How about we start the week with a heart-warming project right on time for Valentine's Day! "Match Maker," the winning sculpture of the 2014 Times Square Valentine Heart Design competition, was unveiled in New York's Times Square today.
Designed by Brooklyn-based Young Projects in collaboration with Kammetal, "Match Maker" is an interactive heart-shaped sculpture that matches individuals based on their zodiac sign.
— bustler.net
Have a glimpse of the winning and finalist installations:Winner: Young Projects - Match MakerHaiko Cornelissen Architecten - TWEET HEART NYPernilla Ohrstedt Studio - O HeartSchaum/Shieh Architects - My Fuzzy ValentineSOFTlab - Sweet HeartThe Living - Vapor ValentineLearn more about each project at... View full entry
The Irish developer behind the Chicago Spire said it has found an investor to pay its creditors, allowing it to emerge from bankruptcy and possibly restart work on the long-stalled residential project. — chicagotribune.com
Fisht reproduces Cowboys signature pair of arched trusses, and shares its bulbous, hump-back shape — albeit with a wave-like articulated roof of polycarbonate. What it appears not to share, at least from the images available online, is the sensitive way Cowboys Stadium hits the ground, slanting in to minimize its bulk. Fisht is a lot more ham-fisted, flaring out and surrounded by all manner of circulatory junk. — artsblog.dallasnews.com
Cowboys Stadium View full entry
According to Brash, the administration had a singular “grand urban vision”—one of New York as a competitive hub for international business deeply rooted in neoliberal ideals.With a radically different vision of the city than those of the working class, Professor Brash argued, many New Yorkers failed to fully benefit from the mayor’s projects and in many instances were left behind. — untappedcities.com
With a little over a week left, the Los Angeles Forum for Architecture and Urban Design launched their first Kickstarter campaign to support the production and distribution of their upcoming book, DINGBAT 2.0, the first in-depth study of the ubiquitous dingbat apartment -- a common... View full entry
The Paris Métro, opened in 1900, extends over more than 200 kilometers of track, serving more than 300 individual stops. But there are 11 more stations that, though once built, now stand nearly abandoned. Many of these "ghost" or "phantom" stations shuttered after the occupation during WWII. [...]
Parisian mayoral candidate Nathalie Kosciusko-Morizet has a bold plan for these phantom stations ... these abandoned spaces should be reclaimed for the city's residents.
— The Atlantic Cities
Working alongside mayoral candidate Kosciusko-Morizet, architect Manal Rachdi and urban planner Nicolas Laisné composed a few renderings of what the stations could become under the proposal. Featuring Arsenal, one of the stations closed since 1939, here are a few potential uses:Night... View full entry
Today’s technology is rooted in the work of Sir Isaac Newton. Contemporary physics’ paradox in resolving the difference between magnetism and electricity implies multiple truths and we wonder what drove Newton’s work and what drove Einstein’s? — toskovic.com
I discuss how paradox, uncertainty, and static historical context in physics justifying technology informs the form follows function of material mission of the modernists. How do alternate sciences and cultures inform the relationship between architecture, form, technology, and person? View full entry
Former Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s vision of new sporting venues across the boroughs fizzled, and New York lost its bid for the 2012 Summer Olympics. But what if the city had tried to get the Winter Olympics instead? It would probably take more hubris than even this city can muster, but the exercise provides some telling measures of scale. — nytimes.com
This 56-minute documentary film features interviews with nineteen Arab architects from Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine, and Saudi Arabia. It explores the subject of the practice of architecture by Arab women architects and features stories on their experiences, challenges, and achievements. In order to facilitate viewing, the film is divided into six sequels. — Center for the Study of the Built Environment
The film was first screened during the Award's sixth cycle ceremony, which took place on January 7, 2014 at the German Jordanian University's Othman Bdeir House for Architecture and Design in Amman, Jordan. View full entry
Last Tuesday's book launch for L.A. [TEN]: Interviews on Los Angeles Architecture 1970s-1990s at the A+D Museum brought author Stephen Phillips in conversation with the book’s publisher, Lars Müller, and architecture critics (among other things) Aaron Betsky and Sylvia Lavin. The book... View full entry
After winning the 2014 Young Architects Program out of five finalists, emerging architect David Benjamin and his firm, The Living will temporarily transform the outdoor courtyard of MoMA PS1 in Long Island City, New York when the summer season rolls in.YAP projects had to provide seating, shade... View full entry
As reported last week by Archinectors Ayesha Ghosh and Alex Stewart, a discussion regarding MoMA's expansion plan and the intended demolition of the American Folk Art Museum took place at the New York Society for Ethical Culture, an appropriate venue for a conversation rife with implications for... View full entry
What a National Register [of Historic Places] listing really means is a 20% federal tax credit for structural investing, along with any state tax incentives, but that's often not enough to make preservation a more appealing option over razing and starting over. [...]
Listing on the National Register certainly gives something of an economic incentive for preservation, as well as a national profile for these sites [...]
However, what historic sites ultimately need is sustainable funding.
— Atlas Obscura
Archinect is delighted to present 5468796 Architecture's travelogue for their award-winning research project, Table for Twelve. The Winnipeg-based firm received the 2013 Professional Prix de Rome in Architecture from the Canada Council for the Arts, awarded to emerging Canadian... View full entry
In his time as a passenger on what he called Spaceship Earth, Fuller realized that human progress need not separate the “natural” from the “unnatural”: “When people say something is natural,” he explains in the first lecture (embedded above as a YouTube video above), ”‘natural’ is the way they found it when they checked into the picture.” — Open Culture