In the terms of the story, we wanted to distill experience to a shape, a volume, instead of a literal space-type (“castle” or “gingerbread house,” etc.) We chose this path in part because the structure of the story wasn’t accessible, the events were scattered, random and untethered to a place. So we had to find the rope, make the place, invent a story-space outside the tale itself. — Places Journal
In the Halloween installment of Places' ongoing series of architectural fairy tales, fabulist Kate Bernheimer and her architect brother, Andrew, investigate the shape of fear itself. Re-imagining a Brothers Grimm fairy tale at the site of a World War II bombing, Andrew Bernheimer and Vera Leung... View full entry
Zaha Hadid is a Woman of the Year because… “She’s an extraordinary force of nature that came out of the blue and whacked us all on the back of the head and said, ‘Wake up, kids, there’s more stuff to do.’ ” —architect Frank Gehry — glamour.com
"If exercise and everyday activity is the mantra, how do you, through design, get people to exercise? ... There is a direct relation between the built environment and people's lifestyles."
History has proved it. Architecture played a major role in defeating infectious diseases such as cholera and tuberculosis in the 19th and 20th centuries by designing better buildings, streets, clean-water systems and parks.
— usatoday.com
As it turns out, infrastructure really matters. Your chance of injury drops by about 50 percent, relative to that major city street, when riding on a similar road with a bike lane and no parked cars. The same improvement occurs on bike paths and local streets with designated bike routes. And protected bike lanes – with actual barriers separating cyclists from traffic – really make a difference. The risk of injury drops for riders there by 90 percent. — m.theatlanticcities.com
I realize that Sandy will prob cause billions in damage to the eastern seaboard, and the lost work will not be great for the GDP, but perhaps the resulting building boom will provide the boost the economy needs? — archinect.com
What do you think? Join the discussion. View full entry
One of the most fascinating things we at MONU recently experienced during a trip to Brasilia had nothing to do with its famous Oscar Niemeyer monuments or the city itself, but with the context surrounding the city.
(Bernd Upmeyer, Editor-in-Chief, November 2012)
— http://www.monu-magazine.com/submit.htm
One of the most fascinating things we at MONU recently experienced during a trip to Brasilia had nothing to do with its famous Oscar Niemeyer monuments or the city itself, but with the context surrounding the city. After two tiring days in the city and having read in a guidebook that in certain... View full entry
Mr. Urbach, 49, until recently the curator of architecture and design at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, and his spouse, Dr. Hartman, 52, a psychoanalyst, have approached the design of their home as if it were a conceptual art exhibit for two.
The apartment’s many mirrors aren’t for checking for stray nose hairs. They “complicate spatial relationships,” Mr. Urbach says.
— nytimes.com
Deep in Hong Kong’s core, 17 floors of a run-down building full of transients provide a key to understanding globalization from the bottom up. Gordon Mathews’s Ghetto at the Center of the World (University of Chicago Press, 2011) paints a detailed portrait of life in and around Chungking Mansions, a single property with two common retail/galleria floors with a basement, and three independent towers that rise above them. — urbanland.uli.org
The American Institute of Architects today issued the following statement with regard to the assessment and recovery efforts in the wake of Hurricane Sandy’s impact. Please attribute to AIA President Jeff Potter, FAIA: “To the many communities in Hurricane Sandy's path, members of the... View full entry
MTA Video Release: Hurricane Sandy - South Ferry and Whitehall St Station Damage. View full entry
Problems...will continue to plague Mumbai as long as the government continues to pretend to put all its faith into a thoroughly planned city-wide manifesto that is ultimately tossed aside... In rethinking the grandiose nature of the Development Plan, perhaps the government can engage in smaller scale implementations and allow new regulations and ideas to...move beyond its paper urbanity. — The Global Urbanist
“Why do they come to us? Because of 15 Central Park West,” Mr. Stern, 73, said earlier this month from his office on the West Side of Manhattan. The Chinese “don’t want to go home at night to their three-bedroom shelf on the 44th floor,” he added. “They want to live in a place. That’s what we do: we’re place-makers.” — nytimes.com
“You used to look out that window and somewhere you would see a crane,” [Richard Meier] said a few days ago. “You go around New York City today and you don’t see that many cranes. It is just not happening at this moment.” “Obviously,” he added, “if... View full entry
Its owners are hoping to sell the house before Nov. 7, when the City Council is scheduled to vote on giving it landmark status, which they oppose. Though they agree that the house ought to be saved — “The property is gorgeous,” Mr. Sells said in its master bedroom one morning — they say they must first safeguard their investment, as well as their livelihood.
“If it becomes a landmark,” Mr. Sells said, “we’re out of business.”
— nytimes.com
The man and the legend behind the concrete mecca known as Brasilia is a ripe 104 years of age, and though he was reported to have been “a bit dehydrated” at Rio’s Hospital Samaritano where he was hospitalized last week (he is thankfully “fine,” as doctors told ABC News), Niemeyer’s old age has not precluded his latest project, a collaboration with sneaker mega-brand Converse. — blogs.artinfo.com
Arcosanti, some 42 years after it first was begun in 1970, is just a tiny fragment of what it intends to become — a town for a few thousand people. Right now, we’re at a population of a little less than 100. It’s pretty easy at that small scale to join architecture and ecology, but we have in mind some bigger ideas. While they certainly come from Paolo Soleri, they also come from Henry David Thoreau. — dirt.asla.org