New Routes for High Speed Rail Funds
It’s hard to imagine turning down $1.2 billion. That is, unless you’re the governors-elect of Wisconsin and Ohio. The New York Times reported today that those two states officially withdrew claim to their shares of federal stimulus money awarded for construction of new rail corridors, citing concerns over subsidies needed to run the trains. Instead the money will be redirected to 13 other states. Ironically, both Wisconsin and Ohio had lobbied aggressively for big hunks of the $8 billion set aside for high-speed rail development in Obama’s stimulus package. Things changed when Republicans won both governorships, partly on the platform of denying the stimulus awards. Read More
Deck the Tiny Walls
English drawing room from the Victorian period, 1840-1870. (All photos courtesy Art Institute of Chicago).
Many museums have of period rooms in their holdings, but the Art Institute of Chicago also has an impressive collection of 68 miniature period spaces. Rather than treat these dollhouse-sized objects as sacred or static, the museum has decorated six of them for the holidays with historically and culturally appropriate trimmings. The English Victorian drawing room is the only one that includes a Christmas tree. Take a look at some of the rooms and details from Tudor to Modern spaces.
Seriously cute stuff inside.
Swamps Emerging on the Urban Landscape
An urban swamp in Detroit (Photo by Clark Mizono)
While bringing nature back into the city is generally heralded as a sign of improvement, this is hardly the best path to that end. Next American City‘s Willy Staley recently took a walk through Detroit‘s East Side with vacant property guru Sam Butler to surmise the problems of abandonment facing the city. Detroit, seeking to demolish some 3,000 structures, has long been at the center of a movement to “shrink” cities suffering from population loss and blight.
More on urban swamps bogging down neighborhood revitalization.
Remembering Louis Sullivan, Seed-Germ Savant
Louis Sullivan set out to invent an architecture of democracy. (Courtesy Whitecap Films)
There’s been no shortage of worthy architectural documentaries in recent years, but you’ll want to make room on your DVD rack for the latest look at a major American figure: Louis Sullivan: The Struggle for American Architecture. Recently given its New York premiere courtesy of the good people at Docomomo New York/Tri-State, this touching and tragic film offers a portrait of the man who perhaps more than anyone aspired to create an American style of architecture, yet was left behind by a nation on the cusp of a century that Sullivan himself did much to define. Read More
Celebrating Sustainability at Chicago's Art Institute
Party-goers holding court at Chicago's Art Institute (photos: Andrew Hensley)
On November 17, The Architect’s Newspaper and Buro Happold, along with our other event partners Dow Building Solutions, Graphisoft, American Hydrotech, and Adaptive Building Initiative, celebrated GreenBuild at the Art Institute of Chicago’s Modern Wing. Renzo Piano’s LEED certified building proved to be a stylish venue for the hundreds of architects, engineers, designers, and other assorted revelers. Click through for pictures of some of the evening’s hundreds of party-goers. It was quite the green scene! Read More
A Shiny New Neighbor for the Farnsworth House
Virginia Tech's Lumenhaus is completely self-powered and the exterior is lit with subtle building-integrated LEDs at night. (All photos of the Lumenhaus: Jim Stroup)
Virginia Tech’s Solar Decathlon-winning Lumenhaus is currently cooling its heals in the opulent surroundings of Millennium Park. The house, which has been touring the globe, was brought to town to coincide with GreenBuild, and is remaining on view through Saturday. The compact house is efficiently designed both in terms of space and energy use, and is completely self-sustaining. Though its stay in Millennium Park will be brief, it’s not going far. The house will be stored on the grounds of the Farnsworth House for the winter and will be open to the public when it reopens for the spring season in April 2011. Whitney French, executive director of the Farnsworth House, sees a deep connection between the two structures. Read More
Bad Parks Can Mean Bad Health
Restroom in O'fallon Park. (Photo courtesy of librarian7**)
A new study says that some St. Louis residents are getting slighted when it comes to the usablity of neighborhood parks, and that may be adversely impacting their health, according to researchers from Saint Louis and Washington Universities. A story in the St. Louis Beacon reports that uneven sidewalks and outdated or broken equipment make neighborhood residents less likely to use parks. Researcher Cheryl Kelly of the School of Public Health at Saint Louis University pointed out that the lack of usability means that “people are getting less physical activity in general, which is a factor associated with health disparities, such as obesity and some chronic diseases and conditions.” Read More
MOCA Cleveland Coming into Focus
Last night in a presentation at Hunter College, Farshid Moussavi revealed more details about her design for the new Museum of Contemporary Art Cleveland, including a first look at the plaza designed by Field Operations. Rows of trees will seperate the mirroed black museum from an adjacent development site, and geometrically patterned pavement will pick up on the forms of the building. Read More
Building from Ruin
Catie Newell: Salvaged Landscape from Imagination Station on Vimeo.
Architectural designer Catie Newell is one of the many artists, architects, and designers that is using the landscape of Detroit as a field of study and its abandoned structures as raw material for building. In her latest installation, Salvaged Landscape, she uses the charred debris of a house, located across the street from the iconic ruined Central Station, to create a new series of walls and passage ways, animated by points of light streaming through gaps in the irregular forms.
DiCaprio's the Devil, But Who Will Star as Burnham and FLO?
(Courtesy Random House)
Chicago has been getting a lot of screentime over the last few years, standing in for Gothman in Batman Begins and enduring the wrath of the Transformers. A blockbuster of a slightly more highbrow sort is in the works, with an adaptation of Erik Larson’s bestseller The Devil in the White City. The Sun-Times and others reported this week that Leonardo DiCaprio will portray the serial killer H.H. Holmes. The story is set amid the preparations for 1893 World’s Columbian Exhibition, and the story of construction of the fair grounds, one of the major developments in the City Beautiful movement, as well as the growth of Chicago as a whole, forms a parallel narrative. Daniel Burnham and Frederick Law Olmsted play major parts in the story. Their roles have yet to be cast. Whoever lands the roles had better start growing their facial hair now. Read More
Artist Proposes Fabric House Coat For St. Louis
Rendering showing proposed House Coat installation in St. Louis (Courtesy Leeza Meksin)
Brooklyn-based artist Leeza Meksin plans to give an historic brick structure in St. Louis a new skin – or rather a new set of clothes. House Coat proposes wrapping over 800 yards of spandex around the two-story building, complete with stylized “corset-like fixtures in the back, weights, [and] leather.”
Feel Wright at Home in Chicago's Riverside
Front view of Frank Lloyd Wright's Coonley House (Courtesy Baird & Warner)
A sprawling Frank Lloyd Wright masterpiece could be yours for a cool three mil. Curbed Chicago digs up the listing for Chi-town’s Coonley House in the historic Riverside neighborhood. The original clients apparently buttered up Wright, who, flattered, gave the house extra attention to detail.
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