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b3tadine[sutures] concurred "i love it. that work of this complexity and beauty is being built in Dallas, let alone the US, is testament to Mayne and Morphosis being one of the premiere firms in the world”. However, some like accesskb argued "beautiful forms and spaces... ugly and cold choice of materials and colours".
News The post announcing the opening of the Perot Museum of Nature and Science, designed by Morphosis Architects and which opened this past Saturday in Dallas, featured some great photos by the photographer Iwan Baan. Cosmos commented "Everything about this building is great. Function... View full entry
The building is alluring but unsettling. Is the museum’s 10-story concrete cube splitting apart or being pieced together? Is it being held intact by an enormous brace — a transparent protrusion on the cube’s side containing a 54-foot-long escalator — or is that a destabilizing gash that pierces the building’s body? — NYT
Edward Rothstein visited the Perot Museum of Nature and Science and while his review focuses on the contents of the building, he also touches on it's architecture. Rothstein argues that the museum is an example of a not so recent trend wherein... View full entry
The initial responses of some local architects to the arena drawings were underwhelming.
While cautioning that the renderings are preliminary, Seattle architect and critic Mark Hinshaw said some of the views of the proposed arena seem like "boxes with a tight lid" that could be any number of public buildings.
"One thing that seems missing is any kind of dramatic roof expression that we have seen with a number of landmark buildings — particularly ones that involve large audiences.
— seattletimes.com
Goldberger addressed the disappearance of journalistic hegemony and the advent of electronic media. While mainstream publications with an ongoing commitment to architecture criticism continue to possess a degree of authority, they are struggling to make themselves heard in this noise. It is clear to Goldberger that “the playing field may be level, but the players are not equal.” — dirt.asla.org
The people of Beijing seem excited about how their city is being shaped. And so they should be. Architecture in China today is bold and unapologetic.
But it embodies China’s rapid growth in less positive ways, too. Although the industry is buoyant these days, its long-term benefits for the people who live here are questionable. Too often, form trumps function.
— latitude.blogs.nytimes.com
Also see: Zaha Hadid opens Galaxy SoHo in Beijing View full entry
"There is a lack of feeling and lack of care for quality of design in retail parks and many dispiriting residential and office developments." In particular, he said he was concerned that architectural education is becoming "over theorised" and lacking in practical experience.
The quality of architecture in Britain is falling behind that of continental rivals, particularly Scandinavia and the Netherlands, he said.
— independent.co.uk
An overscaled monument flagrantly aloof from its surroundings, the addition is a laggard symbol of an era when the Netherlands, like this country, was awash in capital for boldly sculptural new projects.
As such it's a reminder of how slow architecture can be. The $159-million extension is the architectural personification of boom-time thinking.
— Christopher Hawthorne, Los Angeles Times
The arena was always a Trojan horse: its stars (Jay-Z), its original starchitect (Frank Gehry), and its semi-public function (bringing pro basketball to Brooklyn) have been used to make the development of the Vanderbilt rail yard seem like a reward rather than an imposition. In 2009, Gehry left the project, adding his arena and tower designs to the long list of New York’s famous unrealized buildings. — newyorker.com
Brooklynites might consider themselves lucky. In Manhattan, Madison Square Garden’s owners are renovating, spending nearly $1 billion. Judging from results so far, it won’t be enough. The Barclays Center is no Garden disaster, just an extraordinarily expensive lost opportunity. — bloomberg.com
For the latest Student Works feature Elif Erdine a PhD in Architectural Design Candidate at the AA, researching on ‘Generative Processes in Tower Design: Algorithms for the Integration of Tower Subsystems’, profiled Fallen Star an installation set between biomimetics, interaction, and perception.The project led drewjmcnamara to think "I am always amazed at the resources available to students at some schools. And then to see those resources actually being put to good use".
For the latest Student Works feature Elif Erdine a PhD in Architectural Design Candidate at the AA, researching on ‘Generative Processes in Tower Design: Algorithms for the Integration of Tower Subsystems’, profiled Fallen Star an installation set between biomimetics... View full entry
The National Building Museum presents its fourteenth Vincent Scully Prize to Pulitzer Prize-winning architecture critic Paul Goldberger, for his lifetime work of encouraging thoughtful discourse and debate about the importance of design. — nbm.org
Mr. Landman views these attempts at defining the critic’s frame of reference — Kimmelman-style and Scott-style — as entirely appropriate. Critics, he said, are not supposed to be objective; they are free to champion certain kinds of work. They are “free to like or dislike anyone or anything.” — NYT
Arthur S. Brisbane, (the Public Editor) provides some insight into the workings of the NYT Arts section. He spoke with Jonathan Landman, The Times’s culture editor, in an effort to better understand the rules that The Times plays by. Specifically, when it comes to the New York... View full entry
But despite the many and varied predictions of the death of criticism — of architecture as well as other forms of culture — it seems to me that a radical rethinking of critical practice might be prompted by the potentials of writing for online media, and that this rethinking might result in a new belle-lettrism. — Places Journal
How will the accelerating transition from print to digital publishing affect the practice of architecture criticism? On Places, Naomi Stead surveys the scene and is optimistic about the possibilities. View full entry
I remember Poly Styrene, the singer from X-Ray Spex, and all her prophetic songs from the late 70s: "I Am A Poser," "Germ-Free Adolescents," "Prefabricated Icon," "Genetic Engineering." Take a look at architecture and people today and you realize that it all came true. — Vice Magazine
A candid conversation on the horrendous state of new construction in New York, with the crankiest of architecture critics, Ivana Force-Majeure, and Vice Magazine's Bob Nickas. View full entry
Architecture critics are in a particular bind. Like art critics but unlike, say, those of film, they must swim in the same social sea as their targets. Further, because useful architectural criticism requires experience of the design process, they must also be prepared to offend those by whom they might otherwise be employed. — theage.com.au