floors in the exchange building gleamed with terrazzo-tile. Walls were decorated with marble wainscoting. Cherry wood lined windows and doors. Intricate wrought-iron railings accented a grand staircase. The exterior proclaimed its importance with Beaux Arts-style classical columns, porticos, arched windows and decorative brickwork. — Colorado Sun
Nancy Lofholm covers the $8.5 million sale of Denver’s Livestock Exchange Building and digs into the history and plans for it's reuse, as part of the larger revamp of the National Western Complex. View full entry
Architect and educator Peter Exley, FAIA was inaugurated as the American Institute of Architects' 97th president yesterday. Exley is the co-founder and director of Chicago-based architecture, design, and consulting firm, Architecture Is Fun, Inc., which won the AIA Chicago Firm of the Year award... View full entry
Facebook plans to invest $150 million to build 2,000 homes for low-income residents in the San Francisco Bay Area.
The Silicon Valley-based social media giant said Wednesday the money would support the development of affordable homes for families making less than 30 percent of the region’s median income.
— The Real Deal
According to The Real Deal, "the funds will be available to local governments and nonprofit groups in the form of low-interest loans. Projects in San Francisco, Santa Clara, San Mateo, Alameda, and Contra Costa counties are eligible. " The investment is due for full distribution by... View full entry
Inspired by some recent events, Margie Lavender reflected on the Progress and Equality of Women in Architecture. spiketwig commented "This really reflects my experience as well - for the most part I do not experience overt discrimination, but there have been the occasional incidents I've written... View full entry
Dubai largest listed developer Emaar Properties has halted new building work after a construction boom in recent years led to oversupply in the Gulf city, its chairman said on Monday.
Dubai’s real estate market, where supply has outstripped demand for much of the past decade, has come under additional pressure this year from the coronavirus crisis.
— Reuters
"We as a group have stopped supply," said Mohamed Alabbar, Chairman of Dubai's largest developer Emaar Properties, after denying similar claims back in April. The suspension includes work on the new Dubai Creek Harbour mega-development and its centerpiece, the Santiago Calatrava-designed Dubai... View full entry
Snøhetta has designed a mixed-use building in Hong Kong, named Airside. Commissioned by Nan Fung group, the 176,000-square-meter structure is located in the center of the former Kai Tak airport. A 200-meter tall tower set atop a podium fit with roof gardens and urban space at ground level... View full entry
The American Institute of Architects has revealed the recipient of this year's top accolades. The 2021 AIA Gold Medal goes to architect, educator, and sustainability pioneer Edward Mazria, FAIA, FRAIC. In a statement, the AIA points out that Mazria is being recognized for "his work sounding the... View full entry
ElDante Winston [...] PhD student in MIT’s History, Theory and Criticism of Architecture and Art program is keenly interested in how spaces designed for violence retain a memory of violent acts in the present day. — MIT News
"These are places of violence that, when you go to them now, you just watch people mill around and eat gelato," ElDante Winston, a PhD student in MIT's History, Theory and Criticism of Architecture and Art program, says about certain, prominent examples of Renaissance architecture, the subject of... View full entry
The website featuring a parody of Trump's presidential library went viral a little over a month ago. A discussion about it in the Archinect forum included comments like "much too nice," "not enough gold," "I like that Putin makes an appearance in most of the renderings," "far too tasteful for... View full entry
Following a letter released November 27, 2020 by The ---- Johnson Study Group calling for all institutions to remove the name of Philip Johnson from "every leadership title, public space, and honorific of any form," Sarah Whiting, Dean and Josep Lluís Sert Professor of Architecture at the... View full entry
Vestiges of racism and oppression, from bricked-over segregated entrances to the forgotten sites of racial violence, still permeate much of America’s built environment. — The New York Times
For the NYT, photojournalist Richard Frishman shares powerful images of sites, buildings, and places throughout the United States along with their almost forgotten, sometimes preserved, stories from America's segregated past. "All human landscapes are embedded with cultural meaning," Frishman... View full entry
The National Science Foundation (NSF), last week, released video of the Arecibo Telescope's cable failure and collapse. Part of the Arecibo Observatory, the telescope was completed in 1963, and was the largest single-aperture telescope until 2016. This year, NSF decommissioned the telescope... View full entry
The pandemic accelerated a need for digital menu boards, artificial intelligence, expanding drive-thrus into dual lanes and adding drive-thru only units where available. Many other fast food restaurants like Wendy's, Taco Bell, Del Taco, Burger King, KFC and McDonald's have also shown interest in developing many of these concepts. — Construction Dive
With indoor dining areas closed in many, if not most, restaurants since the beginning of the pandemic, the nation's fast food and fast casual franchises are rethinking fundamental design concepts of their operations that will likely become part of the American vernacular for decades to come, such... View full entry
Architect Frank Gehry has unveiled a revised design for 8150 Sunset - a proposed mixed-use housing complex near the eastern terminus of the Sunset Strip.
The project [...] calls for the construction of two mid-rise structures containing 203 residential units - a portion of which would be set aside as workforce and affordable housing - above 57,300 square feet of ground-floor retail space.
— Urbanize Los Angeles
Gehry's ongoing 8150 Sunset project in Los Angeles first appeared on Archinect in March 2015 with initial renderings following in August that year. Urbanize Los Angeles reports that the revised design was the result of conditions of approval imposed by LA's City Council in 2016. For... View full entry
One of the UK’s most famous architects has withdrawn from an environmental coalition in a dispute about the destructive role of aviation in the escalating climate crisis. [...]
The decision follows a row over Foster and Partners’ work on airports around the world – seen by critics as incompatible with tackling the climate and ecological emergency.
— The Guardian
Airport designs have been key projects in Foster + Partners' portfolio for years, with prominent recent commissions and competition entries in Saudi Arabia, Marseille, Chicago, Mexico City, and Beijing. Following Foster's decision to withdraw from his initial commitment, Architects Declare issued... View full entry
