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On May 7, 2016, Joshua Brown, 40, of Williston, Florida was heading down the highway in his Tesla Model S, using the car’s autopilot mode, when he fatally collided with a tractor trailer. The truck took a left-turn in front of his vehicle, and according to a news release issued by Tesla... View full entry
Well that's a downer. In response to multiple child deaths resulting from their distinctive particleboard units tipping over, IKEA is offering a full refund or a free wall-mounting kit for any MALM dresser or chest, and additional models, made between January 2002 and June 2016. In total, that... View full entry
Twice a week or so, loaded with bodies boxed in pine, a New York City morgue truck passes through a tall chain-link gate and onto a ferry that has no paying passengers. Its destination is Hart Island, an uninhabited strip of land off the coast of the Bronx in Long Island Sound, where overgrown 19th-century ruins give way to mass graves gouged out by bulldozers and the only pallbearers are jail inmates paid 50 cents an hour.
There, divergent life stories come to the same anonymous end.
— the New York Times
"New York is unique among American cities in the way it disposes of the dead it considers unclaimed: interment on a lonely island, off-limits to the public, by a crew of inmates. Buried by the score in wide, deep pits, the Hart Island dead seem to vanish — and so does any explanation for how... View full entry
Fifa president Gianni Infantino has announced the launch of a body to oversee the treatment of workers on Qatar’s World Cup stadiums.
Fifa has been under pressure from Amnesty International, among others, over the alleged human rights abuses suffered by construction operatives at World Cup venues.
— globalconstructionreview.com
Previously in the Archinect news:"7,000 construction workers will die in Qatar before a ball is kicked in the 2022 World Cup," new ITUC report findsBBC journalists arrested for reporting on Qatar's World Cup laborersRevealed: Qatar's World Cup 'slaves' to Build InfrastructureDire safety conditions... View full entry
Eleven people died while working on Olympic facilities or Games-related projects between January 2013 and March 2016, according to a report released Monday by Rio de Janeiro's Regional Labor and Employment Office.
The report, released by Elaine Castilho, the auditor for the Rio Olympic Games works, also notes that no workers died in the preparations for the 2012 Summer Games in London.
— ESPN
Related stories in the Archinect news:With the Rio Olympics opening in less than four months, sports federation concerned over problem with venuesBrazil's economy is a mess and its President is facing impeachment. Can Rio make it to the Olympics?"7,000 construction workers will die in Qatar before... View full entry
School of Architecture Dean Norman Millar, who previously taught at SCI-Arc, UCLA, Pasadena Art Center and was active on both the San Diego and Los Angeles campuses of Woodbury, succumbed to pancreatic cancer on April 14. He was 62 years old. Named "Educator of the Year" in 2014 by the AIA|LA... View full entry
Zaha Hadid was a daring creative force from the very beginning...She had the ability to consistently shake things up in the architecture world — and leave a lasting influence. Throughout her extensive decorative career, Zaha Hadid received an abundance of awards including the 2004 Pritzker Prize and most recently the 2016 RIBA Gold Medal, being the first woman architect to win both awards in her own right. — Bustler
Archinect's sister site Bustler rounded up some previous coverage on Hadid's accolades and award-winning projects that she and her firm have won over the last few years. For more Archinect coverage on Zaha Hadid's passing:“We just loved her”: Frank Gehry remembers Zaha HadidThe architecture... View full entry
She died of a heart attack on Thursday in a Miami hospital, where she was being treated for bronchitis. — BBC News
Zaha Hadid passed away Thursday from an apparent heart attack in Miami, Florida. She was being treated in a hospital at the time. Update: Zaha Hadid's office has released an official statement on their website as follows: ZAHA HADID 1950-2016 It is with great sadness that... View full entry
Claude Parent, architect and theoretician of “oblique function”, passed away this past Saturday at the age of 93.Trained at the Académie des Beaux-Arts, Parent studied under Le Corbusier and collaborated with the philosopher Paul Virilio to form the idea of “oblique function”. Jean Nouvel... View full entry
As a designer, Uesugi created serene landscapes that adapted the elements of a Japanese garden — rock, plants and water — to the climate and lifestyle of Southern California. Among his most significant projects are the restoration of the Japanese Garden at the Huntington Library, Art Collections and Botanical Gardens in San Marino, Pine Wind Garden at the Torrance Cultural Arts Center and the Japanese Friendship Garden in San Diego's Balboa Park. — The Los Angeles Times
In memorium, a few photos of Uesugi's landscape work at the Japanese Garden of The Huntington Library: View full entry
dying online is open to anyone willing to share his or her end with the blogosphere. [...]
This dissolving of the barriers between the public and the intimate is death’s vital new upgrade... death has acquired a “neurotic separation” from daily life, and this separation has been identified as part of the “malaise of the late twentieth century.”
But thanks to the internet, death might be losing some of its pariah status.
— designobserver.com
Prompted by the recent mass internet-public mourning of David Bowie, as well as a few agencies that offer post-death social media updates to perpetuate the online persona of your late loved-ones, Adrian Shaughnessy (graphic designer at the Royal College of Art) reflects on how a death shared... View full entry
[Healthabitat, the non-profit Paul Pholeros co-founded,] developed a model called Housing for Health...working with Aboriginal communities, conducting a survey of all housing and completing urgent repairs using mainly local Indigenous contractors, and adding whatever upgrades or repairs they can afford until the money runs out.
The organisation has improved more than 8,000 houses – a third of Australia’s Indigenous-controlled housing stock – and with them the lives of 55,000 people.
— The Guardian
More on Archinect: New study suggests Aboriginal collective memory reaches back more than 7,000 years Mindscraper: high-rise educational facility renderings in Sydney unveiled by Grimshaw & BVN An illustrated history of Canberra, the Australian capital designed by American architects Peter... View full entry
A report by the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) has estimated that 7,000 workers will die before the first ball is kicked in the 2022 World Cup. [...]
“Qatar’s labour laws are ruinous for workers. All the government has done is to codify slavery. Employers can now even lend out workers to another employer without the worker’s consent for up to a year”
— globalconstructionreview.com
In its 2015 report Qatar: Profit and Loss. Counting the cost of modern day slavery in Qatar: What price freedom?, the ITUC demands that FIFA would make workers' right a central concern of the 2022 World Cup preparations. The organization has also called on Qatari authorities to take these... View full entry
Aldo Rossi’s addition to the San Cataldo Cemetery is a paragon of postmodern architecture, seeing the cemetery up close exposes some of the style’s major shortcomings.
[...] all you’ve got left is a half-empty, unfinished cemetery with assorted maintenance equipment left lying around. Perhaps you can keep drawing meaning from this decay. But lord knows it’s difficult to sustain a deep engagement with life and death after you’ve tripped over a garden hose.
— failedarchitecture.com
Related on Archinect:How a postmodernist department store is trying to become the youngest monument in PolandPostmodern No 1 Poultry divides architects in debate over recent heritageThey died as they designed: famous architects' self-styled gravestones View full entry
I think you’re all fucking mad. Deranged. So disengaged from reality it’s not even funny. It’s a fucking TV commercial. Nobody gives a shit.
This has come as quite a shock I can tell you. I think, I’ve come to the conclusion that the whole thing was a bit of a con. A scam. An elaborate hoax.
— Business Insider
"Linds Redding, a New Zealand-based art director who worked at BBDO and Saatchi & Saatchi, died last month at age 52 from an inoperable esophageal cancer.Redding also kept a blog, and after his passing an essay he wrote about the ad business, titled “A Short Lesson In Perspective,” has... View full entry
