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Santa Monica Civic Auditorium Getting Facelift
After attending the recent Alt Build Expo in Santa Monica it became clear to us at AN that the aging Santa Monica Civic Auditorium, a Decorative Modernist structure designed by Welton Becket back in 1958, was in serious need of an update. (Becket, by the way, designed the Capitol Records Building, the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, and a good deal more of mid-Century Los Angeles.)
Well it looks like our wish is coming true: On May 26 the Santa Monica City Council voted to approve a $47 million remodel and seismic retrofit of the auditorium, using Santa Monica Redevelopment Agency funds (the vote to allocate funds was sped up because such monies may soon be frozen once the state budget is passed).
No firm has been chosen, but we will keep our eyes peeled on the RFP, which was posted here last month. ”They anticipate a design build contract,” said Santa Monica spokesperson Carol Lemlein, who noted that perspective teams will be made up of architects, contractors, engineers, and preservation experts. Read More
QUICK CLICKS>Palace 4 Sale, College Towns, Barbie House
How much for a palace in New York? $400 million. Courtesy WSJ
Big Deals. It’s a week of very big deals in NYC as The New York Times reported that Condé Nast signed on the dotted line to move in to One World Trade, and The Wall Street Journal broke the story that The Palace is under contract to be sold to Northwood Investors for $400 million. While across town at The Plaza, the drama continues to unfold with news that landlord Miki Nafti is stepping down and the Oak Room is closing.
Grad Towns. With commencements commencing, many would rather forget that college grads are having a pretty hard time finding work. But a recent search for the ten best college towns from Kiplinger made job opportunities in the college towns part of the criteria. NYC came in first, despite the “sky high rents,” Charlotte and Baltimore followed with their relatively low cost and robust growth.
Open Call. The AIA has announced that My Architect Barbie needs a house. Through the contest to “design a house that meets her guidelines” architects may find the client surprisingly demanding, “With more than 125 careers, I need a spacious office,” says the eight- inch wonder. A big back yard needs to accommodate all her pets, including the giraffe.
Video> Rubik′s Cube House
Rubik's Cube House by Kenneth Brandon
Last Friday, our friends at Curbed spotted this amazing Rubik’s Cube by and puzzle connoisseur Kenneth Brandon and artist Heather Kent. The custom-made creation actually works, as demonstrated in a video after the jump (we imagine things can get pretty surreal inside the house when the twisting gets going). Named House Cube, the puzzle was made with painted stickers, complete with a basement plumbing system.
Books, Beautiful Books
Here’s a bandwagon worth jumping on: designers and books. The new website launched yesterday and is dedicated to sharing the reading lists and the commentaries of book-loving architects and designers from all over. Starting with 50 well-known designers naming their favorite books. (Example: High Rise by J.G. Ballard. Why? “I do have a tooth for dystopia and this is a coolly familiar one,” writes Michael Sorkin), it makes for compulsive skimming, and not a little inspiration. Guess how many architects are Lolita fans?
The site will be updated constantly. Right now, the list is already 677 strong. Additional features include five invited commentators—one each for architecture, product design, fashion, graphics, interior design—describing their must-reads for those in the field. Commentary is encouraged at every turn. And future pages will establish connections with not only readers but bookstores, too.
A paean to books in print, designerandbooks.com is also an education in what makes the mind of the architect tick.
Hyperbolic Paraboloids Can Save Animals
Winning entry by MVVA with HNTB of New York (Courtesy ARC Project)
How do you solve the problem of wildlife crossing a major highway? Build a bridge! On Sunday, the NY Times reported that Michael Van Valkenburgh and Associates (MVVA) was named winner of an innovative competition to build a wildlife crossing over a Colorado highway. Together with construction company HNTB, the team’s design calls for a lightweight precast span that will improve animal and driver safety as well as help reduce habitat fragmentation.
University of Arkansas′ Big-Box Bacalaureate
Walmart on Campus in Arkansas (Photo courtesy Walter Lang)
Walmart has been trying to expand into cities like New York and Washington, D.C. for a while now sparking debate about big box retail in urban centers along the way. To find space, Walmart will likely have to abandon the supercenter in favor of a more petite space, but slimming down to a mere 3,500 square feet sounds pretty extreme.
Video: Making a Brownfield Beautiful
A brownfield being reclaimed (Courtesy ASLA)
The American Society of Landscape Architects has created a great step-by-step video demonstrating how to return a contaminated brownfield site into a real community asset. The video, appropriately titled From Industrial Wasteland to Community Park, traces an abandoned refinery on its way from bio-hazard to bio-helpful.
So Long, Frank Lloyd Wright
Frank Lloyd Wright (Courtesy Library of Congress)
Not many architects can boast being the subject of a pop song, but, then again, Frank Lloyd Wright was always something special. Back in 1969, Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel eulogized the architect in the eponymous “So Long, Frank Lloyd Wright,” appearing on their Bridge Over Troubled Water album. Garfunkel took an interest in Wright while studying architecture at Columbia and later challenged Simon to write the song while living in California.
While some argue that the song is really a cryptic breakup poem between the two singers on the verge of splitting, I’m sticking with architecture going mainstream. As the song says, “Architects may come and/Architects may go and/Never change your point of view./ When I run dry/I stop awhile and think of you.”
Architects with Altitude
Towering figures in the field of architecture. Click to enlarge. (BK / Architect's Newspaper)
Witold Rybczynski, smart writer, stupid article.
Last Thursday, Slate‘s respected architecture critic weighed in with the dubious notion that the shorter in height, the greater the architect. This silly notion has gone viral on the web, and we felt it was our job to rebut it with some tall figures. Here they are.
Rolling on the High Line
View of the High Line lawn from HL23. (Image: Diana Darling)
We were scouting cool party spaces recently and caught this view from the 9th floor of Neil Denari’s HL23 on the High Line. Lower floors of the 14-story condo, now nearing completion, are going to feel pretty vulnerable to nose-pressers strolling up the rail-bed park who will be just feet away from their living room glass walls. But on the upper floors, views of the length of High Line will unfurl as alluringly as the Yellow Brick Road. Right now, it’s possible to make out the stretch of emerald lawn section at 23rd Street, waiting for its sunbathers.
The Other Side of Ellis Island
Most visitors to Ellis Island only get to see the Ellis Island Immigration Museum. I was fortunate enough to go on a hard hat tour of the island’s south side, which is not open to the public, and explore newly stabilized structures including the new (‘new’ as of 1934) ferry building and part of the old South Side Hospital Complex.
photo by Alyssa Nordhauser
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