Today’s News - Thursday, January 31, 2019
EDITOR'S NOTE: Tomorrow and Monday will be no-newsletter days. We'll be back Tuesday, February 5.
● Kimmelman delves into why the battle to designate NYC's beloved Strand bookstore a landmark "is about more than a building" - it "points to a new way to think about saving the city's cultural heritage. Call this the next frontier for preservation" (perhaps San Francisco can show NYC the way).
● King x 2: He has high hopes for a proposed "cluster of towers" (two already rising) on a 14-square-block "patchy void" in San Francisco, but "the simple truth is that it will take more than big buildings to improve the quality of life in this busy but problematic civic crossroads," and we should be "wary of the notion that quantity and quality are synonymous" (and wary of ye olde "bait-and-switch").
● He has high hopes for a team of the four previously competing teams vying to restore the Presidio's Fort Scott - "the combined team might be better able to take on the estimated $200 million-plus cost of restoring 22 historic buildings and the distinctive landscape that surrounds them" (the likes of Elon Musk and WeWork among them - alas, no architects/landscape architects named).
● Green cheers the three shortlisted landscape architects from Paris, Boston, and Minneapolis "taking the lead" in vying to design Detroit's new Cultural District (proposals on view at the Detroit Institute of Arts/DIA until April 1).
● Paletta takes a deep - and fascinating - dive into Niemeyer's "ability to land big works in his home country before and after his exile," and how it "speaks to Brazil's enthusiasm for civic gigantism and Modernism. While Brazil's near future does not look promising, inspiration can still be drawn from the democratic spirit of his works."
● Ikenson talks to George Smart about how USModernist.org and its "priceless" and "largest [2.5 million downloadable pages!] open digital archive of 20th century U.S. architecture magazines" came to be (full disclosure: ArchNewsNow.com is a media sponsor - and part of the archive).
● RIBA launches the Neave Brown Award for Housing, in honor of the Royal Gold Medal-winning "socially-motivated, modernist architect, best known for designing a series of celebrated London housing estates," who passed away last year (deadline: February 21).
● Eyefuls of the nine winners of the AIA 2019 Institute Honor Awards for Architecture (some surprises - great presentation).
● ICYMI: ANN feature: rise in the city 2018 Update: Student designs for affordable housing in Maseru, Lesotho, Southern Africa, are in and - hot-off-the-press - winning designs will be prototyped! (A few prized blocks needing sponsors remain.)
Weekend diversions:
● London's Surface Design Show, focused on the public realm and workplace, returns next Tuesday (includes the code for VIP access).
● A great reason to be in Southern California this weekend: The 14th Annual Museums Free-for-All, which includes over 40 museums that will open their doors free of charge.
● Miranda cheers "Boomtowns: How Photography Shapes Los Angeles and San Francisco," on view in San Francisco: "A century's worth of urban photography provides an excellent look back at a time in which both cities are looking forward - contending with growing pains related to infrastructure, equity, affordability and homelessness."
● "Rafael Lozano-Hemmer: Pulse" at the Hirshhorn Museum in Washington, DC, "uses biometrics to make breathtaking spectacle" ("There is absolutely no tracking of an individual," sayeth the artist).
● Ives brings us eyefuls of "KnitCandela," part of a Hadid retrospective in Mexico City: The "13-foot installation explores a new high-tech approach to casting concrete - a breakthrough for casting geometries that typically require elaborate, expensive formworks" (fab photos!).
Page-turners:
● Wise cheers Lamster's "The Man in the Glass House: Philip Johnson, Architect of the Modern Century" that "passes tougher judgment" than the Schulze bio of nearly 25 years ago - this "thoroughly researched and highly readable volume vividly captures the essence of a complex and disturbing character."
● Pedersen talks to Speck re: "Walkable City Rules: 101 Steps to Making Better Places": "His not-so-secret weapon is his ability to make urban planning accessible. 'Frankly, the most compelling arguments are the most entertaining arguments - people's minds are never as open as when their mouths are open, laughing.'"
● An excerpt from Danley's "A Neighborhood Politics of Last Resort: Post-Katrina New Orleans and the Right to the City" considers: "Can NIMBYs fight for justice?"
● Betsky x 2: Atwood's "Not Interesting: On the Limits of Criticism in Architecture" is "both brilliant and (purposefully) confusing. Against the Ritalin-like-focused constructs of most architecture criticism, he instead proposes a meandering miasma of observations and hints."
● He finds "a wide variety of weirdness, but one that remains based on form and formalism" in "Possible Mediums" - "the question that haunts the book, though, is: To what end?"
● Birnbaum and Craver's "Shaping the Postwar Landscape" is "a rewarding read" about the individuals who "guided and informed landscape architecture during an especially exciting time."
● Brussat reviews Scruton's review of Stevens Curl's "Making Dystopia": "Nobody has done a better job of explaining the persistence of modern architecture," than Scruton - while other reviewers "have deployed falsehood and fake outrage as their chief critical tools."
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Michael Kimmelman: The Battle to Make the Strand a Landmark Is About More Than a Building: An attempt to preserve the home of a beloved independent bookstore points to a new way to think about saving the city’s cultural heritage: Call this the next frontier for preservation, Amazon’s handout being the 21st century version of the demolition of the old Penn Station...Without turning New York into Rome, the city clearly needs to recognize neighborhood fixtures and local businesses as examples of what Jorge Otero-Pailos...defines as “intangible heritage.” The issue isn’t only economic...Those stores on my childhood walk...weren’t just places to buy stuff.- New York Times |
John King: A cluster of towers at Market and Van Ness? Two are rising, and more are on the way: The tower proposed...hasn’t even been approved, but it’s already raised the bar for how developers and architects pitch big buildings in the San Francisco of 2019...Or, to take with a grain of salt...the simple truth is that it will take more than big buildings to improve the quality of life in this busy but problematic civic crossroads...The area includes roughly 14 square blocks...a patchy void...you don’t have to be an anti-growth zealot to be wary of the notion that quantity and quality are synonymous...Fortunately, the two Hub sites where construction has begun show promise. -- Kohn Pedersen Fox/KPF; Skidmore Owings & Merrill/SOM; Gould Evans; Frida Escobedo; Fletcher Studio [images]- San Francisco Chronicle |
John King: Teams vying to restore Presidio’s Fort Scott agree to join forces: ...“a single, consolidated proposal"...The Presidio Trust’s board has agreed to the new approach...a campus-like section of the national park would hold institutions devoted to exploring...climate change, artificial intelligence and the changing nature of the world economy...the combined team might be better able to take on the estimated $200 million-plus cost of restoring...22 historic buildings and the distinctive landscape that surrounds them. -- California Clean Energy Fund/EPIC Institute; World Economic Forum; OpenAI/Elon Musk/Peter Thiel/Reid Hoffman; WeWork- San Francisco Chronicle |
Jared Green: Landscape Architects Take the Lead on New Cultural District in Detroit: The Detroit Institute of Arts and the Midtown Detroit Inc...launched an international design competition...now it’s down to three interdisciplinary teams led by landscape architecture firms...All the teams seek to shrink down the width of boulevards; remove parking; add event spaces, cafes, and public art installations; and vastly expand public green space...proposals is on view at the DIA until April 1. -- Agence Ter (Paris); Mikyoung Kim Design (Boston); TEN x TEN (Minneapolis) [images]- The Dirt/American Society of Landscape Architects (ASLA) |
Anthony Paletta: As Brazil Went, So Did Oscar Niemeyer: The architect’s ability to land big works in his home country before and after his exile speaks to Brazil’s enthusiasm for civic gigantism and Modernism: There are ironies involved in Niemeyer’s success...a reflection of unusual open-mindedness over a remarkably sustained period...Expansive building programs are encouraging; it’s what follows that’s often been the trouble...While Brazil’s near future does not look promising, inspiration can still be drawn from the democratic spirit of Niemeyer’s works.- CityLab (formerly The Atlantic Cities) |
Ben Ikenson: A Priceless Archive of American Architecture Publishing: Meet George Smart, a Modernism fan now obsessed with assembling the largest open digital archive of 20th century U.S. architecture magazines...roughly 6,000 complete issues...some two-and-a-half million downloadable pages...may be bridging the generational gap between fresh converts and older devotees, while offering instructive context to conscientious professionals...efforts have earned 12 local, state, and national awards...including one of the AIA’s highest awards for non-architects.- CityLab (formerly The Atlantic Cities) |
RIBA launches Neave Brown Award for Housing: ...will recognize housing projects built in the UK...one third of the housing should be affordable and should demonstrate evidence of meeting the challenge of housing affordability...Brown is known as a socially-motivated, modernist architect, best known for designing a series of celebrated London housing estates. In 2018, he was awarded the UK’s highest honour for architecture, the Royal Gold Medal for Architecture; deadline: February 21- World Architecture News (UK) |
AIA Announces the Winners of the 2019 Institute Honor Awards for Architecture: Nine projects were recognized, including seven projects in the U.S., as well as one in Toronto and one in Denmark. -- Mahlum Architects; Hariri Pontarini Architects; Lake | Flato Architects + Matsys;| Looney Ricks Kiss; John G. Waite Associates, Architects; Barkow Leibinger; The Freelon Group (Now part of Perkins+Will)/Adjaye Associates/Davis Brody Bond/SmithGroup; OJT; BIG-Bjarke Ingels Group [images]- Architect Magazine |
London's Surface Design Show returns for 2019: ...will exhibit the latest materials in architecture and interior design...over 150 companies, from 14 different countries...some 40 talks and presentations surrounding the 2019 theme of public realm and workplace...Business Design Centre, London, February 5-7- Dezeen |
SoCal Museums announces the 14th Annual Museums Free-for-All on Saturday, February 2 and Sunday, February 3. Over 40 museums - presenting art, cultural heritage, natural history, and science - will open their doors and invite visitors to attend free of charge.- SoCal Museums |
Carolina A. Miranda: How shows of old photos and architectural designs hark back to a golden California of the 1900s: Homes that looked like castles and pre-Columbian theaters: the California of the 1920s was a place where anything went: ...at the California Historical Society in San Francisco...“Boomtowns: How Photography Shapes Los Angeles and San Francisco"...a century’s worth of urban photography...provides an excellent look back at a time in which both cities are looking forward - contending with growing pains related to infrastructure, equity, affordability and homelessness. thru March 10 [images]- Los Angeles Times |
This Art Show Is Taking the Literal Pulse of America: "Rafael Lozano-Hemmer: Pulse" uses biometrics to make breathtaking spectacle: The three works constitute the largest interactive technology exhibition at the Hirshhorn to date. Each requires the input of the visitor to activate it...“There is absolutely no tracking of an individual." thru April 28 [images]- Smithsonian magazine |
John S. Ives: In Mexico City, a 13-Foot Installation Explores a New High-Tech Approach to Casting Concrete: The design, which could unlock previously unattainable forms and reduce material waste, is collaboration between teams at ETH Zurich, Zaha Hadid Architects, and...Architecture Extrapolated: "KnitCandela"...part of "Design as Second Nature," a retrospective of [ZHA's] four decades of material innovation...an homage to Félix Candela...the system is a breakthrough for casting geometries that typically require elaborate, expensive formworks: KnitCrete... Museo Universitario Arte Contemporáneo, Mexico City, thru March 3 -- Mariana Popescu [images]- Metropolis Magazine |
Michael Z. Wise: "The Man in the Glass House: Philip Johnson, Architect of the Modern Century" by Mark Lamster: "Philip Johnson: Life and Work" by Franz Schulze laid bare the architect’s Nazi past...“decidedly unheroic” but that in the end he was “a trifler . . . a model of futility.” Now a new biography...passes tougher judgment on Johnson, for both his life and his work, finding a fundamental emptiness at the core of each...thoroughly researched and highly readable volume that vividly captures the essence of a complex and disturbing character.- Architectural Record |
Martin C. Pedersen: Jeff Speck on Walkable City Rules, Cars, and Why Bikes Make Streets Safer for Everyone: A talk with the author of "Walkable City Rules: 101 Steps to Making Better Places": His not-so-secret weapon - his “special sauce,” as he likes to call it - is his ability to make urban planning accessible. “Frankly, the most compelling arguments are the most entertaining arguments,” he says. “I learned that from Andres Duany. I’ve also found that people’s minds are never as open as when their mouths are open, laughing.”- Common Edge |
Stephen Danley: Can NIMBYs Fight for Justice? In a post-Katrina New Orleans, neighborhood associations increased their political power to promote or suppress development. But to whose benefit? The conflict between values plays out not only in big-ticket development but in smaller development decisions. [excerpt from “A Neighborhood Politics of Last Resort: Post-Katrina New Orleans and the Right to the City"]- Next City (formerly Next American City) |
Aaron Betsky: Attention Deficit Disorder Architecture: Andrew Atwood’s “Not Interesting” take on architecture criticism is a pretty interesting blur of ideas and images: Welcome to the age of ADD Architecture...both brilliant and (purposefully) confusing "Not Interesting: On the Limits of Criticism in Architecture"...what he is not interested in are buildings that are not interesting. He wonders instead whether we might be able to interpret our built environment from a different set of perspectives...Against the Ritalin-like-focused constructs of most architecture criticism, he instead proposes a meandering miasma of observations and hints.- Architect Magazine |
Aaron Betsky: Welcome to the New Normal: A group of young designers offers “possible mediums” instead of buildings: Theory has seemed so last millennium for so long that I am happy to report that it is back...it justifies its work not so much through abstract theories as it does with storytelling, fairy tales, and other “fake” realities..."Possible Mediums" by Kelly Bair, Kristy Balliet, Adam Fure, and Kyle Miller...seeks to serve as the handbook for these approaches...The result is a wide variety of weirdness, but one that remains based on form and formalism...hints that the production of such experiments is the normal activity of architecture today...the question that haunts the book, though, is: To what end?- Architect Magazine |
The Pioneers of Postwar Landscape Architecture: "Shaping the Postwar Landscape," edited by Charles A. Birnbaum and Scott Craver is the fifth in a series...While the editors set out to provide a reference guide, they’ve achieved a relatively compelling read...It was a time in which the profession of landscape architecture experienced impressive growth...The individuals chronicled...guided and informed landscape architecture during an especially exciting time...a rewarding read. -- The Cultural Landscape Foundation (TCLF) [images]- The Dirt/American Society of Landscape Architects (ASLA) |
David Brussat: The mods’ survival explained: Nobody has done a better job of explaining the persistence of modern architecture than does Roger Scruton in his review of James Stevens Curl’s "Making Dystopia"...Scruton sums up with precision what Stevens Curl describes at length and in stunning detail in his book, subtitled “The Strange Rise and Survival of Architectural Barbarism"...reviewers...have deployed falsehood and fake outrage as their chief critical tools. Anything to avoid addressing the book’s indictment forthrightly...Whether through evasion or deceit, modern architecture’s leadership has ensured that, as Sir Roger puts it, “error has been programmed into the system.”- Architecture Here and There |
ANN feature: rise in the city 2018 Update: Student Designs for Affordable Housing in Lesotho Shine. A Few Prized Blocks Needing Sponsors Remain: Student designs for affordable housing in Maseru, Lesotho, Southern Africa, are in and - hot-off-the-press - winning designs will be prototyped!- ArchNewsNow.com |
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