“Thought Matters II”, a publication by the UCLA Department of Architecture and Urban Design, has just been released. Led by renowned architects, designers and UCLA professors Thom Mayne, Neil Denari, Greg Lynn and Dagmar Richter, Thought Matters II explores the work from the 2006-2007 Research Studios in a hard bound book and DVD. Video
Copies are $ 35 and can be obtained by contacting the department at bookorders@aud.ucla.edu or by calling (310)825.7857.



A compilation of research and design studies the book and DVD presents the outcome of the 30-week studios ranging from Mayne’s research studio's urban design findings and design proposals for three sites near Madrid's historic core that offer innovative visions for facing the profound growth and change expected in the Spanish capital over the next two decades — Denari’s studio investigation for new high-rise and tall building morphologies in Chicago, — Lynn’s studio examines how water and movement will be the next big thing in architecture considering Giant Robots in a Lazy River, — through Richter’s studio designs for Housing prototypes in Los Angeles.

Directed by David Fenster, winner of the Jury Prize for Best Documentary Short at the 2007 Los Angeles Film Festival, the 20 minute DVD demonstrates that UCLA Architecture and Urban Design is a leader in applied research produced during the 30-week long Research Studios led by Denari, Lynn, Mayne, and Richter through framing a compelling and engaging narrative of the design and architecture culture in the department.

UCLA Architecture and Urban Design has created an emerging model for the conceptual framework that begins with a deep analysis of the existing demographic, cultural, and infrastructural issues within each studio topic creating an impressive array of animations, graphs, statistics, photos, images, drawings and models. A forum is created in which the students’ through research, fieldwork, site investigation, and meetings with city officials, curators, architects, developers, and other prominent experts are immersed into a real world setting where they can take into account the comprehensive and integrative nature of architectural design and urban development.

The film explores the territory of investigation, research, and design through interviews that engage students from each studio discussing the creative process of their studio project, interviews with each of the Research Studio faculty introducing the studio’s aspirations through final reviews.

The publication demonstrates how these four research studio projects merge the expertise of public officials and professionals with the creativity and criticality of academia to produce a series of urban design concepts that will address and provide solutions to some of the more pressing urban problems facing cities everywhere today. This engagement beyond the conventional academic setting in terms of depth and breadth of research provides students with the rare opportunity to interact with important private and public individuals and officials — putting them at the front line of the public policy and decision-making processes.

Thom Mayne: Madrid Now
The Madrid Now 2006-2007 Research Studio led by Thom Mayne continues the inquiries and aspiration of the L.A. Now studios exploring the current discourse in urban planning and design, with a focus on new urban projects near Madrid.

The three proposed sites hug the outer ring of the historic core of Madrid, currently the M-30 highway, and are of the last remaining parcels of open land within the traditional city boundary. The following five proposals use these sites to offer innovative and achievable visions for facing the profound growth and change anticipated in Madrid over the next two decades - asking questions from a different vantage point and viewing urban design through a modern lens.

Neil Denari: Vertical Futures Chicago
Focusing on Chicago the studio examined development issues and future urban scenarios for North American cities. As a major urban center of 2.8 million people between New York and Los Angeles, Chicago’s place among world-class cities is unique as it not only stakes out a vast territory in the American heartland, but that it is also the city where some of the first and most important developments in high rise construction engaged modern materials with the concomitant emergence of a new form of urban morphology. Chicago’s urban core and further, its historical and visual identities, are directly linked to the phenomenon of verticality.

The studio focused on a comprehensive description of design projects (sited in Chicago) for new high-rise and tall building morphologies by examining the skyscraper, the megablock, the mid-rise cluster, and other types of tall development in relation to its larger context of cities worldwide.

Greg Lynn: Giant Robots in a Lazy River
Las Vegas has long been the Petri dish for architects preoccupied with communication and signage. Architecture in the post modern period (Venturi) was about signage—first print then digital, now already outmoded. Our bet was that the next big thing to come out of Las Vegas would be movement: the Giant Robot. Almost coincident with this idea, the decorated shed in Las Vegas was usurped by vulgar Italianate Post Modernism, and later by an even more saccharin taste of mid-century leisure Modernism. This studio bet that the next big thing would be water experiences: the Lazy River. Curiously, Giant Robots and Lazy Rivers were compatible topics in the studios evaluation.

Dagmar Richter: High Density Housing Prototypes
Los Angeles is a megalopolis filled with reckless urban sprawl. Given that fact, it’s important to explore alternative modes of living and working in Los Angeles and how they might apply to infrastructures and construction methods in the 21st Century. Now, new case studies for a new century are needed, and the UCLA students were asked to glean lessons from the past in order to produce prototypes for the future. Two locations and two time frames dominated this study: Central Europe and its high density, 20th Century housing development and Los Angeles with its rapid growth and infrastructural collapse. The aim of this Research Studio was to produce prototypical housing and to research what prototypes mean to housing in the United States.

The UCLA students involved in “Thought Matters II” were:
Angel Burgos Melendez, Sook Hee Cho, Sachie Fujimori, Jonathan Gilliam, Yifan Huang, Laura Kos, Daniel Lid, Changsuk Lim, David Magid, Jungmin Oh, Aaron Ragan, Stephanie Rigolot, J.Travis Russett, Elizabeth Wendell; Neil Denari, Vertical Futures: Chicago; Students: Thom Beresford, Joseph Chisholm, Stephen Deters, Shusuke Inoue, Shawna Krantz, Liesl Margolin, Marco Montesclaros, David Pierson, Noah Rubin, Melinda Sanes, Scott Severson, Mimi Shin, Carolyn Telgard, Scott Utterstrom; Greg Lynn, Giant Robots in a Lazy River Professor in Residence; Students: Gabriela Aronow, Brendan Beachler, Su-hou Chen, Tiara Chu, Neil Cook, Shawn Gupta, Alissa Hisoire, Travis Ingersoll, Michael Leaveck, Hee Jee Lee, Michael Loverich, Yereem Park, Antonio Torres, Derek Windels, Seyavash Zohoori; Dagmar Richter, High Density Housing Prototypes; Students: Emmet Ashford-Trotter, Haigaz Blikian, Joseph Bryant, Lindsay Clayton, Amirbabak Eshraghi, Heeyoung Lee, Bryan Smith.