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“In the 70s and 80s, my ideas were ignored. I was antagonistic to postmodernism [...] and I paid a price.” — The Guardian
The 84-year-old Habitat 67 mastermind sat down with Rowan Moore to discuss his career and new memoir If Walls Could Speak: My Life in Architecture. Among other topics, he said he had “no idea” that his 2011 Marina Bay Sands design would become “an instant icon” and that the political... View full entry
The project as whole also creates a highly managed territory of the sort that you tend to get in single-owner developments which, despite some funky moves by a Frank Gehry-designed apartment block, is fundamentally predictable. It threatens to cage the beast that is Gilbert Scott’s masterpiece, as might the array of retail logos inside. But, between the blandscape outside and the brandscape within, the power station is cussed enough to assert its own character. — The Guardian
The £9 billion final boss of Greater London adaptive reuse projects (along with the Barbican) is a story of inside and out for Moore, who sees the program’s housing element as an “awkward” mismatch when compared to WilkinsonEyre’s tastefully “sober” and restrained interior retail... View full entry
The problem is that the proposed new work is something else altogether to Venturi and Scott Brown’s playfulness and personality. It has curving glass balustrades, white walls and oak-clad pillars, and expanses of plain paving outside. It is an architecture of near-emptiness, the default style of international art-world good taste. — The Guardian
Moore ran through the litany of changes Annabelle Selldorf is making in replacement of the current iteration’s “bum notes,” which the critic pinned on a rift between the original expansion's benefactors and what was then called Venturi, Scott Brown and Associates. Related on Archinect... View full entry
I’ll pass by the abuse of metaphors (do milestones have hearts?) but not of trees, this being another case of certain designers’ mania for picking them up, moving them around and putting them where they don’t want to be.
Those words from the studio also take liberties with the idea of art. They call the Tree of Trees a “sculpture”. Boris Johnson may once have compared Heatherwick to Michelangelo, but David it is not.
— The Guardian
The Observer critic joined a plethora of online commentators that picked apart Heatherwick Studio’s “Tree Of Trees” Earth Day announcement by comparing it to last year’s fiasco surrounding the MVRDV-designed Marble Arch Mound, which he described as a “cartoon version of nature is... View full entry
This megalopolis of engineering currently lies there, pristine, unspotted by gum or pigeon, with its 319-tonne trains gliding quietly through every few minutes, empty, so that those operating the system can familiarise themselves with the choreography of all that heavy metal. Electronic indicator boards announce their coming with white digits, a notch classier than the orange ones on the old tube. — The Guardian
Moore described the nearly empty £18.33 billion ($23.84 billion) project as an “alternative universe” before likening the transition between the new Elizabeth line and older Central Underground to a scene from (attempted architecture critic) Lewis Caroll’s Alice in Wonderland. The... View full entry
What can be said of a world where one billionaire wants to build a giant tulip-shaped tower of little practical use and another wants to house thousands of students in windowless rooms in a block with all the charm of an Amazon distribution centre? — The Guardian
The Observer critic further continued his contrasting of Foster + Partner’s failed Tulip Tower with the Munger Hall development in California, claiming that each was the vanity project of a wayward billionaire. “Both projects seem driven by ego, but in the wide space between the brutal... View full entry
In fact, America has beautiful and popular non-traditional structures – the Guggenheim Museum in New York, the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles – and it has crude and soulless classical buildings. Unfortunately, the authors of the order are not completely wrong when they say that some architects have ignored public feeling. — The Guardian
Rowan Moore, architecture critic at The Observer, responds to last week's presidential executive order that makes classical and traditional architecture the preferred style for federal buildings. "If architects don’t want to give ammunition to the repressive thinking behind this order," Moore... View full entry
Shield House is just one example of “permitted development”. It is an outcome of a government experiment in deregulation, which allows homes to be made out of old offices and shops without planning permission, that has been going on for some years. An estimated 65,000 flats have been made in this way. — The Guardian
The Observer's architecture critic Rowan Moore highlights in his latest Guardian piece the failed outcome of a government program that seeks to speed up the conversion of old commercial properties into residential spaces. "The experiment has been catastrophic in several significant respects, but... View full entry
“I came away blindsided [by Eisenhower's legacy]. It brings tears to my eyes. How his accomplishments as a general and as a president match anything, all without the fanfare that’s going on around the president now. The opposite. He was modest but strong. A staggering accomplishment.” — The Guardian
Rowan Moore, architecture critic at The Observer, interviews architect Frank Gehry for The Guardian regarding the soon-to-open Dwight D. Eisenhower Memorial in Washington, D.C. The contentious memorial, which drew the ire of conservative architecture critics, was developed by Gehry Partners... View full entry
[...] tall buildings are still sold on the basis that they are good for the environment. Mostly the argument is about density – if you pile a lot of homes or workplaces high on one spot, it is said, then you can use land and public transport more efficiently. There’s some truth in this, but you can also achieve high levels of density without going above 10 or 12 storeys. — The Guardian
The Observer's Rowan Moore dissects a list of the usual arguments in favor of ever taller buildings around the world and concludes that not much of it passes the reality test of urgent climate crisis, resource scarcity, wealth distribution, city planning, global pandemic, and ultimately, good... View full entry
The new breed of airports take that altered reality and alter it some more, to create their own version of the world.
If you want to be dystopian, airports are prototypes for sinister societies of the future, products of the military-entertainment complex where dictatorial government colludes with big business to create controlling environments. Where individuals are pacified by distractions and ruled by technology.
— The Guardian
The Observer's Rowan Moore takes a critical look at the newest global breed of airport architecture, including the recently opened Beijing Daxing and the brand new Singapore Jewel Changi, in the face of climate change, commerce, and mass surveillance. "It is sometimes pointed out that a modern... View full entry
It was supposed to be the ultimate symbol of Cool Britannia. Instead it became a nightmare that exposed the spin and hubris of the New Labour project [...] — The Guardian
The Observer's architecture critic, Rowan Moore, revisits the events leading up to the opening night debacle of the Richard Rogers-designed and much hyped, but ultimately failed, London Millennium Dome on January 1st, 2000. "The Millennium Experience that it contained then is dimly remembered... View full entry
[Amager Bakke] is a work that revels in its own contrivance, a condensation and celebration of the surrounding artifice, a creation of what might be called hypernature. It is at once an energy facility, converting refuse into electricity, and a ski slope. It is arresting and striking. It’s an emblem of a culture of why-not and because-you-can that currently pops up in a number of modern cities [...] — The Guardian
Writing in The Guardian, architecture critic Rowan Moore heaps praise on Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG) and the firm's founder in a write-up of the firm's recently completed Amager Bakke project in Copenhagen. Describing the architect's ability to impress clients, Moore writes, "He... View full entry
It is built into the value system of architecture – the ways in which it is taught, published, recognised and awarded – that the most desirable possible outcome of a career is to be a celebrated maker of singular objects, of buildings that can be admired as you would a painting or a symphony. [...]
It’s a start that the prize is to Grafton Architects – that is to say, a whole practice – rather than its two principals alone.
— The Guardian
Rowan Moore, the Observer’s architecture correspondent, applauds in his recent commentary the decision to award the next RIBA Royal Gold Medal for Architecture to Irish practice Grafton Architects, a deserving team with female principals at the helm, rather than further perpetuating the... View full entry
Responding to recent works by Thomas Heatherwick and Bjarke Ingels, Rowan Moore interrogates architecture's obsession du jour. With each recently unveiling their "most striking landmark to date"—for Heatherwick, the Vessel and for Ingels, the Amager Bakke waste-to-energy power plant—Moore is... View full entry
