It is possible to say without too much exaggeration that we now inhabit a version of the future William Gibson first described 25 years ago.... an accumulation of smaller changes, the consequences of which are subtle and all-pervasive as technology has increasingly lodged in unanticipated aspects of our lives. As Gibson has observed, the actual future is often more nuanced and unexpected than the imagined future. — Places Journal

Art Center, often ranked among the nation’s top design schools, announced Tuesday that it has spent $7 million to buy a former U.S. Postal Service mail distribution center next to its existing satellite campus in south Pasadena, and has hired the Los Angeles firm Michael Maltzan Architecture to do master planning and design work. — latimesblogs.latimes.com

Chinese architect Wang Shu was this week named the 2012 Pritzker Prize winner. Will Galloway commented "unexpected but very coolio. i met wang shu last year at conference held by my uni her in tokyo. nice guy and very impressive presentation. love his work and his approach. i like that pritzker is not going after the usual suspects, personally."

It’s time to put a moratorium on urban agriculture. On guerrilla street furniture. On food trucks and on yarn bombing. — Guggenheim Blog

Buildings are discussed — indeed aspects of them obsessed upon — but almost exclusively in the context of economics. This building went over budget, that surplus of houses led to the foreclosure crisis, that condo broke the record for residential real estate, etc. To the layman, then, architecture is conveyed as little more than something that costs a lot and causes a lot of grief, rather than something with the potential to enhance our daily lives. — New York Times

Fallingwater, Frank Lloyd Wright's architectural masterpiece, is accepting applications for summer 2012 onsite residency programs for students and educators. The one-week programs will include sessions for high school students at two different skill levels, and one program for K-12 teachers. — pittsburghlive.com

The school announced Friday that it has selected Allied Works Architecture of Portland and e.e. fava architects, etc. of Charleston to design a new three-story building at George and Meeting streets.

Richard Goodstein, dean of Clemson's College of Architecture, Arts and Humanities, said the firms were chosen "because of their deep experience in urban design, their commitment to sustainability and their demonstrated sensitivity to place and context." — postandcourier.com

What is essential knowledge for architecture? This frequently posed question targets fundamental principles of design, those basic criteria and priorities through which disciplinary stability is ensured. Yet, insofar as relevance is a core value of architecture, in both theory and practice, the contingent nature of the future guarantees that some forms of knowledge not presently considered essential will eventually become indispensable. — 306090.org

The marriage of light and geometry does indeed find its consummation in architecture, but for me it did not come about so easily. At age eighteen I entered a fine school of engineering, then transferred to a fine school of architecture, finishing there when I was twenty-four. After ten or so years of working in corporate offices, learning what it meant to build—and leading a rather turbulent life—I went out on my own. — lebbeuswoods.wordpress.com

We’ve received emails from people just starting out or thinking of going into architecture asking for advice. It gets heavy sometimes. People who have been laid off in the recession have also written to share their stories. One architect I know told me without irony that he wishes he had read it before starting out on this path. — metropolismag.com

A heartbreaking tale of sleepless nights, severed fingers, and a shitload of hard work — thevarsity.ca

...will re-examine the built environment of the arid and semi-arid west as a vast field of opportunities for design innovation at a range of scales, from building systems to infrastructure and landscape spaces. The conference will present and debate a portfolio of design strategies generated in response to the challenges set forth in ALI's Drylands Design Initiative... — Arid Lands Institute

This week the U.S. Department of Energy announced the 20 collegiate teams selected to compete in the U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon 2013 and unveiled the competition’s location, the Orange County Great Park. caffeine junkie is disheartened by the decision "This is a real miss-step in my opinion.

Guy wrote “why, when the evidence is out there, were a number of architects so defensive about the “Don’t Major in Architecture” article? Why are they whining? My conclusion, so far, is that this touched a nerve precisely because this isn’t new information to architects.” In response emergency exit wound asked, “And the assumption that 'an informed public makes the space for architecture more possible' is based on what exactly?

I am using drawing as a way of inhabiting the space. The drawings are created at 1:1 scale, the body occupying the building and the drawing simultaneously–responding to each unique spatial condition with its inherent residual cultural significance, aesthetic materiality, and phenomenological effect. — SCI ARC Alumni Portal