The urban conditions around us are constantly changing. With a faster or slower SPEED, the built environment is transformed as it does the way we experience and engage with it. In this issue we will be looking at the pace in which physical and social changes happen and the consequences and opportunities available. — mascontext.com
The eleventh issue of the design journal MAS Context, SPEED, is out and available online as a PDF and printed copy. Contributors to this issue include Andrew Bush, Candy Chang, Michael Chrisman, Andrew Clark, André Corrêa, Brendan Crain, Design With Company, José María... View full entry
Charlie Hussey of Edinburgh-based firm Sutherland Hussey, which has 75 per cent of its work in China, believes that architects are often singled out. “Whenever ethics in China is brought up, architects are always picked on,” he says. “But we’re all trading with China. If Joe Bloggs buys a TV, he’s trading with China. Architects just deal with bigger pieces. There isn’t a single person in the UK who hasn’t traded with China”. — ft.com
Marking the decade since the attacks of September 11, 2001, Lebbeus Woods offers reflections on the context for the tragedy, and the reconstruction's bitter sense of business as usual — domusweb.it
In February 2003, Daniel Libeskind was named the winning designer of the international contest to rebuild the World Trade Center. After eight years of collaboration, controversy, and the typical cast of characters in any real estate nightmare, the final product that will tower over Lower Manhattan is not, in fact, the design that won the hearts of New Yorkers. — Inhabitat
A giant image of Ziggy will dominate four levels of the $10 million Tatu building planned for Macquarie St. It will appear on a perforated metal screen and Bowie's eyes and lips will move when apartment residents adjust screens on their balconies. — heraldsun.com.au
... the place is inspired by the deeply strange Club Silencio in Mulholland Drive. Everything from the toilet bowls – black on black – to the saltiness of the nuts on the bar was decided on by the master himself. He even created the 1950s-inspired furniture, the chairs designed to "induce and sustain a specific state of alertness and openness to the unknown".
This is Lynch's answer to Warhol's Factory, the existentialists' Café Flore, the dadaists' Cabaret Voltaire.
— guardian.co.uk
David Lynch has opened his private nightclub in Paris, which he designed. View full entry
GEHRY: No, no, no, no. That was just a fun – fun thing. But it has – it has haunted me. People do – who’ve seen “The Simpson’s” believe it. — New York Observer
On Sunday, Frank Gehry appeared on Fahreed Zakar's CNN program GPS, where among other things, he discussed his regret for having been a guest on The Simpsons. View full entry
How great are the benefits of density? Economists studying cities routinely find that after controlling for other variables, workers in denser places earn higher wages and are more productive. Some studies suggest that doubling density raises productivity by around 6 percent while others peg the impact at up to 28 percent. — nytimes.com
The massive, slow moving Sandcrawlers from George Lucas' Star Wars films inspired the form of his new regional headquarters in Singapore. Designed by Aedas, the Sandcrawler Building is neither rusty nor slow moving - the glassy and streamlined building will combine a high performance facade with lush gardens and foliage that spills over terraces, resulting in a highly efficient commercial space. — Inhabitat
With a judging panel stuffed full of fashionistas (Sir Paul Smith, designer Patrick Grant, face of Burberry Douglas Booth, my-wardrobe.com Buying & Merchandising Director Luisa de Paula, MTV presenter & fashion journalist Louise Roe, fashion blogger Steve Salter and Esquire Editor Alex Bilmes), impressing them all can't have been an easy task but Wood saw off hundreds of competitors to take the 2011 title. — mydaily.co.uk
You have reached an experiment, an attempt to ask each other What Matters Now? We hope to be able to provide enough important answers to the question so as to create, in effect, Proposals for a New Front Page. — aperture.org
There were other strong contenders, but the 2011 Carbuncle Cup for Britain's "ugliest new building" has been awarded to the £600m MediaCityUK. This concatenation of anaemic buildings is the controversial new regional headquarters of the BBC, and home to the media studies faculty of Salford University. — guardian.co.uk
The poet and author and one of the memorial's consultants, Maya Angelou, told The Washington Post, yesterday, the quote makes King seem arrogant. Actually, she put it in harsher terms.
"The quote makes Dr. Martin Luther King look like an arrogant twit," she said.
— kcrw.com
Today, All Things Considered's Melissa Block spoke to memorial's executive architect, Ed Jackson Jr., who explained the quote was paraphrased because of design constraints. At first, he said, the quote was going to be placed on the south face of the monument, but instead the designers decided... View full entry
Russia appears to be edging closer to giving the go-ahead for an underwater tunnel which could one day allow vacationers in Alaska to take a day trip to Siberia in Russia. — independent.co.uk
Sixteen-year-old Austin Hay of Santa Rosa, Calif., has been sleeping in a work-in-progress 130 square foot "tiny home" in his parents' backyard for months. The project came about because "like every teenager, I want to move out," says Hay. — grist.org
