SCI-Arc has announced its Spring 2017 lecture series. And not a single female architect was included in the list. Really, SCI-Arc?Granted, the roster includes historian and theorist Sylvia Lavin as well as the artist Amalia Ulman—but the lack of a single practicing female architect is pretty... View full entry
Dear President-Elect Donald Trump: Please commission U.S. artist Christo’s with the creation of a new a version of his Running Fence to separate the U.S. from Mexico. His first project in Sonoma was completed in 1976 with great success. Though only 24.5 miles long then, in full length today it would transform a racist project into a public art event, and help improve the image of the U.S. with a cultural veneer. — Change.org
Don't pay your national AIA dues if you don't agree with the direction of the association. At least, that's what Mette Aamodt is doing this year. According to a press release issued by the firm, Aamodt explains that she: is calling on architects to join her in refusing to work for... View full entry
Madrid's mayor, Manuela Carmena, is serious about kicking personal cars off the road in the city center.
On a November 5 show on Spanish radio networkCadena Ser, she confirmed that Madrid's main avenue, the Gran Vía, will only allow access to bikes, buses, and taxis before she leaves office in May 2019, as noted by CityLab.
— Independent.co.uk
Are people in love with not having to drive to dense urban locales? (Answer: for the most part, yes.) Following the lead of numerous cities that are seeking either to reduce car traffic or obliterate it altogether, Madrid's mayor actually outlawed personal vehicles from the city's main... View full entry
But so far, Lucas hasn’t found a permanent home for his museum. The monumental project has brought him almost as much grief as Jar Jar Binks, the prequel creature from the planet Naboo with an oddly Jamaican accent that some found racially offensive. — Bloomberg
George Lucas' multi-year, oft-imperiled quest to find a site for his museum is chronicled in this Bloomberg article, which highlights the difficulties of using only the force of one's personality (and the promise of a "gift" of a museum to a city) to cut through local politics and bureaucracy... View full entry
While the architecture in real cities has sometimes become the jumping off point for imaginary structures in cinema (think: the Los Angeles of Blade Runner) the reverse seems to be happening in India, where a filmmaker is being asked to design real structures based on the imagined buildings that... View full entry
Whether you envisioned Hyperloop One as an overhyped pneumatic tube or an inventive way to transport cargo and/or passengers, 35 teams from 17 countries around the world have just been announced as semifinalists in the contest to create working transit corridors for the technology. The 35 proposed... View full entry
In 2015, 18 percent of all existing housing units on Long Island were multifamily. While that is less than half the percentage in New York metropolitan suburbs over all, change is apparent across the island...12,500 condominium and rental units within half a mile of train stations had been approved over the last 11 years, 7,000 of which have been built. Another 10,000 units could be approved in five to six years. — NYT
Marcelle Sussman Fischler reports in from the suburbs around New York City, where luxury, amenity-rich, mixed-used TOD is offering up an urbanized suburbia. Meanwhile in the Denver region, an innovative public-private financing tool Denver Transit-Oriented Development (TOD) Fund, is attempting to... View full entry
This week, with everyone getting well and truly back to work, don't forget to fill your diary with talks, opening nights, and exhibitions to keep yourself occupied. At the very least, it will help to bring more interesting topics of conversation than the increasingly cold weather... Check... View full entry
Forget climbing stars, or even walking laterally--in the increasingly dense and rapid reality of urban life, elevators have become a major part of daily living. According to The Guardian, major elevator designers like Otis are considering re-designing the elevator to become a more comfortable and... View full entry
All across Los Angeles, buildings by the city's most important firms face preservation threats. Rejected and outmoded, can late modernism find love? — L.A. Weekly
What is the value of history in a city known for its ephemerality? (Hint: um, not much, unless everyone agrees it is pretty.) In this piece for the L.A. Weekly, Mimi Zeiger thoroughly investigates the state of late modernist structures in the City of Angels, and how likely it is that many of these... View full entry
The days of having to purchase astonishingly expensive replacement charging plugs accidentally left behind on trips, or for that matter of lugging around charging plugs in general, may be over. At this year's CES in Las Vegas, licensing company Ossia is unveiling a drop ceiling tile that purports... View full entry
The imaginary realm of architecture frequently ventures off into scales that are improbable, if not outright impossible, on the politically and gravitationally constrained Earth (think Étienne-Louis Boullée, or Lebbeus Woods). In a similar if less secular vein, Napp Studio has conceived of an... View full entry
Only one thing is certain now that Frank Gehry has undertaken the plan to revitalize the LA River: in the future, it will be different.Check out Archinect's extensive coverage of the LA River Redevelopment, including interviews with major players like Mia Lehrer via the Next Up series...This... View full entry
Situated in Carrière-Sous-Poissy in France along the River Seine, "Poissy Galore" by Armengaud Armengaud Cianchetta (AAC) and Herlach Hartmann Frommenwiler (HHF) is designed primarily as an ecological public space for both Parisian residents and far-flung visitors. Consisting of an observatory... View full entry
