Exclusive: Art Center Renovation Shortlist
A historic image of Ellwood's masterpiece for Art Center
AN has managed to get its hands on the shortlist for Art Center College’s renovation of its iconic Craig Ellwood building in the hills of Pasadena. Completed in 1976, the dark structure, with its expressive exposed steel frame and amazing glass and steel bridges, is one of our favorites in California, but certainly needs a facelift. According to the RFQ the renovation includes reshaping and expanding the academic building, updating it seismically, installing new sustainable energy systems, and improving its roof and glazing systems. The four finalists are…. drumroll please… Michael Maltzan Architecture, Behnisch Architekten (LA office), Barton Myers Associates, and Krueck + Sexton. That’s three local firms and a Chicago firm, Krueck + Sexton, that renovated a similar project: Mies van der Rohe’s Crown Hall at IIT. The winner, according to competition organizer David Meckel, will be announced early next year. Make sure to take a look at these amazing historic images of the building (including campus construction shots) below, from the Art Center exhibition Hillside Campus. Read More
Woody Allen Sleeper House On The Block
No property is safe from this economy. The futuristic house from Woody Allen’s sci-fi comedy “Sleeper”, which is actually located just outside Denver, is being foreclosed on. The house, built in 1963 by architect Charles Deaton, who also designed Kansas City’s Arrowhead Stadium, has its foreclosure auction scheduled for tomorrow. According to the Wall Street Journal, Denver entrepreneur Michael Dunahay, who purchased the house in 2006, is delinquent on the nearly $2.8 million outstanding balance of his $3.1 million mortgage on the house. So who will buy the amazing spaceship-like abode? Allen’s co-star in the movie was LA preservation hero Diane Keaton. So maybe? Just maybe she’s interested?
Going Dutch in SF Next Week
Dutch firm UN Studio's Dance Palace in St. Petersburg. Firm founder Caroline Bos will be speaking next week.
In case you didn’t watch the World Cup this year, orange is the official color of the Netherlands. And it’s the inspiration for a week of Dutch design events in San Francisco starting on November 14 called Seeing Orange. The week will feature Dutch creativity that includes not just architecture (hi Rem and friends..) but design, fashion, graphic arts, and so on. One of our favorite events is a bike tour (makes sense.. have you ever been to Amsterdam?) of Dutch design highlights led by architect David Baker and urban planner Robert Bregoff. The tour will visit places like My Dutch Bike, which sells handmade Dutch cycles and gear, Hedge Gallery, which features art by Dutch designers, Propeller, showing off sleek Dutch furniture and accessories, and several other destinations. Another highlight: UN Studio founder Caroline Bos will talk with CCA students and faculty about the firm’s “Deep Planning” techniques. Sounds mysterious, but great. The full list of events is here. No word yet on whether there will be any of those great Dutch pancakes, but we’ll keep you posted..
Does New LA firm name spell doom??
Southerland worked on Assembledge's Sunset Plaza Residence
We hear from our friends at Curbed LA that Kevin Southerland, a principal at LA firm Assembledge+, has left to form his own firm, architecture 350. And while we’re very fond of Southerland’s work, and of sustainable architecture, we’re a little overwhelmed with the name, which, according to his new site, “refers to the parts per million amount of carbon dioxide that a global consensus of scientists has deemed sustainable for human life to carry on as we know it.” Whoah. The name is relevant because we’ve reached 382, which seems like a very very concerning statistic. Does this mean that life as we know it is about to end? Meanwhile we look forward to seeing what the firm comes up with. They’ll be located on Doheny Drive in Beverly Hills, and will focus on (of course) sustainable, contemporary residential projects.
Kanner's Many Talents on Display at A+D Tomorrow
Kanner's sketch of his Metro-Hollywood project in LA
LA’s A+D Museum tomorrow evening launches an exhibit celebrating the work of its founder, Stephen Kanner. Kanner died this summer at age 54, a tragic loss for the LA architecture community. The show will feature images and models of Kanner Architects’ work and several of Kanner’s personal artworks and sketches. Many will be surprised by the depth of Kanner’s talents—he could sketch almost any building or neighborhood with exact precision, his cartoons were artful and hilarious, and he excelled at painting, model-making, and even carpet design— or even the breadth of his architecture, so this show is a must-see. A memorial service for Kanner will be held immediately following the opening.
Voters Help Out CA Architects
Despite the sting felt countrywide by largely left-leaning architects, architects in California have a lot to smile about after yesterday’s elections: particularly because a number of ballot propositions went their way. Most importantly Prop 23, which aimed to suspend AB 32, the state’s anti-pollution, pro-sustainability legislation, was trounced, preserving green building and retrofitting funds not to mention important environmental and anti-sprawl measures. Also the defeat of Prop 22, which prohibits the state from taking certain local funds (like city redevelopment funds), to replenish its coffers should help preserve money that architects often tap into. On the negative side—particularly for landscape architects—Prop 21, which would have increased vehicle license fees to help fund state parks, was defeated. And of course prop 19, which would have legalized marijuana in California, went down as well. Sorry architects. You can’t have everything!
Some of Our Faves from the AIA LA Awards
- Eric Owen Moss’s Samitaur Tower, one of our faves
AIA/LA hosted its annual Design Awards last night at LACMA, an event that while not too full of people (that pesky recession) was full of astoundingly good projects. The AIA made us really happy, awarding AN a Presidential Award (Thanks AIA/LA President Paul Danna) for “Architectural Interpreter”. Aw Shucks.. Other notable winners included Firm of the Year Lorcan O’Herlihy Architects and Gold Medal winner Brenda Levin. Since there were a hefty number of Design Award winners, we’ve decided to pick out a few of our favorites. And so without further ado we present the first ever, completely unofficial, AIA/LA Awards Awards! Read More
"Flat" LA Skyline Under Scrutiny
If you think LA’s skyline seems a little flat, you’re not the only one. Apparently LA Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa thinks so too. According to LA Department of Building and Safety General Manager Robert “Bud” Ovrom, the Mayor was disappointed at how the skyline stood in comparison to what he saw in a recent trip to China. The city’s flat-topped skyline was investigated in a two part-series from Curbed LA. We followed up with Ovrom. Read More
Slideshow: Inglewood Plan Strives For Revitalization
Scene along Inglewood's Market Street corridor (Sam Lubell)
The Architect’s Newspaper‘s Sam Lubell tells us about revitalization plans for Los Angeles’ once bustling Inglewood. Architects Christopher Mercier and Douglas Pierson of (fer) Studio see a vibrant future for Market Street:
“Nobody knows about Market Street,” said Mercier. “But it already has the infrastructure to be something special.” The street is narrow, pedestrian-friendly, and lined with shops, rich plantings, small islands, and beautiful (if not well-kempt) historic buildings along its entire length. “Everyone wants to save downtown, but they don’t have the faith in what it can be,” added Pierson.
Read the entire article about revitalizing Inglewood at The Architect’s Newspaper.
A slideshow of Inglewood’s Market Street after the jump.
San Diego Crossing Gets Green Lighting Scheme
The wind-powered project is said to be the greenest large-scale lighting design in the nation. (Courtesy FoRM/S+M/Buro Happold)
California State Route 75 is getting a whole lot snazzier. The 2.5-mile-long San Diego–Coronado Bay Bridge is set to undergo the “largest interactive green energy lighting project in North America.” An international team led by London-based artist Peter Fink (FoRM Associates) and lighting designer Mark Major (Speirs + Major) plus the LA-based office of engineering consultant Buro Happold have won a worldwide contest to illuminate the iconic, swooping girder bridge, opened in 1969. Read More
Army of Nurturers: Creating Elder-Friendly Cities
Tree city, nuclear-free-zone city, why not "elder-friendly city"? Courtesy Sarah Kuehl of Peter Walker & Partners.
A couple of weeks ago, AIA San Francisco wound up its annual “Architecture and the City” festival with a nice jolt of inspiration. In an event at SPUR, organized in conjunction with GOOD Magazine, designers presented solutions to real-world problems. All of the conundrums were interesting and meaty: The California Public Utilities Commission, for example, wants more people to install solar hot water (Civil Twilight’s proposed marketing campaign included bright-yellow outdoor showers for surfers), and the Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority wants to get more people to take public transportation in bus-phobic Silicon Valley (Brute Labs suggested a new service based on the corporate shuttle model). But the most poignant of all the problems was posed by retirement-home developer AgeSong: “To create a forgetfulness-friendly city and environment where many seniors in the early and more moderate stages of forgetfulness can live safely and happily.” Read More
Memphis Exhibition Honors Paul Revere Williams, Architect to the Stars
Marina del Rey Junior High School (David Horan)
Love Lucy? Lucille Ball, that is. Then you’ll love her architect, too. Opening on October 22, the Art Museum of the University of Memphis is hosting the first museum exhibition of African-American architect Paul Revere Williams whose work spans the 1920s through the 1960s.
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