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Out of a half-century career of creative and prolific work, Rudolph’s Burroughs Wellcome headquarters & research center stands out as one of his finest works. We’re now fighting to save this magnificent example of the convergence of corporate & scientific vision and architectural talent—and we thought it would be useful to share an outline of it’s history, purpose, and features. — Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation
A petition to save the only Paul Rudolph-designed building in North Carolina, started by the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation on change.org, had over 1,700 signatures as of September 16th. View this post on Instagram A post shared by PaulRudolphHeritageFoundation (@paulrudolphfoundation) on Sep... View full entry
The Ahmanson Building is the last standing structure of four buildings being demolished at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.
The Leo S. Bing Center is completely gone; construction workers are removing the foundations of the Hammer and Art of the Americas buildings.
Demolition of the Ahmanson began this week, museum representative Jessica Youn said Tuesday, and should be completed “in the last quarter” of this year.
— The Los Angeles Times
Workers have made swift progress demolishing the history William L Pereira and Hardy Holzman Pfeiffer Associates-designed buildings on the Los Angeles County Museum of Art campus. Demolition of Los Angeles County Art Museum @LACMA continues @MiracleMileLA #LosAngeles @KNX... View full entry
The legal battle over the Picasso-Nesjar murals removed by the Norwegian government from the Y Block administrative building in Oslo earlier this week is escalating. The Fishermen hung on the brutalist façade while The Seagull was located in the lobby of the building, which was designed by the Norwegian architect Erling Viksjø in 1969. — The Art Newspaper
Norway's controversial decision to demolish the 1960s Y-block building that was damaged by a car bomb explosion in the July 22, 2011 terrorist attack — and with it, to remove two murals created by Pablo Picasso and Carl Nesjar specifically for this building — has been generating a... View full entry
It’s a small victory for Frank Lloyd Wright fans, but a victory nonetheless: A Wright-designed cottage, previously threatened with demolition, will be moved — wheeled, actually — to a new location Tuesday in north suburban Glencoe. — Chicago Tribune
Tribune architecture critic Blair Kamin has some good news for readers who feared that Frank Lloyd Wright's 1913 Booth Cottage may have already met the wrecking ball after its previous owners filed for a demolition permit last year. Previously on Archinect: Frank Lloyd Wright's Booth Cottage could... View full entry
A battle over the right to enjoy uninterrupted views of the Acropolis has resulted in a five-star hotel being ordered to demolish its top two floors, in a landmark ruling hailed by residents of Athens. [...]
Citizens enraged about the ten-storey establishment blocking their own views of the citadel took the case to the highest court in the land.
— The Guardian
Activists in the Greek capital have been rallying against a number of high-rise proposals that could substantially block the view of the city's most priced historic landmark. The court's decision in the most recent luxury hotel case wasn't easy, however, as The Guardian points out: "In 2012, in... View full entry
“We have to think of buildings as material depots,” says Thomas Rau, a Dutch architect who has been working to develop a public database of materials in existing buildings and their potential for reuse. [...] “Waste is simply material without an identity,” he says. “If we track the provenance and performance of every element of a building, giving it an identity, we can eliminate waste.” — The Guardian
In an opinion piece, Oliver Wainwright writes on how more architecture firms across Europe are exploring methods on preserving, adapting, and reusing existing buildings instead of demolishing them, which hugely create CO2 emissions. But it'll take more than a few progressive architects and... View full entry
Politicians, planners and policy-makers have frequently debated the benefits of allowing architecture to decay – neither demolishing nor preserving it, but letting entropy take hold. What makes this approach to ruins equally empowering and horrifying? — Failed Architecture
Writer and artist Owen Vince penned an excellent Failed Architecture essay on the intricate interplay between managed decline and indifferent decay, architectural reverence and conscious abandonment, preservation, erasure, and deliberate ruination. "To allow a structure to degrade — refusing... View full entry
Grain elevators were once an icon of Canada’s west: often painted a bright boxcar red, they stood in towns across Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba. [...]
In the 1930s there were nearly 6,000 towers; now fewer than a thousand remain. The destruction, in many ways, mirrors the broader decline of rural communities in western Canada.
— The Guardian
For The Guardian, journalist Leyland Cecco on the struggle of small agricultural communities in Canada's prairie provinces to preserve their aging, wooden grain elevators as cultural heritage monuments. Restored Alberta Wheat Pool elevators at the Canadian Grain Elevator Discovery Centre in... View full entry
Demolition has started to take place at the existing Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art (LACMA) complex, where a collection of buildings designed by William Pereira and Hardy Holzman Pfeiffer Associates are expected to give way for a new structure designed by Atelier Peter Zumthor. ... View full entry
According to a recent CountryLiving article, the highly popular open floor plans featured in many HGTV remodeling shows are implemented for reasons most might not guess. Rhonda Kaysen, a New York Times contributor, recently said in an NPR interview, "the reason that they [HGTV] are so... View full entry
Los Angeles city prosecutors are calling for an unfinished mega-mansion in Bel-Air to be torn down to its foundation, the latest twist in the saga over a colossal building at the center of criminal charges, court battles and an FBI investigation.
[...] last week, City Atty. Mike Feuer and his prosecutors stepped up their demands, saying that a structural engineer had found that key structures supporting the building were deficient.
— Los Angeles Times
"Hadid pleaded no contest two years ago to criminal charges tied to the mammoth, unfinished building, which prosecutors said was much bigger than city rules allowed and included bedrooms, decks and even an IMAX theater that the city said were never approved," reports the Los Angeles Times. Calls... View full entry
Tatsuyuki Maeda, a member of the Nakagin Capsule Tower Building Conservation and Regeneration Project, hopes the building will be spared both for its place in architectural history and because of its popularity with tourists. If he had his way, it would not only be preserved but improved, restored to its original state. — CityLab
Reports about the fate of the Kisho Kurokawa-designed Nakagin Capsule Tower — and likely most popular example of the Japanese Metabolist Architecture movement — have been from swaying from planned demolition to possible protection in recent years. Marie Doezema's CityLab piece tries to... View full entry
Parker Center, the controversial building that housed the Los Angeles Police Department for over 50 years, is officially no more.
Yesterday, the City of Los Angeles' Bureau of Engineering announced that above-ground demolition of the eight-story building is now complete. The process, which began in August 2018, is expected to proceed through the end of 2019.
— Urbanize Los Angeles
"The site will be home to a new building, the Los Angeles Street Civic Building, which will house hundreds of City employees that are currently in more remote locations and in rental space," wrote the City of Los Angeles Bureau of Engineering in a statement published yesterday. Urbanize LA reports... View full entry
When the so-called House of the Century rose from the swampy earth back in the early 1970s, it arrived as a vision of the future, a biomorphic experiment in modern living. Back then it was a bright white jumble on the shoreline, and depending on your angle of approach, it looked like either a man's erect genitalia or a giant schnoz.
Today, this futuristic house is a decaying relic of the past, and its future is a subject of concern and conjecture.
— Dallas News
Though Ant Farm, the experimental architecture firm founded by Doug Michels and Chip Lord in 1968, is not among the most well known firms of that era, they produced a number of projects both famous and deserving of fame. They are perhaps best known for their early experiments with inflatable... View full entry
Morandi Bridge in the Italian city of Genoa has been demolished almost a year after its partial collapse killed 43 people. Thousands of residents were evacuated before the operation, which was over within eight seconds. Water was sprayed over the scene to reduce the dust produced by the blast. — The Guardian
The partial collapse of Genoa's nearly mile-long Morandi highway bridge on August 14, 2018 killed 43 people trying to cross the bridge at the time. A controlled explosion brought down the last two pillars this morning while the rest of the old bridge is being removed. Construction on the Renzo... View full entry
