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

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

"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

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!

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

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!.

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

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

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

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

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

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.

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!

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

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

Neuroscience and Architecture

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

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

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.

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!

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

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

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

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

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

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.

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?

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.

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

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

"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!

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

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.