The ATF national response team, at the end of its investigation, reaches one of three conclusions – incendiary, accidental, or undetermined. Given Thursday’s conclusion that the fire was determined to be "incendiary," or deliberately set, local authorities will probably launch an arson investigation to identify those responsible for the blaze. — latimes.com
Previously: Huge downtown Los Angeles fire burns towering apartment project View full entry
Up in the slopes of the Swiss village Verbier in the Alps, BUREAU A's "Antoine" is a little wooden cabin hidden inside a concrete rock that camouflages with its environment. Inspired by Swiss cultural elements like the literature of iconic writer Charles-Ferdinand Ramuz, hidden bunkers, and the... View full entry
On a recent visit to Mountain View, I got a peek at how the Google Maps team assembles their maps and refines them with a combination of algorithms and meticulous manual labor—an effort they call Ground Truth. The project launched in 2008, but it was mostly kept under wraps until just a couple years ago. It continues to grow, now covering 51 countries, and algorithms are playing a bigger role in extracting information from satellite, aerial, and Street View imagery. — wired.com
Here's one for you lovers out there: in the annual Times Square Valentine Heart Design contest, Brooklyn-based, Venezuelan-born firm Stereotank just came out as the winner with their entry "HEARTBEAT."
The interactive installation is scheduled to open for an entire month to couples and singles alike on February 9.
— bustler.net
More information on Bustler. View full entry
The suit charges that Google and senior executives stole Eli Attia's invention, which is a technology that shortens and makes significantly cheaper the design and construction process, mainly for high-rise and large buildings. Google estimates that the invention has potential revenue of $120 billion annually. — globes.co.il
PARADOR is a collaborative project by Paris-based architect David Tajchman and filmmaker Benjamin Seroussi that fuses each of their signature styles and specialties. Starring dancer Olivier Mathieu and model Katya Pushkina, the short film's theme touches on the "complex rules of attraction and... View full entry
The American Museum of Natural History, a sprawling hodgepodge of a complex occupying nearly four city blocks, is planning another major transformation, this time along Columbus Avenue: a $325 million, six-story addition designed to foster the institution’s expanding role as a center for scientific research and education... — New York Times
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) selected 3XN to design its new headquarters after a multi-stage, international architectural competition that concluded earlier this year. The IOC and 3XN have now released the first renderings of the project, which is located on a 24,000sm site on the... View full entry
"Programming Natural Affect" was one of the collaborative workshops during the Media and Architecture Bienniale 2014 last month in Aarhus, Denmark. Organized by Anna Ulak and Philipp Rahlenbeck of openconstructs, the workshop focused on fusing the organic properties of nature and the built urban... View full entry
We're excited to announce the three lucky winners of Archinect's giveaway contest in collaboration with Tiny Modernism.In order to win one of the adorable architectural toddler t-shirts and baby onesies, we had asked you to tell us which dream combination of any four architects would adorn your... View full entry
[Jeanne Gang] had just come back from a trip on which she’d been using binoculars with Swarovski lenses and had become intrigued by the optical aspect of the crystal company’s output. She had also become interested in James Balog’s Extreme Ice Survey, a long-term project that documents glacier shrinkage using time-lapse photography [...]
One challenge the studio faced was communicating the size of the glaciers photographed by Balog, and the extent of the devastation caused by global warming.
— designmiami.com
The Photon Space is becoming known as the first all-glass modular structure of its kind that addresses the health benefits of exposure to natural light and the importance of those benefits in our contemporary lifestyle — where many of us spend it indoors — and its everyday stresses.Recently... View full entry
Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti on Monday proposed the most ambitious seismic safety regulations in California history that would require owners to retrofit thousands of building most at risk of collapse during a major earthquake.
Garcetti’s recommendations target two of the riskiest types of buildings in Los Angeles built before 1980: concrete buildings and wooden structures built atop weak first floors, such as those on top of carports and garages and supported by slender columns.
— LA Times
“I think it’s definitely derivative of the Gardens by the Bay concept,” Chris Wilkinson, one of the British architects responsible for the “super-trees” in Singapore’s Marina Bay, told The Daily Telegraph.
“You’d have expected them to have come up with something a bit more original.”
— telegraph.co.uk
"Super Trees", Singapore, designed by Wilkinson Eyre Architects View full entry
Beth Mosenthal penned an Op-Ed: Response to Michael Kimmelman's Critique of 1 WTC. She writes "I can only imagine the list of priorities that 1 World Trade entailed, but am still celebratory of the feat that it was realized despite perhaps the greatest obstacles any project could possibly... View full entry