Have you ever realized that Hong Kong skyscrapers have holes in them? They're called dragon gates, and according to the Chinese principle feng shui these holes allow dragons to fly from the mountains to the water each day. It's believed that blocking the dragon's path could bring misfortune. Buildings with bad feng shui, such as the Bank of China Tower, have been blamed for surrounding companies going out of business. — Business Insider
Double-paned, waterproofed windows for insulation? Check. Reinforced steel beams for stability during an earthquake? Check. Hole in the center of the building so dragons can fly through? View full entry
Jared Kushner’s family's new skyscraper has caused quite a stir. The design of the 666 Fifth Avenue building in New York has been widely mocked for its apparently "phallic" shape on social media [...]
Although the project has reportedly raised concerns about a potential conflict of interest given the close working relationship between Mr Kushner, the president’s son-in-law, and Mr Trump, it was the skyscraper's design which grabbed the most attention.
— The Independent
Other people have noted that the building looks like a raised middle finger. Meanwhile, some have focused on the address—666 Fifth Avenue. According to Peter Grant of the Wall Street Journal, the Kushner family is trying to change the name to 660 Fifth.I like this response... View full entry
How do you transform a classical museum without dramatically altering the existing architecture? Frank Gehry and the hardworking crew at Gehry Partners have chosen to remove a few walls and increase the amount of natural and artificial lighting, creating a stronger visual connection between... View full entry
Although the LACMA exhibition a few years ago featuring props from Stanley Kubrick's films was, as cineastes say, "nifty," there's something even niftier on view at The 14th Factory: an elaborately detailed, fully inhabitable set recreated from the still-powerful ending of 2001: A Space Odyssey... View full entry
The grueling pace of architecture school notoriously leaves little room to catch up on your beauty sleep. But even the most rigorous students need a bit of shuteye every once and a while, whether under a desk or inside an installation. @usczzz documents passed out students from the USC School of... View full entry
The American Academy of Arts and Letters has announced the recipients of its 2017 architecture awards. Intended to honor architects whose work is characterized by a strong personal direction, this year's winners were chosen from a group of 27 individuals and practices nominated by members of the... View full entry
The Getty Research Institute in Los Angeles acquired a seriously massive archive directly from the studio of Frank O. Gehry today. Dubbed The Frank Gehry Papers, the archives — which were granted as part gift and part purchase — reveal a comprehensive overview of the first 30 years of the... View full entry
Designed by NEXT Architects and Rudy Uytenhaak Architectenbureau in collaboration with Arup and Bureau B+B, the Dafne Schippers Bridge integrates a cycle and pedestrian bridge spanning the Amsterdam-Rhine Canal in Utrecht with a school and public garden. Opening on April 3, the bridge-cum-school... View full entry
The Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat officially declared the Ping An Finance Center in Shenzhen as the world's fourth tallest building — knocking One World Trade Center down to Number 5 in the CTBUH's ten tallest buildings in the world. Rising above Futian District at 599 meters, the... View full entry
Following on the heels of that paperclip-esque tower design for New York, here’s another ‘out there’ skyscraper design. Literally, this one is ‘out there’—in Earth’s orbit. Designed by Clouds Architecture Office, this speculative building would hang from an asteroid, which would be... View full entry
It was only a matter of time until Richard Meier would come out with a lighting collection. Earlier this month, the architect launched a series of stylish indoor lighting fixtures simply named Richard Meier Light at the Ralph Pucci New York showroom. Industrial designer Ana Meier, who is... View full entry
Not content to creepily stalk you with tailored ads on Facebook and Google, ISPs can now sell your internet browsing history to third-parties for cash, thanks to the corporately-backed husks that voted for the move in the U.S. House of Representatives. According to The Washington Post:Congress's... View full entry
Walk through the towering door now, and Midtown falls away. The transition is not abrupt; a visitor is met first with a bank of wooden cupboards, easing newcomers off the street and into the vastness of the house itself. Then, space. The main room provides an unimpeded vista through 100 feet of natural-lit openness, a glass wall, a courtyard and pond, and a small separate structure beyond. The effect — of muted light, of air, of cleanness — is moving. — The New York Times
Fresh from her daily column at The Paris Review, Sadie Stein visits a Philip Johnson-designed apartment/artistic showcase in midtown Manhattan known as the "Rockfeller Guest House."Combining a rich historical narrative with some evocatively observed design, this piece is, as befits its author, a... View full entry
This remarkable custom-built, privately commissioned modern house with its cantilevered design, walls of windows, hand-cut Tennessee limestone walls, rock gardens and rooftop terraces can actually be yours, right now, for $3.5 million. — 6sqft
It's safe to say local architect Dimitri Bulazel was inspired by Frank Lloyd Wright's iconic Fallingwater house when designing this Greenwich, Connecticut home in the 1970s.Like Wright's 1935 architectural masterpiece, it has a cantilevered design set in the woods and incorporates aspects of the... View full entry
In a bold semantic move years in the make, the AIA has renamed a NAAB-accredited, employed graduate on the path to licensure as either a "design professional" or "architectural associate." While you can still call a student pursuing their degree while working in an office an intern (which is... View full entry
