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Today's News - Tuesday, September 4, 2007

ArcSpace's travel adventures in Japan, and a chocolate museum in Mexico City full of surprises. -- A call to use performance-based transportation credits in LEED (do bike racks really make a difference?). -- Green housing project wins awards (but living there is no prize for residents). -- Britain's urban brownfields turning a natural green. -- The age of the engineer is here (where would starchitects be without them?). -- A Danish firm selected to design a Norwegian landmark. -- Germany's biggest synagogue reopens (great slide show). -- Ouroussoff can't get Tschumi's Blue Building out of his mind. -- Battle heats up over Mexico City's towering plan. -- Rose takes on the fab and the mundane in new hotel design. -- Denver's new courthouse will be stone and glass (surprised?). -- First report out on 2007 Aga Khan Award for Architecture (would have been nice if it included all the architects). -- For Labor Day, Lewis honors the labor of the creative trades. -- "MIT's Pioneering Women of Landscape Architecture" project takes International Archive of Women in Architecture award. -- The 1% Solution launches a three-pronged initiative help architects realize their best intentions. -- RMIT University students take their best intentions to Vietnam. -- One we couldn't resist: "A tomb for all people" in the world's largest pyramid in Dessau (we found the website; maybe you can find the call for proposals).

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-- kk Letter: Tokyo, Shibukawa, and Toga Village: A traditional ground breaking ceremony with Arata Isozaki...
-- Rojkind Arquitectos: Nestlé Chocolate Museum (Phase 1), Mexico City- ArcSpace

Use Performance-Based Transportation Credits in LEED. By Alex Wilson- BuildingGreen

Harsh reality of a green plan: A Benny Farm Housing project won awards for sustainable design, but it's no prize for residents who must contend with a buildup of problems -- L'OEUF; Martin Roy et Associés- Montreal Gazette

Industrial revolution: Some of Britain's ugliest industrial sites are being transformed into wildlife paradises, providing a haven not just for plants and animals, but also for the people who visit them. Brownfield sites are ideal for this, as they are often near cities and they are generally unused.- Guardian (UK)

The Engineer’s Moment: A shift in the architecture profession...afffords the engineer an expanded role...Structural engineers are now literally drawing at the table. By Nina Rappaport -- Expedition Engineering; Arup; Foster; Office for Metropolitan Architecture(OMA); Cecil Balmond; Maltzan; Holl; Guy Nordenson; Toyo Ito; Arata Isozaki; Mutsuro Sasaki; Coop Himmelb(l)au; Bollinger & Grohmann; Severud; Nowicki; Frei Otto; Jorn Utzon;h Ove Arup; Behnisch Architekten; etc. [images]- Architectural Record

Here's the new Holmenkollen: A jury formed to select the winning design for Oslo's new ski jump...recommended that the city award the job to a Danish architectural firm. It beat out a long list of other candidates to build what's considered one of Norway's leading landmarks. -- JDS Architects [images]- Aftenposten (Norway)

Germany's Biggest Synagogue Reopens: Architect Ruth Golan and her partner Kay Zareh have spent the last two years restoring Rykestrasse Synagogue to its original beauty, with only some old photographs to work with. [slide show]- Der Spiegel (Germany)

A Ragtag Neighborhood’s Big, Blue Newcomer: I can’t get the Blue Building out of my mind...avoids the ostentatious self-importance that infects the design of so many of the new luxury towers...its contorted form has a hypnotic appeal that is firmly rooted in the gritty disorder of its surroundings. By Nicolai Ouroussoff -- Bernard Tschumi [image]- New York Times

Skyscraper Has Feet of Clay: The Mexican capital’s leftwing government wishes to celebrate the 200th anniversary of the country’s independence by sponsoring the building of the tallest skyscraper in Latin America...has met with opposition from local residents, architects and cultural authorities... -- Vladimir Kaspe (1940s); Rem Koolhaas- IPS-Inter Press Service

Bed and bored: If hotels can be as spectacular as the Hilton in Manchester, why are so many just dull, functional boxes, asks Steve Rose -- Jestico and Whiles; Clash Architects; Renzo Piano; Ian Simpson; Peter Zumthor; Mario Botta; Norman Foster; Richard Rogers; David Chipperfield; Atkins- Guardian (UK)

Stone, glass to mark new courthouse look: ...the final design of Denver's new courthouse...a building with different types of glass in its folded-plate eastern facade and a slanted vertical glass "beacon" on the Fox Street side. By Mary Voelz Chandler -- klipp; Hartman-Cox Architects; OZ Architecture; Studio InSite [image]- Rocky Mountain News (Denver)

Nine projects win 2007 Aga Khan Award for Architecture...will share the US$500,000 (euro385,000) award... -- Anna Heringer/Eike Roswag; Vladimir Djurovic; Foster + Partners- The Hindu (India)

Honoring the Vanguard of the Creative Trades: Labor Day...honors America's "working people"...who toil at manufacturing, constructing or operating useful things. But those who artfully design such things...are also working people who deserve to be honored. By Roger K. Lewis -- Peter Walker; Lewis.Tsurumaki.Lewis; de Leon/Tehrani/Office dA; Antoine Predock; Denise Scott Brown/Robert Venturi; Frank Ching- Washington Post

International Archive of Women in Architecture (IAWA) 6th annual Milka Bliznakov Prize Commendation awarded: Eran Ben-Joseph, Holly D. Ben-Joseph, Anne C. Dodge...for their project, Against All Odds: MIT's Pioneering Women of Landscape Architecture- Virginia Tech School of Architecture + Design

The 1% Helps Do-Gooders Do More Than 1%: A three-pronged initiative, to be unveiled September 4 ...will help architects realize their best intentions; Volunteers Doing Double Duty, Survey Says -- Public Architecture- Architectural Record

A design class in helping others: ...20 RMIT students visited coastal Hoi An [Vietnam] over winter to design a shelter for teenagers and young men...the antithesis of "design tourism"... -- Esther Charlesworth; OzQuest; Lifestart Foundation; Architects Without Frontiers- The Age (Australia)

German town wants its own Great Pyramid: ...a 1,600ft tall "Great Pyramid" near the town of Dessau...a "tomb for all people"...backers are inviting architectural proposals. The international jury to select the final concept will be headed by Rem Koolhaas...- Telegraph (UK)

The Great Pyramid: A Monument for us all- TheGreatPyramid.org

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