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FeaturedCity Block Center / Pablo Dellatorre

Editor's ChoiceAl Jazeera’s Rebel Architecture: Episode 3, “The Architecture of Violence”

Sauflon Centre of Innovation / Foldes Architects

Architects: Foldes Architects
Location: Gyál, Hungary
Principal Designer: Laszlo Foldes
Area: 730.0 sqm
Year: 2013
Photographs: Tamas Bujnovszky

Seaside, Florida was one of Duany and Plater-Zyberg's early attempts at New Urbanism. Image © Flickr CC User Tim Cummins

Spotlight: Andrés Duany

Andrés Duany, a founding partner of Miami firms Arquitectonica and Duany Plater Zyberg & Company and a co-founder of the Congress for New Urbanism, turns 65 today. As an advocate of New Urbanism, since the early 1990s Duany has been instrumental creating renewed focus on walkable, mixed use neighborhoods, in reaction against the sprawling, car-centric modernist urbanism of the previous decades. More about Duany and New Urbanism after the break.

Bahrain's analysis of Modernism in the Arabic nations is arguably contrary to the theme of 'Absorbing Modernity'. Image © Nico Saieh

Beyond Starchitects: An Architectural Revolution at the 2014 Venice Biennale

“The Biennale reveals that modernism was never a style. It was a cultural, political, and social practice,” says Sarah Williams Goldhagen in her recent article for New Republic, The Great Architect Rebellion of 2014. This year, the Venice Biennale dissects the notion of modernism by providing a hefty cross-section of architectural history in the central pavilion. However contrary to Koolhaas‘ prescriptive brief, the 65 national pavilions show modernism was not just a movement, but a socially-driven, culturally attuned reaction to the “exigencies of life in a rapidly changing and developing world.” Unexpected moments define the 2014 Venice Biennale: from Niemeyer‘s desire to launch Brazil into the first world through architectural creation, to South Korea‘s unveiling of a deep modernist tradition with influence across the nation. This Biennale proved to be truly rebellious – read Goldhagen’s article from New Republic here to find out why.

North Classroom Block / CEPLAN

Architects: CEPLAN
Location: Universidade de Brasília – Brasília, Distrito Federal, 70910-900, Brasil
Authors: Alberto Alves de Faria, Fabiana Couto Garcia, Fátima Lauria Pires
Collaborators: Ana Carolina Caetano Alves
Project Area: 1265.0 m2
Project Year: 2011
Photographs: Joana França

Moleskine Livescribe Notebooks: Analog and Digital Together at Last

Forget about scanning the pages of your notebook – you can now work in both analog and digital at the same time. Moleskine recently teamed up with Livescribe, a smartpen manufacturer, to create two new notebooks that work exclusively with Livescribe smartpens to instantly transfer ideas from paper to screen. The notebooks feature add-ons that make this possible, but still retain the rounded edges, elastic closures, ribbon bookmarks, and other details Moleskine notebooks are known for. To learn about the notebook add-ons and how they work with the smartpens, keep reading after the break.

Architect Lord Richard Rogers and the Making Of Scandicci City

<a href="http://www.vimeo.com/103230528">http://www.vimeo.com/103230528</a> Scandicci City began as a suburb of Florence and was often described as a commuter town with a lack of a clear urban center. Having reached out to Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners to address this need, this short documentary created by scandiccibyrogers.com offers a look inside Rogers’ studio in London and the creation of a new urban master plan for Scandicci City.
In it, Rogers explains his belief that public places are crucial parts of cities, and discusses how urban areas can begin to develop from a dense core – an urban design strategy that responds to the rising popularity of city living in recent years, and utilizes public transportation rather than relying on cars.

Formstelle / Format Elf Architekten

Architects: Format Elf Architekten
Location: Töging am Inn, Germany
Photographs: Courtesy of Format Elf Architekten, Bettina Kirmeier

COBE’s Adaptive Reuse of Nordhavnen Silo Marks Beginning of Redevelopment

Danish firm COBE is transforming the largest industrial building in Nordhavnen – a silo – into an apartment building with both private and public functions. For COBE, who also created the urban development plans for Nordhavnen, this project marks the beginning of the post-industrial area’s future. Nordhavnen is a harbor area located only 4km from Copenhagen‘s city centre.
“The exciting thing about old industrial property is how to preserve their soul and at the same time use them for something else,” said Klaus Kastbjerg, the owner of the silo, commenting on the adaptive reuse project. To preserve the soul of the silo, the architects will maintain a raw industrial feeling on the interior. Each of the 40 retrofitted apartments will contain visible historic remnants such as existing concrete columns and walls.
Keep reading after the break for more information and images…

Quinta da Faísca / Carlos Castanheira

Architects: Carlos Castanheira
Location: 5070-272 Favaios, Portugal
Architect In Charge: Carlos Castanheira & Clara Bastai, Arqtos Lda.
Design Team: Orlando Sousa, Sérgio Barbosa
Year: 2013
Photographs: Fernando Guerra – FG+SG, Courtesy of Carlos Castanheira

Le Havre – Cote Docks Vauban / Philippe Dubus Architecte

Architects: Philippe Dubus Architecte
Location: Le Havre, France
Area: 4745.0 sqm
Year: 2013
Photographs: Sergio Grazia

Private Family Home / LA Hally Architect

Architects: LA Hally Architect
Location: Hiltingbury Road, Chandler’s Ford, Eastleigh, Hampshire SO53, UK
Year: 2014
Photographs: Joel Knight

The Barbican in London. Image © Flickr CC User Rene Passet

Brutalism: Back in Vogue?

Are Brutalist buildings, once deemed cruel and ugly, making a comeback? Reyner Banham‘s witty play on the French term for raw concrete, beton brut, was popularized by a movement of hip, young architects counteracting what they perceived as the bourgeois and fanciful Modernism of the 1930s. Though the use of raw concrete in the hands of such artist-architects as Le Corbusier seems beautiful beneath the lush Mediterranean sun, under the overcast skies of northern Europe Brutalist architecture earned a much less flattering reputation. Since the 1990s, young architects, designers, and artists have celebrated formerly denounced buildings, developing a fashionably artistic following around buildings like Erno Goldfinger‘s Trellick Tower, “even if long-term residents held far more ambivalent views of this forceful high-rise housing block.” To learn more about this controversial history and to read Jonathan Glancey‘s speculation for its future, read the full article on BBC, here.

Denver Library, South Elevation, 1994, pencil and colored pencil on yellow tracing paper, 14 x 26 inches. Image Courtesy of Michael Graves & Associates, photo: Ken Ek

Michael Graves 50 Year Retrospective to Open in October

An exhibition celebrating one of North America’s foremost postmodern architects will open this October, marking 50 years of Michael Graves‘ practice. Past as Prologue maps the evolution of Graves’ work in architecture and product design through an array of media including sculpture, painting, furniture, drawings and models. The comprehensive exhibition will begin with Graves’ work from 1964 and conclude with works currently in progress. The exhibition will be hosted by Grounds for Sculpture with a mission to provide insight into the five-decade progression of Graves’ unique design process. More on the exhibition after the break.

Canyons do Lago House / Mutabile Arquitetura

Architects: Mutabile Arquitetura
Location: Capitólio – Minas Gerais, Brazil
Design Team: Gabriel Souza, Isabel Brant, Priscila Musa
Area: 569.0 sqm
Year: 2012
Photographs: Carlos Dias

Spotlight: Fumihiko Maki

Fumihiko Maki, the Pritzker Prize laureate and 67th AIA Gold Medalist, turns 86 today. Widely considered to be one of Japan’s most distinguished living architects, Maki practices a unique style of Modernism that reflects his Japanese origin. Toshiko Mori has praised Maki’s ability to create “ineffable atmospheres” using a simple palette of various types of metal, concrete, and glass. His consistent integration and adoption of new methods of construction as part of his design language contribute to his personal quest to create “unforgettable scenes.”

How Will We Design The Offices of the Future?

In keeping with present office trends, the Lumosity offices in San Francisco prizes lounge-like work environments, both informal and easy to personalize. Image Courtesy of Matthew Millman/Lumosity

For many years, the world of office design remained relatively stagnant, with a light, open plan office floor and a generously-sized cubicle about as much as most employees could hope for. But recently all this has changed: the world of the technophilic, fun loving “Generation Y” has taken over, and with it come offices that mix the best elements of the traditional office with design culled from living rooms, coffee shops and children’s playspaces. This will remain the future of office design for some time – or will it? According to Dr Michael O’Neill, senior research strategist at Haworth, the Gen-Y office’s days are already numbered, as he explains in this article originally published by Metropolis Magazine. Read on after the break to find out why.

Serge Baranx School Refurbishment / Pierre Marsan

Architects: Pierre Marsan
Location: 40380 Montfort-en-Chalosse, France
Year: 2011
Photographs: Arthur Pequin

Are Abandoned Constructions the Ruins of Modernity?

Europe‘s ancient ruins are numerous: Pompeii, the Parthenon, the Colosseum – but what about new ruins? Skeletons of incomplete buildings now litter the skylines of European cities. A form of memento mori, these abandoned constructions prove that no structure is permanent or impervious to the changing desires of a society in flux. English photographer Sam Laughlin documents the creation of these ‘ruins’ in his series Frameworks, a contemporary dissection of the aging built environment.
Enter the abandoned world in Frameworks with more photos and info after the break.

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Sunday, September 7, 2014

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