The Waterhouse at South Bund by NHDRO

"Chinese architects NHDRO have transformed this disused Japanese army headquarters in Shanghai into a hotel, maintaining the building's stripped concrete and brick walls while adding a new Corten steel extension on the roof."

See more about NHDRO along with films and interviews at dezeen here and here.

Van Alen Institute by collective-LOK in New York City

"the design team collective-LOK, comprised of new york and boston-based architects jon lott (PARA-project), william o’brien jr. (WOJR), and michael kubo (over,under), titles the ground floor space ‘screen-play’, for its use of different elastic partition elements. among these veil layers is a modular and porous coffer-like ceiling that diffuses lighting and acoustics while concealing projectors and mechanical equipment. additionally, a wall of accordion walls along with sliding translucent panels divide the open-program area from the private and semi-private spaces."

from designboom.

Lucy McRae Lecture- 26 Nov 2014

"In this lecture, body architect Lucy McRae tiptoes on the edge between imagination and innovation.

Lucy McRae is a body architect exploring the relationship between the body, technology and the grey areas of synthetic and organic materials. She invents playful, imaginary worlds underpinned by the tools of science fiction and technology, to create portals of possibility that provoke the way people embody the future.

Trained in classical ballet and interior design, Lucy staked her claim as the world’s premier body architect during her formative years at Philips Design. Working in the far future design research lab she developed stretchable electronics, an electronic tattoo and a range of emotional sensing dresses awarded Time Magazine's Best Fashion Invention in 2007."

Wednesday 26 Nov 2014
6.30pm – 8pm
No booking required / first come, first seated
Darwin Lecture Theatre, UCL

Bunker 599 by RAAAF and Atelier de Lyon

"...a redundant Second World War bunker in the Netherlands was turned into a sculptural visitor attraction by slicing it down the middle to reveal its insides.... It took 40 days to slice through the solid concrete bunker, which was one of 700 constructed along the New Dutch Waterline, a series of water-based defences used between 1815 and 1940 to protect the cities of Muiden, Utrecht, Vreeswijk and Gorinchem."

from dezeen.

3D Printed "Touchable Memories" by pirate3D

"‘touchable memories’ by pirate3D, turns photographs into 3D-printed objects for people without vision. the social experiment project aims to increase the awareness of the endless possibilities of using technology to improve lives. using an affordable home printer called buccaneer, the visually-impaired can re-experience images by fabricating a tangible scene of it."

from designboom.

New issue of a + t: 'Workforce: A better place to work'

"The contemporary workplace has derived from successive compression/decompression. First there was the hierarchical Taylorist office. Then came the rational well-lit well-organized office with individual cubicles which allocated each employee the exact amount of air they needed to breathe. Later there was a return to the open landscape office, with free layouts, shrouded in vegetation, which was the forerunner of the de-materialization of the workplace.

Today we are in a far more fluid state which envisages the specialization of space and brand expression. Diversity and identity. The workplace should encompass, not only the two basic tasks already known - individual and group work - but also tasks involving learning and socializing.

A Better Place to Work is the first volume of the WORKFORCE series, dedicated to the design of workspaces."

Portions of the issue available digitally here.

‘BS25′ Silos Diving and Indoor Skydiving Center Proposal by Moko Architects

"The proposal by Moko Architects for the Diving and Indoor Skydiving Center restores a part of a house factory in Żerań which operated in the past,. They turn a building in a non-developed area with abandoned halls and warehouses into a recreation center open all year round in the old silos where bulk cement used to be stored in the past. The existing facility is a perfect base for this investment and will be the only place in Poland where people wishing to learn the skills of diving will have the opportunity to safely train at the depth of 25m under control."

from archdaily.

Gurunavi cafe and info centre by Kengo Kuma

Kengo Kuma designed the interiors of two spaces for Gurunavi: one that's used as a physical base and information centre for the Japanese restaurant guide and another that serves as a cafe. He layered wooden boards to create striations inside this workspace and cafe for an online restaurant guide based in Osaka Japan.

from dezeen.

"Lessons for Students in Architecture" by Herman Hertzberger

"Rather than supplying the reader with design recipes... Hertzberger has provided an essential source of inspiration.  In his view everyone - the more he sees, experiences, and absorbs - is automatically in possession of an ever-expanding arsenal of potential instructions with which to choose a path towards a result."

more here.

'Shooting Thoughts' by Filipe Vilas-Boas

"This past week, experience designer Filipe Vilas-Boas launched his latest public project, Shooting Thoughts, in the stunning French Gothic church of Saint-Eustache, Paris. Co-commissioned by Art, Culture et Foi and Nuit Blanche Paris, Shooting Thoughts is an interactive installation project that uses projection mapping to create a “constellation of stars.”

Shooting Thoughts  uses "text messaged thoughts" to create catalysts "for laser beams that travel up the pathways defined by the building's architecture. The project description explains,“The pillars are used as launch stations that carry the star to its final destination on the ceiling of the church via the arches and vaults. Like all of us, each star finds its place at its own speed with its individual trajectory.”

from the Creator's project.

"Intersections" by Anila Quayyum Agha

"anila quayyum agha casts a delicate web of shadows with a single light bulb

pakistani artist anila quayyum agha exercises the architecture of the grand rapids art museum in michigan by infilling it with a dynamic interplay of shadow and light.‘intersections’ comprises a 6.5-foot laser-cut wooden cube pierced with carefully crafted patterns and illuminated from the inside, which casts expansive, lace-like geometries onto the surrounding walls, ceiling and floor."

from designboom.

image courtesy of sarah’s throne

Uppe Folly for King's College London by Mobile Studio

Uppe Folly for King's College London
Arts & Humanities Festival 2014 | #AHFest

Dates: 15th - 24th Oct 2014 (9am-8pm)
Free, open to all during campus opening hours. Booking not required.
Add: King's College London, Strand, London WC2R 2LS (map)

Mobile Studio Architects designed a pop-up modular folly for KCL Arts & Humanities Festival 2014 (#AHFest). Uppe Folly is located in The Strand Quadrangle, a long and relatively narrow space confined by the tall façades of KCL and Somerset House. In response to the 'Underground' theme, Uppe Folly encourages visitors to simply stop and look up - something we often forget to do in a dense and busy city such as London.

Scale figures and "Accessories series" by Terada Mokei

Scale figures made by designer Naoki Terada to 'make life easier at the office' have evolved into a product that includes "Accessories series" and are sold to the general public by Japanese company Terada Mokei. 

Thanks to Ryoko Uyama for pointing them out.

Richard Serra show at Gagosian Gallery, 11 Oct to 28 Feb 2015

"An ensemble of four very different works, with a room devoted to each, fills Gagosian in London, in Richard Serra’s first show of sculpture here since 2008. The sum is bigger than the parts, though each work is satisfying in its own way, and each is worth the trip alone. 'I wanted to make a show with different aspects of compression and circulation, intervals and elevation, different ways to approach a field or a space or a context,' the 74-year-old artist tells me, speaking from New York." (from the gaurdian)

Richard Serra is at Gagosian Gallery, London WC1, from 11 October to 28 February 2015.

Collages by Frank Dresme

"Project 360U+00B0 was a thesis project produced at The Utrecht School of Arts in 2007. The project, was vested in the production of four psychogeographic maps. These maps are the routes between personal destinations in Amsterdam."

more here.

CJ Lim lecture: 'Food Cities', 1 Oct 2014

CJ Lim

Food City: Lecture and Book Launch. 
01 Oct 2014
6.30pm – 8pm
No booking required / first come, first seated
Darwin Lecture Theatre
Map

Food City, the follow up to Smartcities and Eco-Warriors, explores the issue of urban and architectural transformation and how the creation, storage and distribution of food has been, and can again become, a construct for the practice of everyday life.

ReMIX outlines house renovation plans with UV installation

"Beijing architecture firm reMIX Studio has literally outlined its plans for the renovation of an ancient hutong residence by marking proposed structures with illuminated white strings

ReMIX is in the process of overhauling the interior of an old building in the Dashilar hutong, where a lot of regeneration work is being undertaken.

However, the architects knew early on the project would not be completed to show visitors to the area during the city's annual design week, so came up with an alternative presentation.

"We came up with a way to visualise our plans instead," reMIX cofounder Federico Ruberto told Dezeen."

more at Dezeen,

Technical Studies Lecture

Philibert de l'Orme's "The bad and good architect", 1567

French architect Philibert de l'Orme was one of the great masters of the French Renaissance. In the final pages of his treatise Le premier tome de l’architecture of 1567 he featured two illustrations entitled "The bad and good architect."  The illustrations serve as a manifesto and communicate the ideals of their author.

"Whereas the bad architect wanders in a barren landscape dominated by a gloomy medieval castle, the good architect enjoys the pleasures of the garden.  Beautiful buildings rise on each side, their ornaments echoing the productions of nature.... Revealingly, in addition to lacking hands because he does not know how to make something useful, the bad architect has no recognisable features; he is deprived of eyes, nose, mouth and ears, whereas the good architect has a visage.  The latter is moreover, engaged in a dialogue with a young disiciple who turns his face towards him.  With their windows wide open like eyes surveying the scene, the nearby buildings seem to look on this conversation with benevolence."

-from Ornament: The Politics of Architecture and Subjectivity by Antoine Picon

'Disobedient Objects' at the V & A 26 July- 1 February

"From a Suffragette tea service to protest robots, this exhibition is the first to examine the powerful role of objects in movements for social change. It demonstrates how political activism drives a wealth of design ingenuity and collective creativity that defy standard definitions of art and design. Disobedient Objects focuses on the period from the late 1970s to now, a time that has brought new technologies and political challenges. On display are arts of rebellion from around the world that illuminate the role of making in grassroots movements for social change: finely woven banners; defaced currency; changing designs for barricades and blockades; political video games; an inflatable general assembly to facilitate consensus decision-making; experimental activist-bicycles; and textiles bearing witness to political murders."

at the Victoria and Albert Museum
10.00 to 17.45 daily

more info here.
10.00 to 22.00 Friday

'Everything is made of something' 

Mark Miodownik, director, The Institute of Making, University College London, and author of 'Stuff Matters'

' Materials are at the heart of every company I visit and it is hard not to conclude that although Google and Twitter may dominate technology headlines, and cosmologists may be most popular with the media, materials transformation is still what makes the world go around. Starting next week in a new series of columns for Observer Tech Monthly I am going to tell the story of stuff. Each month I will pick a different material and uncover the human needs and desires that brought it into being, and decode the materials science and engineering behind it.

..there is more to materials than the science. Those who make things all have a different understanding of the practical, emotional and sensual aspect of their materials. For instance, we know the sounds of the doors in our houses, and can distinguish between someone leaving or entering from the subtle differences in keys rattling and hinges creaking. As a child I could always tell whether it was my mother or my father coming up the stairs, from the subtle differences in the sound of the creaky stairs. These acoustic personalities of buildings are often overlooked during the design process. Carpet makes a room feel warmer but also changes the acoustic signature of the room. The clickity-clack of high heels and the party they announce are muted; the squeak of rubber tennis soles and the sport they anticipate is banished; the comforting solid thump of sensible shoes on their way to work is no longer proclaimed. Installing carpet is a kind of auditory gag, which may of course be used intentionally for that purpose such as when designers want to create a sense of intimacy and calm. It is this diversity of material knowledge that I intend to capture in these columns.'

http://www.theguardian.com/science/2014/sep/14/story-of-materials-human-civilisation-mark-miodownik

Bartlett B Pro Show 24-28 September

a celebration of the work of students from The Bartlett School of Architecture's post-professional Masters programmes.

Opening party

Tuesday 23 September, 19.00

Speeches and awards from 19.30

Exhibition open to the public 

24 – 27 September 10.00 – 18.00

28 September 10.00 – 14.00

Venue

The Royal Ear Hospital

21 Capper Street, London WC1E 2QG

Front, left image: Team Filamentrics [Zeeshan Ahmed, Yichao Chen, Nan Jiang, Yiwei Wang], MArch GAD, RC4, ‘SpaceWires’, Rendering. Front, right image: Team Physa [Mingjie Fan, Shihong Sun, Nan Yang, Kai Kai Zhou], MArch UD, RC16, ‘Bio-Digital Futures, The Copper Corridor’

PG2014 Exhibition at University of Westminster 12-19 Sept 2014

PG2014

 

THE DEPARTMENT OF ARCHITECTURE INVITES YOU TO PG2014:

An exhibition of thesis projects from the MA Architecture; MA Architecture and Digital Media; MA Architecture Cultural Identity and Globalisation and MA Interior Design

 

PREVIEW

Friday 12 September

6 – 9pm

 

UNIVERSITY OF WESTMINSTER

35 Marylebone Road

London

NW1 5LS

 

EXHIBITION CONTINUES DAILY

Saturday 13 September

to Friday 19 September

9am – 9pm

Chelsea College of Arts Postgraduate Summer Show 2014. 5 - 12 September 2014

Catch the Chelsea College of Arts Postgraduate Summer Show, featuring work by graduating students from the MA Interior & Spatial Design course.

Location:
Chelsea College of Arts
16 John Islip Street, London
SW1P 4JU

more info here.

Staircase in Mallorca by Studio Mishin Architectural Bureau

Photo: Quintin Lake Photography

"A sculptural staircase in the form of irregularly perforated copper panels is the central element of Villa Mallorca. The staircase leads over three storeys and creates a visual link to the copper details throughout the interior and exterior of the building."

Photo: Quintin Lake Photography

from DETAIL.

'Bounce below' in an abandoned slate mine in Wales

"Giant trampolines inside a mammoth slate quarry cavern are the latest tourist attraction tipped to bring thousands of thrill seeking tourists to the region.

Bounce Below will open next month at Llechwedd in Blaenau Ffestiniog – the world’s first facility of this kind. The caverns, twice the size of St Paul’s Cathedral, will be lit up in a light show while visitors bounce on giant trampolines linked by a 60ft long slide."

From here and here.

OPEN 2014 on until 4th July

Date:
13 June 2014 - 4 July 2014
Time: 9.00am - 9.00pm
Location: 35 Marylebone Road, London NW1 5LS - View map

OPEN2014 is the end of year exhibition for:
Architecture BA Honours
Interior Architecture BA Honours
Master of Architecture (MArch) RIBA Part II

OPEN2014 is part of the London Festival of Architecture 2014

All welcome. Entry is free, no need to book.

Thanks to Christina Diamandi for the photograph of the Interior Architecture contribution to the exhibition.

IA Graduates at 'Free Range'. Brick Lane July 10-14

Bartlett Summer Show. 27 June - 5 July

Opening night and party

Friday 27 June
18.00 –  01.00
Official show opening by Michael Webb
19.00

Venue

Main Quadrangle and Slade Galleries of UCL, Gower St, London WC1E 6BT

Open to the public

Friday 27 June, 18.00 – 22.00
Saturday 28 June, 10.00 – 20.30
Sunday 29 June, 10.00 – 17.30
Monday 30 June, 10.00 – 20.30
Tuesday 1 July, 10.30 – 16.30
Wednesday 2 July, 10.00 – 16.30
Thursday 3 July, 10.00 – 20.30
Friday 4 July, 10.00 – 20.30
Saturday 5 July, 10.00 – 20.30

Optical Glass House by Hiroshi Nakamura & NAP

"A tree-filled courtyard is glimpsed through the shimmering glass-brick facade of this house in Hiroshima, designed by Japanese architect Hiroshi Nakamura."

more plus video at dezeen.

David Adjaye Talk May 20th

Dream Builders: David Adjaye

20 May 2014 

7:00 PM - 8:30 PM

Venue: RIBA, 66 Portland Place London W1B 1AD

"David Adjaye has been described as an architect with an 'artist's sensibility'. His internationally renowned buildings are defined by his bold use of innovative materials and a diverse colour palette which reflect an equally strong interest in landscape and terrain.

From his pioneering 'Ideas Store' library buildings in the UK, to the Museum of Contemporary Art in Denver , to The Bernie Grant Arts Centre in Tottenham, London, to the Nobel Peace Centre in Oslo and the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum for African American History and Culture in Washington DC, his work is imbued with, and inspired by, the stories of people and dynamics of place.

In 2007, he was awarded an OBE for services to architecture and in 2013 he topped the Guardian's "Powerlist" of Britain’s most influential black people. He currently has projects underway in Ghana, Nigeria, America, China and the Middle East.

In partnership with the BBC, the RIBA brings you an opportunity to direct questions to David Adjaye as he is interviewed by Razia Iqbal about his approach to building, his many journeys and the projects and experiences that have defined him.

A recording of the event will be broadcast by the BBC World Service."

Fees: £5 Standard

Tickets here.

'Ruin Lust' at Tate Britain, 4 March-18 May 2014

Ruin Lust
Tate Britain
4 March – 18 May 2014
Adult £11.00 (without donation £10.00)
Concession £9.50 (without donation £8.60)

Ruin Lust, an exhibition at Tate Britain from 4 March 2014, offers a guide to the mournful, thrilling, comic and perverse uses of ruins in art from the seventeenth century to the present day. The exhibition is the widest-ranging on the subject to date and includes over 100 works by artists such as J.M.W. Turner, John Constable, John Martin, Eduardo Paolozzi, Rachel Whiteread and Tacita Dean.

Dutch Architects Dus: Large Scale 3D Printing

"Working on site for three weeks, the architects have so far produced a 3m-high sample corner of their future house, printed as a single piece weighing 180kg. It is one of the building blocks that will be stacked up like Lego bricks over the next three years to form a 13-room complex, modelled on a traditional Dutch gabled canal house, but with hand-laid bricks replaced by a faceted plastic facade, scripted by computer software."

From the Gaurdian.

The xx's Temporary Performance Space in the Park Avenue Armory

London-based band xx is doing a series of shows in a temporary installation in New York's Park Avenue Armory.  This video describes the design as well as past installations in the building.  It also describes the building itself, parts of which recently were renovated by Herzog and deMeuron.

Chthonic churches at Lalibela

Lalibela is a town in northern Ethiopia that is famous for its monolithic rock-cutchurches. This rural town is known around the world for its churches carved from the living rock, which play an important part in the history of rock-cut architecture. Though the dating of the churches is not well established, most are thought to have been built during the reign of Lalibela, namely during the 12th and 13th centuries.

Thanks to 2nd year critic Quynh Vantu for bringing up this reference during Monday's crit.

'The Dictionary of Details' Lecture by Wayne Head

The Dictionary of Details

When: Thursday 20th March 18.00

Where: University of Westminster, 35 Marylebone Road, London NW1 5LS

Architect and director of BDP, Wayne Head has produced a Dictionary of Details and will give a lecture at the University of Westminster prior to its forthcoming publication by Routledge. The book looks in depth at details in architecture and explores whether they are mere ornaments or structural ideals representing larger principles. Illustrated examples range from the simplest to the most innovative through drawings, diagrams, photographs and text.

David Rockwell's temporary bespoke theater for TED 2014

"TED, the nonprofit enthusiastic to ‘ideas worth spreading’, has invited the rockwell group to build the stage for the 30th anniversary of the conference, in vancouver. set in the vancouver convention centre, the portable and temporary theater is constructed with 600 pieces and assembled onsite for the five day festival. the intimacy of the space is realized by instilling a sense of community while having singularity in form. the individual and the collective are showcased in unison as the arena becomes a manifestation of the organization’s core principles. in addition to david rockwell’s observations, from being an attendee over the years, further inspiration for the theater was gathered from historic organizational spaces such as campfires and other non permanent commons. comprised mostly from locally harvested douglas fir wood sourced from the pacific northwest, the seating ‘bowl’ also includes a walkway along the perimeter with lattice-like platforms and handrails. 16 different seating options are present, and vary from lounge groupings, rows of benches, and beanbags. a standing room area in the back allows viewers to access personal electronic devices, without disturbing the rest of the audience. aided by an electronic cutting machine, the event construction company, nussli, fashioned the structure (along with the custom furniture and steelcase fabrication) to be easily disassembled back into 8’ x 10’ x 12’ boxes, and possibly reused for upcoming events."

from designboom

Models by Naomi Kasahara

Naomi Kasahara is a set designer based in Long Beach, California.  Her excellent models, especially when photographed well as they are above, show materiality, equipment, structure, lights, and people (including actors and audience).

new issue of a+t Reclaim: Domestic Actions

The new issue  of a+t Reclaim, "Domestic Actions", contains 54 actions that strip and boil down the home to its most basic roots. They have lightened the load, made up for previous mistakes and taken away the aesthetic preconceptions that until now had put strain on these type of interventions.

Reclaim - Domestic Actions classifies these actions into three Re- processes: Reduce, Retrieve and Remove. The recent additions refer to refusal and relinquishment options about the current living environment. After having undergone a series of material, formal, technical and economical adjustments, the role of inhabiting a space is viewed with a fresh perspective. Lastly, the issue adds a fourth process: Simulate, a valuable partner for times of crisis.

The volume forms part of the RECLAIM series.

You can read a sample here and see more here.