Architect Deborah Berke, founder of New York City-based firm Deborah Berke Partners, has been selected as the first recipient of UC Berkeley’s College of Environmental Design (CED) inaugural 2012 Berkeley-Rupp Architecture Professorship and Prize. — bustler.net
The Berkeley-Rupp Prize will be awarded biannually to a distinguished practitioner or academic who has made a significant contribution to promoting the advancement of women in the field of architecture, and whose work emphasizes a commitment to sustainability and the community. View full entry
With a sea change (partly generational, mostly philosophical) overtaking architecture, and attention turning from glamorous buildings and celebrated designers to broader issues like urbanism, public space, social responsibility and collaboration, “Common Ground” is well intended but, alas, a missed opportunity. — nytimes.com
Let’s mentor a new generation of architects who are as proud to be women as they are proud to be designers. And let’s start by taking back the “architectress,” by infusing that cringe-inducing, condescending, mid-century term of opprobrium with some born-this-way, kick-ass, grrrl-power, retro cool. Imagine Architectress t-shirts and Architectress tattoos, Architectress blogs and Architectress fansites, Architectress flash mobs and Architectress meetups. Imagine Architectress going viral. — Places Journal
Back in the '70s, second-wave feminists were organizing and agitating, forming alternative communities, creating new spatial practices and attempting to pry open what a contemporary reporter called the "exclusively male preserve" of the American architecture profession. Gabrielle Esperdy revisits... View full entry
In a letter titled ‘Kicking against the Prix’, the RIBA gold medallist claimed the Coop Himmelb(l)au founder had failed to attend the biennale despite issuing a critical press release last week describing it as ‘banal’. — architectsjournal.co.uk
David Chipperfield’s full letter I am disappointed that our British architectural press should give so much coverage to the destructive opinions of a Viennese architect about the Biennale, even though he hadn’t even visited Venice. My concerns are not about the criticism, which I... View full entry
A reliable source provided us with some official blueprints for the Apple Campus 2 yesterday, and these are just a few of the images that illustrate the mammoth building currently being planned in Cupertino, Calif. A single one of these slides leaked out today, so we are putting these up now; we are resizing and still have to watermark. — 9to5mac.com
Firms credited on the drawings include Foster and Parters, ARUP, OLIN and Davis Langdon. View full entry
“We don’t believe architecture can solve anything,” Andraos said of the relationship between environmentalism and design in WORKac’s creations. “Rather, we feel this is a question of impacting culture. In the architect’s Sisyphean relation to power, we believe in the visionary, and his agency to radicalize and to move culture.” — yaledailynews.com
Gift Will Endow an Annual Prize to Recognize Outstanding SCI-Arc Graduate Thesis Projects The Southern California Institute of Architecture (SCI-Arc) today announced it has received a transformative $100,000 gift from world-renowned architect and SCI-Arc trustee Frank Gehry, and his wife, Berta... View full entry
The practical problem to solve in meditation space is making it as quiet as possible, making the architecture as quiet as possible. The architecture has to come to rest if you want the mind to come to rest. And the architecture has to be, doesn’t have to be, but it’s best if it’s holding you to the ground as opposed to ascension. — Metropolis Magazine
Metropolis conducts a Q&A with Michael Rotondi on the design of sacred spaces. What he says is a beautiful way to look at architecture, meditative space and ourselves. View full entry
Mr. Shelton and his longtime design partner, Lee Mindel, were known for a distinctive modernist aesthetic that blended clean lines with references to classical periods to create opulent settings. Their less-is-more sensibility became a hallmark for apartments ringing Central Park.
“Truly they were leaders in their field,” said Margaret Russell, the editor in chief of Architectural Digest. “They won pretty much every award a firm could win.
— nytimes.com
[FLW's] entire archive is moving permanently to New York in an unusual joint partnership between the Museum of Modern Art and Columbia University’s Avery Architectural & Fine Arts Library, where it will become more accessible to the public for viewing and scholarship.
The collection includes more than 23,000 architectural drawings, about 40 large-scale, architectural models, some 44,000 photographs, 600 manuscripts and more than 300,000 pieces of office and personal correspondence.
— nytimes.com
The Architects' Journal reported that Wolf Prix referred to the Venice Architectural Biennale as an ‘expensive dance of death’ and went on to claim a ‘great’ biennale would have featured forums and themes looking ‘behind the scenes’ at decision-making. mimiz took on the charge "having just come back from venice where I moderated several panel discussions on the behind the scenes making of interventions at the US Pavilion, I think Prix is sucking on some sour grapes."
For the latest feature in the Student Works series Nicholas Waissbluth explored the inaugural workshop for the INSITU program which took place in Medellin, Colombia. INSITU is an initiative founded by Blokcad Lab and uAbureau in 2011 to implement projects that investigate the... View full entry
"Zawia#00:Change discusses the significantly changing realities imposed on all social, political and economic systems and their influence on design disciplines. Zawia#00:Change will attempt to demonstrate whether architects are ready to embrace changing ideals and new modes of operation, and whether they are willing to help better people’s lives rather than focusing on glorifying design or architecture." — www.zawia.co
Zawia is a periodical, English and Arabic publication and collaborative events on architecture, design & urbanism. The first volume Zawia#00:Change is out now! It features contributions from Saskia Sassen, Stefano Boeri, Joseph Grima, WAI architecture think tank, Carlo Ratti, Markus... View full entry
“I think the age of totally specific specialization as a designer is less interesting. I think what’s more interesting is to merge different interests and passions and invent something new.” - David Rockwell, Rockwell Group — media.designerpages.com
Rem Koolhaas is to receive the 2012 Jencks Award, announced the Royal Institute of British Architects. The Jencks Award is given annually to an individual (or practice) that has recently made a major contribution internationally to both the theory and practice of architecture. — bustler.net
More than ten years at the center of the Chinese architectural avant-garde, the role of standardarchitecture as an architectural paradigm solidifies more and more on international ground. Not interested in defining the new Chinese, nor to perpetuate the role of the status quo of the architecture... View full entry