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New research from the Italian University of Campania Luigi Vanvitelli into the “hedonic quality” of bus terminals and their effects on users’ consumer behavior has shown an offsetting cost-benefit that correlates to better ridership where there is a higher quality of... View full entry
The unfortunate "winner" of the UK’s Carbuncle Cup, which annually celebrates the country’s most detested new architecture, has been announced as the 2019 Liverpool Lime Street redevelopment scheme from Broadway Malyan. The contest, which is presented by the London-based magazine The Fence... View full entry
Boring, soulless buildings are making people stressed and lonely, according to Thomas Heatherwick [...]
Calling for “a national conversation” about halting the spread of depressing architecture, he said: “We need to fearlessly demand interestingness. We need to rebel against the blandification of our streets, towns and cities, and make buildings that nourish our senses. Human beings deserve human places.”
— The Guardian
The Lantern House and Vessel designer has been making the media rounds lately to promote his new treatise Humanize, which offers a call-to-arms of sorts for architects and planners both looking to combat the proven detriments bad architecture has on mental health. Heatherwick says his... View full entry
A groundbreaking new exploration of the physical elements of interiority comes to us in the form of an all-black wood pavilion by LIN Architecture in China's Jiangsu Province. Labeled as a “space experiment” and located near the river on Jiangxin Island in Zhenjiang, the design forgoes... View full entry
Even before Covid-19, many ambitious productions had been taking place not in the three-sided black boxes that defined the experimental zest and emerging punk of the late 1970s, or […] theater-in-the-round pioneered in ancient Greece and Rome, but in elaborately engineered glass cubes that evoke the International Style’s high Modernism and the minimalist penthouses of the contemporary metropolis. There would not seem to be a more flagrant violation of dramatic immediacy. — The New York Times
Glass cube sets from Miriam Buether, artist Todd Knope, and Expo 2020 Dubai British Pavillion designer Es Devlin have been popular among directors like Sam Mendes. One of Devlin's previous designs was based on a temporary Rachel Whitehead installation in East London from 1993. The artist's work... View full entry
The central disappointment of these spaces is not that they are so narcissistic, but rather that they seem to have such a low view of the people who visit them. Observing a work of art or climbing a mountain actually invites us to create meaning in our lives. But in these spaces, the idea of “interacting” with the world is made so slickly transactional that our role is hugely diminished. Stalking through the colorful hallways of New York’s “experiences,” I felt like a shell of a person. — The New York Times
In this snarky piece, New York Times critic-at-large Amanda Hess recounts what it was like visiting as many of these hyped-up Instagrammable "museums" that have popped up around the U.S. in recent years. “What began as a kicky story idea became a masochistic march through voids of meaning. I... View full entry
Across Hong Kong, where almost half the population lives in government-provided housing, public housing complexes have become wildly popular Instagram destinations. Locals and tourists have flocked to estates around the city, craning their necks to get that perfect social media shot and irritating residents in the process.
The estates have drawn professional interest as well, featuring prominently in marketing campaigns and even a music video by the Korean boy band Seventeen.
— The New York Times
Hong Kong's public housing, largely built in the 1960's and 70's, has attracted widespread public attention for its aesthetic appeal. These modernist style high-rises photograph beautifully with colorful displays of clean lined symmetry. While these buildings are visually engaging, they also play... View full entry
Spaces like the Museum of Ice Cream and the Paul Smith Pink Wall offer a perfect setting for a highly shareable image—and that’s it. What happens to art, or travel, or the outside world in general when taking a photograph becomes an experience itself?
As photo-driven social networks continue to grow more powerful, they are both transforming boutique economies and exercising visual influence over our modern day cuisine, travel destinations, clothing labels, and makeup trends.
— The Ringer
From museums to music festivals to that cool-looking, brightly colored wall there, this article looks into how image-driven social media like Instagram is increasingly changing the way people are consuming art and culture in practically identical ways. In one interesting part of the article... View full entry
Trump’s design aesthetic is fascinatingly out of line with America’s past and present. If you doubt it, note that the interiors of the apartments his company actually sells bear no resemblance to the one he lives in. But that doesn’t mean his taste comes from nowhere. At one level, it’s aspirational, meant to project the wealth so many citizens can only dream of. But it also has important parallels... — Politico
The best aesthetic descriptor of Trump’s look, I’d argue, is dictator style. View full entry
Could one of Alvar Aalto's most sublime works be the result of a mistake? And more intriguingly, did Aalto exploit error to acheive a certain aesthetic/politically pointed effect? In this thoughtful piece on Medium, Dan Hill explores the role of "benign errors" in Aalto's work, a term the... View full entry
It's bullshit. The golden ratio's aesthetic bona fides are an urban legend, a myth, a design unicorn. Many designers don't use it, and if they do, they vastly discount its importance. There's also no science to really back it up. Those who believe the golden ratio is the hidden math behind beauty are falling for a 150-year-old scam. — fastcodesign.com
Do designers ever follow the Golden Ratio? Is it even relevant in architecture? FastCo.Design writer John Brownlee voices his perspective on the old myth. View full entry
Outside, across the car park of this otherwise unremarkable industrial estate, is a grand, neoclassical mansion that recently became a global internet sensation . It is the world’s first 3D-printed villa. [...]
Not all architects are convinced that 3D printing is good for architecture as a discipline. [...] "It may come without economic cost at a small scale but in architecture, if we are not careful, this is at the expense of integrity.”
— theguardian.com
Previously: Rapid Construction, China Style: 10 Houses in 24 Hours View full entry
Archinect's Architecture School Lecture Guide for Fall 2013Here on Archinect we recently launched "Get Lectured", where we'll feature a school's lecture series--along with their snazzy posters--for the current season. UPDATE: We've begun adding international schools! Although the Fall '13 term... View full entry
Orhan Ayyüce penned a remembrance to his friend architect Larry Totah, titled Slow Weather of Architecture. Therein he describes "The House"...overlooking Pacific Ocean rather edgewise and build like a long drawing depicting a horizontally composed architecture. The fog, roof and the walls are more of Chumash hiring Hopi to build on their mountains for few exquisite basket full of shellfish to adorn the wedding dresses in Hopi villages like the ones a Don Juan dreamed of, a fair exchange"...
Amelia Taylor-Hochberg interviewed architectural photographer Bilyana Dimitrova, formerly Metropolis Magazine’s photo editor. The two discussed Architecture Photography in the 21st Century ahead of the exhibition 'Beyond the Assignment: Defining Photographs of Architecture and... View full entry
Those outside the design industry may often wonder what makes for good architectural design. Most laypeople would say good design is aesthetically pleasing and unique, but their assessment would likely end there. — DesignBuild Source
