Tag: charles-jencks | ArchDaily

The Architect as Writer: Expanding the Discipline Beyond Buildings

Diogo Borges Ferreira — Thu, 04 Sep 2025 07:30:00 +0000

Architecture has always been more than bricks and mortar. It is equally constructed through words, ideas, and narratives. From ancient treatises to radical manifestos, from technical manuals to poetic essays, the written word has served as a spatial, pedagogical, and political tool within the field. Writing shapes how architecture is conceptualized, communicated, and critiqued — often long before, or even in the absence of, physical construction.

The Timeless Appeal of Modernism in Technology and Digital Architecture

Diogo Borges Ferreira — Thu, 13 Feb 2025 07:30:00 +0000

Modernism, a movement that sought to break away from traditional forms and embrace the future, laid the groundwork for many technological and digital advancements in contemporary architecture. As the Industrial Revolution brought about mass production, new materials, and technological innovation, architects like Le Corbusier, Walter Gropius, and Mies van der Rohe championed the ethos of "form follows function" and a rational approach to design. Their principles resonate in the digital age, where computational design and high-tech materials redefine form and construction.

DOGMA Receives 2023 RIBA Charles Jencks Award

Nour Fakharany — Wed, 03 Jan 2024 05:30:00 +0000

The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA), in collaboration with The Jencks Foundation at The Cosmic House, has announced that Dogma is the 2023 recipient of the Charles Jencks Award. Previously awarded to Zaha Hadid, Níall McLaughlin, Herzog & de Meuron, and OMA, the award celebrates other forms of thinking and production that can drive architecture beyond design. This year’s recipient, Dogma, is a Brussels-based architecture practice focusing on the interplay between architecture and urban environments.

The Language of Lighting: How to Read Light and Shadow in Architecture

Thomas Schielke — Mon, 13 Mar 2023 05:00:00 +0000

Imagine if light would not only provide optimum visibility for tasks but convey meanings as well. Standards with recommended lux levels for various visual tasks have led to a quantitative understanding of lighting. However, lighting can also be used to contribute to emotion in rooms and to structure architecture. Would it be adequate to regard lighting as language sent by architects or interior designers and being received by inhabitants and citizens? Adding a semiotic perspective can help to recognize how light and shadow contributes to the meaning of the built environment.

How Maggie’s Centres Help Cancer Patients Find Strength from Within

Laura Raskin — Sun, 20 Oct 2019 04:00:00 +0000

The rapidly growing cancer care provider uses big-name architects and designers to create comfortable, hospitable spaces.

Charles Jencks Dies at Age 80

Maria Erman — Mon, 14 Oct 2019 10:52:00 +0000

Renowned architecture theorist and historian, landscape designer and co-founder of Maggie's Cancer Care Centres, Charles Jencks died yesterday, as reported by RIBA Journal on Twitter. Born in Baltimore, Maryland, on June 21, 1939, Jencks was 80 years old at the time he passed away.

This Week in Architecture: Being Recognized

Katherine Allen — Sat, 15 Sep 2018 06:30:00 +0000

Try as we might to inure ourselves to the opinions of others, recognition is a powerful thing. It brings with it a captive (and expectant) audience, not just of admirers but of kingmakers - or, cynically, those who see an opportunity to capitalize. For architects, this can be both a blessing and a curse. Many practices start with the motivation to pursue an idea or concept; as recognition becomes diluted to labels it becomes harder to understand what was distinguishing in the first place. This week saw the announcements of a numerous significant awards - and an interview with a practice determined to shake off the labels that come with recognition. Read on for this week’s review.

Alejandro Aravena to Receive 2018 RIBA Charles Jencks Award

Katherine Allen — Thu, 13 Sep 2018 07:45:00 +0000

Chilean architect Alejandro Aravena and founder of ELEMENTAL has been named the 2018 laureate of Royal Institute of British Architect's (RIBA) Charles Jencks Award. The prize is given in recognition of an individual's exceptional contributions to the field of architecture, both in built and theoretical works. Aravena will receive the prize and give a lecture at RIBA's London headquarters on 15 October.

Caroline Bos, David Adjaye, Li Xiaodong and Many Others to Speak at 2018 World Architecture Festival

Jack McManus — Thu, 26 Jul 2018 16:00:00 +0000

After two years in Berlin, the World Architecture Festival will move their 2018 edition to Amsterdam for three days of talks, design presentations, and award ceremonies featuring cutting-edge contemporary works and some of the most prominent figures in architecture today.

Rafael Viñoly, Charles Jencks, and Kim Cook Among Lead Speakers for WAF 2017

Tessa Forde — Tue, 26 Sep 2017 06:00:00 +0000

The World Architecture Festival (WAF) has announced their program for the 2017 edition focusing on the theme of “Performance.” An incredible list of speakers including Alison Brooks, Charles Jencks, Pierre de Meuron and France Kéré will feature across 3 days from November 15^th to 17^th at the Arena Berlin, Germany. Conferences, city tours, lectures and critiques of the shortlisted projects from the 2017 WAF awards are among the events scheduled for the festival.

Global Architectural Political Event London

Rene Submissions — Mon, 29 May 2017 14:43:00 +0000

‘Global Architectural Political Events’ are a series of public debates organised by Alejandro Zaera-Polo & Guillermo Fernandez-Abascal that continue the investigation about the political re-engagement of the discipline, as analysed in the essay ‘Well into the 21st Century’ and the ‘Global Architectural Compass’.

AD Classics: Pruitt-Igoe Housing Project / Minoru Yamasaki

Luke Fiederer — Mon, 15 May 2017 04:00:00 +0000

Few buildings in history can claim as infamous a legacy as that of the Pruitt-Igoe Housing Project of St. Louis, Missouri. Built during the height of Modernism this nominally innovative collection of residential towers was meant to stand as a triumph of rational architectural design over the ills of poverty and urban blight; instead, two decades of turmoil preceded the final, unceremonious destruction of the entire complex in 1973. The fall of Pruitt-Igoe ultimately came to signify not only the failure of one public housing project, but arguably the death knell of the entire Modernist era of design.

Understanding British Postmodernism (Hint: It’s Not What You Thought)

Timothy Brittain-Catlin — Wed, 29 Mar 2017 04:00:00 +0000

In this essay by the British architect and academic Dr. Timothy Brittain-Catlin, the very notion of British postmodernism—today often referred to as intimately tied to the work of James Stirling and the the thinking of Charles Jencks—is held to the light. Its true origins, he argues, are more historically rooted.

Níall McLaughlin Wins 2016 RIBA Charles Jencks Award for Architecture

Patrick Lynch — Wed, 21 Sep 2016 16:00:00 +0000

The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) has announced Níall McLaughlin, founder of Níall McLaughlin Architects, as winner of the 2016 RIBA Charles Jencks Award. The award is given annually to an outstanding architect or practice "that has recently made a major contribution internationally to both the theory and practice of architecture."

Herzog & de Meuron Win 2015 RIBA Jencks Award

AD Editorial Team — Wed, 19 Aug 2015 09:12:00 +0000

The RIBA annually bestows the Jencks Award to an outstanding architect or practice "that has made a recent significant, simultaneous contribution to the theory and practice of architecture." This year the honors go to Herzog & de Meuron.

WAF Announces 2015 Festival Theme

AD Editorial Team — Wed, 22 Jul 2015 16:00:00 +0000

The World Architecture Festival (WAF), the world’s largest architectural festival and awards event held annually in Singapore, has announced the theme of this year's program: 50:50. The theme is inspired by Singapore’s upcoming 50th anniversary as an independent country, and will look back on how architecture and urbanism have changed during the last 50 years, as well as forward on what may change or stay the same in the next 50 years to come.

AR Issues: Architecture That Goes Beyond Style Wars

Catherine Slessor — Thu, 16 Apr 2015 09:30:37 +0000

ArchDaily is continuing our partnership with The Architectural Review, bringing you short introductions to the themes of the magazine’s monthly editions. In this editorial from AR’s March 2015 issue, AR Editor Catherine Slessor discusses the phenomenon of "architects and magazines pursuing content rather than style," arguing both that architects should be raising the bar and also that the media, by nurturing their critical stance, should be a part of the solution, not the problem.

Call For Entries: World Architecture Festival 2015

James Taylor-Foster — Fri, 13 Mar 2015 04:00:44 +0000

Now in its eighth year, the forthcoming 2015 World Architecture Festival Awards (WAF) will take place in Suntec in central Singapore following three days of intensive live presentations and judging. Following a $180 million modernisation programme, the redesigned space will host WAF’s soundproofed crit rooms, auditorium and Festival Hall Stage. Entries are now invited from architects and designers for the 2015 edition of what is described as "the biggest architectural awards programme in the world." The awards are expected to attract more than 750 entries, around half of which will be shortlisted into thirty categories. The closing date for entries is the end of May, and shortlisting will take place in early June.