The Trump administration has awarded contracts to build four border wall prototypes using non-concrete "other materials," U.S. Customs and Border Protection announced Thursday.
The contracts came a week after the administration announced four companies that will build prototypes of concrete border walls. In all, the eight prototype walls will cost about $3.6 million.
— The Hill
Adding to the four firms already selected to build border wall prototypes last week, Trump now also contracted another round of companies that will specifically build non-concrete prototypes of his favorite campaign promise. By encouraging 'other materials' border wall designs, Trump hopes to... View full entry
The unexpected closure of Angels Flight on Monday, four days after the funicular’s grand reopening, seemed a fitting twist for a railway that has operated in fits and starts for half a century. Since its reopening, 21 years ago, Angels Flight has been shut down more than half the time. — Los Angeles Times
Los Angeles's well known car culture quite efficiently dismantled the city's public transportation, passenger railway system, and the now long-gone network of red cars. Yet, one passenger train, and the smallest of all, keeps rising from the ashes — and dying again. Angels Flight, the... View full entry
Chicago is one of the global centers of the architectural world, not only for its rich history, but also as a stage for continuous innovation and design exploration. This lineage is a major part of why The Chicago Architecture Foundation (CAF) has decided to create the Chicago Architecture Center... View full entry
Tampa Bay is mesmerizing, with 700 miles of shoreline and some of the finest white sand beaches in the nation. But analysts say the metropolitan area is the most vulnerable in the United States to flooding and damage if a major hurricane ever scores a direct hit.
A Boston firm that analyzes potential catastrophic damage reported that the region would lose $175 billion in a storm the size of Hurricane Katrina. A World Bank study called Tampa Bay one of the 10 most at-risk areas on the globe.
— washingtonpost.com
Published more than a month ago, long before Hurricane Irma was even on anyone's forecast, this piece by Washington Post writer Darryl Fears tells the tale of Tampa Bay as a seeming paradise, with its 4 millions residents, hot real estate market, lofty development ambitions, construction boom —... View full entry
Art thrives when it collaborates with or takes inspiration from other discliplines, a tenet that is physically expressed in the new campus of the Emily Carr University of Art + Design, located on the east side of downtown Vancouver. Designed by Diamond Schmitt Architects, the campus reflects the... View full entry
Justine Testado featured the 'Spaceships' series of Hamburg-based Lars Stieger. RaúlGHO commented "Tal vez, el arquitecto diseño el detalle esperando que así se descubra, como una nave espacial de serie de televisión." Plus, Matthew Allen reviewed the exhibit ‘architecture, architectural... View full entry
For all the concern about the gentrification, rising housing prices and the growing gap between the rich and poor in our leading cities, an even bigger threat lies on the horizon: The urban revival that swept across America over the past decade or two may be in danger. As it turns out, the much-ballyhooed new age of the city might be giving way to a great urban stall-out. — The New York Times
Richard Florida paints a gloomy picture of the state of the great American urban revival in his NYT op-ed, "The Urban Revival Is Over," citing gentrification, income disparity, rising crime numbers, unaffordable housing prices, and the anti-urban agenda of the current White House tenants. Joe... View full entry
Although Harvard, Yale, Columbia, and UCLA have once again have secured their high-ranking places on the United States' Top Architecture Schools for 2018 (as compiled by Architectural Record based on surveys conducted by DesignIntelligence), the University of Southern California has made... View full entry
In the meta news category, Bjarke Ingels' full-scale "Lego House," inspired by the titular rectangular building blocks and slated to open later this month in Denmark, now apparently has a miniature version in the form of real Legos that will be available for sale only at the Lego House. According... View full entry
On this week's show we talk to Kogonada, the writer and director of the critically-acclaimed film Columbus, and Kyle Bergman, founder of the Architecture & Design Film Festival. Left: Kogonada, Photo by Kyle Flubacker; Right: Kyle BergmanOur conversation with Kogonada touches on his... View full entry
The International Criminal Court (ICC) ruled on 17 August, that an Islamic extremist caused €2.7m in damages when he destroyed shrines in Timbuktu, Mali, in 2012. This is the first time that the ICC has made a ruling solely on cultural destruction, setting an important precedent. [...]
Islamic extremists used pickaxes and bulldozers to destroy nine mausoleums and the centuries-old door of the Sidi Yahya mosque, built during a golden age of Islam [...].
— theartnewspaper.com
By ruling that "the destruction of the protected buildings has caused the suffering of people throughout Mali and the international community," the International Criminal Court in The Hague acknowledged the demolition of cultural heritage as a war crime — potentially treating recent acts of... View full entry
In this round-up of notable architecture in Africa, Wired takes a closer look at projects from Morocco to South Africa, including the Lideta Mercato in Ethiopia by Xavier Vilalta and the Bosjes Chapel by Steyn Studio. As the piece notes, "Contemporary African architecture is extremely varied: it... View full entry
With an expected completion date of March 2019, the 18-story, 80-meter-tall-plus building in Brumunddal, Norway known as the Mjøsa Tower will soon become the world's tallest wooden structure, a coveted title among those designers who favor wood over more traditional tall building materials... View full entry
But what if there were a way to see gentrification long before the coffee shops, condos and Whole Foods appear? What if city planners and neighborhoods had an early warning system that could sniff out the changes just as they begin?
[...] neighborhood advocates would have the opportunity to implement policies ranging from reserving affordable housing units to educating residents of their renting rights to helping small businesses negotiate long-term lease extensions.
— NPR
In his NPR piece, astrophysics professor Adam Frank explains how various big data sets, like housing prices, eviction records, census data, or social media usage, can be utilized for "predictive analytics" to detect early onsets of gentrification for specific neighborhoods at an increasingly high... View full entry
Detached from the rest of the building for soundproofing reasons, the 10,000 panels that line the central auditorium are the result of parametric design, a process of creating multiple individual designs using algorithms.
A million individual cells ranging from four to 16cm long are cut out from the panels [...]
The ivory coloured gypsum fiber acoustic panels contain a seashell motif and were designed by Swiss architect Herzog & De Meuron with help from German studio One to One.
— Global Construction Review
Interior view of the central concert hall. Photo: Iwan Baan."It would be insane to do this by hand," GCR quotes Benjamin Koren, founder of One to One, the studio that created the design algorithm for the concert hall's acoustic panels. "That’s the power of parametric design. I hit play, and it... View full entry
