© Thomas Lewandovski

After World War II, post-war Europe was suffering from a lack of housing with many displaced people from the extensive bombing raids.  In response to the housing crisis in Europe, Le Corbusier began delving into designing large scale, communal residences for the victims of World War II. One of the most notable projects in this series was the Unite d’ Habitation in Marseilles, France. This project had inspired a continued implementation of the design type across Europe. The fourth building in the series is the Corbusierhaus in Berlin, Germany. Completed in 1959, it was designed as a symbol for the modernization of Germany after the war and the Cold War. read more »

© Juliusz Sokolowski

Architects: Jojko+Nawrocki Architekci
Location: Rybnik, Poland
Project year: 2007 – 2010
Photographs: Juliusz Sokolowski

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Call Center in Santo Tirso / Aires Mateus

In our AD Photographers section we are now featuring portuguese photographer Joao Morgado. Born in 1985, he has made his photographer career during the last 4 years, working regularly with offices from Portugal, Spain, Netherlands and Italy.

1. When and how did you start photographing architecture?

I always had a passion about photography but it became more intense during my studies in architecture.

Through that time, i visited a lot of buildings and i spent several hours a day in libraries absorbing architecture and somehow i missed something from the photos of the buildings i have visited before. Since then i became more and more interested, not only in my own point of view, but specially in the truth of architecture.

A couple of months later, i had an invitation from an editor to photograph buildings of three respect Portuguese architects for a yearbook publication: Aires Mateus, Promontorio and Menos é Mais.

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© Michael Graves

A bright and fun building that stands out against it’s surroundings, Michael Graves is well respected for his design that brought hope to the families of children with disabilities in Washington D.C. and surrounding areas.

St. Coletta was founded in 1959 by a couple with a child diagnosed with Down Syndrome. As they had history dealing with the struggle of finding an educational system that worked for their child, they decided to establish the school as a special education charter which serviced and educated children with severe or multiple disabilities. The bright colors and simple forms make it very fitting for the people that the building serves, as it is fun, playful and inviting.

More on St. Coletta School after the break.

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© Tim Griffith

Architects: WRNS Studio
Location: San Francisco, CA, USA
Project Team: Sam Nunes, Bryan Shiles, Russell Sherman
Project Area: 469,767 sq ft
Project Year: 2009
Photographs: Tim Griffith Photography

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© Pablo Vicens

Architect: Vicens + Ramos / Ignacio Vicens y Hualde, José Antonio Ramos Abengózar
Location: Guisando, Avila, Spain
Collaborators: Fernando Gil, Desirée González, Pablo Gutiérrez, Romina Barbieri, Joaquín Esperón, María José Muñoz, Raúl Rodríguez, Tibor Martín, Patricia de Elena, Javier Margarit
Project Year: 2003-2009
Photographs: Pablo Vicens

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AP Photo/Lennart Preiss

Ai Weiwei is a complicated individual living in complicated times. But he’s an artist so this goes without saying. He’s constantly challenging the status quo and seems to thrive on it. But for him there may be no other way of being human, given the role he has accepted as an artist.

For many artists, it is this way. Regardless of nationality, art is about getting into trouble, not about sitting safely in one’s designer loft. Notice how artists flock together whenever they move into rough industrial neighborhoods. Many people like to think of themselves as artists. It’s easy to adopt this pose. Very few, however, actually take risks either in their work or to produce it. Ai Weiwei risks everything for his work.

More after the break. read more »

© David Frutos

Architects: Noname 29 / Alfredo Payá Benedito
Location: San Vicente, Alicante, Spain
Collaborators: Arturo Calero, Sonia Miralles, Vicente Pascual Fuentes, Beatriz Vera Payá, Natalia Velasco Velázquez, Gerardo Bernal Castell
Client: Maestre Ruiz
Project area: 240 sqm
Project year: 2008 – 2009
Photographs: David Frutos

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© Julien Lanoo

Architects: TANK Architectes
Location: Lens, France
Project area: 920 sqm
Project year: 2009-2010
Photographs: Julien Lanoo read more »

REX’s website, voted as one of the Top 10 Architect’s websites by our readers.

This Inspiration Series is brought
to you by Veer.com

Every day we spend quite some time visiting architect’s websites (maybe even yours!) to be up to date with new and ongoing projects.

It’s a very fun part of our job, especially when websites have a good design and usability. However from time to time we stumble upon websites that are very difficult to browse, or present projects in a way that you can’t even understand them.

You know that we as architects have the ability to design “from a spoon to a city”, and a website should be among those things we can (and should) design, especially when it is one of our most important marketing tools. I’m not saying that you should learn HTML and code your own website, but as we know from our work, an informed client is a good client. Therefore, having a good idea on what your website should offer to its visitors can help you relate with the person you hire to maintain it, the same way we love when a client has a clear idea on how they want their building to be… and not asking for a “green roof” just because they read it in some random magazine.

Below you will find a few tips that can help you on this process. I’m very confident that some of you may already know about some of them, and it’d be great if you could share your comments based on your experience.

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©New York Times- Tony Cenicola

Famous on all ends of the architectural spectrum, the Orange County Government Center takes Paul Rudolph‘s fundamental ideas of the houses he designed decades before to a much larger scale. This fascinating architectural structure was built to be the office and government of Orange County in New York, containing everything from records to a Department of Motor Vehicles for the state.

The obviously brutalist style was infused with Rudolph’s interest in “working with Mies Van Der Rohe’s concept of implied space.”

More on the Orange County Government Center after the break.

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© Stéphane Chalmeau

Architects: Tétrarc Architects
Location: Saint Herblain, France
Project Area: 4,457 sqm
Budget: 8.3M Euro
Project Year: 2006-2010
Photographs: Stéphane Chalmeau

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© JR/Agence VU

The 2011 TED Prize-winner is the artist who goes by the tag, JR. His enormous photographic installations obscure the facades of buildings, overlay streets, and sometimes collage to cover clusters of buildings in one massive broken image.

While some shy away from calling his work “street art,” I don’t see any shame in this—especially given the clear social justice objectives inherent in the imagery. It presents the faces, literally but never as cliché, of invisible and overlooked peoples. In this way, it is street art in the best sense of the term. You walk into the street and there it is and it has something to tell you. It takes buildings and turns them into indexes of shame, embarrassment, nobility, hope—whatever you might associate with the everyday struggles of the displaced lower-classes.

More after the break. read more »

© Eric Laignel

Multiple rooms, both interior and exterior, have been added to a non-descript, one-story 1960′s ranch style home transforming it into a receiver of Miami’s tropical climate. While the effect is striking, minimal alterations were made to the existing structure. The house is entered through a 20′x30′x30′ volume where a reflecting pool and oculus align to activate the space with reflection and luminance. A large room organizes the house into private and public realms. Tremendous spaces with oversized windows overlook the pool and canal. A 60′x20′x20′ volume, at the rear of the home provides enclosure for outdoor living and a large circular column contains an outdoor shower open to the sky. The second floor contains a secluded courtyard garden, off the master bedroom. The project provides a flexible infrastructure for the participation and enjoyment of the pleasures of life.

Follow the break for more photographs and drawings of Villa Allegra.

Architects: Oppenheim Architecture + Design
Location: Miami Beach, Florida, United States
Project Team: Chad Oppenheim, Juan Calvo, Giovana Henao, Leslie Abraham, Rodrigo Londoño, and Roger Placencia
Project Area: 9,000 Ssqf
Project Year: 2002
Photographs: Eric Laignel

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© Amit Pasricha

Architects: Khosla Associates
Location: Dehra Dun, India
Design Team: Sandeep Khosla, Amaresh Anand, Subodh Divekar and Dhaval Shellugar
Structural Engineer: Manjunath & Co.
General Contractors: Sawhney Builders
Electrical Consultant: Lyle Lopez
Plumbing Consultant: S.K. Consultants
Acoustics: KLM Designs
Building Green Analysis: The Energy and Resource Institute (TERI)
Project Area: 25,000 sqm
Project Year: 2010
Photographs: Bharath Ramamrutham & Amit Pasricha

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While in Chicago earlier this year I had the chance to interview  an amazing architect: Michael Graves.

Michael Graves has played an influential role in architecture, often credited as moving the profession in America from abstract modernism to post-modernism. His designs communicate a clear point of view reflecting a sense of playfulness with sophistication. The balance of traditional elements (typically through arches, columns, and pediments) and exploration with color convey the lessons of modern architecture while referring to historical details.

Michael Graves’s most notable accomplishment may be in his success as a high profile architect and a household name. He teamed up with companies such as Target, Disney, Phillips Electronics, and Black and Decker developing a wide range of products reaching a larger public. In doing so he has required us to evaluate our design sensibility and responsibility, serving both large-scale design and intricate details such as bathroom fixtures, teapots, and dinnerware.

Michael Graves has served as a Professor of Architecture at Princeton University, founder and principal of Michael Graves & Associates, and has been awarded some of the most prestigious awards including the 2001 Gold Medal of the American Institute of Architects, and the 2010 AIA/ACSA Topaz Medallion for Excellence in Architectural Education.

Please find the rest of the interview below, including questions on American Architecture and the obsession of chasing green design:
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During this summer SO-IL (Solid Objectives Idenburg Liu) took the stage.

First, the Brooklyn based firm won the P.S.1 Competition for this summer with Pole Dance, an interactive performing installation. Then a few weeks after we presented you Flockr, the main pavilion for the Get It Louder festival in Beijing.

We had the chance to meet and interview principals Florian Idenburg and Jing Liu at P.S.1 while Pole Dance was open. The interview went great. I highly recommend that you check out their response to our question regarding their experience starting and running a firm, just during the financial crisis.

The firm is currently involved in interesting projects abroad, which we look forward in featuring here at ArchDaily in the future.

Please find the rest of the interview below:
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During the AIA convention in Miami we had the chance to interview Steve Dumez, Design Director at Nola-based firm Eskew+Dumez+Ripple, who received his FAIA during the event.

Steve is the “design guru” at EDR, overseeing the design of all projects from concept to construction documents, and according to the firm “his hand sketches in the early phases of design are invaluable”.

Steve, along side partners Allen  Eskew (FAIA) and Mark Ripple (AIA, LEED AP) have been focused their efforts in the NOLA area, not only with their buildings, but also taking part on the initiatives  to rebuild NOLA. Steve is also a Past-President of AIA Louisiana and AIA New Orleans.

EDR’s work portfolio includes projects in varies scales, such as the Prospect.1 Welcome Center (AIA Small Project Award 2010)  or 930 Poydras Residential Tower, a 462,000 sqf project. On the videos below we discuss with Steve about their experience working on such different scales.

Other works by Eskew+Dumez+Ripple previously featured at AD:

• 930 Poydras Residential Tower
• Prospect.1 Welcome Center
• Dr. Nancy Foster Florida Keys Environmental Center (with Guidry Beazley Architects)
• LITE Technology Center

… and more coming soon!

Enjoy the rest of the interview:
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Peter Zumthor - Courtesy of Marco Masetti

This interview was completely conducted and translated by Marco Masetti, done as his bachelor’s degree thesis in Italy.

The idea of multiplicity is innate in Peter Zumthor’s projects since his very first works: works of art surrounding us put on various meanings, which do not always remain on parallel levels combining well with dialectical relationships. The vague is planned strictly, holding by the rules of the architectural language. Beauty is in the undetermined, the multiple, but it is obtainable only through precision. Multiplicity of objects is shown only when who is living with them can distinguish their single parts and, at the same time, can see the work in its wholeness. This throw back to the “unitary” character of architecture, in which every part is in relation with the others and together they give a sense to the project. Zumthor’s planning is pure: nothing is pointless. In this society, as the architect says, «architecture has to oppose resistance», and react to the naughtiness of shapes and meanings, and return to talk its own language. Original shape invention or particular composition doesn’t take to the truth. Between multiplicity and silence there’s a tense and vibrational relationship, and the concrete idea is in their equilibrium.

Things determine the spatial dimension of the world, and therefore its knowledge and usability to us. The project triggers a linking mechanism between things, so they can assume a meaning to the user, becoming an efficient tool to know of the world. Things, objects, the world of references, transform our sensations in remembrance. The pictures that come to mind enclose Zumthor’s research heart. Shape is the result, not the reason. Beauty doesn’t come out of the shape alone, but of the multiplicity of impressions, sensations and emotions that the shape has us to discover.

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