Architectural Details: Elissa and Alvar Aalto’s Patchwork Wall of Bricks

"Aalto’s idiosyncratic courtyard walls are this building’s defining feature, and form a beautiful example of how a unique architectural language can be produced by deviating from conventional construction techniques. The walls are composed of a patchwork of different brick patterns, forming a collage of texture and color that evokes the patina of the surrounding forest."

more at architizer.

'Housing Social Life', Technical Studies Lecture by Peter Barber, 10 December

Peter Barber – Peter Barber Architects

The Social Life of Housing

Thursday 10th December, 6.30pm, Room M416 (Evans)

Faculty of Architecture and the Built Environment

University of Westminster

35 Marylebone Road

London NW1 5LS

“We think that space conditions, and is in turn conditioned by, society and culture and that architecture can create the potential for social action and activity” Peter Barber Architects

Peter Barber previously worked with Richard Rogers, Will Alsop and Jestico+Whiles prior to establishing his own practice in 1989. He is currently a design tutor at the University of Westminster, teaching MArch Studio with Ben Stringer. He has lectured about the work of the Practice at many institutions, including the Royal Institute of British Architects, the Architectural League in New York, and numerous international and domestic university schools of architecture including Genoa, Frankfurt, Brighton, Kingston, Glasgow and The Bartlett.

In October 2001 the Practice won first prize in the Architecture Foundation's prestigious Innovations in Housing Competition. The project won a Housing Design Award, runner-up in Royal Academy Summer Exhibition, AIA Award and RIBA Award. It was also short-listed to the last 10 for the 2006 Stirling Prize. A series of radical urban housing projects have followed which have variously won Housing Design Awards, RIBA Awards and AIA Awards. Peter Barber Architects have won the Building Design Architect of the Year for Housing in 2007 and 2010. In 2015, Peter Barber Architects landed the Royal Academy’s top architecture prize for its alternative vision for low-cost housing on London’s Mount Pleasant.

Peter Barber will talk about the development of his practices work and in particular the evolution and reinvigoration of housing typologies such as the terrace/courtyard hybrid at Donnybrook Quarter and the McGrath Road project where Barber reexamines the back-to-back housing typology.

For details contact Will McLean / Pete Silver

w.f.mclean@westminster.ac.uk

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.

New book: 'Bathroom' by Barbara Penner

 

Bathroom charts the evolution of the bathroom and the habits and lifestyles to which it gave rise. It shows how and why the bathroom emerged and how it became an international symbol of key modern values, such as cleanliness, order and progress. The modern bathroom, its technologies and its customs have been exported globally through colonialism, the media, fashion, world expositions and tourism. Barbara Penner explores the conflicts this process has caused, as well as discussing more user-friendly and low-tech alternatives, which are set to become ever more relevant in our environmentally conscious age.

Abundantly illustrated, Bathroom examines examples from history and from across the globe. From squat to high-tech bidet toilets, and from cast-iron bathtubs to monsoon showers, this is an original and eye-opening study of a significant but often overlooked space.

from Reaktion.

HOUSE (AFTER 5 YEARS OF LIVING)

A film made by Charles and Ray Eames about their house, Case Study House #8.

from twbe