He has coined a punning term, BIGamy, to describe his own up-for-anything style. He rejects the idea that an architect must adhere to a single personal aesthetic, which enables him to be cheerfully flexible in meeting the demands of corporate clients. Ingels’ creative impulse to say yes to everything, even contradictions, often leads him into hybridism. — wired.com
Previously in the Archinect News:
68 Comments
I hate to say this cause he's a $#@*, but Trump Chicago, easily.
Agree. And every time I hear Bjarke talk about WTC 2, I'm starting to think that The Donald may actually be less full of shit than he is.
BIG is hands down the best architect around and potentially the best in history. Name one architect that has done more for his age? FLW and Corbu were senior citizens before they did 1/2 of what we at BIG have done. If they were around now they would not understand at all what this generation thinks and wouldn't be able to build anything substantial.
GO BIG OR GO HOME!!
Agreed, BIG has their hand on the pulse of the contemporary youth, which is who drives this world. He's 32 years old and has built more than any other architect around, showing his genius. You just have to look at his designs and see that we spend an enormous amount of time and energy making sure he knows his client, and he creates brilliant work. Trump is really nothing compared to BIG for design and to even think otherwise is just showing your age and stupidity.
^Nate Holmblower, Adrian Smith designed the Trump Tower under the veil of SOM. He was the guru of every skyscraper they put up from 1990-2010, including the record-breaking Burj Khalifa.
Then "he wasn't getting paid enough" so in 2007 he took his coworker Gordon Gill and kicked rocks, to form Adrian Smith + Gordon Gill Architecture. These were two of the brightest minds at SOM, so many of their underlings followed as they were head hunted. A cool bit of biographical history. And he was originally hired at SOM right after the Hancock was built in '69 when Bruce Graham was designing the Sears Tower. Very eery to imagine that; he interned for SOM's brightest architect at the time, who designed the tallest building in the world, at the time. And 40 years later he does the exact same thing himself. Up next: Kingdom Tower in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. Smith is breaking his own record by 500 more feet (3,280ft supertall structure).
He's going to go down in history textbooks without a doubt. Grade school students will be learning his name. Not Bjarke Ingles, ARP1.
^knoa, so you both are trolling then? Bjarke is 41, he STARTED his office at 32.
what the hell are either of you on? sheesh
Agreed, Adrian Smith is def doing it big when it comes to skyscraper design. Just saw the Trump Chicago, and it reminded me of the 2WTC--which is funny because our branding perceptions are warped, just because of the names attached.
Trump and BIG seem to have a lot in common. I'd like to see a serious study of comparison between the two... think of the self-publishing (Art of the Deal vs. Yes is More) and the over the top cult of personality, the relative young age, the populism, etc. More in common with Trump then Rem, for sure.
Adriana Smith is a fossil. When BIG is that old, watch. Of course you and your other old white men will be long gone and we will be in charge.
bjarke's a white guy, so what would change? you said we.
when BIG is that old he too will be an old white guy.
Bjark is the worst starchitect ever. I hate him. I want to bitch smack him and Kanye simultaneously. That would make me happy.
He is like a mediocre pop star...fame by pure luck, politics, and association...his work is like one of the millions of A- studio projects...not horrible but nothing special...success as a result of fame...
He is a Popitect...Beiber of architecture
You're all wrong.. Yoshiharu Tsukamoto and Momoyo Kajima of Atelier Bow Wow will rule us all.
They are all fighting to posess the One Ring of Power and will lay waste to the world in order to get it.
Sorry, I already got the one ring and it's mine all mine.
Bjarke will be old by the time he is running in the 2044 election against North West for the President of East China.
my boxes stack higher than your boxes.
Bjarke is getting run down - bags beneath his eyes and putting on weight - I don't envy him - I get my 8 hours sleep at night
Unfortunatley when you are selling style and youth, aging and weight gain won't do those folks very well. Especially since the branding doesn't share credit with partners... though Gehry and many others don't was well, but he wasn't selling his sex appeal.
he travels in an rv with his name on the side, to burning man....nuffsaid!
BIG is definitely selling style. But I don't think that he is selling "youth" at all. He's selling what architects like Gehry, Koolhaas, Zaha Hadid etc are selling: that Architecture can be something that is enjoyable for broad range of users. Most of the people who interact with BIG's buildings will not know who he is or how young he is.
There was a recent article that BIG was one of the to eight most valuable brands based on name recognition. Apple was first, but BIG is in good company.
^ "recent article" BS
I find that the anti-BIG critics tend to also reject popular culture generally and the acknowledgment of mass culture by architects, artists, curators etc.
This article was fantastic!!! So much incredibly intimate detail about contemporary practice.
I wish I still taught a Pro Practice class. I'd spend half a semester *just* teaching this article. It's so rich.
Also, I adore BIG and Bjarke unreservedly. Even more so after this article!
"He tells me BIG’s design, which his staff calls the Dorito, has engineering issues. So he’s going to pitch a newly brainstormed concept: the Watchflower"
"Ingels worries that the cheaper alternative, straight columns, would leave the lower floors cluttered with obstructions. But Rinnebach recommends straightening things out. “I could live with that,” Ingels concludes."
Great article....very illuminating
This quote is a pretty good summary of an architects job, if not the definition of good architecture: I really like this idea that architecture is the art and science of trying to make everybody happy.
I still don't quite get BIGs work, in the sense of understanding what endears him to the academic crowd. Maybe its more his understanding of the process of negotiating a design and study of that which is interesting. Is the work seeking to pursue any agenda beyond that: getting built with whatever flourish can be added? I don't fault them for that, but its not a novel approach.
It is interesting to engage in projects normally reserved for the most corporate firms.... But How much would they have to change before Bjarke would walk away? Seems like he'd be ok with anything really.
There's also a difference between making a developer "happy" and making people that use the buildings happy. Depends on what you value... The process itself seems so diagrammatic not material or humanistic.
It's probably generational--I remember the 90s there was a backlash against "selling out", maybe Jay Z and Silicon Valley brought back the greed is good success first mantra.
"maybe Jay Z and Silicon Valley brought back the greed is good success first mantra"
We have grown more comfortable the idea of operating within the system and finding opportunities to create something special or subversive within the parameters of a Facebook Reddit or Twitter. We're also more comfortable with cultivating a personal brand. Previous generations were/are probably more suspicious of that behavior.
I think, Nate and davvid, you are on to something - the enthusiasm for BIG is in part an acceptance of 'selling out' as part of an identity.
It might not be new in itself, but he is - so far as I'm aware - the first name-architect to embrace that as an approach to practice. Rem certainly expressed some fascination with uncritical commercial architecture through his writings, but as a designer his reputation as difficult kind of refutes being labeled a sell-out. BIG takes it further by being the easy architect. Is the work still doing anything inventive, critical, or even beautiful though?
I don't know. I haven't actually seen any in person, if that still matters anymore.
Nate + davvid, that is a very insightful point. The current generation, the millennials, are living in a sort of self deluded optimistic fantasy. They truly believe that the system is malleable. The poor fools.
I wish I were as confident in my own worldview as jla-x. Life would much easier.
Either way, you could compare this design strategy to that of Steve Jobs (as i read movie review) where every detail was life or death like it matters. That said, seeing W57 on the west side highway is cool (though its mostly obstructed by a large utility building. Oops!). One of the projects of theirs I like... not really 2WTC or Google though, which seem very anti-architecture.
say yes to everything
And there we have in a proverbial nutshell the essential problem with the the world's second oldest profession.
This isn't as big of an issue in other design fields, is it? Are industrial designers or graphic designers torn between doing esoteric/small/slow work and doing corporate/mass appeal work?
Designers are always handing around letters denouncing unethical corporate work--though whever there is money, there will always be someone "designing" it.
The problem i had in the article is Bjarke's love of the Philip Johnson quote "I am a whore" repeated above by Miles. I don't agree with that sentiment at all... but I guess it is fitting that Philip Johnson was always a second rate Mies until he decided to be a second rate Graves (sometime after being a second rate Nazi). Everyone is real good at talking and tweeting now and not so good at making buildings.
Simple:
Glass House = anti-architecture
Farnsworth House = architecture
Selling out does seem silly in this current climate, just explaining the culture shift. Frank Gehry is making a lot more sense these days.....
It seems Gehry has more of a relationship with art and Aalto than the media gave him credit for. Which was first, Glass House or Farnsworth? Not sure, but Glass House did require the building of a separate residence, if that's what you mean by "accommodated". The Farnsworth feels much more complete in its proportions, the starway, the detailing. Of course it's museumy but it's not a one trick gimmick.
If you are an architect that doesn't have a style or vision, it becomes more important to cultivate a cult of personality.
I'd love to hear an explanation of what anti-architecture is exactly.
Anti-architecture is the nonsensical rambling of self-styled academics whose actual architectural output is zilch.
It can also be defined as architecture that fails to fulfill its programmatic purpose. In other words bad architecture is anti-architecture in the same way that contaminated food is poison.
I'm not seeing the architecture/anti-architecture distinction...
True it doesn't make a difference. Architecture doesn't need explanation, Ted talks, or magazine covers. Deep down you know what's awesome. Most of it is a miracle just to exist, just like every smile and rainbow
The thing I like about Bjarke is his way of articulating the architecture school thesis studio approach as if is he is still in school - not jaded by experience -
nice article. he's a millinial wet dream - epic.
Architecture has become so divorced from the experiential...it has become objectified, which is what modernism was supposed to be moving away from...object buildings...and because of this architecture has reverted back to its pre-modernist function...as a sign/symbol...Everything is now a temple...Each building has its own little axis mundi...I find BIGs one liner bullshit fake, boring, and shallow...perfectly appropriate for the zeitgeist...
Architecture cannot exist in a vacuum as some rarified elitist practice. It is the physicality and structure of our society. Objects matter, images matter, messages matter and experiences matter to our society. You can bitch about it all you want with snarky comments but it won't change anything.
^ it should be obvious. BIGs work is reductionist...the proof is that it can be almost fully explained via diagram...good architecture cannot...Like I said, his work is not horrible, like an A- studio project...but that kinda makes his undeserved fame even more annoying... and the promise and optimism of his firm is about as empty as the "Yes we can" slogan...can what?
MANY firms that work to create experiential architecture use diagrams. Jla-x's issue is not with BIG, its with contemporary architecture, maybe even contemporary culture. Its reductionist to put so much emphasis on the post-rationalizations of diagrams.
This is an image produced by BIG for its proposed Kimball Art Center Building. What about this room is a one-liner or a diagrammatic trick or pop-architecture?
Was the Danish Pavillon not an experiential building? It relocated a beloved statue temporarily and provided an opportunity to rent bicycles and ride them through the building and around the expo.
^ and? looks like poorly detailed trash, the concept is nothing original either
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