Rice University has picked the New York architectural firm Diller Scofidio & Renfro to design an opera theater scheduled to open in 2018.

The 600-seat theater will stand in what now is a parking lot between Alice Pratt Brown Hall, the home of Rice's Shepherd School of Music, and Rice Stadium. Besides serving the school's Opera Department, the theater will be used for chamber music concerts and other events, Rice said.

Charles Renfro, a 1989 Rice graduate, will be the lead architect. — chron.com

“All of us who knew them thought this was going to be pretty much a slam dunk — that they would save the Folk Art Museum,” said Peter Wheelwright, a former chairman of the architecture program at Parsons, the New School for Design. “I knew they were capable of doing it and that, because of their friendship, that they would make a sincere, genuine, wholehearted effort.” — NY Times

"I think that the press has been too fast to reduce the conversation to heroes and villains and martyrs, and to suggest that what MoMA is doing is necessarily bad. We want to get more information out. We want to share the problem with others and invite them to really take a hard look" - Elizabeth Diller — LA Times

The heat is on in the architectural competition for Vancouver Art Gallery's new downtown home on a site at West Georgia and Cambie Streets. From a pool of 75 applicants, the gallery narrowed down a shortlist of five firms — all of which are no strangers to designing world-class exhibition spaces. — bustler.net

In doing press for the film, Jonze has repeatedly credited New York architects Elizabeth Diller and Ricardo Scofidio, AIA, founding principals of Diller Scofidio + Renfro, with helping him devise the feel of his settings. Diller took time to chat with ARCHITECT about the film, as well as the uncanny qualities of the near-future and why she generally prefers murder stories to sci-fi. — architectmagazine.com

Diller Scofidio + Renfro has won the Zaryadye Park competition in Moscow. Set in the historic district of Zaryadye in downtown Moscow, the design competition was established to find an architecture and landscape plan to transform the 130,000 sq.m. former site of Hotel Russia into a multi-functional public park.

Coming in second and third place are TPO Reserve and MVRDV, respectively. — bustler.net

"To some degree, the very characteristics that promised to make the bubble easier to build ultimately handicapped its fund-raising ability. Because the structure was temporary — Mr. Koshalek envisioned inflating the pavilion designed by the New York firm Diller Scofidio & Renfro in May and October — the museum was able to avoid the layers of approval usually required for any structure destined for the National Mall." — The New York Times

The Hirshhorn Museum’s proposed Seasonal Inflatable Structure, also known as “the Bubble,” a project announced in 2009 and intended as an architecturally and culturally transformative space on the Mall, would operate at a loss in each of three scenarios examined in an assessment done by the Smithsonian. — washingtonpost.com

As a public-art stunt, the Seasonal Inflatable is troubling. The Hirshhorn should build it anyway. — Washington City Paper

Designed by Diller Scofidio + Renfro and Rockewell Group, the building is envisioned as a kuntshalle, essentially a museum with no permanent collection, that would accommodate shows from local and international cultural establishments. Its most dramatic feature will be a 140-foot retractable structure that when rolled into place will double the size of the ground-floor gallery. — Crain's

To fund the Bubble, the museum originally turned to Bloomberg, planning to call it the Bloomberg Balloon in honor of a $1 million (or greater) gift. But, perhaps tellingly, the Hirshhorn has not consistently referred to the Bloomberg Balloon as such, suggesting there may still be room—or the need—for a larger donor. Diminishing federal support certainly won’t fund the Bubble, and to date, the museum's board has not stepped up to bridge the funding gap. — tnr.com

Proposals to reinvigorate the city centre of Aberdeen, Scotland by High Line architects Diller Scofidio + Renfro have been rejected by City Councillors. [...] The Full Council voted 22-20 - with one abstention - to reject the scheme but agreed to retain proposals to refurbish Aberdeen Art Gallery, redevelop the site of the City Council’s former St Nicholas House headquarters and the Upper Denburn area, and to invest in ‘City Circle’ plans to make the city better connected for pedestrians. — World Architecture News

Diller Scofidio + Renfro were announced today as designers of the gallery and visitor experience for the reopening of the Smithsonian’s Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum. New York exhibition specialists Local Projects will act as participatory media designer and develop engaging ways to access digital content at the museum and remotely. The museum campus is scheduled to reopen in 2014. — bustler.net

The design centralizes all social and public spaces in a vertical stack at the south face of the building. This continuous space features a multi-story glass façade that maximizes light and offers exceptional views to the south. The interiors of the study cascade – a system of special alcoves reserved for social interaction – are complemented by outdoor gathering spaces and terraces that are clad in cement panels, wood, and other materials. — ps.columbia.edu