Chris Burden Builds a “Small Skyscraper” in Old Town Pasadena
Chris Burden’s Small Skyscraper (Sam Lubell / AN)
Next time you visit old town Pasadena you may be in for a suprise. When you slink down an alley off of Fair Oaks and Colorado, the next thing you see will be a four-story, 35-foot-tall skyscraper, sitting in the middle of a courtyard. It’s an installation by artist Chris Burden (yes, he’s the one that did the cool lights and all the matchbox cars at LACMA) called Small Skyscraper (Quasi Legal Skyscraper).
Burden collaborated with LA architects Taalman Koch on the open design, which conists of slabs of 2x4s supported by a thin aluminum frame. Burden started envisioning the project back in the 90s, but at that time the idea was for a solid structure made of concrete blocks. This one is lightweight and seems almost like an erector set. Presented by the Armory Center for the Arts, Small Skyscraper will be on display until November.
Hard Core Cake-Off: Architects Bake Cakes & Eat Them, Too
A Guggenheim cake under construction, although unrelated to the exhibit. (Michelle Schrank/Flickr)
On a recent sunny day in Silver Lake the Materials & Applications gallery got folks together to eat cake. In honor of the group’s 10th anniversary M&A hosted an architectural bake-off called “Elevate Your Cake,” with groovy deliciousness by an impressive group of designers. They included Predock Frane; Chu + Gooding; Escher GuneWardena Architecture; Gensler; Deegan Day; Deutsch; Patterns; Noah Riley Design; Warren Techentin; Barbara Bestor; MASS; Osborn; Modal Design; Taalman Koch; and Andy Goldman.
That’s right, this was no amateur night. These were serious architectural cakes. Chu + Gooding’s cake, “Inopportune Totem,” looked like a porcupine had mated with a death-by-chocolate. Warren Techentin’s entry, “cubisphere,” was made up of Japanese Mochi and chocolate cake balls. It looked like a cube made of colorful (but edible) golf and ping pong balls stacked on each other. After several of the cakes were raffled off everybody got down to business: eating the rest.
OMD in Joshua Tree
Jennifer Siegal’s Prefab Showhouse has been sitting on Venice’s Abbott Kinney Blvd since 2006, giving clients a preview of what they can get if they invest in a work by her firm, OMD (Office of Mobile Design). Well it’s no longer there. It was recently transported via semi and (once in the desert) robotic tank (yes, robotic tank) to Joshua Tree, where it has found its place as an off-the-grid guest residence for film producer Chris Hanley. The 720 square-foot steel frame structure, with a high sloping ceiling and a steel support chassis, uses solar panels for electricity and also has tankless water heaters, radiant heat ceiling panels, and translucent polycarbonate glazing. It’s not too far from one of our favorite desert houses, Taalmankoch’s iT House, in what is becoming a precious little off-the-grid architecture community. Oh, and if you go, make sure to check out one of our favorite bars in the world, Pioneertown’s Pappy and Harriet’s. Read More
Americana goes prefab
LA architects Taalman Koch have taken their prefab sensibility from projects like the Off Grid iT House in Pioneertown to, of all places, The Americana at Brand, Grove-developer Rick Caruso’s latest lifestyle center/historic town recreation/playland in Glendale. The project, created for marketing and event company Sparks Exhibitions, is a temporary demo space for the new Palm Pre on the Americana’s large central lawn. The 12×20 structure (with a 12×16 deck) was constructed in about 12 hours on site. It was made with aluminum framing, swiss pearl walls, galvanized steel roof, and redwood floors, all prefabricated off site and tested at Spark’s factory. “When it got to the Americana it was completely ready; we didn’t even need a tape measure,” said Taalman Koch principal Alan Koch. The structure’s next stop, on Monday, is The Grove itself, where it will stay for two weeks. Read More
Advertise on The Architect's Newspaper.
Archives
Categories
Architecture
Design
East Coast
Midwest
National
Planning
Shft+Alt+Del
Sustainability
Transportation
West Coast
