The Paris-born collector and billionaire Nicolas Berggruen says he is moving ahead with plans for his ambitious Berggruen Institute building, designed by the Swiss architects Herzog & de Meuron, that will rise on a plot of land in the Santa Monica Mountains, close to the Getty Center. He says, however, that no date has been set for the ground-breaking of the new venue, which will act as a base for the institute. — The Art Newspaper
The Los Angeles-based Berggruen Institute first unveiled the master plan for its "Scholars' Campus," designed by Herzog & de Meuron in collaboration with Michel Desvigne Paysagiste and Inessa Hansch Architecte as well as executive architect Gensler, in August 2017. Image © Herzog & de... View full entry
Six trustees, among them the prominent designer David Rockwell, have resigned from the board of the Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum to protest the removal of the museum’s director, Caroline Baumann, following an investigation into issues including her 2018 wedding.
Ms. Baumann was forced to resign on Feb. 7 after an investigation by the Smithsonian’s inspector general into how Ms. Baumann procured her dress and the venue for the ceremony.
— The New York Times
In a resignation letter protesting the ouster of former Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum director Caroline Baumann for suspected improprieties involving her purchase of a bargain designer wedding dress, architect David Rockwell of Rockwell Group writes, "We all serve on the board because... View full entry
This Olson Kundig-designed Hollywood Hills West retreat, called "Collywood," sits just over the Sunset Strip and overlooks Los Angeles, offering panoramic views stretching from the San Gabriel Mountains to the Pacific Ocean. A seamless connection between the interior and exterior of the home was... View full entry
Developers SJP Properties and Mitsui Fudosan America may be forced, under a recent New York State Supreme Court ruling, to tear down the top 20 stories of a nearly-completed 56-story luxury residential skyscraper in New York City designed by Elkus Manfredi Architects. The New... View full entry
The Office of Metropolitan Architecture's (OMA) much-anticipated exhibition, Countryside, The Future, is set to open next week at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York City. The exhibition, according to the museum website, explores "radical changes in the rural, remote, and wild... View full entry
Located in the city of Jiangyin, China, the new Brearley Architects + Urbanists (BAU)-designed greenway captures the local push toward more sustainable transport and builds on the formal qualities of the nearby Yangtze River. Through geographical mimicry, the formal manifestation of the... View full entry
The new Inuit Art Centre (IAC) at the Winnipeg Art Gallery in Winnipeg, Canada designed by Los Angeles-based architects Michael Maltzan Architecture is set to open its doors later this year. A statement published on the Winnipeg Art Gallery website states that the space is "constructed to house... View full entry
One of the Upper East Side buildings that was once home to the National Academy of Design will soon get a starchitect-designed revamp. At a hearing this week, the Landmarks Preservation Commission voted to approve a Rafael Viñoly-designed plan to renovate one of the museum’s former holdings, with some modifications. — Curbed NY
Plagued by financial troubles in recent years, the National Academy had sold, among other properties on Fifth Avenue, its historic building on East 89th Street to Salon 94 art gallery in 2016 "The owner of the gallery, Jeanne Greenberg Rohatyn, hired Viñoly to restore the landmarked building’s... View full entry
The New York Botanical Garden (NYBG) and Douglaston Development have announced a plan to build a two-towered, 450-unit affordable housing complex on garden-owned site located one block away from its 250-acre facilities in The Bronx. Real Estate Weekly explains that the project comes as a... View full entry
Foster + Partners has revealed their winning design for the Qianhai Talents' Apartments in Shenzhen, China. The co-living project is designed for "talents," which are young professionals who engage in a rigorous work-centered lifestyle away from their families. Operating as a dynamic... View full entry
Architect and educator Nicholas de Monchaux has been selected to lead the Department of Architecture at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's (MIT) School of Architecture and Planning. de Monchaux is known globally as a scholar of the intersections between technology, data, and... View full entry
The Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Upstate New York has named Dennis Shelden as the new director for the school's Center for Architecture Science and Ecology (CASE). According to a press release announcing the selection, Shelden will head "a boundary-pushing organization at a critical... View full entry
A plan created by architects Solomon Cordwell Buenz (SCB) and developer 601W Companies that aims to bring the tallest exterior glass elevator in North America to the Edward Durell Stone-designed Aon Center in Chicago has been approved by the city's Department of Planning and Development... View full entry
London-based Asif Khan as designed the Expo Entry Portals for Expo 2020 Dubai. Drawing inspiration from the latticework present in the traditional "mashrabiya" among Arabic dwellings, the three portals are crafted entirely from intertwined lightweight carbon fiber composite and sit defiantly upon... View full entry
The Architecture Lobby (TAL) has published a letter arguing against a proposed executive order from President Donald Trump that would mandate classical architectural stylings for America's federal buildings. The group became the latest major architecture and built environment-related... View full entry
