But gender bias is not the most dangerous consequence of the lone-wolf image: It is the unspoken permission to abuse that should worry us. For the privilege of working alongside this aggressive and uncompromising genius, we are asked to tolerate his erratic, harsh, and selfish behavior. [...] To fight sexual abuse and abusers, we must first let go of this simplistic and fictitious image of the lone wolf. — Esther Sperber on Architect Magazine
In this short opinion piece, Studio ST Architects founder Esther Sperber argues that, in light of the ongoing #MeToo movement, rejecting the prevalent “lone wolf”/creative genius myth and emphasizing a collaborative culture instead are important steps to stopping abuse in architecture. View full entry
MAD Architects have restored Japan's historic Kiyotsu Gorge Tunnel as a permanent art installation, “Tunnel of Light”, coinciding with the 2018 Echigo-Tsumari Triennale. The art event hosts approximately 160 artworks across 200 villages, inhabiting abandoned spaces as sites for interaction... View full entry
Chinese authorities are razing one of the Beijing studios of dissident artist Ai Weiwei. He said that demolition crews showed up without advance warning, and have begun the process of tearing down the studio.
Ai has been a longtime critic of the government, and on Saturday, he began posting videos to his Instagram feed of the studio's destruction. "Farewell," Ai wrote. "They started to demolish my studio 'Zuoyuo' in Beijing with no precaution."
— NPR
Ai, who has been living in self-imposed exile in Berlin since Chinese authorities returned his confiscated passport in 2015, responded to NPR about the sudden demolition of his Zuoyou studio in Beijing: We didn't receive any advance warning or announcement of the demolition. We were required to... View full entry
At around 12,000 years old, Göbekli Tepe in south-east Turkey has been billed as the world’s oldest temple. It is many millennia older than Stonehenge or Egypt’s great pyramids, built in the pre-pottery Neolithic period before writing or the wheel. But should Göbekli Tepe, which became a Unesco World Heritage Site in July, also be regarded as the world’s oldest piece of architecture? — The Art Newspaper
T-shaped limestone pillars. Image: Wikipedia.Archaeological research of the ancient Göbekli Tepe ruin site in present-day Turkey suggests that the impressive monolithic structures, believed to date back to the Pre-Pottery Neolithic era (10th–8th millennium BCE), might in fact be the first... View full entry
Trump is obsessed with the FBI building. For months now, in meetings with White House officials and Senate appropriators intended to discuss big-picture spending priorities, the president rants about the graceless J. Edgar Hoover Building in downtown Washington, D.C. — axios.com
President Trump has reportedly taken an interest in the FBI headquarters J. Edgar Hoover Building in downtown DC, overseeing every detail of the project. While he recognizes the value of the property, the president is not a fan of brutalism. Trump complained, "Even the building is terrible... It's... View full entry
The NCARB Board of Directors recently announced a Policy for Diversity in which the organization states a commitment to greater diversity, with respect to gender, race, geography, age, perspective (architect vs. non-architect), and physical ability, when electing leadership positions. The NCARB... View full entry
Space remains a vast, untamed place, penned in only by the limits of our own imaginations.
So why the hell are there so many staircases in space? [...]
Once you start realizing how many stairs there are stopping you in real life, it becomes impossible not to notice them existing in the sci-fi you adore. Turns out they’re everywhere [...] our sci-fi imitates a real-world reliance on steps and stairs in our architecture.
— io9/Gizmodo
With Staircases in Space: Why Are Places in Science Fiction Not Wheelchair-Accessible?, Ace Ratcliff pens an excellent analysis of the pervasive presence of staircases in sci-fi that appear to foreshadow a future where universal accessibility for wheelchair-bound people like herself—and beyond... View full entry
Where you have curvature, you have scutoids — The New Yorker
Naming a fundamental shape that nature uses at 2018 AD is a credit long overdue. Now the shape architects use has a legitimate public name and official credibility and no longer be called weird. First living architect came to my mind was Frank Gehry. Yours? "Honestly, in the beginning, we... View full entry
A five-tonne, 6m tall model of Le Corbusier’s Villa Savoye has been towed into a fjord in Denmark and subsequently sunk as part of a summer art exhibition.
Created by Danish artist Asmund Havsteen-Mikkelsen, the installation appears as a half-submerged vision of a once visionary future. It’s also a critical comment on the importance of modernity today.
— ICON
"The project is a critical comment on the current status of modernity after the scandals of Cambridge Analytica, the Trump election and Brexit," Danish artist Asmund Havsteen-Mikkelsen tells ICON Magazine. "After these scandals, I think our sense of democracy and the public sphere has been... View full entry
For a brief period from 2011 until 2012 Renzo Piano’s 309.7m London skyscraper, The Shard, was the tallest in Europe. However, it has since been dwarfed by three new buildings in Moscow, and, this summer, the title has shifted to Moscow’s second city, St Petersburg, as one of Russia’s largest companies plans its relocation. — phaidon.com
The Lakhta Center, designed by British firm RMJM, is set to be Europe's new tallest skyscraper. The nearly completed supertall, located on St. Petersburg's coast, will reach approximately 1,515 feet, which is about 50% taller than The Shard in London. The building will serve as the... View full entry
Created by architects Raumlabor, the Floating University in Berlin invites students and experts from all over the world to explore solutions for future urban challenges. It’s said that the things we learn at university today will be outdated by the time we graduate. So what does a learning environment look like where students research cities of the future? — popupcity.net
Berlin-based firm Raumlabor have created a floating university running through the summer months to explore new learning environment possibilities. Located in a rainwater basin in Berlin, the temporary structure is under constant development with students, professors, and experts implementing... View full entry
The museum is in a former foundry and is operated by Culturespaces, a French museum foundation that specialise in immersive art displays. This is the opening exhibition at what Culturespaces calls its “Workshop of Lights”, and its larger space, La Halle, is dedicated to Gustav Klimt and a century of Viennese painting. There are also works by Egon Schiele and Friedrich Stowasser, better-known as Hundertwasser. — The Guardian
The museum foundation Culturespaces recently opened Paris’s first digital museum of fine art, Atelier des Lumières, with an opening exhibition displaying works by Gustav Klimt. The former foundry has been transformed into an immersive, multi-sensory space expanding artworks across the entire... View full entry
In 2016, the Berlin-based US artist Ryan Mendoza and Rhea McCauley, the niece of Rosa Parks, teamed up to save the civil rights activist’s Detroit home from demolition. Now, the structure is heading to another block: the New York auction house Guernsey’s, where it is due to be auctioned tomorrow (26 July) with an estimate of $1m-$3m. — theartnewspaper.com
Park's house is part of the 700-lot of African American Historic & Cultural Treasures up for sale at the New York auction house Guernsey’s. McCauley initially bought the house for just $500 back in 2016 reaching out to Mendoza to help preserve the house. In 2017 the structure was safely... View full entry
MAD Architects' new China Entrepreneur Forum Conference Centre has broken ground in the rugged, snow-capped mountains of Yabuli, located in northeastern China. China Entrepreneur Forum Conference Centre by MAD Architects, located in Yabuli, CN. Image: MAD Architects. The new centre will act as... View full entry
In the past — or in schools with higher proportions of white students — a student acting out might garner an intervention by their principal, or a concerned teacher’s phone call to parents. But today, throughout the US, discipline in many schools has become a matter of law enforcement, rather than education. In New York, the majority of school guards — 5,000 School Safety Agents patrolling 2,300 public and private schools — are civilians employed by the School Safety Division of the NYPD. — urbanomnibus.net
Out of fearful reaction to school shootings and other safety concerns, many school environments look and feel like prison to the students attending. Through an extensive background on how school design has gotten to this point, "Where School Meets Prison" examines the impact prison-like design has... View full entry