Nicholas Korody interviewed Andrés Jacque (of the Office for Political Innovation) about COSMO, the winning entry of this year’s MoMA PS1 Young Architect’s Program competition. Therein he argued "I believe that the architect’s role nowadays can also be providing alternatives, and enriching through diversity the collective catalogue of desirable possibilities."

Thayer-D commented "I don't think this qualifies as architecture, but it's very interesting" to which Kozumelle responded "I have seen this in person and it is not architecture in the strictest sense but still a wonderful, fantastic idea. Jaque's ideas are always politically charged and veer into other territories and he does it well."

Plus, for Screen/Print #34 Amelia Taylor-Hochberg featured the latest edition of KTISMA, from the University of Oregon’s School of Architecture and Allied Arts.

News
The Guggenheim Helsinki Design Competition selected Paris-based Moreau Kusunoki Architectes as the grand-prize winners.

midlander likes the design very much, but worries "a totally green firm will struggle to achieve a built work that lives up to the image and proves to be durable. This project is already showing itself to be complicated and controversial (due to the client/city relationship)".

RIP Desert Modern - architect Donald Wexler, who passed away on June 26th.

The Atlantic put together an informative interactive chart detailing the racial compositions of some of America's least diverse professions. As expected, architecture still ranks high up with 77.7% Whites — a much discussed phenomenon here on Archinect.

davvid believed "This has got to change. I think its one of the barriers that keeps the profession from reinventing itself...My concern is that by shutting out or not attracting architects from lower income groups, the profession fails to absorb new influences and new perspectives", while Alternative quipped "Good on non-whites for avoiding this horrible profession!"

With a citizen lawsuit now rejected it is pretty clear that Paul Rudolph's Government Center won't be saved, despite preservationist pleas. Fred Herring sees a pattern "Folk Art, Prentice and this... All highlighting the impotence of Twitter preservationists". More helpfully, Quondam suggested "Twitter preservationism would only start to come even close to working if the money Twitter made off of the Twitter preservationists was automatically earmarked toward preservation".
 

Firms/Work Updates
Everyday Intern penned a thoughtful response to the (now old) news regarding NCARB’s sunsetting of the term intern. In short "they punted it...NCARB is turning its back on an integral group of the profession". Donna Sink chimed in "I'm in complete agreement with you and also felt very disappointed and let-down after the Future title task Force announcement at the convention". kjdt offered up some further details "The reason that NCARB didn't recommend a particular title is that when the task force ran the issue by the state boards many were adamant about their own currently allowed and disallowed titles".

Recently Selim Senin worked on a design for "Luleburgaz Woman Academy" while Franco Chen worked on the geometries of a vase which "consist of three cylinders and a triangular prism".

Over at the Architectstasy blog, Jessica A.S. Letaw critiques a 2005 TED talk by Thom Mayne and the San Francisco Federal Building by Morphosis Architects.

Mateo Arquitectura has completed the remodelling of El Ninot market in Barcelona, a key market in the city’s food distribution network for its well communicated central location.

School/Blogs
Nicole Doan summed up the end of her architecture school studies at Cal Poly Pomona with two posts. The first reflected on Senior Project Reviews, the second on the news that she and fellow students Kate Bilyk and Jeffrey Stevens won first place in the Julius Shulman Emerging Talent Award Competition.

Kyat Chin (also at Cal Poly Pomona) highlighted "Spectacle of the Nakedness" a design proposal (done in collaboration with Jacklin Lee, Andrew Lytle, Saba Salekfard ) which sought to "bring the bathhouse back" to West Hollywood.

Over at the community Blog for IDS 420 Summer 2015, jeshedge wrote about her first week interning at "Kingdom Design Ministries, a nonprofit that renovated bedrooms and bathrooms for children with disabilities".
 

Discussions/Threads
justinritchey17 started a thread to gather opinions on getting a minor in Computer Science with a BS in Architecture? kickrocks got things going "If...serious...consider taking a double-major instead of trying to cram some basic 101 stuff in before graduating...Spend a few more years...it could be a very good combination".

Xenakis agreed "Architects that can program are the future of architects - as architectural design becomes increasingly parametric - this is were it's headed - Dynamo and grasshopper with Revit and Rhino respectively need good programming skill". toasteroven shared "I was a dual CS and arch major...I feel like the most useful minor would be in english, but I could see how CS might be useful".

Donna Sink was looking for a decent cost estimate for glass railings? She clarified "I don't personally much like this type of railing, but someone where I work has requested one". shuellmi answered "Couple hundred a LF for a traditional glass railing w/ s.s. handrail and shoe" although Carrera (who once owned a glass business) thought that was "a little light, the hardware to install the glass alone is $80/LF (based on your photo), and then add the glass at $200/LF. With install its closer to $600/LF and the steps could get up to $800/LF".

Noah Walker uses "glass rails frequently. 250/ft is good for estimating purposes here in Los Angeles.  Add 25% if you want low iron glass.  Usually you will not need special engineering if you use the pre-approved details from CRL or others.  Yes,  a solid continuous cap at the top is now part of most codes.  In a residential setting you can cap the glass with wood or metal to double as your handrail".

Finally, justinritchey17 wondered Why are people so fascinated with classical architecture? rob_c thought it was simple "People like classical architecture because they get it. After ornament became a crime everyone but architects checked out" while for Good_Knight it is deeper than that "people are so fascinated with classical architecture because it teases the soul with the prospect of there being, in fact, an eternal ideal worth striving for".

Marc Miller asked for some clarification "So why which buildings are deemed classical versus not...what's the cutoff? The Renaissance-as the Age of Enlightenment- is not classical, but if it is a derivative...what's the metric for that evaluation? The tricky part is that you can't rely upon scale, proportion, etc- otherwise a lot of early 20th century will sneak in". EKE replied "I don't maintain that classical architecture and art is the only path to beauty….I believe that beauty and truth exist as things ...independent of us.  We can use art and architecture as one way to access them.  Classicism is one well established, very efficient method for achieving this.  There are many others."