On November 11th in London, Sotheby's will be auctioning off the late great David Bowie's Memphis, Milano collection, which includes works by architect and designer Ettore Sottsass, Aldo Cibic, and Michele De Lucchi, among others. The works embody the Memphis movement's 1980s philosophy of 'New... View full entry
Turkey’s president looks at northern Syria and sees what others don’t: a massive real estate project.
Recep Tayyip Erdogan, whose army is attempting to clear 5,000 square kilometers in northern Syria of Islamic State, talks about building entire cities when his soldiers’ work is done. In regular addresses, he describes a future in which refugees return home to Turkish-built apartment blocks supplemented by Turkish-built schools and social facilities.
— Bloomberg
That may be the only way to get some of the nearly 3 million Syrians in Turkey to return home and begin reconstructing their country, he says.For more on the Syrian conflict, check out past coverage:A well, a windmill, a mirror: Sigil's real and symbolic interventions in SyriaWater Wars: the... View full entry
This post is brought to you by FunderMax. Make your imagination into individual, large-sized decor concepts. With various formats and motifs spanning over multiple formats, your fantasy becomes reality.As a small inspirational source, we present to you a few application examples. FunderMax... View full entry
Between now and next fall, Mr. Holl’s office will dedicate five major arts projects in the United States. In the same period, dozens of new cultural commissions will open around the world, many by the biggest names in the architectural business, including David Adjaye, Herzog & de Meuron, Rem Koolhaas/OMA, Thomas Heatherwick, Fumihiko Maki, Mecanoo, and Robert A. M. Stern. — NYT
Despite earlier predictions and rumors to the contrary, Reed Kroloff reports on the Millions of Square Feet, Billions of Dollars: (from the new Tate Modern and Elbphilharmonie, to The National Kaohsiung Arts Center in Taiwan) of new cultural commissions. View full entry
Ministers have repeatedly given more public money to London’s planned garden bridge, despite official advice against doing so, and risk losing more than £20m if the controversial project is cancelled, according to a report from the National Audit Office...The Garden Bridge Trust has yet to secure the necessary sub-lease on the area of the South Bank where the bridge will land, the report notes, while the main contractor [is] on standby and construction has been delayed for at least 18 months. — The Guardian
For previous news on this ongoing struggle: London mayor Sadiq Khan blocks extra funds for garden bridge Allies and Morrison propose an alternative to the garden bridge London's garden bridge, the saga continues Sadiq Khan investigates troublesome details in Thames garden bridge project View full entry
It’s an issue that oscillates according to many factors, mainly debt, but also the competitiveness of and between students and likewise of and between staff. We monitor it very carefully and are continuously seeking to improve our approach, extend support, and address the culture that surrounds the issue. We welcome this discussion which also needs to spotlight overworking, a culture of competition and production that is too intense, and an unhealthy disregard for rest and repose. — Bob Sheil – bdonline.co.uk
Learn more about what's happening at The Bartlett under Bob Sheil in our Deans List.Related on Archinect:When designing for mental health, how far can architects go?UK architecture students seeking mental health care is on the rise, according to Architects' Journal surveyArchitects constitute the... View full entry
There is a city which is suffering a worse property bubble than Sydney, whose residents are more priced-out than Londoners, and where there is a greater divide between the housing haves and have-nots than even San Francisco.
That city is Vancouver, and in response to these mounting challenges, the west-coast Canadian metropolis recently imposed an extraordinary new tax on foreign buyers – whose impact is now being watched closely by other cities grappling with bloated property markets.
— theguardian.com
Related stories in the Archinect news:Mayor of London launches probe into the impact of foreign investment in city's real estateAnother case of "poor door" for proposed Vancouver high-riseCan Vancouver break out of its 'boring-architecture' mold with these new ambitious skyscraper View full entry
Is flood mitigation the new frontier in urban planning? China, whose urban centers have regularly been experiencing infrastructure-shuttering floods, is actively encouraging its metropolises to start reshaping themselves to handle the new reality via the so-called "sponge city" program. As an... View full entry
For all of the dubious attention attracted by the “Bilbao Effect” theory [...] a more prosaic, and arguably more important aspect of museum location has received little attention: not which city a museum is built in, but where in that city. Locations that would once have seemed inevitable, such as Chicago parkland, are hugely contentious in the 2000s, while locations previously unthinkable in that year – an abandoned lumbermill in Bilbao [...] – are now commonplace. — theguardian.com
Related stories in the Archinect news:Embattled Lucas Museum may move to S.F.'s Treasure IslandLawsuit against Lucas Museum holds off (for now)‘Museum directors hated Bilbao’ View full entry
This week is one of the first in the season to demand a coat. With nights starting to draw in, the temperature dropping, and with many galleries and events opening later in the evenings, now is the perfect time to replace parks with free exhibitions. This year’s Stirling Prize winning project... View full entry
Manifestos serve a purpose. They make quick, abrupt statement, clear the air, and get attention. This manifesto is no different, except it has nothing theoretical to state nor anything specific to propose. It only has one maxim: there are no good ideas. Its only corollary, which necessarily follows, is that there are no good designs. — Numéro Cinq
The essay revisits Pruitt-Igoe to make quick points of obvious relevance today, especially this election cycle. It is both broad and pointed, and takes much of its spirit and bluntness from the manifestos of the past that it reviews briefly, in passing. The quality of our lives today—all of... View full entry
This post is brought to you by BQE ArchiOffice. Learn how this Brisbane-based architectural firm is enjoying faster cash flow now. About Based in West End, Brisbane, Tim Bennetton Architects is a small, private architectural firm with a single director and three employees. They work in an... View full entry
Greenpeace, Sierra Club BC, and Stand.earth formed the Rainforest Solutions Project as part of the Tides Canada Initiative. The coalition has spent nearly two decades developing a sophisticated legal and policy framework called Ecosystem-Based Management to tackle the persisting struggle over Canada's treasured Great Bear Rainforest, while also negotiating the conflicting interests of multiple groups. — Bustler
Winning over six equally worthy finalist teams, the Rainforest Solutions Project addresses both natural and cultural preservation, and it enforces stronger ecological responsibility in industrial economic pursuits. The Project resulted in a landmark 250-year agreement between all stakeholders... View full entry
In August, after a multibillion-dollar, year-and-a-half-long battle, Uber agreed to sell its business in China and depart the country.
It was a face-saving retreat for Uber, which got a 17.7 percent ownership stake in Didi and $1 billion in cash. [...]
Investors recently valued Didi at $35 billion, making it one of the most valuable private companies in the world. Uber, with operations in almost 500 cities on six continents, is worth $68 billion.
— bloomberg.com
More stories from the Uber-verse:The view from inside a self-driving Uber: "the technology is not quite ready"Uber and the future of on-demand public transitGoogle, Uber, Lyft, Ford and Volvo join forces to lobby for autonomous vehiclesWomen-only Uber alternatives face pushback from... View full entry
Architect Sean Lally of Weathers runs the podcast Night White Skies: "A podcast about architecture's future, as both Earth's environment and our human bodies are now open for design."The podcast is in its infancy, but Lally has already logged some really fascinating interviews with the likes... View full entry
