This project was designed to offer a kinetic and mechanical solution to a problem that would otherwise be nearly impossible to solve with static architectural components: providing shading across a building facade for both low evening sun and high afternoon sun conditions.

There is an argument, however, that view anxiety is just indulgent, naive sentiment. Nostalgia, after all, was originally defined as an illness. The English may have invented the idea of the picturesque, which gives us a special attachment to an 18th-century notion of visual delight. [...] And what exactly is the difference between the hated wind turbine [...] and the delightful 18th-century windmills that John Constable painted? His were industrial scenes. Constable was a modern man. — telegraph.co.uk

"It’s an attempt to really use architecture intelligence and design intelligence to unpack violations of international law," Weizman says of Forensic Architecture. Along with SITU Research, he and his team have developed a technique called video-to-space analysis to harvest spatial data from cell phone videos and photos, analyzing footage, sometimes from multiple sources, to model and recreate chaotic events to better understand what happened on the ground. — fastcodesign.com

Up until recently Canary Wharf was the only place for skyscrapers in London. [...]

Now it seems that London is going to receive a more cohesive skyline, with a new study produced by the New London Architecture (NLA) thinktank suggesting that at least 236 tall buildings (those over 20 storeys in height) are currently proposed, approved or under construction in the capital. — independent.co.uk

Imagine close to the entire population of the U.S. picking up and moving somewhere else.

That’s the scale of China’s urbanization campaign: 250 million farmers moving to the city over the next 15 years. [...]

In Southwest China, the city of Chongqing is being used as a test case for transitioning rural Chinese to change their residency status to urban residents. The government is persuading millions of farmers there to move to the city. — marketplace.org

Is London in danger of losing its soul? The question may sound melodramatic, but this is just what many of the British capital’s commentariat have been discussing over the past few days. [...]

Barely a day goes by without a local news story about the phenomenal rise of London property values. In just the past few weeks, we've learned that price levels are "approaching madness." [...]

London buyers start to bid consistently 25 percent above the asking price. — theatlanticcities.com

Provocative Dutch practitioner finally accepts offer to curate biannual exhibition, declaring it will 'sever all connections with contemporary architecture' — theguardian.com

Researcher Anastasia Swearingen claims that "LEED certification is little more than a fancy plaque displayed by these ‘green’ buildings", and compares energy use intensity (EUI) of LEED certified buildings to non-certified buildings. Quoting data from the Green Building Report for the District of Columbia, she concludes that "For LEED-certified buildings, their EUI was 205, compared to 199 for non-certified buildings..." — treehugger.com

MAS is proud to announce that Michael Kimmelman, architecture critic of The New York Times, has been named the winner of the 2014 Brendan Gill Prize. [...]

The jury singled out Kimmelman’s exceptional coverage of the challenges posed by an overstressed Penn Station, challenging New Yorkers and their regional neighbors to no longer settle for anything less than planning and design excellence that befits the busiest transportation hub in North America. — The Municipal Art Society of New York

So it’s official: Americans are choosing public transportation in record numbers. The American Public Transportation Association announced this morning that the U.S. made 10.7 billion mass transit trips in 2013, the highest figure in 57 years.

The story here is not of a sudden resurgence, but rather a slow, steady climb over the last decade, back toward ridership levels not seen since the 1950s. — theatlanticcities.com

“Places of Memory,” a medley of work by five contemporary artists from Turkey, will make up Turkey's first-ever showcase this summer at the Venice Biennale's prestigious architecture exhibition. [...]

Architect Murat Tabanlıoğlu, the curator of the Turkish pavilion, explained during Monday's news conference that they will be putting on a show delving into three areas of İstanbul: Taksim-Salıpazarı, Bab-ı Ali and Büyükdere Avenue, all of which marked a threshold in Tabanlıoğlu's life. — todayszaman.com