About thirty years ago, French landscape architect Patrick Blanc became a pioneer in the implementation of vertical gardens in Paris, and later in other cities around the world. Through the creation of vertical structures capable nourishing plant species, these systems allow species to grow on the facades of buildings, considerably reducing a structure's internal temperature and allowing the expansion of green areas to new (vertical) territories within the city.
Blanc's creation was part of a series of developments in understanding what nature adds to the city, recognizing the value of green spaces and their contribution to social, environmental and urban policies.
New technological developments in construction have given architects great freedom when designing. Innovations in construction materials and their properties allow for the creation of increasingly original and surprising facades. The buildings constructed as a result can even inspire people to travel thousands of kilometers just to see these masterpieces. This week, we present 15 of most ground-breaking facades through photos by prominent photographers such as Paul Ott, Peter Bennetts and Laurian Ghinitoiu.
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Conceptual drawing of MXC’s primary domed enclosure, proposed to be a mile wide in early discussions, but eventually scaled back. Image Courtesy of The Experimental City Documentary
The Minnesota Experimental City (MXC)—a utopian plan for the city of the future that was decades ahead of its time, and yet is surprisingly little-known—was the brainchild of the urban planner and technocrat Athelstan Spilhaus. Spilhaus was a man who saw science as the solution to the problems of the world, and became a public figure presenting his ideas of utopia in everyday life through his comic strip "Our New Age." During the mid-1960s, he conceived an ambitious plan to condense his ideas into a prototype for future cities that would be both noiseless and fumeless, accommodating America's growing population and their by-products.
A new documentary,The Experimental City, explores the development, and ultimately, failure of the MXC's vision for future settlements. Using retro film clips, it takes us back in time to a period where Spilhaus' predictions of computers that can fit into your home and remote banking appeared more of a fantasy than reality. The film is directed by Chad Freidrichs (known also for his 2011 film The Pruitt-Igoe Myth) and was premiered at the Chicago Film Festival, in conjunction with the Chicago Architecture Biennial. Several further screenings will be taking place across the country, including at DOC NYC on November 16th.
The Southbank Undercroft, which lies beneath the Queen Elizabeth Hall along the River Thames in London, has been the subjectof muchdebate in recent years following a proposed closure and redevelopment in 2013. Long Live Southbank, an organization born out of this threat of expulsion, gave the diverse community who call the space home a voice. After 17 months of campaigning, they were successful in ensuring the Undercroft was legally protected and fully recognized as an asset of community value. Since then, the group of activists has begun another groundbreaking journey.
In partnership with Southbank Centre, Long Live Southbank recently launched a new crowdfunding campaign to restore the legendary Undercroft. The restoration project will cost £790,000 and is set to open in 2018, improving Londoners’ access to free creative spaces in the heart of the City. These types of space are becoming increasingly rare and the restoration effort reflects a desire to celebrate the authentic cultural sites that make London the vibrant landscape it is.
In addition to their videos, #donotsettle’s Wahyu Pratomo and Kris Provoost tell extended stories about the buildings they visit through an exclusive column on ArchDaily: #donotsettle Extra. In this installment, the duo brings you to the newest design by OMA, Rijnstraat 8 in The Hague, The Netherlands. Saskia Simon and Kees van Casteren from OMA explained the architecture of Rijnstraat 8 to #donotsettle while touring the building.
This project, which houses a variety of Dutch government agencies, is an example of a spatial alteration that occurred as result of political and organizational changes. However, given the existing structure by architect Jan Hoogstad, OMA has transformed the architectural experience of the building from within.
It is safe to say that architects, academics, critics and even the public have been arguing about the merits of architectural style for centuries. Even during the course of my own career, the more general style categories of contemporary-vs-traditional have continued in an unabated battle. For better or worse, contemporary has generally won out as the default position for most schools and publications, probably because of the sheer visual entertainment value it offers, and the lucrative merits of its two stepchildren, branding and advertising.
I’d like to propose another position: that certain enduring principles of art, rather than any temporary style—and, remember, they are all temporary—should be our real architectural goal. This presumption means you must be agnostic when it comes to style and put aside any notion of an ideological stance regarding the right or wrong of your architectural preferences. There are those, of course, who say that to imagine that “my art” is better than yours, or even that I can define real art in the first place, is a fool’s errand.
Amazon’s open call for bids for its new headquarters, HQ2, closed last month, but in the months leading up to the final decision in 2018, analysts will continue to flood the internet with detailed studies evaluating who they believe should be the winner. In other words, the mirror-mirror-on-the-wall game for cities is just starting to warm up.
Earlier, ArchDailyreported on the data-driven approach adopted by Moody’s Analytics which projected Austin, TX as the winner. But another study by IT education company Thinkful now points towards Washington DC as the city most likely to make the cut. So what makes Washington DC the fairest of them all? Read on to see how data science techniques helped analysts at Thinkful with this prediction, what kind of approach they adopted, and how it differed from that of Moody’s Analytics.
https://www.archdaily.com/882976/amazon-hq2-study-by-data-science-experts-names-washington-dc-as-ideal-host-cityZoya Gul Hasan
As most architecture students and practicing architects find out, all-nighters are (ironically) the stuff of nightmares. They're a last resort when the project is due and you have run out times you can say "I’ll do that tomorrow." All-nighters should be avoided at all costs as they can have many negative effects on your mind such as decreased concentration and reduced long-term memory. Even your body can suffer too; pushing yourself to the limit as you fight tiredness and work as much as physically possible will weaken your immune system and can cause circulatory problems from sitting down for 20 or so hours straight.
In a previous article, we have discussed the many ways in which you can avoid pulling an all-nighter so you don’t have to be as sleep deprived. But sometimes things just don't go to plan, and you may feel that working through the night is the only option. Read on for tips and tricks that should make your all-nighter slightly more bearable (if that's at all possible).
Jaime Lerner defines urban acupuncture as a series of small-scale, highly focused interventions that have the capacity to regenerate or to begin a regeneration process in dead or damaged spaces and their surroundings.
Rather than urban acupuncture, the intervention that took place in the rugged geography of Medellin’s Comuna 13 was like an open-heart surgery, a large-scale action aimed at bringing about physical and social change of what was once one of the most dangerous neighbourhoods in the world’s most dangerous city.
The bilingual guides take us through the neighbourhood, showing us the escalators that gave the intervention worldwide fame. At the same time, in one of the many refurbished squares, a CNN team records interviews with locals and foreigners who visit by the hundreds what was, until recently, an unlikely tourist destination. A drone flies over the scene, we do not know if it is operated by the omnipresent police, CNN or tourists.
Today, the construction industry is faced with increasingly challenging demands in terms of safety, energy saving and aesthetics. In fact, very strict energy and safety regulations and standards have been put in place to make sure new buildings, but also renovated ones, are fire and earthquake resistant while safeguarding the environment. At present, the ventilated facade is one of the most widely used and most innovative systems, in both residential and production sectors: it is an excellent vertical closing system characterised by fire-retardant and anti-seismic elements, which can insulate a building both thermally and acoustically, reducing the impact of weathering on masonry structures (UNI 11018).
More and more, the kitchen is gaining importance in house design, in many cases serving as the center around which the rest of the spaces unfold. For this reason, this week we present a selection of 15 images of kitchens, from different parts of the world, which allow us to appreciate the variety of configurations, materials, and shapes now used in this important space. Read on to see the images of photographers including BoysPlayNice, Peter Bennetts, and Juane Sepulveda.
Deeply rooted in the phenomenological ideas of Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Steven Holl’s architectural philosophy is centered on human experience, materiality, and a thorough engagement with the site or context. But more than his experiments with space and material, he is best known for his mastery over what is perhaps his favorite material, or medium: natural light.
His design for the Visual Arts Building at the University of Iowa, seen here through the lens of photographer Aaron Dougherty, is one of his projects that best explores these concerns. Clad in weathering zinc and stainless steel, the four-story building houses studios, teaching spaces, galleries and faculty offices for all visual arts departments—from Ceramics, Jewelry Design and Sculpture, to Printmaking, Painting, Video Art, and 3D Design.
Oh my. Where to begin? My first impulse was just to move on and shake my head in wonder, perhaps, that a well-established designer and architectural thinker would wish to publish an article so dyspeptic. It is, after all, a common pattern: the young pranksters of yesteryear, once their hairlines have started to recede, transform into schoolmasters as befitting their recently-acquired academic sinecures. It’s all just part of the normal generational cycle that keeps a culture moving forward. Business as usual.
Increasingly close collaboration between architects and engineers has caused an explosion in bridge design over the last few decades, resulting in structures that are both bold yet rational. As a result, cities have exploited bridges as great monuments of design, to foster pride in the residents and promote themselves as a destination for tourists. These ideas have inspired photographer Greig Cranna as he travels the world, capturing the elegance of today's bridge infrastructure.
Cranna has been documenting some of his stunning photography on Instagram, collating it over the past 20 months into a forthcoming book, Sky Architecture—The Transformative Magic of Today's Bridges. In capturing these entrancing structures, the photos show the impact of the bridges as an addition to the landscape and revel in their contemporary silhouettes and designs.
Moscow welcomed its first new park in 50 years with the opening Zaryadye Park in mid-September. Designed by architects Diller Scofidio + Renfro, Citymakers and Hargreaves Associates, this new public space has been a big draw for Muscovites, with over a million people visiting in the first weeks since its inauguration.
The park has become one of the most important contemporary spaces in Moscow, exhibiting high-quality infrastructure and landscapes, as well as extraordinary views to the Kremlin and the Red Square.
2017 has been an amazing year in the field of technology for architects. Most excitingly, we’ve seen an exponential growth in our fascination with virtual and augmented reality. Various types of innovative technology for architects are rolled out so regularly, we find our architect clients wondering where to begin.
Which of the many tech developments are merely gimmicks that will disappear as fast as they arrived, and which are here to stay, becoming permanent fixtures within professional practice? We’ve compiled a list of 10 pieces of technology for architects that will differentiate your firm from the competition in the studio and on the construction site.
Architecture, as all architects like to remind everyone, can be a stressful profession. Long days, late nights, indecisive clients, too-decisive clients, permit issues, legal issues, software problems, contractor problems... all combine to generate a high-pressure work environment. So, when architects get a chance to let loose and relieve some of that pressure, they really let loose. Here are a few moves to get you dancing like an architect:
Structural prototype by the makeLab™at LTU. Image courtesy of LTU
Detroit is a long-standing symbol of innovation in America, especially in the production of automobiles, music, and, at one point in history, airplanes. It has, correspondingly, been called the Motor City, Motown, and the Cradle of Democracy. Over the last half-century, racial tension, urban migration, and disinvestment have shifted the city’s identity, causing it to become a symbol of post-industrial America and the attendant urban deterioration. Together, these elements render Detroit’s more recent nickname—the Renaissance City—tragically ironic.
