Today’s News - Tuesday, October 20, 2020
● Charu Suri profiles the non-profit Office Hours, launched in July by architectural historian and artist Esther Choi, "offering mentorship to emerging BIPOC design creatives - predicated on the notion that self-identification is crucial to reinforcing the belief that being a BIPOC creative is possible."
● Wainwright x 2: He interviews Scottish-Ghanaian architect Lesley Lokko (now temporarily in Edinburgh) re: her resignation as dean of CCNY's Spitzer School of Architecture - "the obstacles that she encountered in New York were unlike anything she had come up against before" - and her plans for the future (in Accra).
● He cheers Denizen Works' "beautiful chapel on a barge - bringing salvation to Hackney hipsters. The holy vessel is an arresting thing to encounter on the towpath" (indeed!).
● Robert Neuwirth takes a deep dive into why "a Singaporean firm has become the go-to master planner in 10 African countries": "'You fly in, fly out and get the job done.' This attitude is exactly what worries architects across Africa" (Akon City = "Morris Lapidus on acid").
● Meanwhile, Sidewalk Labs launches Delve, "a generative design tool" that "aims to guide developers, architects, and planners in the creation of healthy, sustainable, and equitable urban neighborhoods" - and "dramatically speed up and optimizes the planning process."
● Cajsa Carlson reports on a range of recycled-plastic houses, designed by Julien de Smedt in collaboration with the Norwegian startup Othalo and UN Habitat, using a system that "will allow the millions of tons of plastic waste to become useful building material" (each house incorporates around 8 tons).
● Dan Charles talks to Donnel Baird re: how his BlocPower is "fighting climate change, one building at a time - focusing on neighborhoods that don't have a lot of money to invest. 'Solar panels aren't just for rich people, or for White people. They're for everybody.'"
● Bill McKibben digs into "the most important global forecast" re: the environment "that you've never heard of" + a great Q&A with DLAND's Susannah Drake re: lessons from Sponge Park "for cities trying to deal with sea-level rise."
● TCLF's Birnbaum responds to the "evasive responses from Hirshhorn officials" re: whether they consider the Sculpture Garden a work of art - if they don't, "they should explain why."
● Hilburg reports on Design Miami/'s "Architects for Beirut, a fundraising initiative to help restore the historic city's damaged buildings and public spaces" by offering original drawings, signed prints, models, and books by a who's who in the architectural world (all proceeds will go to on-the-ground rebuilding efforts).
● The National Trust for Historic Preservation's annual conference, themed PastForward 2020, kicks off - online - next week "with adjusted registration rates to make this year's conference as accessible for as many people as possible.
● Ravenscroft brings us newly released images of Dubai 2020 Expo's main pavilions by a who's who in the architectural world on the day the 6-month extravaganza was set to open - now rescheduled for 2021.
● Eyefuls (and project profiles) of Dezeen Awards 2020 architecture public vote winners.
● Call for entries: Nominations for the inaugural On The Brinck Award to honor the best books about Architecture, Community & Regional Planning, and Landscape Architecture (no collections or monographs), sponsored by University of New Mexico School of Architecture & Planning.
● Call for entries: ArchDaily's 2020 Young Practices.
● ICYMI: ANN feature: Excerpt: "Stanford White in Detail" by Samuel G. White; photos by Jonathan Wallen: A rich presentation of the sensual and scenographic effects created by the legendary architect. For White, every surface was an opportunity, and few opportunities were neglected.
Special Event:
● NYC Architecture Biennial 2020: "Social Inclusion in the Workplace and in Design" October 20-23: Online and free of charge - an opportunity to reach a broader audience around the world - the lectures will be shared in English, Spanish, and Mandarin. ArchNewsNow is proud to be a media sponsor!
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Charu Suri: A Grassroots Mentorship Program Aims to Break Down Design Industry Barriers: Office Hours is offering mentorship to emerging BIPOC design creatives: When architectural historian and artist Esther Choi started the nonprofit...a mentoring initiative that features design creatives who identify as Black, indigenous, and people of color, she didn’t quite realize the impact that it would have...[It] is predicated on the notion that self-identification is crucial to reinforcing the belief that being a BIPOC creative is possible. -- Dong-Ping Wong/Food New York- Architectural Digest |
Oliver Wainwright: Interview: 'Race is never far from the surface': Lesley Lokko on quitting New York: The Scottish-Ghanaian architect resigned as dean at the Spitzer school after less than a year citing ‘a lack of respect and empathy for black women’: ...Lokko is widely regarded as one of the most progressive voices in architectural education. But the obstacles that she encountered in New York were unlike anything she had come up against before. “It was a textbook ‘problem woman of colour’ scenario,” [she says] speaking from Edinburgh where she has temporarily relocated...plans to set up an independent school of architecture in Accra.- Guardian (UK) |
Oliver Wainwright: The floating church: inside the holy vessel bringing salvation to Hackney hipsters: The area around London’s Olympic Park is a regeneration hothouse with micro-breweries, tech startups, speakeasys and spas. Now their spiritual needs are being met - with a beautiful chapel on a barge: Genesis will be moored here for up to five years...before setting off on a voyage around London’s waterways...The holy vessel is an arresting thing to encounter on the towpath... -- Murray Kerr/Denizen Works- Guardian (UK) |
Robert Neuwirth: A Singaporean firm has become the go-to master planner for African cities: Surbana Jurong has signed contracts to do city master plans in 10 African countries. Why is the continent relying on outside firms to map its future? ...a global firm owned by the government of Singapore...one of the few clues regarding how the company operates: “You fly in, fly out and get the job done.” This attitude is exactly what worries architects across Africa...So what do these architects think a truly African city should look like in the 21st century?...a few possible principles: -- Issa Diabaté/Koffi & Diabaté Group; Kabage Karanja/Cave_Bureau; Omar Degan/DO Architecture; Hussein Bakri/Akon City; Christian Benimana/Mass Design Group; Kunlé Adeyemi/NLÉ- City Monitor |
Sidewalk Labs launches Delve, a generative design tool for optimized urban development: ...aims to guide developers, architects, and planners in the creation of healthy, sustainable, and equitable urban neighborhoods by presenting...a wide plethora of design possibilities, generated via machine learning, that respond to the unique criteria presented by individual projects...intended to dramatically speed up and optimizes the planning process...has already been employed as part of a case study...[in] planning of the 12-acre mixed-use development at the North East Lands site at Wembley Park, an 85-acre redevelopment project...- The Architect's Newspaper |
Cajsa Carlson: Julien de Smedt designs range of recycled-plastic houses: ...working with Norwegian startup Othalo... in partnership with UN Habitat - the United Nations' programme for sustainable urban development - homes are designed to be a low-cost option for sub-Saharan Africa...[each] house incorporating around eight tonnes of plastic waste...the same building blocks will be used for various kinds of housing...the system will allow the millions of tonnes of plastic waste to become useful building material...aims to eventually expand...into temperature-controlled mobile storage units for food and medicine, as well as refugee shelters and larger modular buildings such as schools and hospitals. -- Frank Cato Lahti- Dezeen |
Dan Charles: Fighting Climate Change, One Building At A Time: ...with a company that he founded called BlocPower. [Donnel Baird] is attacking one of the seemingly intractable sources of America's greenhouse emissions: old residential buildings...focusing on neighborhoods that don't have a lot of money to invest..."Solar panels aren't just for rich people, or for White people. They're for everybody"...deploying new technology [and] created new ways to finance...targeting...small apartment buildings, community centers, and churches, almost exclusively in low-income neighborhoods. They've worked on a thousand buildings so far, in half a dozen cities.- NPR / National Public Radio |
Bill McKibben/350.org: The Most Important Global Forecast That You’ve Never Heard Of: A new scenario from the International Energy Agency that tries to foresee a world in which we reach net-zero carbon emissions by 2050 is a step in the right direction: Next year...there are signs that important parts of the world’s financial system are already beginning to get the message. + Q&A with Susannah Drake/DLANDstudio re: there may be lessons from Sponge Park [along Brooklyn’s Gowanus Canal] for cities trying to deal with sea-level rise.- The New Yorker |
Charles A. Birnbaum: But is it Art? Evasive Responses from Hirshhorn Officials about the Sculpture Garden Redesign: Washington, D.C. Historic Preservation Office unequivocally stated...the sculpture garden is “an important work of art”...Oddly, senior Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden officials queried on the subject could not or would not render an opinion...If [they] do not consider landscape architecture to be an art form and their sculpture garden a work of art, they should explain why...do they not have a professional and ethical obligation to make that determination before executing a plan that would have ramifications long after they depart the institution? -- Gordon Bunshaft; Lester Collins; Hiroshi Sugimoto- The Cultural Landscape Foundation (TCLF) |
Jonathan Hilburg: Design Miami/ launches an art and architectural drawing sale to fundraise for Beirut recovery: ...Architects for Beirut, a fundraising initiative to help restore the historic city’s damaged buildings and public spaces...through November 17...nearly 100 architects or their offices contributed work...All of the proceeds will go towards on-the-ground rebuilding efforts. -- Norman Foster; Toyo Ito; James Wines; SO - IL; David Adjaye; Toshiko Mori; Michael Van Valkenburgh; Amale Andraos/WORKac; Makram el Kadi & Ziad Jamaleddine; Barry Bergdoll; Aric Chen; Nader Tehrani; Terence Riley; Sean Anderson- The Architect's Newspaper |
PastForward Online 2020: Join us online for the first virtual National Preservation Conference, October 27-30, 2020: ...with adjusted registration rates to make this year’s conference as accessible for as many people as possible. Featuring the themes Resilience and Relevance...more than 32 sessions on topics such as racial justice and equity, dealing with the effects of the pandemic, climate change, the challenges facing America’s main streets, and many more.- National Trust for Historic Preservation/NTHP |
Tom Ravenscroft: Dubai 2020 Expo reveals main pavilions ahead of rescheduled event: ...released images of buildings by Adrian Smith + Gordon Gill, Grimshaw and Foster + Partners that will host next year's coronavirus-delayed event....scheduled to begin [today], meaning that many of the buildings on the 438-hectare (1,083 acres) site to the south of Dubai are largely complete. October 1, 2021- March 31, 2022 -- HOK; Santiago Calatrava; AGi Architects; Hopkins Architects; Es Devlin; Asif Khan- Dezeen |
Dezeen Awards 2020 architecture public vote winners -- -- Vo Trong Nghia Architects; A-01; Tectone + Tact Architecte; Henrique Barros-Gomes Architects; Heatherwick Studio; Durbach Block Jaggers Architects & John Wardle Architects; OV Architekti; Nic Brunsdon; Atelier Tao+C; Unparelld'arquitectes; Snøhetta; Schwartz Besnosoff Architects- Dezeen |
Call for entries: Nominations for the inaugural On The Brinck Award to honor the best books about Architecture, Community & Regional Planning, and Landscape Architecture (inclusive of environmental design and urban design) published 2017-19 (no collections or monographs); sponsored by University of New Mexico School of Architecture & Planning (UNM SA+P); Round 1 deadline: November 30- University of New Mexico School of Architecture & Planning (UNM SA+P) |
Call for entries: ArchDaily's 2020 Young Practices: to highlight young, emerging practices that are providing innovative approaches, proposals, and solutions...Tell us about what your practice says about the challenges we're facing, share your portfolio with us, and describe your contribution to the future of architecture and cities; deadline: November 8- ArchDaily |
NYC Architecture Biennial 2020: "Social Inclusion in the Workplace and in Design" October 20-23: Conference will be online and free of charge, This is an opportunity for us to reach out to a broader audience around the world - the lectures will be shared in English, Spanish, and Mandarin. ArchNewsNow is proud to be a media sponsor!- New York City Architecture Biennial |
ANN feature: Excerpt: "Stanford White in Detail" by Samuel G. White; photographs by Jonathan Wallen: A rich presentation of the sensual and scenographic effects created by the legendary architect. For White, every surface was an opportunity, and few opportunities were neglected.- ArchNewsNow.com |
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