The design of PPG Place, by Philip Johnson and John Burgee, melds the notion of the modern corporate tower with a neo-gothic monument. Clad in almost a million square feet of glass manufactured by the anchor tenant PPG industries, the architects ingeniously rethought accepted practices in curtain wall design to create "the crown jewel in Pittsburgh's skyline." (1) The 1.57 million square foot complex was one in a series of high profile corporate projects completed during Johnson's controversial foray into postmodernism.
Pittsburgh: The Latest Architecture and News
AD Classics: PPG Place / John Burgee Architects with Philip Johnson
Eliciting Environments | Actuating Response
Current computational, sensing and fabrication technologies provide new opportunities for architects and designers to embed intelligence and responsive behavior directly into architectural matter. Such design tactics not only elicit new sensibilities and socio-aesthetic desires, but also instrumentalize new understandings of hierarchies, networks and organization of building systems controls. Responsive technologies play a critical role in advancing the evolving relationships between humans, constructed environments, administrative controls and natural systems. Systems that mitigate human-machine-environment interaction are evolving to encompass more complex methods of collecting and managing data that can produce subtle differences in feedback and response.
Center for Sustainable Landscapes / The Design Alliance Architects
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Architects: The Design Alliance Architects
- Year: 2013
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Manufacturers: Vitro®, PPG IdeaScapes, PPG Paints
Plan Envisages Reusing Pittsburghs Industrial Past to Bring The City Closer Together
With the advent of the High Line and the recent announcement about Chicago's Bloomingdale Trail, it's becoming clear that the 'parkway' is a powerful new force in urban planning, which has the potential to change the way cities around the world function. A new project in Pittsburgh seeks to harness these possibilities, as the city's history of industry has left its stamp upon the city in the form of a rusting industrial riverfront. A plan by Saski Associates envisages re-using this space to create a green belt, tying the city closer together. By adding pedestrian, cycling and light-rail transport routes, and creating plenty of green spaces, they hope to tap Pittsburgh's unrealized potential to be a river-front city, while encouraging geographical and social closeness amongst its communities.
More images and the architect’s description after the break…
Kaufmann Program Center / Renaissance 3 Architects
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Architects: Renaissance 3 Architects
- Area: 20500 m²
- Year: 2011
Gates Center for Computer Science and Hillman Center for Future Generation Technologies / Mack Scogin Merrill Elam Architects
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Architects: Mack Scogin Merrill Elam Architects
- Area: 208000 m²
- Year: 2009
Liberty Medical Center / Front Studio Architects
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Architects: Front Studio Architects
- Area: 20000 ft²
- Year: 2009
Glass Lofts / Front Studio Architects
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Architects: Front Studio Architects
- Area: 39000 ft²
- Year: 2010
Urban Biophillic Pavilion / studio d’ARC
- Area: 576 ft²