For the latest edition of the In Focus series, Archinect talked to London-based photographer Edward Neumann. He describes himself "an aspiring fine art photographer...I like the ‘art for art’s sake’ school of thought".

Plus, Amelia Taylor-Hochberg Editorial Manager for Archinect features BI's inaugural publication, "FREE" in Screen/Print #3. Donna Sink LOVED "the cover of this periodical!  So satirical".

News
It's that time of the year again, so we are taking a look back at the year 2013 on Archinect by sharing the most trafficked and popular pages in Archinect's diverse online ecosystem, with a list of 13 top 13 lists for '13.

Miles Jaffe got excited "Woo Hoo! My images headline #5 and #8!" in Archinect's Top 13 Discussions for '13' while in response to Archinect's Top 13 Lecture Posters for '13', Harold-Sprague Solie argued "You can really read into each schools methodology and educational philosophies through these posters. It is a shame to see so many of them favoring fancy graphics over simple legibility...especially the California schools".

Allison Arieff is editor and content strategist for SPUR, laid out What Tech Hasn’t Learned From Urban Planning. Thayer-D believed the problem was obvious "Because the architects they hire don't do urbanism, they do object buildings...Like the article said, they need to become better urbanists".

Helene Combs Dreiling, FAIA, executive director of the Virginia Center for Architecture, was inaugurated as the 90th president of the American Institute of Architects (AIA), during ceremonies held on December 12th at the Andrew W. Mellon Auditorium.

After a highly successful 23 year collaboration, Sean Griffiths, Charles Holland and Sam Jacob of FAT decided to close-up shop.

Bustler.net reported the three finalists (Heneghan Peng Architects, Nieto Sobejano Arquitectos and MEL) for Moscow’s New National Center for Contemporary Arts. 

HandsumCa$hMoneyYo complained "How much longer is the stacked boxes trend going to continue?...I'd keep it national & use the Russian firm".

Firms/Blogs/Work Updates

Parallax Architecture and Planning partnered with Opsis Architecture to design a new gateway and learning center for the campus of Manzanita School. Reflecting the surrounding Santa Monica Mountains "The entry portal connects to a multi-level path that gradually ascends the hilly terrain, ensuring that students will be immersed in nature each time they enter the campus".

Schools/Blogs
Evan Chakroff continued reporting in from the Knowlton School of Architecture’s December 2013 of the architecture/urbanism of Japan. 

Day six saw the group visit "Ise shrine is widely lauded as the best extant example of Shinto architecture" and the next day in Nara they explored Todai-ji temple complex and the historical Naramachi district. During days 9-10 the tour stopped at Kenzo Tange's 1958 Kanagawa prefectural office, Naoshima Island and Hiroshima, site of Hiroshima Peace Park, also designed by Tange.

SCI-Arc recently announced that it will break ground on Magic Box, a 4,000-square-feet, 2-story digital fabrication lab to be built at the south end of the SCI-Arc building.

Sweden's Association of Architects asked students at KTH's Arkitekturhögskolan to rank their education. The survey found that the education at KTH was considered the worst. Sixty-six KTH students responded to the survey and about 70 percent said they were "not getting enough or any training at all in visualization and oral presentation". The same proportion of students also said the school was failing to teach them how to tie their architectural concepts together with actually erecting buildings.

Cameron Rodman posted work from his Fall studio. The "topic for the semester was 'Gateway Communities'. This project had been in collaboration with the Knoxville Metropolitan Planning Commission and PlanET (Plan East Tennessee)".

Discussions
Quoting Brett Steele from Log 28, momafresh25  asked "what is experimental architect? is Zumtor and Herzog experimental"? 

tammuz clarified "We may differentiate an experimental architectural process from an experimental architecture. If the architectural outcome is not intended to be the experiment proper (gauging the pursuant conditions) but is an outcome of an experimental process, then it cannot be called an experimental architecture per se". Quondam for his part (re)posts "Gehry's method of design via innumerable study models [ie, experimentation] seems to have become quite influential...Personally, I like seeing all the study models of various projects by various architects. I like it because it clearly demonstrates just how experimental architectural designing can be. And I seriously consider the notion that it may well be Gehry that best introduced architectonic experimentation to the profession".

jla-x is confused about the law never a good thing. If  single family homes are "exempt" in a state "Are there any limits to what a designer or residential designer can do with regard to these exempt structures? Can one open a residential design studio and design homes in the same way an architect would as long as they refrain from using protected titles or words"?

BulgarBlogger answered affirmatively "Yes- they are called ‘builders’." 3tk basically agreed "Assuming the exemption is to the practice law (which I believe it is), legally yes, you are allowed by law to engage in the practice of architecture within the exemptions without a license".

jitter12 added "Come on down to Texas.  Not only are single family homes exempt, but so are commercial buildings under 20,000 sf and multifamily with less than 16 units per building. Oh, and duplexes, warehouses with minimal public access too.  It's the freakin' wild west down here.  TSA is rumbling about stepping into that battle next session".

Finally, toasteroven wanted to talk about newly formed The Architecture Lobby, 
who argue; 

"first, that architectural employers and employees alike have bought into the myth of the artiste working outside of the labor discourse. You almost never hear the terms 'labor' and 'architecture' together. Secondly, we have never resolved our compensation model".

gruen griped "I wish this was what the AIA was for, instead of sending me come-on offers for fed-ex/kinkos...My biggest complaint about the AIA is that they don't function as a trade organization". jla-x got excited "YES!"