In this article I will begin discussing architectural education and how it teaches students before beginning their role as a qualified architect.
This article was inspired by P.E.A.R. (Paper for Emerging Architectural Research) Issue One. My article will by no means follow a logical path or try to make any conclusions. Part One of this article will begin a discussion about teaching and architectural practice. There may be a Part Two… or there may not…
Kevin McCloud poses a question to the audience, “Who here likes this house?” 99% agree they like it. There is one dissenting voice in the crowd, and McCloud asks why. “I like the traditional look”, comes back the answer. This is a good place to begin a discussion of Richard Hawkes’ Crossway house as featured in the latest series of Grand Designs.How do we approach the design of a home? Do you pursue the vernacular tradition of the local area or do you push the boundaries? Do you make a statement? Do you pay head to planning? Maybe you do all these things. McCloud is keen to remain ever populist in his answer to his own question. He lives in an old house with its own character and he wouldn’t have it any other way. However here is the point. Whether it is the Hall house, a Georgian Townhouse or a grandiose Victorian pile, the house has always set its own typology. The 21st century house of now need be no different. Like those classic examples the house of today should give a nod to its contemporaries without resorting to mimicry.
Crossway. Photo by James Brittain from Crossway website
elodie nourrigat and jacques brion of N + B architects have designed the exploitation center
and building for forest fire fighters, located in the very heart of a huge green zone in brissac, france.more
dubbed ‘villa-villa’ the residence contains a traditional insulated home combined with a walled-in courtyard space that is open to the sky. the concept was based on the fluctuating temperatures of the ordos climate.more
We featured another pick from the ordos scheme here:
located in Tanzania and designed by WOW Architects. The hotel is comprised of two buildings and its overall design was inspired by geological processes that shape rock formations in nature.
see the review here: Inhabitat
Closer to home;
Called The Pride, after the City of Pride pub which it will replace, the 200m-tall tower will be located next to Canary Wharf and have 410 apartments and eight penthouses. more
The monthly survey from by the RIBA on the employment trends reveals a steady increase on lack of workload for those architects employed:
“Since the survey commenced in January 2009 there has been a steady increase in the number of individual respondents indicating that lack of work has lead to them personally being under-employed in the current month; this figure now stands at 32%, up from 21% in January. Large practices are currently the most pessimistic about their ability to maintain current permanent staffing levels, indicating that further staffing reductions are regrettably likely to occur in the large practice sector in the coming quarter.” RIBA
The contnued delays on major goverment projects such as the Cross Rail and the lack of significant impact the Olympics projects has on the indusrty will only make these statistcs worsen before it gets better.
on the positive side:
according to Building;
A glimmer of hope? Three housebuilders gained more than 10 planning approvals last month
see the data here:
For the past twenty years the voice of the architecture profession has mainly been drowned out by the computer generated sky-piercing towers of luxury. Year after year some of the biggest names in architecture tried to out do each other in what is technically feasible with oddly named styles of ‘deconstruction’, ‘blobitecture’ and ‘ribbon architecture’. This constant craving to create jewels of desire in the urban fabric left the general public wondering what on earth we do. Now, with the global economy in tailspin, these exercises in object making have come to a crashing halt. For many of us, we couldn’t be more thankful.
Prince Charles has lambasted Richard Rogers’ design for the redevelopment of London’s Chelsea Barracks, labelling it ’unsuitable’ and ‘unsympathetic’ read his full comments here
via: AJ
Don’t worry readers, this won’t be an excerpt from my dissertation, I’m not going to drone on about concrete megastructures or the brilliance of a slab block building in south London!
I went to a talk by the Royal Academy of Arts this evening, it was quite thought provoking. The lecture was titled “The Architects Who Made London”, chaired by Maxwell Hutchkinson it was about Alison and Peter Smithson, by Max Risselada.
Max began slightly brokenly, some of his sentences were disjointed, but I noticed that this made me hang on his every word – I had to concentrate quite hard, though his English was good, some ways of using words was not common in normal English conversation.
He talked from a very personal point of view about the Smithsons, and I gather that he knew them well. As far as I know the Smithsons were from the North, possibly even residing in the countryside. They travelled down to London and while young managed to get a job at the biggest and best architectural practice at that time – The LCC.
Attributed with the official “first Brutalist Building” the Smithson’s built projects were far and few between, the odd thing being there were all vastly different! They designed Hunstanton School; a small private country house, rather like a two story cottage; The Economist Building; and Robin Hood Gardens.
The later two are the ones I am interested in.
The Economist Building
Alison was the brains, the thinker, the researcher, Peter put ideas into practice. He also taught at the AA.
The Smithsons had a saying ~
“We see architecture as a direct result of a way of life”
This struck a chord with me If I design a building for how PEOPLE live NOW then surely that is all that architecture is for. Architecture is not about creating a tribute to the past, or guessing and second guessing about the future. It is about here, now, living… in HOUSES…
(Also see my previous blog about life, homes, and cities).
Of course, you will notice I am referring to my previous articles and my current themes for my regular Monday blogs – housing and the recession.
Robin Hood Gardens was originally conceived as one long building, but the study of the site revealed that two shorter slab blocks would work better – providing a safe haven in the centre. The strategy for preventing noise from two busy roads was explained during the talk – the solution the Smithsons had used seemed commendable.
But this blog is not about Robin Hood Gardens, don’t worry, I told you at the start I would not bore you with dry facts that should be kept for my dissertation.
This blog is about the Smithsons – as PEOPLE.
*They were alternative.
*They might have had socialist ideas in the backs of their minds.
*Alison was one of the first famous female architects, she challenged sexism.
*They were not elitist like many others in their institution.
The Smithsons were the ‘John Peel’ of Architecture…
They had an aura about them that said “we know something you don’t know, we know about something new in architecture… we know a secret…
And if you had the opportunity to talk to them you would probably have been drawn to them, inspired by them to work harder, research longer and learn that secret.
It could be said that they never had “repeat clients” or built many projects because they wanted to spend all of their time and resources on ONE project only. They never ran multiple jobs in their office, and it definitely was not big. In those days an office of more than 35 or 36 people was deemed to be unacceptable – the whole team would simply not be in touch with the project. The project needed a care and attention that a big office could not provide, and The Economist is testament to this. The detailing is of the steel joints with the stone is impressive and apparently there were great debates about the type, colour and feel of the internal door handles. This was not an office orientated by money.
Stone Detail
The Smithsons have always been heavily criticised, often by people who feel threatened by them, or don’t understand them. It is fair to say the Smithsons don’t have many built projects, but this is not the be all and end all – they were heavily interested in education, research, and furthering architecture. Alison studied and researched, Peter taught – they were the ultimate architectural combination. As a couple, they pushed architecture forwards, but what about people? Did they create spaces that can be well used by people, did they responsibly design a housing estate that could be maintained well, were they in touch with society? They have definitely been criticised for all manner of different things, but I would say the only thing that they are FAIRLY criticised for is their lack of feeling for people. What was their relationship like, apparently they never argued, were they loving or was it more like a business relationship? Some how, somewhere, something tells me they were not in touch with “normal” humans. Were they a classic example of “architects vs humans?”…
All Images, Models and Photographs by Mark Ellery
Last week on Boidus we discussed quite a few of the issues that surrounded the forthcoming meeting of the G20. We felt it was important to comment on the meeting for it would probably have a far reaching impact on the future direction of many key decisions. In parallel to these political events were the events of the many citizens who used their democratic right to protest. The vast majority of citizens aired their feelings in peace. The final images that Boidus showed was that of the small minded idiots that chose to smash windows in the city of London. It was a very eventful week in London. Aside from political posturing of world leaders in search of photo opportunities what was the outcome of this most historic event.
Photograph: SHAUN CURRY/AFP/Getty Images
Check out this very impressive concept project featured on Inhabitat ;
The beautiful and expressive (X) House designed by Multiplicities is one of 100 entries that have been cleared for construction in Mongolia as part of the Ordos 100 project. Conceptually designed as a white lung wrapped in a black skin, the house employs a series of barriers to filter air, light, and rain, and features a smart passive design that will allow it to weather the harsh climate of Inner Mongolia.
Designated as lot 24 in the Ordos 100 village, the (X) house is designed to address the extreme changes in temperature that the region faces throughout the year.
Check out more about this and other entries here:
The idea is to take two kinds of algae which are brought in attached to ships, Sargassum muticum and Undaria pinnafitida, and use it in a new 40 MW power plant. The €200 million ($264 million) plan would supply 50% of the electricity required by Venice’s city center.
This Venice ambitious plan is being developed by EcoWordly and will use the Venice canals as the source of the algae. It’s a genius idea which will turn the free growing and otherwise ‘nuisance algae’ to boats and gondolas, brought to Venice by ships from Japan into a resourceful source of energy. It’s viability as a source of bio fuel is yet to be proven but in this case where growing it will not be artificial then there is a strong reason to be optimistic.
Other projects on this include efforts to grow the algae as explained in the CNN video below. Viability research of producing enough algae for fuel demand is just beginning, with a variety suggestions of including using brackish or seawater , but issues then arise of what to do with the accumulated salt once the biomass is extracted.
Here is a Video of CNN explaining the idea:
Check out some few very promising claims and counter claims on the the facts of algae’s viability, productivity and its green credentials from the a recent Algae Biofuels World Summit in San Francisco.
Other algae bio fuels projects with potentials include:
Adiamo Alghe! Italian Biodiesel Producers Turn to Seaweed as a Feedstock
New Algae Biofuel from Sapphire Energy “Chemically Identical to Gasoline”
Algae Biodiesel Facility for Maui Announced, Operation Could Begin 2011
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