EVENT> Architecture & the Media: Trade Press, An Evolving Role
Architecture & the Media #3: Trade Press, an Evolving Role
Thursday, September 6
6:00-8:00pm
Center for Architecture
536 LaGuardia Place
Traditionally, publication in a trade magazine was an effective way to reach peers and demonstrate credibility to clients. Are trade publications becoming hybrids of journalism and networking sites, two-way streets where users are more engaged with editors?
Join us at the Center for Architecture on September 6 for a panel discussion on design reporting, the third installment of Architecture & the Media, a four-part series exploring today’s media landscape co-produced by the Center for Architecture, AIANY’s Oculus and Marketing & PR Committees, and The Architect’s Newspaper.
For Trade Press: An Evolving role, moderator and AN executive editor Alan Brake will be joined by editors Katie Weeks of Eco-Structure magazine, Linda Barr of Real Estate Weekly, Stacy Shoemaker Rauen of Hospitality Design magazine, and Diana Moser of Multi-Housing News.
Tickets: $10 for members and students, $20 for non-members.
PURCHASE TICKETS HERE
Congressmen Attack New LA Courthouse Proposal
One of Downtown LA’s two existing courthouses, on Spring Street. (fark.com)
Two congressmen really seem to have it in for the planned new U.S. courthouse and federal building in downtown Los Angeles, for which several prominent LA firms have been shortlisted.
According to the LA Times, California Representative Jeff Denham earlier this month called the proposal a “sham,” insisting that the judiciary should be able to share courtrooms more efficiently at their current spaces (there are currently two federal courthouses downtown).
Race Street Rising
Retail will wrap around the proposed tower’s base at Second and Race Street (Courtesy Peter Gluck and Partners).
Last week Philadelphia’s new zoning code went into effect, but projects nurtured under the old code may still be rising. Just yesterday, architect Peter Gluck presented a tower proposal to the Old City Civic Association for a 16-story building adjacent to the Ben Franklin Bridge. Because the zoning permits were filed last month the building is subject to old code.
Gluck’s presentation of 205 Race Street soured when new renderings revealed that an early proposal by SHoP Architects, initially approved at a 100-foot height, had morphed into a 197-foot tower that sets back from Race Street, PlanPhilly reported. The group voted 11 to 1 to oppose the project.
Golden Lions Awarded Amid Divisive Venice Biennale
Torre David / Gran Horizonte, 2012, Urban-Think Tank (Alfredo Brillembourg, Hubert Klumpner), Justin McGuirk. (Francesco Galli/Courtesy la Biennale di Venezia)
It’s been a hot and highly stimulating few days at the Venice Biennale. David Chipperfield’s theme, “Common Ground,” which sought to establish connections across architecture culture, has proven surprising divisive. Some loved the elegant progression of projects in the Arsenale, which included everything from expressionist displays by Zaha Hadid, to neo-postmodern confections by FAT, to a hand built house by Anupama Kundoo, all of which managed to mingle thanks to Chipperfield’s tasteful curation.
Some formalists griped that the show was regressive, while more socially engaged architects thought it too estheticizing. Still, every Biennale must crown its winners. This year’s Golden Lion for the international exhibition went to Torre David/Gran Horizante by Urban-Think Tank (Alfredo Brillembourg and Herbert Klumpner) and Justin McGuirk, an investigation, featuring photography by Iwan Baan, of an informal community built in an abandoned, unfinished skyscraper in Caracas. The team created an bar inside the Arsenale which featured food, music, drinks, and neon lights to showcase their work and transform the atmosphere of the overall exhibition.
Special Coverage from the 2012 Venice Biennale, Issue 3
The Architect’s Newspaper is on the ground in Italy for the 2012 Venice Biennale. Here’s the third edition of a three-part series on the best of the Biennale, brought to you by The Architect’s Newspaperand Il Giornale Dell’Architettura. (You may also view the first issue and the second issue.)
Hope on Hudson? Durst has Idea for Beleaguered Pier 40
With Hudson River Park languishing, Douglas Durst is weighing in on dilemmas at Pier 40 (at left). (Stoelker/AN)
As AN recently reported, Hudson River Park is still in the weeds, both literally and figuratively. Now Douglas Durst is pointing to a possible solution to the beleaguered Pier 40. The pier was once one of the few money making sources for the self-sustaining park, but it is now deteriorating and costing $2 million a year to maintain. Durst, chair of the park’s friends group, told The New York Post that the park should consider stacking up the existing parking to free up valuable space and in turn rent the pier as lofts to the area’s expanding tech sector. The notion could avoid a lengthy State Legislature battle and an uphill ULURP processes for the proposed hotel/residential complex.
On View> California’s Designing Women, 1896 to 1986
(Courtesy The Autry)
California’s Designing Women
The Autry in Griffith Park
4700 Western Heritage Way
Los Angeles
Through January 6, 2013
It was uncommon for women to practice industrial design throughout late 19th and early 20th centuries. However, California’s newness and frequent population growth provided various opportunities for women to get involved with the creation and production of design. Autry National Center’s California’s Designing Women, 1896–1986 with works from over fifty women designers from California celebrates female designers who made major contributions to Californian and American design. The exhibition displays approximately 240 examples of textiles, ceramics, furniture, lighting, tapestries, jewelry, clothing, and graphics all inspired by California’s amalgam of society which include Indigenous American, Chinese, Japanese, Anglo, and Mexican cultures. Upholding California’s reputation for unlimited creativity, the displayed work includes materials such as wood, abalone, glass cotton, steel, silver, acetate, acrylic, and fiberglass, spanning a century of design movements from arts and crafts to art deco to mid-century modern and beyond.
PRODUCT> Rock Chair, by Fredrik Färg for Design House Stockholm
This streamlined Scandinavian stunner is not your granddaddy’s rocking chair.
We have lounges, chaises, day beds and a range of other seating options designed for nesting, curling up, reclining and relaxing, yet the rocking chair, that front porch symbol of lazy day languor, has been mostly forgotten by modern design. In fact, Design House Stockholm, the self-described publishing house for contemporary Scandinavian design, noted that “at some time in the 20th century the design development of the rocking chair stopped” altogether. With that in mind, Stockholm-based furniture designer Fredrik Färg created Rock Chair, a rocking chair that “continues the traditional rocking chair’s comforting function but in a modern design.”
Special Coverage from the 2012 Venice Biennale, Issue 2
The Architect’s Newspaper is on the ground in Italy for the 2012 Venice Biennale. Here’s the second edition of a three-part series on the best of the Biennale, brought to you by The Architect’s Newspaperand Il Giornale Dell’Architettura. (View the first issue here.)
Facebook Likes Gehry: Sprawling Expansion Unveiled for Menlo Park
Frank Gehry’s plans for a new Facebook campus. (Courtesy Gehry Partners)
Perhaps trying to regain its mojo after a difficult summer on the stock market, Facebook has selected Frank Gehry to design an expansion to its Menlo Park Campus in California. The project, scheduled to break ground next year, will include a quirky 420,000-square-foot warehouse topped by a sprawling garden. The cavernous space will contain open offices for as many as 2,800 software engineers, according to Everett Katigbak, Facebook’s environmental design manager. The firm wouldn’t reveal the project’s price tag.
A Rough Commute in Venice
Alan Brake and Julie Iovine in Venice. (The Architect’s Newspaper)
While we editors toil in a rainy New York City (and Chicago and LA), AN‘s outgoing executive editor Julie V. Iovine and incoming executive editor Alan G. Brake (and editor-in-chief William Menking, photographer) are dealing with their own challenges, like their daily commute to the Venice Biennale by boat. Thanks for sharing, guys!
Whether you’re in Venice this week or just checking in on the highlights from afar, stay up to date with AN‘s special coverage from the Venice Biennale. We posted the first of three editions published on the ground in Italy this morning and will have two more issues coming your way later this week. Ciao!
DS+R and OLIN’s “Granite Web” Fails to Ensnare Aberdeen
Diller Scofidio + Renfro and OLIN’s web-like park and culture center in Scotland has been rejected by City Council. (Courtesy DS+R)
In a tightly contested decision, the City of Aberdeen, Scotland has decided not to move forward with a dramatic $222 million renovation of Union Terrace Gardens designed by Diller Scofidio + Renfro and OLIN. The 22 to 20 vote may have brushed aside the so-called “Granite Web,” but it did retain the principals behind the design for whatever future plans are built on the site, including better pedestrian access, a revamped city council chambers, and a new art gallery. Council Lead Councilor Barney Crockett said the project “never won the whole-hearted acceptance of the people of Aberdeen.” [Via World Architecture News.]
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