Today’s News - Monday, September 23, 2013
• ArcSpace brings us a charming summerhouse that is "a restrained yet contrast-filled reinterpretation of the Swedish gabled boat houses," and an Ando profile.
• Surprise! The 1969 "neo-Corbusian" Preston bus station gets landmarked, leaving the pro-demo faction fuming: "Obviously it's not the outcome we were hoping for."
• BIG's big idea for "a twisted 500-foot beehive of a tower" in Vancouver "has the city's art and architecture crowd panting with desire" - and others who see it as an "eyesore."
• An impressive shortlist to design London's Met Police HQ (in our humble opinion, the designs don't impress).
• Kamin considers Pelli Clarke Pelli's design for DePaul University's arena a good beginning with "several good strokes," but it still needs work.
• Saffron, on the other hand, can't say enough about Weiss/Manfredi's "dazzling new" Singh Center for Nanotechnology for the University of Pennsylvania.
• Chaban delves into SHoP's 32-story B2 at Atlantic Yards that will be the world's largest modular building, and "could well remake the entire housing industry, saving both time and money for developers and tenants."
• Litt x 2 with two thumbs-up for Westlake Reed Leskosky: a "neat, crisp, quietly confident" apartment complex in Cleveland will "set a fresh new tone for a highly visible, long-blighted zone" + The firm winning the job to master plan the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts proves "that no one needs to feel sorry for Cleveland architects."
• Hawthorne x 2 (3 actually): Q&A with DS+R's Diller re: working with Eli Broad, other art-museum projects, and the fate of the American Folk Art Museum: "We don't see [demolition] as a fait accompli."
• On Disney Hall's 10th anniversary, he hails it - and Gehry - for hitting all the right notes; its "shimmering, canny gregariousness" is a "remarkable work of public architecture" + Q&A with Gehry by Hawthorne and Swed: the master reminisces about the hall's "fraught, 15-year creation": "I was told by the Disney family that no matter what I did I wouldn't get the project."
• A rather amusing encounter with Hadid as she punch-lists the soon-to-open Serpentine Sackler gallery: "fans consider her a bloody-minded genius, her detractors a showboating starchitect" ("I don't make nice little buildings").
• An amusing conversation with Tigerman re: his surprise at - and appreciation of - receiving a lifetime achievement award from AIA Chicago: "I'm sure it wasn't easy for them. To swallow hard and say, 'OK, let's give this son of a bitch a lifetime achievement award.' That doesn't mean I'm going to stop challenging them, for sure."
• Art historian Grigor pens an eloquent tribute to Iranian-born, California-based architect and artist Voskanian: "Not one but two nations ought to mourn" (some amazing buildings we've never seen!).
• Moore is a bit mystified by the Lisbon Architecture Triennale: it's "a valiant attempt to realize good intentions - without really succeeding" (add to that, it's "hard to know what to look at").
• Call for entries: 2014 SEED Awards for Excellence in Public Interest Design.
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-- Tham & Videgård Arkitekter: Summerhouse, Lagnö, Sweden: a restrained yet contrast-filled reinterpretation of the Swedish gabled boat houses.
-- Tadao Ando: He spent his early years as a professional boxer and truck driver, until he...taught himself architecture and eventually became one of the Great Fathers of contemporary architecture. |
Breakthrough: Ed Vaizey lists Preston bus station: Architecture minister has unexpectedly given Preston’s under threat 1969 bus station a grade II listing: Two previous bids in 2002 and 2009 to secure statutory heritage protection for the BDP-designed ‘neo-Corbusian’ concrete landmark both failed..."Obviously it’s not the outcome we were hoping for.." [images]- The Architects' Journal (UK) |
An architectural eyesore or a potential masterpiece? Proposed building for False Creek could divide the city: ...a twisted 500-foot beehive of a tower that has the city’s art and architecture crowd panting with desire...part Bladerunner, part modern sculpture — would be such an exclamation point amid Vancouver’s monotone sheet-glass condo towers, that some see it as a pivotal opportunity in the city’s evolution. -- Bjarke Ingels Grooup/BIG [image]- The Province (Vancouver) |
Revealed: designs by finalists in new Met Police HQ contest: ...five big name practices shortlisted in the contest to design the new HQ for the Metropolitan Police Service on London’s Victoria Embankment. -- Allford Hall Monaghan Morris/AHMM; Allies & Morrison; Foster + Partners; Keith Williams Architects; Lifschutz Davidson Sandilands [images]- The Architects' Journal (UK) |
DePaul University arena has distinctive look, challenging task: ...design still needs work...Should they build it? And, if so, where? Sometimes, a design can be seductive enough to quell such debate. But the release of the expected winning design for the $173 million arena is unlikely to do so...has several good strokes...Yet it isn't strong enough to forestall the debate... By Blair Kamin -- Pelli Clarke Pelli [images]- Chicago Tribune |
Singh Center for Nanotechnology enlivens Penn campus: Instead of focusing on the boundaries between architecture and landscape, they fuse the two into a seamless whole. Their dazzling new project is like the mythical centaur; you can't exactly say whether it is man or beast...a topographical structure in an urban context. By Inga Saffron -- Weiss/Manfredi [slide show]- Philadelphia Inquirer |
Barclays at 1: Taking the next step: Assembling the world's largest modular building, bringing new tenants and business to Brooklyn: 32-story B2 at Atlantic Yards...could well remake the entire housing industry in the city, saving both time and money for developers and tenants. By Matt Chaban -- SHoP Architects [images]- NY Daily News |
Westlake Reed Leskosky design for Upper Chester apartments sets a positive tone for the bright future of a current dead zone: ...neat, crisp, quietly confident...low-key approach makes sense because the new building’s most important job is to set a fresh new tone for a highly visible, long-blighted zone... By Steven Litt -- Foster + Partners; Robert P. Madison International; Stanley Saitowitz/Natoma Architects [images]- Cleveland Plain Dealer |
Westlake Reed Leskosky of Cleveland wins prestigious job to master plan the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts: ... building a national practice based here and winning big jobs in other cities, proving that no one needs to feel sorry for Cleveland architects. By Steven Litt -- Frank Furness/George Hewitt (1876) [images]- Cleveland Plain Dealer |
Q&A: Elizabeth Diller on working with Eli Broad and more: ...other art-museum projects...in New York and Berkeley and on the Stanford campus...the fate of the American Folk Art Museum...Where does that process stand? "We’ve been working hard for the last three months...not just on the fate of that building but also on the question of how MoMA ought to expand...We don’t see [demolition] as a fait accompli. By Christopher Hawthorne -- Diller Scofidio + Renfro- Los Angeles Times |
Frank Gehry's Walt Disney Concert Hall is inextricably of L.A.: A remarkable work of public architecture, it reflects and engages Los Angeles like few other buildings: ...responds to the lonely moonscape urbanism of Bunker Hill with a shimmering, canny gregariousness that spills down Grand Avenue...accomplishes all the things Gehry has become famous for and all the things he was supposed to be incapable of doing. By Christopher Hawthorne [slide show + video Q&A w/Swed]- Los Angeles Times |
For Frank Gehry, Disney Hall is 'my home': Q&A: [He] looks back on the creation of one of L.A.'s iconic structures: ...reminisced about the fraught, 15-year creation of the hall and the hopes he has for its future...."I was told by ... the Disney family that no matter what I did I wouldn't get the project." By Mark Swed and Christopher Hawthorne- Los Angeles Times |
Zaha Hadid: 'I don't make nice little buildings': Her fans consider her a bloody-minded genius, her detractors a showboating "starchitect" of convoluted fantasies. As the Serpentine Sackler gallery opens in London, she talks about resisting rectangular design – and why she'd be happy to build in Syria- Guardian (UK) |
Why Stanley Tigerman designs with death in mind: After a half-century of building iconic structures, he still didn't expect a lifetime achievement award: “I’m sure it wasn’t easy for [AIA Chicago]. To swallow hard and say, ‘OK, let’s give this son of a bitch a lifetime achievement award.’ And I’m very appreciative of it. That doesn’t mean I’m going to stop challenging them, for sure.”- Grid Chicago |
Rostom Voskanian and an Architectural Legacy: ...left behind a legacy and a tradition in Iranian-Armenian modern architecture when he left Tehran in 1988...Not one but two nations ought to mourn. By Talinn Grigor/Brandeis University- Asbarez Armenian News (California) |
Lisbon Architecture Triennale: A series of sceptical exhibitions questions the purpose of architecture: Close, Closer...is a valiant attempt to realise good intentions...without really succeeding. It is also hampered by the fact that the aversion to building things means that it is hard to know what to look at. By Rowan Moore -- Beatrice Galilee- Observer (UK) |
Call for entries: 2014 SEED Awards for Excellence in Public Interest Design recognizing excellence in social, economic and environmental design; cash prizes + all-expense-paid trip to present at the 14th international Structures for Inclusion conference (SFI 14), March 2014 in NYC; deadline: November 12- Design Corps / Social, Economic, Environmental Design Network (SEED) |
Book Review: "Never Built Los Angeles" by Sam Lubell and Greg Goldin; foreword by Thom Mayne: The contradictions and challenges of Los Angeles as a metropolitan conceit of perpetual promise continue. By Sam Hall Kaplan- ArchNewsNow |
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