brennan + company architects

Humanitarian Design - Emily Pilloton

2010-01-20T17:47:00.000-08:00

The Colbert Report

Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c

Emily Pilloton

www.colbertnation.com

Colbert Report Full Episodes

Political Humor

Economy

Designer Emily Pilloton wants to create things that aren't just well designed, but have a positive social impact. People. Planet. Profit. These three words focus the concept of humanitarian design---design that has necessary human purpose, is kind to the planet and is also potentially profitable. Philloton's book, "Design Revolution: 100 Products that Empower People" shows and tells the story.

Colbert gives her an opportunity to give us some insight. One example, is the pushable plastic drum. For people who must walk miles to obtain clean water, the drum holds 20 gallons. Once filled it weighs 400 lbs. The "push weight" of it, however, is 40 pounds. A person can fill the drum and then push it home. Without the drum, people could carry only a few gallons at most. These simple design ideas are revolutionizing the lives of people in the developing world.

Pilloton's mission is to encourage and report on the ideas that provide humanitarian solutions to vexing problems of the poor. We can't believe the eye glasses that have a self adjusting prescription lens. With all the gloomy feelings today about our economy and strange times, Pilloton offers a demonstration of how designers do good things with their minds and hearts.

Baltimore Woman Fined for Green Landscaping

2010-01-19T09:22:00.000-08:00

Wood Chip Playground

A local Butchers Hill resident, Maxine Taylor, used wood chips to create a parking pad at her woodsy, stable-house that she renovated. She lives in the house and also has her studio in the space. The city ordered Ms. Taylor to use either asphalt or concrete, both impermeable surfaces. This article provides a lively discourse on the conflict over green options. There are some gnarly transitional issues involved in moving to a greener community. Most conflicts involve building codes that have not caught up with sound environmental practices

Our favorite quote, from Ms. Taylor:

"I though there was way too much concrete," she said. "I didn't know about sustainability or runoff. I was just trying to be...what's today's word? Green?"

The city's own Sustainability Plan for a "cleaner, greener" city calls for removing impervious surfaces citywide to reduce the runoff into the storm drains and into our dying Chesapeake Bay. In fact, the Parks & People Foundation, with help from city grants has removed 20 acres of pavement. In place of the pavement, they planted trees, grass and flowers to soak up rainfall.

Its a loopy time.

One Year in 120 Seconds

2010-01-09T15:11:00.000-08:00

We have been hard pressed to post in the new year. Life is swirling around us. So, we'll post this time-lapsed video from Oslo, Norway, before we lose our way. This one has nature, environment and architecture (you will see a vernacular house in the background!). It sets a beautiful tone. Provides a quiet relief. Lasts more than :30 or 140 characters. Ironically, this visual speeding up of time, reminds us to slow down and crack open each day.

Sliding House

2010-01-08T07:18:00.000-08:00

Awesome.

Cleaning Up Detroit One Orange Object at a Time

2009-12-30T16:31:00.000-08:00

Metropolis Magazine discusses Detroit's confrontation with its deterioration here. A group of former Cranbrook Academy of Art students, appalled by the number of deteriorated houses in the city, formed Object Orange. They painted the dangerous and dilapidated houses orange so that they could be exposed and dealt with. Both things happened. The houses they painted orange were clearly seen and shortly demolished, one may assume from embarrassment, by the city.

“At this point in Detroit there are so many abandoned spaces,” says Christian, a New Jersey native who recently began teaching at a university in Colorado. “Living around these neighborhoods and experiencing the product of the blight and seeing what happens to the children and the landscape, we’re just kind of questioning it and saying, ‘Why is nothing done? Why is this happening?’”

There also seems to be a whiff of art object to us. Art and social action? Art as protest?

If nothing else Object Orange has produced a new typology for site-specific art installations: art as a possible agent of demolition. “I tell my students that if you’re in Detroit you don’t need a studio,” Christian says. “The city is one big studio.”

We like their attitude.

Blu Dot Goes Undercover with Real Good Chair

2009-12-30T06:38:00.000-08:00

On November 4-5, 25 Real Good Chairs were dropped around NYC, free for the take. Many were GPS-enabled. Watch the film to see what happened. It is a little lengthy (that is, longer than :30), but more fun than numerous "action" films we've seen lately. This is a great example of "gorilla advertising."

Small House Flickr Slide Show

2009-12-30T05:50:00.000-08:00

As we step across the dividing line between this year and next, let us celebrate the small, the reasonable, the wee.

via Small House Style

A Reason to Celebrate

2009-12-23T10:17:00.000-08:00

This evokes the all-embracing spirit of the holiday. Thanks, again, to TED.

Thought for the Holiday.

2009-12-23T05:43:00.000-08:00

"I have about reached the conclusion that, while large industry is important, fresh air and clean water are more important, and the day may well come when we have to lay that kind of hand on the table and see who is bluffing." Barry M. Goldwater

Social Media and Its Unnerving Creepy Facts.

2009-12-21T19:08:00.000-08:00

There is no going back.

What to do with Empty Space in Depressed Areas of a City?

2009-12-21T16:51:00.000-08:00

(The pitch starts at :58)

RIBA Guerrilla Tactics 2009: Space Invaders Live Pitch

The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) is striving to address many of the same urban issues we struggle with here in the United States. At each year's annual meeting, a problem is posed for a "Guerrilla" (cheap, under the radar) solution.

How would you propose to use abandoned space?

This year's Guerrilla Tactics Live Pitch was titled Space Invaders and was designed to respond to the Arts Council "Art in Empty Spaces" movement that is rolling across the country. Piercy Connor Architects went up against Feix and Merlin to pitch their solutions in front of a panel of industry experts, architectural peers and clients. Not an easy crowd. The moderator's comment at the end, made to the winning team was a gentle, whack in the face of designer illusions.

Most Puzzeling Patents of 2009

2009-12-21T15:19:00.000-08:00

(Click image to enlarge)

Creative minds flock to the U.S. Patent Office to assure that their ingenious idea is not ripped from their hands by someone who beat them to it. Designer extraordinaire, Paula Sher, has taken this year's most thought provoking submissions and created a jovial graphic to represent them. Click on the chart above. It will pop-out to set your mind humming with new thoughts, inventions, bright ideas you have been meaning to get to and all manner of folly. Note the categories that border the panel. Click!

Pentagram Pulls Back the Curtain, a Little.

2009-12-21T14:56:00.000-08:00

Wallpaper, the magazine of design cognoscenti (and a few poseurs!), has just published the Pentagram holiday cards that have been mailed to a select design community since 1974. Pentagram, founded in London, and now with offices around the planet is one of the most prestigious design firms in the world. Wallpaper explains:

Each Christmas, Pentagram designs and publishes a small book and sends it to a very select group. Intended to provide diversions during what, for many, can be a hectic period, the booklets traditionally avoid any direct reference to the festive season, adopting a strong graphic vocabulary, setting them apart from the myriad of cards received at this time of year. Since John McConnell's first design in 1974, they've grown to become a cult collectors' item.
In the spirit of goodwill, Pentagram opened their archives for us so we could celebrate the history of their unique way of celebrating Christmas, without any tinsel or fairy lights in sight. Which is just how we like it.

Its hard not to like Pentagram, although, envy does get in the way.

www.pentagram.com

Landscape Wonder from Norway's NRK

2009-12-20T06:58:00.000-08:00

In honor of our little mashup of snow and ice here in Baltimore, we thought we'd post this gorgeous video. It is just ten minutes of a train ride through Norway, the place where snow really falls. The original was 7 1/2 HOURS long. It aired in Norway on November 27. It was watched, beginning to end, by 1.2 million Norwegians, one-quarter of the population.

The full length video shows every minute of the scenic train ride between Bergen on the Norwegian west coast, crossing the mountains to the capital of Oslo. You can download the entire video here. The NRK has also thrown open the door to the creative world. Designers and videographers are invited to edit it, remix it, share it, cut it, color it, digitize it. Whatever. (The Creative Commons license applies.)

The full-length video was a wild idea by the staff at NRK, the state run Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation. The wild idea turned out to be a wild success. Besides the size of the viewing audience, there were over 1,500 tweets (and still growing) posted (#bergensbanen). From our perspective, it seems like a orgy of landscape devotion. The NRK deserves some praise. That they invited people to simply observe the landscape of their country was a daring notion and a wonderful gift. No spectacle. No drama. No screaming, talking heads. Just the natural world.

Let it snow!

2009-12-20T05:36:00.000-08:00

Here's the situation in Baltimore today: the Blizzard of 2009. We like how snow rounds things and softens the world. Too, noise pollution disappears. There is just the wonderful, white, quiet. If only we could wrap the city in the equivalent of insulation noise control batts year-round!

2009-12-20T05:28:00.000-08:00

If you like a slew of wonderful images for inspiration or just for feasting, we recommend a leisurely cruise on the blog "Feasting Never Stops."

Unchop a Tree - Maya Lin, "What is Missing?"

2009-12-16T15:44:00.000-08:00

Maya Lin - Unchopping A Tree from Unchop A Tree on Vimeo.

Maya Lin, from her groundbreaking project "What is Missing?," provides a moving video on the shocking effects of deforestation. Imagine: the equivalent of Central Park is destroyed in 9 minutes. Don't miss the unchopping at the end! rebmiT!!

Dirty Ugly Design - The Decade of

2009-12-16T07:26:00.000-08:00

(From left) Cover of Steve Heller and Mirko Ilic’s book Handwritten (2006);
and Jon Gray’s book jacket design for Everything Is Illuminated (2002)

Jonny Hannah’s hand-drawn lettering for the Starbucks Birmingham International
Jazz Festival 2005 (left) and the book Telling Tales (2004).

Steven Heller Speaks

Steven Heller of the School of Visual Arts In NYC makes the argument that graphics of the 90s were driven by the concept of "dirty design." It is an interesting and, by any measure of the comments section, a controversial point of view.

Apple, Target and Ikea, Too
We tend to think it is an oversimplification of the graphics for the age of George W. Bush, especially considering the potent graphics of Apple, Target and Ikea . But, the "dirty" style was a breath of fresh air in the midst of tight, conservative memes that predominated the decade.

Praise to it all.

I.D Magazine Folds!

2009-12-16T06:37:00.000-08:00

ID Magazine, America's foremost design magazine, has devastated the design world by announcing it is ceasing publication. The bible of the design cognoscenti is gone. Awful news.

Citing the dramatic drop in advertisers and the rise of unique, segmented web resources, some free of charge, the magazine announced its closing---the day after "Employee Appreciation Day."

Design and Web 2.0 Distractions

2009-12-15T06:01:00.000-08:00

FINGERS ON THE POLITICAL PULSE: Senate aides with
BlackBerrys in hand during a committee meeting .
(Sarah L. Voisin/the Washington Post

"We can't see the garden."

The Washington Post offers a critique of the PDA / laptop world. This one has great meaning for designers. This trend portends the demise of awareness of one's surroundings as a consequence of spending oodles of time with one's head down reading the latest on a Blackberry, iPhone, and all manner of gadgets and apps. Robert Harrison, professor of Italian Literature at Stanford offered this nugget:

The difficulty, Harrison argues, is that we are losing something profoundly human, the capacity to connect deeply to our environments.

Landscape designers talk about bestowing on a garden its genius loci, or spirit of the place, that bubbles up into your consciousness if its presence is strong enough and the visitor meditative enough to receive it.

Harrison says a garden truly reveals itself only when its own depths and those of the beholder flow together. But that takes time. "For the gardens to become fully visible in space, they require a temporal horizon that the age makes less and less room for."

Designers, architects, take note: the "cloaking device."

"Most of the groves, courtyards, gardens, fountains, artworks, open spaces and architectural complexes have disappeared behind a cloaking device, it would seem," he writes in his book "Gardens: An Essay on the Human Condition."

What will it take to bring us back to our context? Or, how will our environments change in order to elicit interactions and bestow a sense of place? Or, what will become of our relationship to the constructed world? Only questions, it seems.

Architectural Freedom Compromised by Swiss

2009-12-12T11:29:00.000-08:00

Minarets Banned
The Washington Post reported that in a referendum last month, 57.5 percent of Switzerland's voting citizens endorsed adoption of a law banning minarets, and only minarets, the often elegant towers attached to mosques throughout the Islamic world.

University of Maryland Architect Responds
Roger K. Lewis, a practicing architect and a professor emeritus of architecture at the University of Maryland, offers this reasonable thought in his recent blistering rebuke of the Swiss in the Washington Post:

During this holiday season of glad tidings and goodwill, perhaps the Swiss will reconsider their reactionary vote. Rather than outlawing minarets, a fundamental component of mosque architecture, the Swiss should do the right thing: ensure that a mosque and its minaret comply with the same laws and standards as churches and other buildings serving citizens of the community.

Period.

Font Favorite

2009-12-10T07:01:00.001-08:00

When the Salahi's crashed the State dinner, they not only created Washington's newest verb, to be "Salahi'd," it looks like we have a new typeface as well. Sorry, we couldn't resist. Politico article.

Give me an "S!" Give me an "A!" Give me an "L!" Give me an "A", "H," "I!" What did we spell?!

Pursuit of Happiness

2009-12-10T05:59:00.001-08:00

Click to enlarge image

A terrific photo essay by Maira Kalman, who blogs once a month for the New York Times. The subject, Back to the Land, was a Thanksgiving reflection for her NYT blog "And the Pursuit of Happiness." We won't elaborate, but the innovative design graphic with text is a breath of fresh air. And, Alice Waters and democracy get involved.

"The United State of America could be less fastly, fastly and more slowly, slowly."

As far as moving back to the land, a theme in Kalman's essay, we are urbanists. We suggest: Stay in the city. Make your home greener; spend more on real food; enjoy life where you are. Others may differ.

Advice to a Young Architect

2009-12-07T14:21:00.000-08:00

The brilliant and somewhat adorable, Ma Yansong, 34 year old Chinese architect of renown, and founder of MAD architects, was recently interviewed by DesignBoom. Ma's career is nothing but remarkable. Trained by Yale and Zaha Hadid, he seems to be creating the future with each new, amazing structure. When asked what advice he would give to young architects, he responded:

Don't hesitate.
Make a decision fast. Follow the first 5 seconds instinct.
If you think you need to compare and you hesitate,
then it must be a wrong decision. As in your life one
decision comes after the other and if you realize you do
something wrong, you know it is because of a previous
decision, which was a mistake. I think everyone should
follow their heart. Robert Stern, the Dean of the Arts and
Architecture at Yale says this to all the students on their
graduation day : 'You should forget everything you learned
from school and start on your own. No matter who said
what, you should believe only in yourself'.

We thought this suggestion that one have faith in one's instinctual response was particularly good advice in these cautious times. This "5 seconds instinct" taoism-like exhortation, could also reflect the kind of twitter-world we live in. However, judging from Ma's work, he is at the peak of his form...in some fabulous 5-second increments. We are passing his advice along, on an impulse.

How Not to Take on Climate Change Deniers

2009-12-07T13:06:00.000-08:00

His first words are, "Perhaps I ought not to have accepted the invitation." Gregory Norminton tells the story of appearing at The University of St. Andrews in England to debate climate change. As he explains, his confrontation with the opposition's distortion of known facts turned him into "a bug-eyed fanatic," a mirror image of his foes. We, too, recently confronted a denier at a local meeting and felt the same kind of extreme frustration. What to do? Mr. Norminton speaks:

I can now offer the following hard-won tips for anyone considering debating climate change deniers:

Don’t.
If you must, consider ingesting some form of tranquiliser.
Study the stagecraft of Bernard Manning.
Be up-to-date: know your Aristotle!
No matter the provocation, avoid Nazi analogies like the plague.
Bring plenty of friends.
Just don’t.

Not hopeful.

Cut-Ups in New Zealand.

2009-11-23T07:05:00.000-08:00

"Going West" is a beautiful short film illustrating the worlds in a book, incorporating papercraft to make something dreamlike and wonderful. It was animated by Andersen M Studio.

The New Zealand Book Council has produced this intriguing video encouraging, what else, reading. We are told that there are NO computer generated effects! The entire stop-motion animated design is of hand-cut and manipulated papers, producing a dream-like world.

It is hard to imagine that this intricate design is completely handmade. In today's world of computer animation, we think it takes on a very welcoming feel, unlike the computer animation's more slick and forced images. What do you think?

Artificial Bio-diversity

2009-11-19T04:36:00.000-08:00

Don't miss the pleasure of Christoph Niemann's newest contribution to his "Abstract City" op ed series for the New York Times. This one has the tongue-in-check title of "Bio-Diversity." It's good news in a world flooded with bad and sad.

Sarah Susanka Draws the Line

2009-11-18T09:44:00.000-08:00

Sarah Susanka

For all of you who appreciate Sarah Susanka's championing of the "Not So Big"house, you may be happy to know that she is expanding the brand. Susanka has taken houses from the "Not So Big" books and packaged the drawings of them. She is selling those drawings at the website houseplans.com.

Now you can build your own Not So Big house. However the Not So Big drawings are not so cheap, costing $5,000 to $6,500. For individuals who have no wish for a custom home, who can read detailed drawing, who know how to select and bid out a job to qualified contractors, who feel they know the wealth of fixtures and materials to chose from and who are savvy enough manage and respond to the contractor during complexity of construction, this may be a fine solution. For those who are less inclined to take on all of these responsibilities, consider hiring an architect.

Susanka, one of the innovative thinkers in the field of home design, has always emphasized quality over quantity. That's a good reason why many follow her. She has also changed the way people think about the value and integration of space for daily living. Her skill in using color, enhances space in way that is hard to match. Susanka has brought so much to the housing scene. Her success is a tribute to her manner of communicating ideas, as well as the usefulness of them. Susanka is a big gift from the not so big design genie.

Via Guido Reni 10 00196 Rome

2009-11-16T09:20:00.000-08:00

MAXXI Interior

15.11.2009 Rome - Museum of 21st Century public opening

Zaha Hadid, Architect / Designer

Rome's National Museum of 21st Century Contemporary Art and Architecture, whose acronym is MAXXI, was opened to the public yesterday, 15 November 2009. Its official opening will be sometime in 2010, but by all the first reports the space is stunning. Baghdad-born, London-based, and first woman to win the coveted Pritzker Prize, Zaha Hadid, is the building's architect. To some, this seems like Rome's Bilbao moment.

The building required 51,000 tons of concrete and steel, and $203 million of construction dollars. This wonderful Flickr slideshow gives you a good look at the structure from the eye-popping photos it has already inspired. Jay Merrick of The Independent in the UK (which actually has a daily section devoted to architecture), made these comments in this article after a recent visit:

The sweeping geometry of its form and its internal configuration are almost baroque in the way they modulate volume, light and glimpsed views. Exterior spaces are intertwined, sometimes dramatically, at other times with an almost graceful restraint. Inside, the drama is much more visceral. Heavy black staircases, underlit by white lightboxes, rise as if in flowing oriental brush strokes into the overlapping volumes of the gallery spaces. We seem to be in an Expressionist film set.

I have read that the sometimes languid, sometimes fiery, Hadid dislikes handrails. In some of the photos, you can detect the recessed handrails she brought to the design in the main halls. This comment is not meant to be trivial. It is an attempt to consider the mind-busting thought that goes into the details of ground breaking projects like this one.

Hadid was awarded this project over a decade ago, long before she became an international icon for architecture, much like Gehry's relationship to Bilbao. There will be more news to come on this project, but you can say, for now, that Hadid has taken Rome.

New York Times article
Design Museum, British Council, Biography/Comments
Design Boom article
Lofta.com - good review and photos
Zaha Hadid Project: Painting as Building
Wiki: Zaha Hadid

Monday Morning Graffiti

2009-11-16T07:29:00.000-08:00

Holding up the city’s shaky infrastructure.
You can find Argentine, Gualicho’s website here. (Photo by celso_nyc.)

Get to Know a Graffiti Artist:

"Gualicho was born in Buenos Aires. Though he has lived in this city all his life, he’s one of several artists constantly on the move. He has recently traveled and painted walls all over South and Central America. He began painting graffiti in 1998 and, from 2006 onwards, he’s been using the pseudonym “Gualicho”. His art is very distinctive and colourful. He creates new worlds by inter-connecting animals, plants and machines, also retro-futurist cities and ambiguous characters which reflect archetypes within human beings. He draws upon influences such as folk art, religious icons, comic graphics and 60s psychedelia, together with his own urban heritage on graffiti culture, comic, tattoo, skate and rock. He defines his style as post or neo-graffiti, though he also works vastly on canvas, paper and other materials. Since 2001 he co-manages Barfuss, an animation studio, where he has created pieces for several international companies."

via Escape Into Life
Flickr photo stream slideshow here

Don't let green get you down.

2009-10-30T11:06:00.000-07:00

credit:stephencaver.com

Friday thoughts: If you are like us, some days you get tired of fighting the green fight. There is a sense of despair when you see the people in the car in front of you heaving their fast food wrappers and cups out the window as they drive through your city at 50 miles an hour. There is the sense of anger when you watch one more cigarette butt tossed on the sidewalk, because you know it has a biodegradable life span of 400 years and it is going to wind up in our oceans. Plastic bottles? We can't even go there. Restaurants packaging food in Styrofoam? Why?! Then there is the unfathomable results of a recent Pew study showing that the number of Americans who believe there is solid evidence for global warming is at its lowest point in three years. These things wear you down little by little.

But we found some good news today. We thought we would share it to cheer you and ourselves up:

82 percent of Americans say they are still buying green products and services today, which sometimes cost more, according to a 2009 study commissioned by Green Seal and EnviroMedia Social Marketing.

More than six in 10 (or 66 million) U.S. homes currently use eco-friendly household products (Focalist, 2008).

U.S. consumers are looking at using more green products in everyday life, with more than one-third of adults regularly buying green products (Mintel Research, 2008).

18-34 year olds are twice as likely to buy green (EnviroMedia, 2009); 40 million baby boomers currently buy green (AARP, 2008).

And more intriguing good ideas here and here and here and here---we could go on!

These are small steps on the long journey. But, remember – though some countries, corporations and individuals - are trashing the earth without a second thought, we ARE making a difference. And we continue to make a difference every time we make a choice or take action for a green world. Also remember, it took 20 years for people to give up buttons...and use zippers. Fight on!

No Goat Jokes.

2009-10-29T09:03:00.001-07:00

Before

After

An old idea receives new attention. Individuals and organizations are choosing a new green option, using goats to clear farms, parks, roadways, ranches. No harmful chemicals are employed. No heavy machinery is needed. The goat's cloven-hoofs, that allow them to meander slops and cliffs, cause no harm to the earth. Also, goats are quiet.

This "innovation" has become rather popular. It was used recently, even, in Druid Hill Park---three days, one-quarter acre. Eco Goats in Donaldson, MD, provided the herd. What volunteers couldn't do, goats did. Additionally, goats will completely clear an area of invasive plants.

Rent-a-Ruminator in Seattle provides more information on the beauty of goats and a slew of before and after pictures.

Pretty Sweet Green Roof

2009-10-29T07:36:00.000-07:00

Japanese practice Atelier Tekuto has completed this aluminium-framed private residence in Kanazawa City, western Japan.

We especially liked this little green roof system. Other sustainable features include full LED lighting, rainwater harvesting and solar panels on the top for water heating. It is helpful to see the variety of green roof designs. We think this one is pretty sweet.

Architectural Review featured this house. For additional images of it, click here.

Our Trash is Killing Birds in Remote Places

2009-10-20T07:13:00.000-07:00

Chris Jordan has published a series of images identified as dead albatross on Midway Atoll whose bodies are filled with bits of plastic they ingested.

Midway Island is an anemic little line of sand and coral reefs, way out in the middle of the Pacific. Now, I don't know Mr. Jordan personally, and haven't fact-checked the story behind the photos -- but presuming it's all as presented, this really is a horrifying set of images.
Birds that live as far away from civilization as you can imagine, their innards packed with petroleum flotsam?

via Boing Boing http://tiny.cc/vhpqU

Mr. Sustainable!

2009-10-16T07:16:00.000-07:00

Rob Brennan, AIA and Carri Beer, AIA, LEED AP

Brennan + Company's founder and Principal Architect, Rob Brennan was featured in the October issue of Baltimore Magazine. Tapped as one of the region's reigning green gurus, Rob, along with Carri Beer, talk about how to make a home environmentally friendly. It's a good read, if we do say so ourselves. Here's the link.

Polaroid, Lost and Found.

2009-10-16T06:23:00.000-07:00

Few things mark an era like a Polaroid photo. When Polaroid announced in 2008 that they were discontinuing the production of Polaroid film, hearts fell. A frenzy of bidding quickly heated up on Ebay for any remaining film, sparking scrappy bidding wars.

On Oct. 9, the last lot of Polaroid film passed its “use by” date, and the era of instant Polaroid photography is officially over, or at least for now. But there is hope. The Impossible Project is one of them. The Impossible Project has been founded with the aim to re-invent and re-start production of analog film for vintage Polaroid cameras. They have leased the Polaroid factory in Enschede, The Neatherlands that closed in June of 2008. They plan to produce an innovative and fresh product for all the artists who work with Polaroid film and all us common, die-hard fans who get goofy about it.

This from a New York Times recent comment :

The Polaroid was the only kind of contemporary photograph that could come close to the unique singularity of a painting or drawing, part of its charm being the unpredictability of its colors and marks on the print. The built-in frame is another major reason why people were attracted to them, giving the impression of a “finished piece” the moment they become visible.

May it always be.

The 60s swing again.

2009-10-16T05:43:00.000-07:00

The Beatles by Robert Whitaker, 1964
Robert Whitaker Archive
© Robert Whitaker

The National Portrait Gallery in London has assembled an exhibition of iconic photos of the musical groups who created "Swinging London" in the 60s. Beatles to Bowie: The 60s Exposed, 15 October - 24 January 2010, could only be fun. The Who, The Kinks...they're all there.

Huge cultural and social changes were reflected in the styles and imagery of the pop music scene. The classic rivalry between The Beatles and The Rolling Stones is played out visually by a variety of top photographers such as David Bailey, Gered Mankowitz and Robert Whitaker, who helped create and endorse their changing images.

Fact: Next year it will have been 50 years since the 60s. No way!

Urban Rust

2009-10-14T07:34:00.000-07:00

When you walk around a city, you don't expect to find Cor-Ten steel---weathered steel alloy with a protective coat of rust---on facades. You expect to see it in industrial areas or an occasional modern single-family home. A post on A Daily Dose of Architecture provides a nice opportunity to see Cor-ten steel at work on city buildings.

For more views of Cor-Ten, Flickr has a group dedicated to it!

The Paradox of Preservation

2009-10-14T06:09:00.000-07:00

The Century Plaza hotel, designed by Minoru Yamasaki, opened in 1966 and quickly began accommodating stars and dignitaries. New owners have revealed plans to demolish the hotel, no longer the VIP magnet it once was, and replace it with a $2-billion complex that includes two 50-story towers containing condos, offices, shops and a smaller luxury hotel.

Los Angeles is to modern architecture, what Rome is to Catholicism. However,"California modern" postwar architecture, for better or for worse, undermined the ideas of traditional architecture forever. Its reach is international. Its style immediately recognizable. For some, it is a reason to swoon, for others it seen as an egotistical force undermining the intrinsic value of meaningful design. As historic, modern architectural buildings begin to age, it is inevitable that the preservationists and the developers will collide.

While preservationists would argue for reuse based on green values, developers argue that 60s modern buildings are hardly energy efficient, sustainable or nontoxic. In his Sunday column, Christopher Hawthorne, LA Times architecture and design critic, makes this point:

Those two ideas -- that preservation is green and that postwar city building was not -- are now coming together in some contradictory, even absurd ways. The debate over the future of the Century Plaza has been a case in point. Both sides have tried to argue that they have sustainability on their side, the Conservancy because knocking down the hotel would waste its "embodied energy" -- the energy it took to construct it -- and Michael Rosenfeld, the developer, because his proposed replacement, designed by the architect Harry Cobb, would promote green urbanism, namely pedestrianism and use of mass transit.

These conflicting ideas deserve a thoughtful investigation in less charged venues. It seems that the guiding ideas of preservation-as-green, must be bold and vivid to win the day. The issues confronted in preservation are often more complex and broad than the arguments that are being presented in defense of green preservation. Is preservation always "green?" And, to throw a wrench in the works, we wonder, how preservationists, who typically hold a disdain for modern architecture, will wholeheartedly defend against its demise?

The starting line at the Baltimore Marathon this weekend!

2009-10-13T13:26:00.000-07:00

Photo by Arianne Teeple at the top of the Hilton Hotel

Click on this photo to enlarge it and enjoy all the colors. The Under Armor Company has done a good deed for the city by promoting this marathon. Bravo for Under Armor and bravo for city life.

The Future of Prefab. Where's it Going?

2009-10-12T09:32:00.000-07:00

Empyrean International, "Dwell House"

Marmol Radziner "Skyline House"

Michelle Kaufman's "Glidehouse"

Our stringer in Los Angeles sent us this thoughtful article by Los Angeles Times architecture critic Christopher Hawthorne. Hawthorne tells the story of the prominent prefab architects who are rethinking their efforts, some of whom are closing down their operations. Those closing their operations include Michelle Kaufman of Glidehouse fame, Empyrean International, the company that worked to develop Dwell's prefab models and Marmol Radziner, the Los Angeles firm known for smartly designed Neomodern houses, has mothballed its prefab factory in Vernon in what it says is a temporary move.

Prefab is foundering again. Most of this distress is, of course, caused by the freeze of credit. But even if you take away this credit problem, making the leap to high-volume business remains prefab's central dilemma.

One way to reach that point is by colonizing big swaths of flat land and building 1,500 identical houses at the same time. Without a doubt this kind of development is what has helped get us into our current dilemmas. Hawthorne and others have another solution. The solution resides largely in helping develop prefab infill apartment complexes and cooperative housing.

At the heart of this solution is the tricky sociological process of detaching modern prefab from the ideal of the single-family house.

Most people in this country -- even most city-dwelling, design-loving sophisticates -- still locate their dreams of residential bliss under the roof of a detached house. That roof might be pitched or it might be Gropius-flat, but it still covers a house and not an apartment.

We will have to see how the current financial crisis will effect this powerful, very American, expectation. This article last week in the New York Times, Real Estate section, "Owners No More," may be the first indication.

Somebody call the design police!

2009-10-09T11:30:00.000-07:00

I think I need an aspirin. Thanks to one of our stringers in Florida, we were linked to this fascinating video of an animated building---the former headquarters of Bayer in Leverkusen, Germany. This is called a "media facade." It is composed of 5.6 million LEDs over a 17,500 square meter surface. We can't imagine having an apartment overlooking this enormous vision! Imagine a whole neighborhood of such facades.

The gargantuan advertising form creates an intense kind of visual pollution that curtails any ability to say "No!" Also, seeing a piece of architecture used in this way makes us weepy.

For a look at how the LED plates were constructed, here's the link.

Hat Tip to B. Eby

Glenn Gould Speaks About Music

2009-10-06T16:18:00.000-07:00

Glen Gould (upper) Tim Page (lower)

We rarely have the opportunity to listen to a musician talk just about music. Musical genius, Glenn Gould, referred to as the "James Dean of classical music," did one last interview before his untimely death six weeks later at the age of 50. Gould is legend. Although we rarely post about music (we are aching to say something about Gustavo Dudamel but reserve our enthusiasm so we don't appear to be wandering) we thought Gould personified a kind of music, design-mind worth honoring.

It appears that Gould scripted the whole interview for New York music critic Tim Page and himself! A weird but intriguing aspect. They recorded it just after Gould's 1981, historic, re-recording of Bach's Goldberg Variations (a story in themselves).

When we heard the interview, we were so pleased just to hear Gould's voice. You may, too. Here's the link to the interview. Musicians, this is an exquisite gab-fest that begins to get really cool about 20 minutes into the "interview."

twitter: @glenngouldfndn

What happened to the Bromo Seltzer Bottle?

2009-10-05T09:08:00.000-07:00

Almost nothing today matches the impact of the colorful Bromo Seltzer image. It was a brand extraordinaire and a design triumph. This 1995 Baltimore Sun article we found fills in the colorful details.

The 51-foot-high bottle was fabricated of laminated steel. It was 20 feet in diameter, tinted blue to resemble the headache remedy's bottle and mounted on the very pinnacle of Baltimore's Emerson Drug Company headquarters at Lombard and Eutaw streets. What became known as the Bromo Seltzer Tower served as a potent landmark. The bottle even had a huge crown on the top.

So what happened to it? The revolving, blazing bottle lasted 25 years until January 1936, when winds and rain got the best of it. Adolph F. Nethen, general foreman of Claude Neon Lights of Maryland, climbed to the top and took the metal sheeting apart. The rusted, decayed materials were taken to the scrap yard. A sad demise for a great symbol.

We want that bottle back!

We are up against Goliath. We need your vote!

2009-09-30T16:15:00.000-07:00

Help us keep architecture, sustainability, design and culture in the foreground of the conversation.

Brennan + Company Architects blog (the very one you are now reading!) has been nominated for a Mobbie Award in the category of "Art + DIY" AND also the category of "Misfits" (which makes some sense), by the Baltimore Sun.

It means a lot to us to be part of the blog wonders in Maryland. It would mean a heap of happiness for us if you faithful (and unfaithful) readers clicked the Mobbie icon at the top right and placed your vote for us (you can vote once a day!). Thanks!  

Talk About Adaptive Reuse!

2009-09-29T07:58:00.000-07:00

This 13th Century church in Maastricht, Netherlands, was re-purposed as a sensationally beautiful, contemporary bookstore. In the USA, we tend to tear buildings like these down because developers feel that the buildings are too difficult to adapt or that they are simply in the way of the developer's objectives.

Because of the dearth of historic preservation incentives, history and culture goes down with bulldozers and wrecking balls. Our own home town of Baltimore has demolished some fabulous old buildings to make way for such projects as high-rises and hospital expansions (requiring huge parking garages).

We do not oppose development, but we see projects like this as examples of the historical benefits and possible magnificence of reuse. The simple comfort of historical space and the urge to reflection they provide is immeasurable.

Small Sag Harbor Shelter

2009-09-25T06:09:00.000-07:00

A great example of creating interior design cohesion even when creating zones within a small space.

Abstract Art Meets Football Stadium Success

2009-09-24T07:59:00.000-07:00

Anne Truitt, "Apricots"

In 1975, the Baltimore Museum of Art (BMA) included a number of Anne Truitt's Arundel paintings in an exhibition. "The works were white, starkly white, with a little white paint on top, and some marks in graphite." The first exhibition of abstract expressionism at the BMA, it was vilified by the art critic at the Baltimore Sun. Week after week The Sun expressed its denunciation of her work, even suggesting that all public funds be withheld from the BMA in punishment for its insult to public sense.

The event, including Truitt's diary account of it, is considered by Tyler Green editor of Modern Art Notes in this post. Green reports that the exhibition, today, of abstract artworks in museums, and even football stadiums, has become common and is well received. Perhaps the forcefulness of an art form's rejection may be the measure of its potential for future acceptance.

October 8, the Hirshorn Museum is mounting the first exhibition of Truitt's work since 1974. Ironically it was curated by Kristen Hileman. Hileman is the newly appointed Curator for Contemporary Art at...the BMA.

Link: Anne Truitt's legendary journal, Daybook

Frank Lloyd Wright's Unknown Legacy

2009-09-22T15:28:00.000-07:00

Above is a trailer for a film entitled "One Hundred Women Architects." The film premiered at the Solomon Guggenheim Museum in June as part of a Symposium celebrating the 50th year anniversary of the Guggenheim Museum in New York designed by Frank Lloyd Wright.

Over 100 women architects, designers and artisans worked with Frank Lloyd Wright, many of them going on to remarkable careers of their own. They are Frank Lloyd Wright's unknown legacy, and their practice forms a legacy for all women working in architecture today. The full length 20 minute film features architects Marion Mahony, Isabel Roberts, Jane Duncombe, Lois Davidson Gottlieb, Eleanore Pettersen, and Read Weber.

It is a little known fact that Wright was one of the few architects who hired women to work in his studio. His work force included at least 25% women. This was unheard of in his day. The film pays tribute to this history.

We've dicovered that you can order this 20-minute documentary film plus its backstory, the symposium discussion and an interview with Lois Gottlieb, a Wright Fellow at http://bwaf.org.

Small Homes. Big Deal.

2009-09-21T10:19:00.000-07:00

A change in the building code in 2005 has allowed Los Angeles architects and builders to expand housing for first time buyers and middle income families. The new code allows builders to divide small parcels of land to create grouped small houses. They differ from large condominiums, because individuals separately own their homes. Buyers must agree to adhere to certain restrictions, such as not altering the exterior, or painting the facade a different color. These small lot subdivisions promise increasing density without creating large, anonymous complexes. We think it is a smart idea. The Architect's Newsletter has the fuller story.

Expand Your Vocabulary

2009-09-21T09:41:00.000-07:00

Nadel Architects with Barrio Planners: Felicitas and Gonzalo Mendez Learning Center

viv-id(vĭv'ĭd)

Architectural Record offers The First Word: A Dictionary of New Architecture Updated Daily. The writers take a look at new projects and---in a single word---explain what about each design caught their eye. A nice resource for many different reasons, all good.

Julius Shulman Film in US Theatical Release

2009-09-17T12:46:00.000-07:00

The documentary film, Visual Acoustics: The Modernism of Julius Shulman, has found a distributor, Art House Films. Yipee! Narrated by Dustin Hoffman, VISUAL ACOUSTICS celebrates the life and career of Julius Shulman, the world’s greatest architectural photographer, whose images brought modern architecture to the American mainstream. Shulman, who passed away this year, captured the work of nearly every modern and progressive architect since the 1930s including Frank Lloyd Wright, Richard Neutra, John Lautner and Frank Gehry.

The film opens in NYC at Cinema Village on October 9. It works its way to the E Street Cinema in Washington DC for an opening on November 6. On October 16 VISUAL ACOUTICS opens in Los Angeles at, yes!, the Nuart Theater. The website link above provides dates for many other cities. This promises to be an enriching and fascinating film. By all accounts, besides being a genius photographer, Julius Shulman was a kind, funny and wonderful human. We could use that kind of role model. Right now. Let's go!

World's First Sustainable City to Be Built in the UAE?

2009-09-14T12:05:00.000-07:00

How more ironic could it be that the petroleum rich United Arab Emirates (UAE) will be the first to build an entire city, Masdar, that will be the world’s first zero carbon, zero waste city powered entirely by renewable energy sources. While a substantial number of our citizenry see no need for action of any sort, even the petroleum nations get it. Hmm.

LAVA, The Laboratory for Visionary Architecture, a Sidney, Australia, firm created the prize-winning design.

2009 Shiny, Green Award

2009-09-09T11:33:00.000-07:00

Photographer: Anne Gummerson

We are happy to say that our own Carri Beer, AIA, LEED, AP, and Rob Brennan, AIA, CSI, received the Natural Home Magazine 2009 Kitchen of the Year Award . They received the award for the superior integration of green materials, including recycled-paper counter tops; cork and rubber composite tiles; zero-VOC paint, PVC-free nontoxic wall coverings; 100% recycled cabinet material, and recycled-glass backsplash tiles. The addition of energy and water-saving appliances and recessed fluorescent lighting served to further enlarge the project's environmental scope.

Before Photo

Another distinction of the redesign was opening the dark, closed, 1960s kitchen and breakfast area to the living and dining rooms and the expansive view and ample daylight. The project is a great example of how a home owner can take a battered, cramped area and dramatically recreate it as a sunny, open, living space.

5 Shipping Containers + 3,0000 acres = Retreat

2009-08-14T07:04:00.000-07:00

Cinco Camp, Roger Black’s West Texas retreat, is made of five shipping containers on his 3,000-acre ranch. “I wanted something that blends into the landscape and could be installed and eventually removed with minimal disturbance to the environment,” he said. Here's the NYT slideshow of Black's retreat.

Here's the NYT article relating the details of the project.

Rare Orchid Discovered on Eastern Shore

2009-08-12T09:02:00.000-07:00

The "B'More Green" column in the Baltimore Sun provides this delightful story. Read it slowly. For those environmentally oriented, it is sheer poetry. It's here. Platanthera x canbyi: fewer than a dozen of these plants have been found in the last 70 years.

FAR FOOD

2009-08-12T05:54:00.001-07:00

Click on image to enlarge.

A way to consider the real cost of food to the environment. Far Foods is an alternative packaging concept for supermarket produce, highlighting the distances that some foods travel and the resultant carbon dioxide released during the journey. The receipt features a boarding card style tear-off strip. By James Reynolds.

(via swiss-miss.com)

An Incomparable Chair Blog

2009-08-11T22:00:00.000-07:00

For all of us who love them, the best chair blog, ev-ah. HERE.

First Floating Wetland Education Center

2009-08-11T18:57:00.001-07:00

The Elizabeth River in Virginia is one of the most polluted in the country, but help is on the way. The University of Virgina School of Architecture (UVA) has established the Learning Barge as the first floating wetlands learning center in the country. There is a good podcast interview with founder of the project, Phoebe Crisman here explaining the ambitious goals of project and the dire situation of the river (the Crisman interview begins at 00:15:15).

Where others have placed structures directly on the wetlands, UVA decided to put people on the river. Floating on the river, one experiences the full impact of the river crisis and its effect on the wetlands. One begins to grasp the larger picture. A terrific idea.

One Step Backward for Design and Architecture

2009-07-27T06:53:00.000-07:00

Declared unacceptable: A huge yellow sign spelling out “United States”
on the Canada-facing facade of the new border station in Massena, N.Y.,
is being dismantled because of security concerns.

The US Customs and Border Protection agency is removing the yellow text from the border crossing between Canada and the USA. The belief is that the prominence of the words creates a security risk, as if terrorists won't know there is a US border crossing there if they remove the text.

This disconnect between architecture and reason is painful. The effort to upgrade the dismal government architecture of the past decades has required effort and pressure from the design community. The move by the border patrol sets things back significantly. This article in the New York Times puts things in context.

Control Fate with Witchcraft

2009-07-22T13:49:00.001-07:00

Christoph Neimann, illustrator, graphic artist and man-who-sews, provides a sweet treat in the NYT today. We think he has an utterly delightful take on life, on the childish superstitions that we teach ourselves, and our own stories about our triumphs over luck, love and life. We're inspired.

Neimann's blog is here.

Art Embedded in Architecture : The Future of Art?

2009-07-21T12:45:00.000-07:00

Detail, Barry Anderson AtA award winning installation,
Kansas City, NCDFS Building

Kansas City's American Institute of Architecture (AIA) had a great idea and then did it: Art Through Architecture (AtA). New architectural projects may achieve Gold, Silver or Bronze levels of Art Achievement by dedicating a percentage of the construction budget to collecting artworks, commissioning temporary or permanent artworks, and/or including artists on design teams.

Recently the National Center for Drug Free Sport (NCDFS ) has been awarded highest level "Art Achievement" by Art through Architecture (AtA) for commissioning a new, site-specific video installation by Kansas City based artist Barry Anderson as part of a recent architectural renovation project completed by el dorado ,inc. architects. Said Project Architect, Josh Shelton:

"Anderson's video installation introduces an ambient and shifting horizon line, allowing multiple perspectives and vanishing points to appear and re-appear. His work, and our collaborative dialogue surrounding the work, was necessarily spatial. As a result, our team began to understand the new architecture surrounding us in expansive ways."

As the technology grows increasingly sophisticated, we are seeing video installations become embedded in architecture. There seems to be a sweeping trend developing. We will have to wait and see if it has the long-term life of physical art done with the hand or whether it is a passing fad. As few seem to "draw" architecture any more---buildings being designed almost exclusively on computers---it seems part of the zeitgeist that the art in buildings is no longer "drawn" either.

Bill Viola Commissioned by St. Paul's Cathederal, London

2009-07-21T11:37:00.000-07:00

Bill Viola, Ocean Without a Shore, 2007, 3-channel High Definition
video/sound installation.Installation view by Thierry Bal.
Photography Kira Perov. Copyright Bill Viola and Kira Perov 2009.
Courtesy the artist and Haunch of Venison.

Video seems to be in the news stream today. But this news makes you go, "Well, of course. Who but Viola could pull this one off." Internationally acclaimed artist Bill Viola has been commissioned to create two altarpieces for permanent display in St Paul’s Cathedral. The project will commence production in mid 2009 with completion in early 2011.

Viola is an esteemed video artist, having created imaginative and ground-breaking video installations for over 35 years. The St. Paul's commission is to depict two themes, Mary and Martyrs. Says Viola:

“The two themes of Mary and Martyrs symbolize some of the profound mysteries of human existence. One is concerned with birth and the other with death; one with comfort and creation, the other with suffering and sacrifice. If I am successful, the final pieces will function both as aesthetic objects of contemporary art and as practical objects of traditional contemplation and devotion.”

Viola manages to grasp and relate issues that illuminate the mind and heart in a way that is beyond words. His moving exhibits remind us of our humanity in all its fullness from grief to exhilaration and joy. First one to London in 2011, please, send word.

From Hell to Heaven courtesy of video artist Marco Brambilla

2009-07-21T10:28:00.000-07:00

Marco Brambilla has installed an astonishing hi-def video in the elevators at The Standard hotel in NYC. Here is a video of the installation followed by an interview with Brambrilla. The work was accomplished in Crush software, the leading-edge in video compiling.

As guests rise in the elevator they travel from hell (the street level), and then closer and closer to heaven (the penthouse?) When descending in the elevator the video is reversed, from heaven to hell! The hedonistic nature of it all is pretty sweeping.

Bye, Bye Birdy. Climate Change Pushes Migratory Birds North.

2009-07-21T08:46:00.000-07:00

We recommend this article in Bloomberg press reflecting the impending effects of climate change on birds. A relevant comment by Mike Di Paola, the article's correspondent:

"My first reaction to the findings was, so what? It doesn’t necessarily mean that migratory ranges are shrinking or that bird numbers are dwindling. What we are witnessing, however, is symptomatic of much bigger problems.

The birds are reacting to global changes that ecologists believe presage chaos at the ecosystem level. A warmer climate will alter vegetation, the availability of prey and a thousand other habitat features too complicated to predict.

“Because species respond individually and in very complex ways, we expect that ecological communities will start to tear apart,” says Burger. “This is one of the things we’re worried about.”

Repeat: "...we expect the ecological communities will start to tear apart." This is a very profound issue.

Extreme Showdown

2009-07-20T13:08:00.000-07:00

"You've pulled some leftover mac n' cheese out from the refrigerator, glance over at your counter, and see a microwave and a toaster oven. Which do you toss your plate of mac into, if you're looking to be the most sustainable?"

The Answer.

Julius Shulman : A Timely Exhibition

2009-07-20T09:41:00.000-07:00

Pittsburgh, PA: Mark your calendar. The Carnegie Museum of Art has announced the exhibition "Palm Springs Modern: Photographs by the late Julius Shulman." The show opens 19 September and closes 31 January. The exhibition, to be held at the Heinz Architecture Center, offers a tour of the mid-century architecture and lifestyles of Palm Springs.

The exhibition features 100 original photographs by renowned Los Angeles–based photographer Julius Shulman of houses designed by iconic Modernist architects, such as Richard Neutra, Albert Frey, and John Lautner. Also presented are 20 original drawings, and renderings of three key projects by Neutra, including the famed Kaufmann House, designed as a winter residence for Edgar J. Kaufmann Sr.

Palm Springs is almost unique in America. For decades it served as a stylish laboratory for architects whose buildings are now being reexamined. The fame of Palm Springs is due in large part to the iconic photography of Shulman's striking and evocative images.

Essential equipment!

2009-07-20T07:17:00.000-07:00

One weird leap for design. For the farm, kitchen, executive office, condo, kids room? This invites your imagination. Right here, honest. I'm sure Design Within Reach (DWR) is on top of this.

Walter Cronkite November 4, 1916 - July 17, 2009

2009-07-17T19:17:00.000-07:00

And that's the way it is Friday, July 17, 2009. Walter Cronkite, known as the most trusted man in America. Rest in peace.

Thom Mayne Guest DJs!.

2009-07-17T08:58:00.000-07:00

Two Toms: KCRW's Tom Schnabel with Thom Mayne

Radio station KCRW's "Guest DJ Project" asks cultural notables to discuss music. In this episode Morphosis' Thom Mayne offers five tracks that have inspired him over the years. We love this idea, and KCRW, which we tune into on iTunes radio.

Photographer Julius Shulman Dies

2009-07-17T08:01:00.000-07:00

Above are two of the most famous photographs in archives of architecture. Both were shot by the photographer, Julius Shulman. Shulman, the legendary architectural photographer, died July 15th at the seasoned age of 98. His images brought fame to a number of mid-20th century Modernist architects and made him a household name in his time.

His home town of Los Angeles provides this obituary. It includes a video of Shulman and a collection of his photographs plus a Q&A with him done in 1994. May he rest in peace.

Mental Health Break

2009-07-16T09:01:00.000-07:00

Director Claude Lelouch mounted a camera to the front bumper of a sports car, and films it howling through the streets of Paris very early one summer's morning. The film, just nine minutes long, certainly demonstrates his exemplary car control at speeds calculated to be as high as 135mph as he races for his rendezvous with a mystery blonde.

It is an astonishing sequence, filmed in one take as Lelouch runs red lights, mounts curbs, drifts round tight corners, and narrowly avoids pedestrians and will certainly have you on the edge of your seat, if not hiding behind it. Lelouch, was arrested after the release of the film.

Toyo Ito's New Stadium in Kaihsiung, Taiwan

2009-07-16T08:25:00.000-07:00

The New York Times' Nicolai Ouroussoff reviews the Toyo Ito's new stadium that will serve as the World Games 2009 main stadium. Ouroussoff always gives us a perspective on architecture and design that is rich and illuminating.

Like many who came to prominence in the past decade or so, these architects have sought to create structures that explore the psychological extremes that late Modernism and postmodernism ignored. Their aim was to expand architecture’s emotional possibilities and, in doing so, to make room for a wider range of human experience.

Mr. Ito’s stadium is the next step on that evolutionary chain.

Enjoy the read.

Samuel Mockbee and the Rural Studio

2009-07-16T05:55:00.000-07:00

The late architect Samuel Mockbee and Rural Studio, the design/build program he co-founded in rural Alabama's Hale County, are the focus of the newly released documentary Snakebit. The 60-minute film, produced for PBS, explores Mockbee's quest to instill in future architects an ethos of compassion and responsibility, as well as the knowledge and passion to improve their communities' quality of life.

Mockbee was one of the first architects whose designs fully integrated materials from the community into the homes his students built. His concept of sustainability and environment responsibility, the unique use of materials and the ingenious designs remain a guiding light for environmentalists. Here are some slides of the Hale County projects to give you the flavor of the Rural Studio's work.

Snakebit draws on never-before-seen interviews with Mockbee. The film takes place in the year following Mockbee's death from leukemia, the film chronicles the studio's struggle to maintain his guiding spirit and documents its affect on the communities it assists and the students it trains.

Ultimately, say the filmmakers, Snakebit offers a dialogue about what it means to be both a successful professional and a responsible member of society. Snakebit is scheduled to air on PBS stations in fall 2009. You wouldn't want to miss it.

17 Words of Architectural Inspiration

2009-07-15T16:56:00.000-07:00

We just caught a TED presentation given by Daniel Libeskind, architect for Ground Zero in New York. Liebeskind shares 17 words that inspire his work. He is rapid fire and radical. Here's the video.

Relief from dog days. Really.

2009-07-15T12:07:00.000-07:00

Dog Barn

Heart Box

If green roofs are good for the house, why not the doghouse? Well, maybe. We came across this article in the Los Angeles Times, Home and Garden section today. The article provides instructions for building your own sustainable doghouse with a rooftop garden. This press release we found indicates that even Bo Obama is getting one. His is being donated and uses only reclaimed materials.

The designs above, and Bo's dog house, were created by landscape architect Stephanie Rubin and her partner, sculptor Chris Isner. Their designs for both dog and bird houses and can be found here. The prices for the dog house designs span from $1,000 to $4,000, depending on Fido's size. Not pricey, if you live in the posh Brentwood neighborhood in Los Angeles, where the dog houses are popular, maybe as yard props.

We did wonder if folks have dog houses in the yard anymore. Aren't the dogs all laying on the couch in a nice air conditioned house, with their luxury Whole Foods vegan pet food and Godiva "dog bones"? But, we thought we should pass this news along to help our readers remain on the leading edge of the sustainable pet movement. Thanks to this idea, it may not be so bad anymore for someone who is "in the dog house."We feel certain there's a little beer cooler in there.

Happy Bastille Day!

2009-07-14T07:58:00.000-07:00

The Rue Monsier with Flags, Édouard Manet, French, Paris, 1878

Qu'est-ce que c'est! Liberte! Egalite! Fraternite!

Neuroscience and Architecture

2009-07-13T15:27:00.000-07:00

Area #5 is where the mind gets serious when viewing architecture.

How does the mind see architecture and what predisposes it to like one kind of architecture and not another? Scientists are beginning to explore this aspect of the mind's mysterious workings.

Walter van den Broek (a.k.a "Dr. Shock") is a Dutch psychiatrist blogging and twittering about neuroscience. In a recent blog post he discussed the scientific findings of how the mind views "places," like an architectural project, as opposed to objects, such as faces or furnishings. Although there is little research about this, recent experiments indicate that this visual work is accomplished in the parahippocampal place area (PPA).

The work of this part of the mind is complex and it is also where complexity is managed. Scientists have found out that the activity of the PPA is not diminished by familiarity, is not disturbed by motion passing through the scene and the PPA activity is even greater when viewing novel rather than repeated scenes. And, finally, there is greater activity in this area when the research subjects viewed live complex scenes---such as objects, faces, house elevations---then when they viewed the same kinds of scenes as photographs.

Now this isn't a lot to go on, granted. But there is more to come and science is on the job. There is even a new organization encouraging further research called the The Academy of Neuroscience for Architecture (ANFA). So you could to begin following this research because it is going to be very interesting.

And you thought it was just the mojo of good design that moved the masses. It is probably much more complex and, well, personal.

Summering in Paris

2009-07-10T10:12:00.000-07:00

If you were in Paris this summer and you wanted to see the famed Mona Lisa painting, this is what you would be up against. So if you are reading this at the economical beach house that you are sharing with only 8 others, smile!

via Sebastian Puig :c-monster.net

We've Succumbed

2009-07-10T08:42:00.000-07:00

Yeah, yeah, we're just as crass and celebrity oriented as any Michael Jackson gang on earth. But, with good reason. Let us explain. Someone put up a site, inviting anyone to post a video of themselves moonwalking. Thousands have responded and continue to respond from all over the world.

Here's what we liked about it, besides the lovely humanity and the hilarious fun with the moonwalk: there are SO MANY ENVIRONMENTS. It's wild. The spectrum of design and architecture is as endless as its video makers. Take a look at the "Eternal Moonwalk."

Sound Bytes of Life.

2009-07-10T07:03:00.000-07:00

Have you listened to your street lately? What lively or subtle sounds emanate around and within the surrounding architecture? Giles Turnbull a British chap who lives in the English countryside, aimed his microphone at London spaces to see what he could hear. This page at the Morning News reveals the results. The recordings represent an archeology of sound.

Wouldn't it be astonishing to be able to hear the sounds of the market, waterways, street life of ancient worlds? We would listen with deep attention. These short snips of sound remind us that we tend to tune-out the details of sound. Turnbull's project encourages us to recall that we can isolate and focus on this realm whenever we please. This simple exercise can heighten the experience of our world.

Happy Birthday David Hockney!

2009-07-09T12:06:00.001-07:00

Pearlblossom Hwy. - 1986

"Most photographers think that the rules of perspective are built into the very nature of photography, that it is not possible to change it at all. For me, it was a long process realizing that this does not have to be the case."

"When making his two photocollages of Pearblossom Highway, David Hockney positioned himself closer to or more distant from his subjects, choosing which elements in the scene should be large and which should be small. By reassembling views from multiple perspectives, he applied ideas borrowed from Cubist painting to produce a rich, compound image that he considers "a panoramic assault on Renaissance one-point perspective."

Hockney made this work as a preparatory study for the final version, Pearblossom Hwy., 11 - 18th April 1986, #2, which measures approximately six-and-a-half by nine feet. Aside from scale, the principal differences between the two versions are the distortion of the stop sign in the foreground and the left and right edges of the composition."

Getty Museum

Shanghai Sensation

2009-07-07T11:56:00.000-07:00

A thirteen-story building FELL OVER in Shanghai!

Improper construction methods are believed to be the reason the building collapsed in Shanghai, according to a report from the investigation team. The investigation team's report said that workers dug an underground garage on one side of the building while on the other side earth was heaped up to 10 meters high, which was apparently an error in construction, according to a report on eastday.com, Shanghai's official news website. (Italics added)

Here's a link to terrific hi-res photo series with additional details. Below are the cheerfully pink graphics explaining the event.

Managing Design Abundance / A new slant

2009-07-06T07:53:00.000-07:00

The funny thing about waste is that it's all relative to your sense of scarcity.

Illustration: Rodrigo Corral

Chris Anderson's outside the box Wired editorial "Tech Is Too Cheap to Meter: It's Time to Manage for Abundance, Not Scarcity"puts a whole new slant on our thinking.

A few months ago it was time for my kids to choose how to spend the two hours of "screen time" they're allowed on weekends. I suggested Star Wars and gave them a choice: They could watch any of the six movies in hi-def on a huge projection screen with surround sound audio and popcorn. Or they could go on YouTube and watch stop-motion Lego animations of Star Wars scenes created by 9-year-olds. It was no contest--they raced for the computer.
It turns out that my kids, and many like them, aren't really that interested in Star Wars as created by George Lucas. They're more interested in Star Wars as created by their peers, never mind the shaky cameras and fingers in the frame. When I was growing up, there were many clever products designed to extend the Star Wars franchise to kids, from toys to lunch boxes, but as far as I know nobody thought of stop-motion Lego animation created by children.

We think this represents a disinterest in a reality that is packaged and processed, and a return to a yearning for a very modern kind of authenticity. It is such an interesting contrast, because both exist today in a hyper form.

4th of July Salute from Solar Thermal

2009-07-04T08:36:00.000-07:00

A picture was worth 24,000 mirrors when eSolar, a company based in Pasadena, Calif., that specializes in solar thermal power, transformed a vast field of heliostats at its Southern California solar farm into a Fourth of July tableau of the American flag and the Statue of Liberty. The New York Times reports.

Mr. Gross, the founder of the tech-incubator Idealab, contends that eSolar can deliver electricity cheaper than natural gas, repeat, cheaper than natural gas, by using sophisticated algorithms to control inexpensive and lightweight mirrors called heliostats. The heliostats create steam that runs turbine engines, that generate electricity. Simple, but true.

hat tip to @pingpants

Sony Walkman - 30th Anniversary

2009-06-30T06:06:00.000-07:00

When thinking about electronics design, the Sony Walkman was the leading edge of a technological revolution. Just for fun, the BBC gave a Walkman to a 13-year old and asked him to use it for a week and report back. Here's the article about the investigation. Don't miss the comments, where Walkman users wax nostalgic. One of our favorite lines from the reviewer, 13-year old Scott Campbell:

Personally, I'm relieved I live in the digital age, with bigger choice, more functions and smaller devices. I'm relieved that the majority of technological advancement happened before I was born, as I can't imagine having to use such basic equipment every day.

Those Walkman years were tough!

One wonders how the iPod will stand up to its 30th Anniversary. We imagine Steve Jobs will still here, completely rebuilt.

Charles and Ray Eames Get Spacey

2009-06-29T13:34:00.000-07:00

People mostly know the superstar couple Charles and Ray Eames for the amazing furniture they designed. Actually they were true multi-disciplinarians, as proven by this film they made in 1977, entitled ‘Powers of Ten’ for IBM. Elmer Bernstein wrote the sci-fi score. It opens with a picnic in a park, before taking the viewer on a journey out to the edge of the universe, and then back to a carbon atom inside the hand of the man.

It serves to put things into perspective.

As a point of earthly reference, in the late 1940s, as part of the Arts & Architecture magazine's "Case Study" program, Ray and Charles designed and built the groundbreaking Eames House, Case Study House #8, as their home. Located upon a cliff overlooking the Pacific Ocean and hand-constructed within a matter of days entirely of pre-fabricated steel parts intended for industrial construction, it remains a milestone of modern architecture.

Lamenting Lost Marbles.

2009-06-26T07:58:00.000-07:00

Flickr Slide show of the new Acropolis Museum.

Twelves years in the planning and execution, the Acropolis Museum officially opened 20 June 2009. Crouching 300 yards from the Parthenon's slender bones like a skewed stack of glass boxes, the $180 million museum provides a setting for some of the best surviving works of classical sculpture that once adorned the Acropolis. With about 150,000 square feet of exhibition space, it holds more than 4,000 ancient works, many of them never displayed before due to lack of space in the cramped old museum that sat atop the Acropolis hill.

The larger issue that was fueled by the opening of the Acropolis Museum, is of "the Marbles." Only about half of the original marble panels from the famous frieze that used to encircle the Parthenon are on view. The remainder famously, or infamously, line the walls of the Duveen gallery in London’s British Museum, to which they were transported in the early 19th century by the Scottish aristocrat Thomas Bruce, seventh Earl of Elgin, hence called, "The Elgin Marbles." A cogent point of view on the whole issue of the "looted" marbles is nicely articulated by Greek blogger Pinelope.

If you enjoy reading well written architectural descriptions, we think Nicolai Ouroussoff, the New York Times architecture and design critic, provides some of the very best. He's description of the Acropolis Museum reflects the beauty and imagery of great architectural writing. Here's a snip from his review of the building designed by Swiss-born architect, Bernard Tschumi:

The genius lies in how the room snaps disparate sculptural and architectural fragments into their proper context. You first enter the south side of the gallery, where the museum’s friezes and metopes will be seen against the chalky backdrop of the rooftops of Athens. As you turn a corner, the Parthenon comes into full view; the ancient temple hovers through huge windows to your right. The eastern facade of the Parthenon and the sculptures that once adorned it unite in your imagination, allowing you to picture the temple as it was in Periclean Athens. Eventually you descend through a sequence of smaller galleries, where the glories of the High Classical period gradually give way to Roman copies of Greek antiquities. The Parthenon fades from view.

Reviews of this building, generally, conclude that the design of it reveals the importance of the return of the Marbles to their rightful country. We're sure this debate will continue for some time.

Out with the Old in with the New?

2009-06-24T11:17:00.000-07:00

New York City: Old Pennsylvania Station

New York City: New Penn Station

The Infrastructurist blog provides a look at eleven historic buildings that met the wrecking ball and what replaced them. Try not to cry. Better, yet, cry.

No joke.

2009-06-23T11:09:00.000-07:00

Those of us who appreciate the history, legend and design of Moleskine notebooks, will understand the ire that knock-offs generate. The notebook on the left is a real Moleskine, made in Milan, Italy, where it should be made. The notebook on the right is made in Germany, where it shouldn't.

An organization, aptly named, Plagiarius has taken on the (heroic) work of identifying companies that copy and market other's design ideas. Plariarius hands-out public awards to these dubious companies who prefer to hide in the shadows. Surprisingly, they are not all Chinese, although companies in Guangdong, PR China show up a few too many time through the years. Here is the 2008 roster of those who choose to copy rather than innovate.

Plagiarius announces their negative award, during a press conference, at the annual “Ambiente” household consumables trade fair, held in Frankfurt, Germany. The award is conferred on those companies that the jury has found guilty of making "the most flagrant" design imitations. As his award icon, Rido Busse, the founder of Plagiarius, chose a gnome, which he painted black with a gold nose to signify the “illicit earnings from product imitation."

Our favorite award was entitled, "Special Award for Falsification of a Vacuum-Pump." In nothing sacred?!

Some Facts & Numbers from Plagiarius

>	10% of world-wide commerce are fakes and plagiarisms
>	Annual world-wide economic loss: EUR 200-300 billion
>	Annual world-wide loss of jobs: 200.000
>	Dramatically rising numbers of confiscations through customs
>	Increase of unauthorized/unfounded product liability claims on part of the creatives

Hat tip to PAW

Berliners Brainstorm

2009-06-11T11:15:00.000-07:00

Recently Tempelhof Airport, in the center of Berlin, was closed . The city of Berlin challenged citizens to come up with some ideas for the 300 hectare site. Normally, architecture prevails, the bigger the better: gigantic hotels in fancy shapes, sky-high office towers, hovering philharmonic temples, dramatic sports arenas. Architect, Jakob Tigges, proposed an amazing idea: build a 1,071 meter high mountain.

Tigges, Tempelhof Mountain would be constructed of rubble. The German construction industry produces 280 million tons of rubble in a year, for starters. We think it is a wondrous idea. The creation of a new "natural" structure would add both a visual and emotional anchor to the community that few buildings achieve.

It seems that all involved understand that the idea would be difficult to pull off. There are many supporters trying to figure out the ecological impact of moving 280 million tons of rubble, for example. Getting the mountain developed has some difficulties. It may not happen, but, what the idea serves to do is create a "holding space' for the site. This pause allows some creative space to consider an ingenious solution, one that has inspired people to think differently about the use of space. We really like that.

Jakob Tigges Facebook page

Turn, Turn, Turn

2009-06-11T08:27:00.001-07:00

"The answer my friend, is blowin' in the wind." The wind power industry is seeking trained technicians. Community colleges and technical institutes are creating wind turbine technician programs as fast as they can. One of the first classes is at Cerro Coso Community College in Kern County, California. When the class was announced in February, the course fee was $1,000. The demand for the class has been so high that the course fee has since doubled! America is mobilizing the green industry.

If you can climb to 300 feet and can face the possibility of, ahem...dismemberment, you will make $15 to $20 an hour. Crack technicians will make in the six figures. These are permanent jobs that will be necessary as long as there are wind turbines. Prediction: 250,000 jobs. Let's hope.

Vertical Gardens!

2009-06-09T12:33:00.000-07:00

Kevin Smith, founder of Smith Built is a prolific designer. Although Smith is primarily a builder, his vertical gardens are triumphant. They are an inspiring delight. We like them.

The one below, installed at the Bardessono Hotel in Napa Valley, in collaboration with the brilliant Flora Grubb of Flora Grubb Gardens, is a magical, show stopper.

Poisoning of the Cities

2009-06-09T12:15:00.000-07:00

Nicolai Ouroussoff, New York Times architecture and design critic is not happy. In his critique of the new Brooklyn Nets Arena, Ouroussoff describes the design:

A colossal, spiritless box, it would fit more comfortably in a cornfield than at one of the busiest intersections of a vibrant metropolis. Its low-budget, no-frills design embodies the crass, bottom-line mentality that puts personal profit above the public good. If it is ever built, it will create a black hole in the heart of a vital neighborhood.

Whew! He goes on:

But what’s most offensive about the design is the message it sends to New Yorkers. Architecture, we are being told, is something decorative and expendable, a luxury we can afford only in good times, or if we happen to be very rich. What’s most important is to build, no matter how thoughtless or dehumanizing the results. It is the kind of logic that kills cities — and that has been poisoning this one for decades.

For the complete review, click here.

Invasive Species War : Ecological Meltdown

2009-05-30T13:44:00.000-07:00

Tiny Macquarie Island, in the South Ocean,
somewhere between Antartica and Australia

This science story in the Los Angeles Times blew us away. When seal hunting sailors arrived at the Macquarie Island around 1810, rats and mice casually debarked onto the island. These rats and mice attacked the local food stores. So on the next trips sailors brought cats, to stop the proliferation of mice. Next, a common tradition, they brought rabbits to provide stranded sailors with food. The cats, brought to catch the mice and rats, swiftly killed thousands of rabbits and totally exterminated the islands birds. Uncontained, the remaining rabbits slowly stripped the island of vegetation causing perilous erosion.

To control the rabbits, scientists brought fleas infected with the Myxomatosis virus! As the rabbit population was reduced, the cats, with no rabbits to eat, grew hungry and began attacking a new, burrowing bird population. To stop this, the scientists shot all the cats. Once the cats were gone, the few remaining rabbits, despite the virus, began proliferating, again. With the rabbits eating vegetation to excess, the island erosion increased, causing landslides. Now, it looks like the island may slide into the sea, endangering the rare penguin population.

But, wait! To prevent the island's demise, the scientists are now going to eradicate all the rabbits, mice and rats remaining on the island, a process that could cost at least $16 million and take years. We kid you not!

Big Boats from Little Chop Sticks Grow?

2009-05-29T12:48:00.000-07:00

Wood was the original building material for humankind’s first boats and Shuhei Ogawara, who works in the Fukushima, Japan, City Hall Forestry Department, decided to go back to basics when designing a home-made canoe.

Ogawara added an environmental twist to the concept, however, by using only discarded wooden chopsticks from the city hall cafeteria - 7,382 of them! The result is a snazzy-looking canoe 13 feet long that weighs 66 pounds. You just can't beat this for ingenuity.

Did You Know?

2009-05-29T06:44:00.000-07:00

BUILDING ENVELOPE PERFORMANCE
Click to enlarge image

Did you know that 43% of carbon emissions in the United States originate from the operation of buildings?

11 Most Endangered Historic Places

2009-05-29T05:53:00.000-07:00

The National Trust for Historic Preservation (NTHP) has announced its list of Endangered Historic Place. NTHP president, Richard Moe, says, "These 11 sites highlight many critical issues, including the importance of preserving architectural icons of the recent past and preservation as one of the most effective forms of sustainable development. Places like these help tell all of our stories, and losing them not only erases a piece of our heritage, it also represents a threat to our planet."

This year's designated sites are:

Frank LLoyd Wright's Unity Temple, Oak Park, Ill.
Wright’s design was unprecedented in 1905, with its cubist theme and poured concrete construction. Says Moe: "A century after its completion, Frank Lloyd Wright's temple is at a critical crossroads. If the building's structural integrity and interior damage are not addressed, this Modern icon will be lost to future generations."
The Hangar for the Enola Gay, Wendover Airfield, Utah
"The National Trust for Historic Preservation's ‘most endangered' designation for the Enola Gay Hangar highlights the critical need to preserve sites associated with the Manhattan Project," says Moe. "Though they evoke a unique, emotionally charged response, the sites associated with the Manhattan Project are part of America's story, and we look forward to the day when the public can visit Wendover and the Enola Gay Hangar as part of a Manhattan Project National Historical Park."
Memorial Bridge, between Portsmouth, NH and Kittery, ME
Memorial Bridge is "an engineering marvel and a landmark of transportation history … the oldest operational lift bridge in the eastern United States, [it] represents a key link in the great Eastern coastal route," says Moe. "Because federal and state-funded infrastructure projects across the nation have been identified as a priority by the Obama Administration, we now have an opportunity to reshape bridge preservation practices in the United States. Memorial Bridge is the poster child for all we stand to lose by erasing these cultural and engineering landmarks."
The Human Services Center, Yankton, SD
The Human Services Center in Yankton, S.D., a prairie hospital formerly known as the South Dakota Hospital for the Insane, is the oldest public institution in the state. In1890 Dr. Leonard Mead implemented his groundbreaking idea of creating an environment that would be therapeutically beneficial for patients instead of the sterile, fear-provoking asylums of the day. Buildings were added to include neo-Classical, Art Deco, and Italianate styles. Eleven of its structures are to be torn down. "This is an unparalleled collection of buildings," says Moe. "Dr. Mead's vision of a beautiful, soul-nourishing environment doesn't have to end just because the State of South Dakota wants to dispose of the Yankton campus."
Miami Marine Stadium
Miami Marine Stadium in Virginia Key, Fla., a cantilevered, cast-concrete stadium damaged by Hurricane Andrew, deterioration, vandalism, and neglect. Miami Marine Stadium is both a South Florida landmark and an icon of Modern design. Moe explains: "There was a time—not long ago—when the ultimate Miami experience was a night at Miami Marine Stadium. This magnificent stadium is an icon of the Modern movement and an important piece of Miami heritage and history, and we can't afford to lose it."
Mount Taylor, New Mexico
Mount Taylor in New Mexico, is a sacred site for American Indian tribes whose cultural and archaeological resources are threatened by uranium mining. The mountain was originally named for President Zachary Taylor. Says Moe: "We can't allow an antiquated mining law—one that has no merit today—to forever scar a place that has tremendous historical and cultural significance to thousands of Americans."
Ames Shovel Shops, Easton, Mass.
Ames Shovel Shops, was a 19th-century industrial village in Easton, Mass. "The shovels manufactured by the Ames family powered, enriched, and defended America,” says Moe. "This is a remarkable example of a manufacturing complex that has survived intact for 150 years."
The cast-iron architecture of Galveston, Texas
Dorchester Academy, Midway, GA
Dorchester Academy in Midway, Ga., was founded in 1868 as a school for freed slaves. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. wrote and practiced portions of his "I Have a Dream" speech at Dorchester Academy. “The story of Dorchester Academy is not widely known, but it's a story that deserves to be told,” Moe says. “In addition to its highly significant role as a school for generations of African-American students, Dorchester played a seminal role in the great social movements of our nation's history."
Lana'i City, Hawaii
Lāna’i City, Hawaii, known as "Pineapple Isle," is a site of plantation homes built in the 1920s. "Lāna‘i City is a jewel, the last remaining intact plantation town in Hawaii," says Moe. "Its remote location protected the city from the intense development pressures seen in other parts of the state, and, as a result, it's been a haven for visitors anxious to experience an authentic and natural slice of paradise.”
The Century Plaza Hotel, Los Angeles
The Century Plaza Hotel in Los Angeles was built in the mid-’60s and designed by Minoru Yamasaki, the architect of the World Trade Center. "How is the demolition of a 40-year-old, fully functioning building environmentally responsible?" asks Moe. "In a state known for its environmental stewardship and strong focus on sustainable development, it boggles the imagination to think a developer could propose tearing down a newly renovated, thriving hotel—a landmark of Modern architecture—and replace it with new construction. Because historic preservation inherently involves the conservation of energy and natural resources, it has always been the greenest form of development."

Charlie Rose Interviews Frank Gehry + Renzo Piano

2009-05-23T12:19:00.000-07:00

The show is a full hour, and very interesting. Each man emphasizes the seriousness of architecture's purpose and the importance of an engaged client. These two "starchitects" seem more humbled by the process than we have given them credit for. At one point, in discussing the NYT team for the new NYT building design, Gehry explains why he walked away from the job: the body language and attitude of the NYT team scared him. He makes this comment in a way that does not connote arrogance, but, rather, a longing for the playful process he has come to revere as the essence of creativity. Renzo Piano was awarded the job.

Renzo Piano discusses, among other ideas, the aesthetic of sustainability, which he believes is the inspiration driving the 21st Century. Simplified, he describes a sustainable building as one that "talks and breathes with nature." We liked his thoughts that architecture is the art of building emotion and that the idea of beauty is changing with the idea of sustainability. This beauty, he feels is the one thing that can compete successfully against the ethos of power and money. Piano is from a long line of builders. When his father learned that Renzo was going to study architecture he said to his son, "Why become and architect, when you could be a builder?" We guess this is a global contention of practices that will never end.

As each man discusses his life and work, the mind gratefully returns to contemplate some of the bigger issues of the practice of architecture.