Richard Meier Reinterprets Bauhaus Modernism in New Tel Aviv Luxury Tower
(Courtesy Richard Meier & Architects Partners)
Architect Richard Meier is stamping downtown Tel Aviv with another luxury landmark, “Meier on Rothschild,” a mix-use residential, commercial and office complex towering 39-stories over Tel Aviv’s White City. Located on Rothschild Boulevard, the tower is Meier’s modern take on Bauhaus architecture that characterizes the city, where two- and three-story buildings defined by minimalist and functional architecture and marked by smooth white curved exteriors are common.
KOONS, MEIER AMONG DESIGN SELECTION TEAM FOR TAPPAN ZEE REPLACEMENT BRIDGE
Jeffery Koons, perhaps best known for his quirky stainless steel glossy sculptural reproductions of balloon dogs, has been called upon by Governor Andrew Cuomo to help decide what the new Tappan Zee bridge will look like. Koons, along with Richard Meier, winner of the Pritzker Prize for Architecture, and Thomas Campbell, Metropolitan Museum of Art Director, were named to the selection design team that will provide counsel on the construction of the Tappan Zee replacement bridge. Governor Andrew Cuomo announced the decision in a press conference Wednesday. Meier’s most notable work includes the Getty Center in Los Angeles, the Barcelona Museum of Contemporary Art and the Jubilee Church in Rome. The design team will offer advice on the bridge’s aesthetics and visual compatibility with the surrounding nature.
Activists Press On for AIDS Memorial at Triangle Park
A view looking east through the Triangle Park plan by M. Paul Friedberg and Partners. (courtesy Westside Healthcare Coalition)
On the eve of World AIDS Day, dozens crammed into the City Planning building in downtown Manhattan where the Rudin Organization presented plans for the former St. Vincent’s Hospital site at a Universal Land Use Review Procedure (ULURP) hearing. The commission is set to vote on the plan on January 24, but over the last few months yet another issue has emerged at the long contested site. Activists from the Queer History Alliance continue to press for an AIDS Memorial to be placed at a proposed park across the street from the former hospital, which was considered ground zero during the height of the AIDS crisis.
Quick Clicks> Architecture in Store, Meier is Gilt-y, Clean Air Square, and Suburban Slums
Van Alen Books hosting an opening party on Thursday, April 21 (Courtesy Van Alen Institute)
Just Architecture. The Van Alen Institute announced that NYC is about to welcome its first bookstore and reading room singularly devoted to architecture, Van Alen Books, located on 30 West 22nd Street. Jeanne Gang of Studio Gang Architects (and one of the two candidates for the next PennDesign Architecture Dean) and architectural historian Anthony Vidler will be presenting their latest books at the opening party scheduled for next Thursday, April 21.
Flash Sale Curator. Curbed shows today that there is no boundary for what architects can do. A popular flash sale venue, Gilt Groupe, is having a home products sale today at noon, curated by an architect, Richard Meier. Items up for sale include “a signed copy of Taschen’s Meier, a mezuzah he designed for The Jewish Museum of New York, and his Architectonic Menorah,” normally sold for $1K!
Breathing Times. According to Streetsblog, New York’s Times Square, visited by 250,000 pedestrians each day, has become much more breathable since the 2009 installation of pedestrian plazas (find out why Bill Clinton is a fan) on Broadway. Concentrations of two traffic-related air pollutants, nitrogen oxide and nitrogen dioxide, have gone down by 63% and 41%, respectively!
Suburban Slumification. Business Insider identifies 18 cities (including a less-than-expected Minneapolis) where suburbs are rapidly turning into slums. In the past, cities suffered crimes and poverty during recessions, while the rich stayed away in their safe suburban havens. But not anymore. Suburban slums are growing five times faster than cities.
Partying for the World Architectural Festival
Paul Finch welcomes the New York crowd to the launch of World Architecture Festival 2011
The 2011 World Architecture Festival was in town beating the drum for their international competition at the Van Alen Institute last night. Paul Finch, the festival’s program director, was joined by AN Editor-in-Chief William Menking and Van Alen Chair Abbey Hamlin in hosting the star-studded event.
The frigid weather did not deter a distinguished crowd—white maned Richard Meier, red scarved Bernard Tschumi, man of the hour Thomas Leeser, Parks Commish Adrian Benepe—from celebrating what promises to be a hot ticket this November in Barcelona. With his English lilt Finch thanked the crowd for coming and promised his remarks would steer clear of Ricky Gervais territory.
He briefly outlined some of the goals for this year’s program, which included a bigger tent to incorporate interior architecture as well. While no hat was passed, Finch did say that the organization would be happy to take donations in any denomination. Jan Berman of MechoShade promptly offered to make a donation in lira.
The Meier Menorah
From left to right, the candleholders represent the biblical expulsions from Egypt (the obelisk); Roman Palestine (Hadrian's victory column); France (1310); England (1290); the Spanish Inquisition (1492); the emancipation of Jews in Vienna (1890); pogroms in Russia (c. 1900); and the concentration camps in Germany during WWII.
Starchitect Richard Meier is now in the Judaica business, sort of. He recently designed a limited edition menorah and series of mezuzahs for The Jewish Museum in New York. The menorah is based on the Meier Lamp, a piece that was originally commissioned by the Israel Museum in 1985. And just in time for Hanukkah (which begins December 1st), this limited edition menorah can be purchased through The Jewish Museum Shop.
Meierland
Meier's model village, with the Getty Center in foreground. (Photo: Scott Frances/Courtesy Richard Meier & Partners)
An important part of Richard Meier’s design process is his use of scale models—usually beautifully crafted of wood—to consider a physical form in its broader context. In-house model makers are often asked to fabricate multiple iterations of projects, and the firm is famous for its elegant presentation models, such as the one for his extraordinary gridded skyscraper (designed with Steven Holl, Charles Gwathmey, and Peter Eisenman) for the World Trade Center competition. Fortunately, Meier has not only kept many of his models, some going back 40 years like the Smith House in Connecticut, but also a spectacular series of working models for the Getty Center (above). These are kept in Meier’s model museum—a loft space in Long Island City that is opened to the public starting tomorrow, May 7, through August 27 (the museum is closed to the public during the winter months, due to the climate’s impact on the models). Tours can be arranged through Richard Meier & Partners Architects at 212-967-6060.
The A+D House Party
There was quite a crowd gathered at the new A+D Museum last night. CLICK TO LAUNCH SLIDESHOW
As promised yesterday, we are going paparazzi. We have pix of the architecture event of the week: the opening of LA’s A+D Museum. (See Slideshow Here). The event drew hundreds into the museum’s brand new space, a beautiful white jewel box located on the ground floor of a midcentury office building. Guests were treated to tunes from KCRW DJ Tom Schnabel, and bid on works of art and sculpture created by some of LA’s biggest architects and cultural icons. Big names contributing work included Bruce Mau, Max Neutra, Lorcan O’Herlihy, Thom Mayne, Richard Meier, Hitoshi Abe, and many more. And so it begins for a museum that has for years been known for not having its own space. Welcome home.
Our Academy Awards
Valerie Jarrett, a senior advisor to President Barack Obama, delivers the opening remarks last night.
Or so they like to say, when referring to the Cooper Hewitt’s National Design Awards, or more accurately, the Cooper Hewitt, National Design Museum’s National Design Awards. And that’s exactly what it was like: a little too much of a mouthful of an event. But it was also an undeniably bounteous banquet of everyone Who’s a Who in architecture and design of all stripes. Read More
Eavesdrop NY 17
Richard Meier with his daughter Ana, who models the Lutz & Patmos sweater he designed in 2008. She recently threw his 75th birthday in the plaza of the Segram Building. (Courtesy Lutz & Patmos)
HAPPY B-DAY, MR. ARCHITECT
On October 12, Richard Meier turned 75. His birthday bash for 150 was held that night at the Four Seasons, or rather under a white tent on Park Avenue alongside the Seagram Building fountains. Eavesdrop didn’t find anyone on the B-List who was invited, but all the A’s were there including Peter Eisenman, Michael Graves, David Rockwell, Robert A.M. Stern, City Planning Commission chair Amanda Burden with TV talker Charlie Rose, and President of the American Academy in Rome Adele Chatfield-Taylor with playwright John Guare. A Meier follower tells us that his 50th was held at his duplex on East 72nd Street, where he raised eyebrows by exiling his mother to a far corner of the room, while putting Burden on his right. Interior designer Rose Tarlow hosted his 60th birthday on the tennis court of the house he designed for Norman and Lisette Ackerberg in Malibu. This time, he was sent into his fourth quarter of a century by daughter Ana, who arranged everything in no-surprise white. No roasts among the toasts made by family and friends, with Meier himself going only slightly off-color in his effusive compliments to his lovely offspring. The cake was a layered white slab. Read More
Eavesdrop NY 11
Meier In A Box
Pin-Up: Magazine for Architectural Entertainment features Richard Meier in
its Summer 2009 issue. Turns out “architectural entertainment” is not an oxymoron after all, at least not at Pin-Up. Meier poses on the cover with the box containing his $1,800 limited-edition lifetime opus from Taschen. Box placement and the architect’s sheepish grin remind us of that infamous Justin Timberlake/ Andy Samberg SNL video skit. You know the one. It’s that musical DIY about how to create an extremely personal boxed gift. Coincidence, or is Pin-Up just living up to its tagline? Buy the issue and tell us what you think. Buy it now. Read More
The Economy & You, Humble Architect
Meier, in better times. Courtesy Cornell
There’s been a lot of questions about how the so-called credit crisis might impact the architecture and design industries. We’ve been tracking this for months, but so far no one has exactly admitted to apocalypse. Until now.
At a Vanity Fair party on Monday–the day the Dow dropped 504 points–man about town Richard Meier had some dour words for the Observer:
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