Redondo Beach duplexes). The dot-com bubble burst killed two huge, ready-to-be-built projects outright. Also some of the stuff shown is purely speculative or for competitions. Life goes on. But yeah, the models tend to be pretty anal.
I think Amazon's got the book for $38, if that's mo' betta.
That is betta the most, I'll check for that, thanks.
Yeah, it always amazes me that anything gets built at all in this profession. There are about a million ways for a project not to happen, and only one way for things to work.
"AMF, UCLA CoGen, San Jose Rep, Conflucence, etc." This is built stuff?? Where is it published?
Anyway, great work coming out of y'all's office, keep it up!
Well, Astronauts Memorial is tied up with Wes' previous partnership, so it hasn't been published in either of the JPA monographs. There's a few mediocre pics of it on Google Image and a couple better ones on flickr. San Jose Rep was like the first built project in the second monograph. CoGen, Confluence were in the first monograph. Those are all pretty big, built projects.
My honest take on Wes Jones' work is that it's WAY over-detailed and over-structured. I'm guessing that's why he doesn't have more built: he uses six large beams where one will do. I was in Houston recently, and drove down to where all the petrochemical plants are--these massive agglomerations of structure and piping. It looked a lot like Jones' work to me.
His graphics also seem somewhat dated (at least from the Instrumental Form era.) They did even when Instrumental Form first came out. They have a kind of zip-a-tone monochrome aesthetic that renders everything in a flat, cartoonish, yet complicated way.
Who? Wes Jones,Who? Wes Jones,Who? Wes Jones
sure... do you have a portfolio online?
Yes I do, but more of a web site than a portfolio. Why do you ask?
just curious about your work
after viewing his new web site, i'm sure, and i was pretty sure before- that wes jones hates me. the flashing and the colors, and the flashing- and the flashing colors- and how many times do i have to click before i can see a damn picture? i'm color blind AND i'm prone to headaches.
garpike. mindarch is about to ask you to display your work, and then criticize you, or your website, for not being as good, or as clever- and i believe there is a difference- as wes jones'. i'm pretty sure about this, because i've seen it happen on archinect before.
good call TSCOMG......
I'm afraid I must agree with TSCOMG on that one, no matter how much i like Wes Jones's work I find his website unbearable. Loud, pretentious and a real pain in the ass to use.
That new site is horrible! I couldn't even get to the work (ok, I gave up quickly, but I shouldn't). I love some of his work and surely have more patience looking over websites than most.
That's the reason people think Flash is bad, imho. Blinking things with no real prupose.
Maybe I'll go back and look, if folks say there's some new/good work on there.
"Loud, pretentious and a real pain in the ass to use."
"Blinking things with no real prupose."
Exactly, but thats why I like it...
i like the site, and i like wes jones work. i have yet to read any discourse, but i am sure it will confound me on some level. i did have the opportunity to see a lecture in the middle 90's at NJIT, he was just starting with Hillier, and he talked about the Astronaut Memorial. i thought he did a good job of explaining his idea about the project, and even why it failed to work the way he intended....i like the snippets and the "exam" on the site about BOSS, i can relate to alot of it. my interests in surgery, early 70's and 60's Mopars, body modification somehow just seem to connect.
trace, there is some new stuff in there i hadn't seen before.
I like the work, although the "taste test" was a bit ridiculous, especially considering that it's geared toward potential clients...eh, i dunno, maybe that's the point...
"...BOSS architecture, highly disciplined, reasonably priced."
im suprised no one has compared him to Corbu yet,...its so obvious hes making the same moves, just in a techy way.
Wes is speaking at my school on Nov. 7th. Hope his lecture is as interesting as his graphics.
Is that the Yale lecture? I'm planning on going, so maybe I'll see you there.
TSCOMG, exactly what I figured. Kind of childish, eh?
......
.......
"TSCOMG, exactly what I figured. Kind of childish, eh?" = ......
mindarch..
i agree with garpike on this one.. i don't understand why someone
can't make a comment regarding someone elses work without
having their own work called into question... i'm a fan of wes'
work but i find his websites incredibly frustrating to navigate.
they load slowly and seem to be more about image and superfluous
details that have nothing to do with his work...and trying to actually
find images of his work isn't worth the search...which i figured is
what the website should be all about.
i think it's a fair criticism of wes that he tends to care more about
image and eyewash than actual built work..although i find what
has actually been built to be quite intriguing
an alternate take on the difficulty in finding images of the work:
-jones partners does'nt want the image to be the most important thing.
-the message of the site is that it takes a certain kind of client and that the design solution will spring from a relationship between the client and jpa.
i found the site both annoying and strangely addictive, like bad tv. i couldn't stop the taste test, even after i had lost patience with it. despite what i think the goals behind the site might be (stated above), i think the reality of it will end up alienating more clients than it snares.
I wish Wes were still in the Bay Area-- i've been told that the architecture scene here was so much more vibrant when he was here.
I liked Wes a lot as a critic when i was in school-- he's smart, engaging and knows how to direct students to use their best abilities without forcing his agenda on them. And he's a good speaker with a solid grasp of phenomenology and all that fun Heidegger stuff-- he's an intellectual but an equally solid designer-- in terms of the critic/ practitioner in architecture, they don't come better than him.
if only more people in design were like him...
New book is out.
Gallery show this weekend too. 11.17.07 A+D museum LOS ANGELES
he also knows how to bankrupt clients
if the client isn't bankrupt at the end, they're not getting architecture
Hahaa! Well played Free!
spy photos from gallery construction-
Did I mention there'll be free beer?
Wes was my thesis advisor at SCI_Arc, and I cannot overstate his effectiveness as an educator.
I went into that environment with a high level of naivete, oblivious to professorial politics and agendas. Now that i'm graduated and gone, I think it's safe to say that I'm now familiar.
When Wes was first suggested to me as an option for advisor, I was hesitant. Like other sciarc'ers, he has a very clear, rigorous focus & aesthetic, which happens to be dissimilar to my own. But unlike some others, and to his credit, there was no attempt whatsoever to impose any of it.
What he provided was consistently razor-sharp evaluation and guidance, with no bs. His insight was invaluable - i think that semester did more for my development than the rest combined.
As for his own work, glad to see more getting built.
As for the website, it's a welcome respite from the cesspool of stark stuffy minimal hyper-serious-ism that is 99.9% of architects' pages.
wes is boss
Appleseed - just browsed through the new book at B&N. Really nice. At $60, I'm not likely to pick it up soon, but I totally love the work.
This kind of bothers me though: built work: what, three houses and a Sci-Arc gallery install? What happens along the way to all that work that prevents it from getting built? You guys are modeling every bolt in Rhino, and it's all totally believable and eminently buildable, right? Like the Rhino model practically has the shop drawings right there? What's the deal?
mike jones..... who..... mike JONES......mike JONES
While I wouldn't argue that there isn't enough of this stuff out there, there's more than three houses and a gallery install. AMF, UCLA CoGen, San Jose Rep, Conflucence, etc. There's some big and critical projects. Every (non-built) project has it's own sob story as to non-completion. Some of that is outlined in the project descriptions in the new book. One iteration, gets chosen over the other (we did three versions each of the Silverlake and Redondo Beach duplexes). The dot-com bubble burst killed two huge, ready-to-be-built projects outright. Also some of the stuff shown is purely speculative or for competitions. Life goes on. But yeah, the models tend to be pretty anal.
I think Amazon's got the book for $38, if that's mo' betta.
That is betta the most, I'll check for that, thanks.
Yeah, it always amazes me that anything gets built at all in this profession. There are about a million ways for a project not to happen, and only one way for things to work.
"AMF, UCLA CoGen, San Jose Rep, Conflucence, etc." This is built stuff?? Where is it published?
Anyway, great work coming out of y'all's office, keep it up!
Well, Astronauts Memorial is tied up with Wes' previous partnership, so it hasn't been published in either of the JPA monographs. There's a few mediocre pics of it on Google Image and a couple better ones on flickr. San Jose Rep was like the first built project in the second monograph. CoGen, Confluence were in the first monograph. Those are all pretty big, built projects.
Thanks-
did they ever fix Wes's project at the University of Cincinnati. That thing was a piece of shit
Yea, UC really fucked that one up. As far as I know, it uh, hasn't maintained well.
My honest take on Wes Jones' work is that it's WAY over-detailed and over-structured. I'm guessing that's why he doesn't have more built: he uses six large beams where one will do. I was in Houston recently, and drove down to where all the petrochemical plants are--these massive agglomerations of structure and piping. It looked a lot like Jones' work to me.
His graphics also seem somewhat dated (at least from the Instrumental Form era.) They did even when Instrumental Form first came out. They have a kind of zip-a-tone monochrome aesthetic that renders everything in a flat, cartoonish, yet complicated way.
Block this user
Are you sure you want to block this user and hide all related comments throughout the site?
Archinect
This is your first comment on Archinect. Your comment will be visible once approved.