Panel on Women in Architecture: Today in NYC

Today at 6:30pm in New York City, Design critic Alexandra Lange will moderate a panel of award-winning female architects (Galia Solomonoff, Claire Weisz of WXY Design, and Marion Weiss of Weiss/Manfredi) on “their experiences in a male-dominated field and how the gender landscape has changed since the start of their own careers.”
According to an excellent blog post by Lange, she already knows the first question she’s going to ask: How do they feel about Architect Barbie? But the panel will go beyond gendered toys. As Lange points out, many women have been reluctant to discuss the issues facing women in architecture, preferring to let their work speak for itself; however, the reality is that little has changed for women over the last 15 years (As Lange says: “when I graduated from college in 1994 the percentage of female members of the AIA was 15 percent. In 2010, it was 17 percent.”)
The time is ripe to truly explore this issue and possible solutions -including systemic change and improved work/life balance (not just for women, but for all architects).
If you’re interested in taking part in this panel, you can buy your tickets ($20) here.
Smart Growth: Tactical Urbanism Event

Taking place at the National Building Museum in Washington, D.C. on October 11, the Smart Growth: Tactical Urbanism Event features Mike Lydon, the primary author of Tactical Urbanism Volumes 1 and 2. He will discuss chair bombing, site-previtalization, depaving, open streets, intersection repair, and numerous other placemaking tactics at a time when cities and citizens are increasingly using short-term action to spur long-term revitalization. The event, which starts at 12:30pm, is free and presented in association with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the Smart Growth Network. For more information, please visit here.
modeLab Simulation Lab

Taking place October 20-21, modeLab is putting on Simulation Lab, a two-day workshop on the topic of simulation with processing. In a fast-paced and hands-on learning environment, they will cover technical programming concepts such as syntax, control, and modularity. Utilizing a suite of libraries to extend processing’s functionality, they will explore and incrementally develop force-based, physics-based, and agent-based simulations. Additionally, they will examine strategies for visualizing the dynamic nature, unexpected tendencies, and behavioral effects present in our simulations. For more information, please visit here.
Architects in Conversation: Jeanne Gang + Paul Goldberger

Visionary architect, MacArthur Fellow and National Academician Jeanne Gang joins Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and architecture critic Paul Goldberger as part of the Academy’s annual Architects in Conversation series. Together they will discuss Studio Gang’s past, present, and future projects, as well as Gang’s role within the important architectural tradition of Chicago. The talk will be on Wednesday, October 3, 2012, at 6:30pm at the National Academy Museum. For tickets and for more information, please visit here.
‘Beyond Green! Tall Buildings in a Sustainable Future’ Symposium

Taking place October 10-12 at the University of Stuttgart, Germany, the “Beyond Green! – Tall Buildings in a Sustainable Future” symposium focuses on how tall buildings be designed, built and maintained in a sustainable fashion. The keynote lectures will be held by Christoph Ingenhoven and Helmut Jahn_Murphy/Jahn. The sessions are dedicated to urban development and economy, ecology, planning and realization, structure and skin and building services. More information after the break. (more…)
Playboy Architecture, 1953-1979

What is the connection between sex, architecture and design? Opening tomorrow, September 29, Playboy Architecture, 1953-1979 explores the role of architecture in the famous men’s magazine Playboy. Colomina, along with the curators of NAiM/Bureau-Europa in Maastricht, The Netherlands, centers the exhibition around the research of Beatriz Colomina, a professor at the Princeton University School of Architecture and founder of their Media and Modernity program, who has been studying the connection for the past three years.
Playboy Architecture, 1953-1979 illustrates how cities, buildings, interiors, furniture and products have always played an important role in the fantasy world of Playboy. Ever since Hugh Hefner launched Playboy in 1952, its erotic spreads have featured the likes of Frank Lloyd Wright, Mies van der Rohe, Buckminster Fuller, Moshe Safdie, and Paolo Soleri. As Colomina’s program argues, “sexual revolution and architectural revolution are inseparable.” The exhibition reveals how Playboy reshaped masculinity with the influence of architecture and design. (more…)
ArchiNATI 2012

Starting today, September 28, and running until October 5, ArchiNATI 2012 is week-long festival celebrating Cincinnati’s built environment, partners with institutions city wide to organize and highlight events that showcase Cincinnati’s architecture. Hosted by the Young Architects and Interns Forum (YAiF), a committee of the Cincinnati Chapter of the American Institute of Architects, the events will give everyone the opportunity to experience the built environment in a new way where their interests intersect with architecture and design. Films, talks and tours will take place in the greater Cincinnati area, which kick off with an exhibition of Miami University and University of Cincinnati student design work and open house at the Miami University Center for Community Engagement. For more information and details about the event, please visit here.
‘Akihisa Hirata: Tangling’ Exhibition

Taking place at the Architectural Association until November 17, the ‘Akihisa Hirata: Tangling’ exhibition is the first ever international solo show put on by Akihisa Hirata, an emerging Japanese architect. The exhibit features an immersive 1:1 scale installation – a contorted loop – to distil his architecture’s essence into a large-scale experiential structure. Over a hundred study models and conceptual sketches will be presented on and within the structure, as well as an interview with the architect and intimate films of his projects, illustrating Hirata’s view of architecture and ecology, form and function, as a complex, interwoven ‘tangle’. More information on the exhibition after the break. (more…)
‘Richard Meier. Building as Art’ Exhibition

Taking place September 30-March 3 at the Arp Museum Bahnhof Rolandseck in Remagen, Germany, the ‘Richard Meier. Building as Art‘ exhibition illustrates Richard Meier’s complex design process using prominent buildings and projects from his entire work history. The main focus will be on his museum buildings, as well as on the residential projects created at the start of his career in the USA. The works on display included in the exhibition explore the concept of an architecturally composed space on the basis of five aspects: site, proportion, light, route and color. The exhibition includes a selection of models, original sketches, renderings and photographs. More information after the break. (more…)
Architecture and Design Film Festival

Featuring more than twenty-five films from eleven countries, public programs, and an architectural driving tour of Lower Manhattan, the fourth season of the Architecture and Design Film Festival is taking place October 18-21. Returning to Tribeca Cinemas, in New York City, the films in this year’s Festival consider a range of topics, including contemporary and historic visionary architects, the creative design process, architecture as cultural emissary, the creation of the High Line, and modernist architecture on the East and West Coasts, among other subjects. The Festival features two world premieres, two U.S. premieres, and numerous films shown in New York City for the first time. Tickets go on sale October 1. More information after the break. (more…)
NC State University Fall 2012 Lecture Series

North Carolina State University’s School of Architecture recently launched their Fall 2012 lecture series which focuses on “Material | Digital.” The series begins September 24th with Grace La of La Dallman. Featuring other keynote speakers throughout the series, it concludes on November 19th with a local practitioner panel. For more information, please visit their website here.
‘Pleated Shell Structures’ Exhibition / Zaha Hadid Architects

Opening October 12th, the ‘Pleated Shell Structures’ Exhibition consists of a short term, site specific research prototype designed by Pritzker Architecture Prize-winning architect Zaha Hadid and her firm. Presented by the Southern California Institute of Architecture (SCI-Arc) in their gallery, the exhibit positions itself within the argument of parametric design research to focus its efforts on design methods that encompass an operative pathway from design intent to manifestation. The exhibition will be on display until December 2. More information after the break. (more…)
Akihisa Hirata: Tangling

Presented in an “interwoven tangle”, Japanese architect Akihisa Hirata has revealed his view of architecture and ecology, along with form and function, in his first ever international solo exhibition at the The Architecture Foundation in London. Now on view, the immersive 1:1 scale installation – “a contorted loop” – display’s over a hundred study models and conceptual sketches, an interview with the architect, and intimate films of based on his projects.
The exhibition opened shortly after Hirata’s receipt of the Golden Lion award at the 13th Venice Architecture Biennale for his contribution, with Kumiko Inui, Sou Fujimoto and Naoya Hatakeyama, to the Japanese Pavilion, curated by Toyo Ito.
Continue after the break for more. (more…)
HelloWood 2012: Social Architecture in Hungary

HelloWood - a creative, professional and social program with a message that mobilizes more and more young people – was organized for the 3rd year by MOMEline – designworks, together with its new partner Reflekt social architecture studio. The week-long creative camp included 200 Hungarian and international students who worked together to realize social and cultural spaces for eight north-eastern Hungarian communities. The social mission of the project was showcased at Sziget, Europe’s Best Major Festival. Cameron Sinclair, the co-founder of Architecture for Humanity, commended HelloWood’s inspirational initiative for aspiring to social change with thoughtful design for marginalized communities.
Join us after the break for details on some of the projects. (more…)
modeLab Data Lab

Data Lab, a two-day workshop put on by modeLab September 29-30, focuses on advanced topics and data structures in grasshopper for rhinoceros. In a fast-paced and hands-on learning environment, they will cover the fundamental concepts of data structures as well as strategies for working with lists, sequences, and data trees in the newly released version of Grasshoppper 0.9. They will engage a series of design problems which highlight the limitations of standard parametric design workflows and serve as catalysts for discussions related to best practices, linear versus non-linear design processes, and the re-use of files. Each design problem will require either the specific use and manipulation of data structures or the extension of Grasshopper through add-ons. To register and for more information, please visit here.
modeLab Grasshopper Webinar

The Grasshopper Webinar, presented by modeLab, is a free event that will introduce participants to the fundamental concepts and essential skills necessary for effectively designing with Grasshopper for Rhinoceros. They will cover concepts such as object attributes/parameters, data types, data structures, and designing with algorithms. Specifically, this webinar will focus on creating and manipulating both lists and data trees as well as best practices for integrating Grasshopper into your professional workflow. Also, due to the high demand, they opened up a second date, which is set for September 24. To register and for more information, please visit here.
‘New Towns New Territories: New Players in Urban Planning’ Conference

The International New Town Institute is organizing the ‘New Towns New Territories: New Players in Urban Planning’ conference taking place September 27th from 9am-7pm. The event, which will be held at the NAi in Rotterdam, will explore the latest innovations in global urbanization, privatization and new organizational models of urban development as well as the impact and challenges for professional practice. Global urbanization is moving at a faster pace than ever before and it is showing a fundamental shift in its structure and organization. Hundreds of economic, eco and satellite cities are being developed by private companies. Not only in Asia, but also in Europe. Who are the new players in the field of urban development? What visions, ambitions and strategies do they have? What innovations and financial models make these cities possible? These are just a few of the questions that will be answered and discussed. For more information, please visit here.
Designer Thomas Heatherwick is Star Guest at Hay Festival Segovia 2012

Hay Festival Segovia just announced that UK designer Thomas Heatherwick will be the keynote speaker for the architecture and design sessions at the Spanish edition of Hay Festival set to take place in Segovia September 27-30. In an hour-long conversation entitled The Truffle Pig Process, Thomas Heatherwick will be talking to Martha Thorne, executive director of the Pritzker Architecture Prize and associate dean of external relations at IE School of Architecture & Design (IE University), about his studio’s creative process and the increasingly blurred borders between design, architecture and society. More information on the event after the break. (more…)
‘Chandigarh: Portrait of a City’ Exhibition

In continuation of their exhibition program on architectural photography taking place in New Delhi, Photoink is currently presenting Chandigarh: Portrait of a City by French photographer, Manuel Bougot until October 27th. Bougot’s interest in Le Corbusier’s architecture began in the 1980s when he worked on Caroline Maniaque’s thesis in architecture–on the Jaoul Houses built in 1954 in Neuilly, France. Since 2006, Bougot renewed his interest in Le Corbusier, attending talks on Chandigarh and photographed the only building the architect ever built for himself – a cabanon (a summer cabin) in Roquebrune-Cap-Martin. Photographing Chandigarh was therefore necessary to further any understanding of Le Corbusier, the urban designer and his philosophy about architecture and modernism. More images and information on the exhibition after the break. (more…)
‘Ricardo Legorreta and Santa Fe’ Tribute Event

Santa Fe University of Art and Design and the Santa Fe Art Institute recently announced the Ricardo Legorreta Tribute event, a weekend of activities across the city honoring Legorreta’s influence on Santa Fe design. Taking place October 19-20, the event will include a series of lectures, films and tours that will honor the legacy of the late Mexican architect whose inspired designs have helped shape the landscape of many residential, academic and corporate buildings in Santa Fe. More information on the event after the break. (more…)
Venice Biennale 2012: hands have no tears to flow / Austria Pavilion

The Austrian Pavilion for the 2012 Venice Biennale is a collaboration of Wolfgang Tschapeller, Rens Veltman and Martin Perktold, a team that consists of interdisciplinary fields of study, thought and action from architecture and art. The contribution, entitled “Hands have no tears to flow. Reports from / without Architecture” invites visitors to comprehend architecture as a social and cultural phenomenon and to experience it from different perspectives and views. It explores this year’s theme, Common Ground, with a discourse on the sociopolitical function of architecture. The exhibit will be on view at the Biennale until November 25th.