Invisible Cities - Italo Calvino

A great book that synthesizes a multitude of possibly conceptual urban experiences through discussions between Marco Polo and Kublai Khan. I still read passages weekly to help wrap my head around conceptual possibilities of space.

If this book does not get you excioted then architecture may not be your cup of tea - just my 2 cents.

Anarchitecture- Lebbeus Woods

If you haven't already shared or experienced the feeling of some of the conceptual explorations present inside this gem- you will!

I run a small journal called Manifold. You might check out the recent issue, #3, "The Interview Issue." It features interviews with many different leading theorists and architects, including Manuel De Landa, Brian Massumi, Jesse Reiser, Sanford Kwinter, Stan Allen, Charles Waldheim, James Corner, Chris Reed, Mark C. Taylor, and K. Michael Hays, among several others. What I think will be helpful about it is that it provides a sense of what's going on in academia right now from many different viewpoints. We used the interview format to keep things as plainspoken and clear as possible. You can download it for free from www.manifoldmagazine.com (click on "3 The Interview Issue"), and if you want a print copy, you can request it from info@manifoldmagazine.com I hope it's helpful to you.

Definitely some good discussion in the latest Manifold, worth the read. I particularly liked the discussion with Jesse Reiser and Philip Wood.

wasn't there another thread with the same topic?

read Devil and the White city

and my blog www.talkitect.com

You might want to consider reading some of Jorge Luis Borges works. His short stories collections are great for reading in transit or anytime really. His writings are deceptively simple, he artfully invests a novels worth of ideas into a handful pages without becoming static or dense.

Borges

thank you guys :)
yeah, i know there are other posts about this but i really meant it as a preparation for m.arch 1, not a general arch. reading. i will def. check out your recommendations, i still have 3 full months!

Yeah, Borges is amazing. Dream tigers is a good one of his - although you can't really go wrong with any Borges.

I agree with Fays on Jane Jacobs.

Also, No Place Like Utopia by Peter Blake might be a good refresher to read about what shaped architecture in the past 80 years or so.

thanks talkitect, did you mean devil IN the white city by eric larson? nothing comes up wth devil AND the white city. thanks

I'm sure that is the book he ment. It is a really great read.

hey synergy, yeah i fiigured so i ordered it anyway.
i actually ordered all 8 books, will be busy reading - thanks everyone again!

one LAST question.....can you guys recommend me a book that talks about the MODERN conditions of today's cities as they are occurring now? as up to date as can be? to supplenment these readings, i want to be updated as much as possible about the world we live in now from an architectural standpoint in addition to magazine articles - such as the the very insightful manifold. i know there are TONS of books but for someone who will study arch. for the first time in sept., if you hd to pick ONE, what will tha book be?

gracias~

newport, who is teaching grad studios? that's where i'd start. second, i am pretty sure there are summer studios right now, go and talk to the prof's teaching the summer. the summer studios tend to be much looser because the focus is on studio only. next go to some of the bookstores in nyc and peruse the architecture sections, philosphy, and art...i think devil is not going to be informative to anything in studio, it's more luxury than intensive discourse. borges, musil, joyce, and others are more appropriate.

thanks b3tadine, i would love to do summer studio but can not get financial aid :(
yeah, i should peruse some bookstores too, sounds good!

go and visit, they'd be happy to talk to you.