Un-cluttering a Kahn Classic
By Kristen Richards

A restored gallery on the third floor includes the north window wall overlooking the sculpture garden—once hidden from view by offices.
Copyright 2006 Yale University Art Gallery. Photo: Elizabeth Felicella

Like proud parents (l-r): Polshek Partnership project manager Steven Peppas, AIA; partner-in-charge Duncan Hazard, AIA; Yale University Art Gallery director Jock Reynolds; and project architect Lloyd L. DesBrisay, AIA.
Kristen Richards

On a steamy July Tuesday, a handful of journalists enjoyed a well-chilled hard-hat tour of the almost-completed restoration of Louis Kahn's 1953 Yale University Art Gallery. "This has been a tough job," mused Duncan R. Hazard, AIA, lead architect and partner with Polshek Partnership Architects, looking relaxed (and relieved) during the briefing. He said that Kahn knew exactly what he wanted, but not exactly how to build it. "The whole thing was experimental."

Louis Kahn's original design of the 1953 Yale University Art Gallery included light-filled studios for art and architecture students and expansive exhibition spaces under his famous tetrahedron ceiling. Over the years, studios were moved to other buildings, and the museum was divided into a warren of smaller galleries, classrooms, offices, and storage. Even the five-story window wall facing Paul Rudolph's 1963 Art and Architecture building had been reduced to four floors when an exterior courtyard on the basement level was roofed over to create additional interior space.

Now, everything is being put to rights. A new window-wall system was developed that duplicates the original—without its many technical shortcomings. Partitions have been removed, creating vast, uncluttered spaces for exhibitions; a newly engineered version of Kahn's original "pogo" wall units will allow the spaces to be easily reconfigured as needed. All of the building's mechanical, electrical, power and data, fire-protection, elevator, loading dock, and security systems have been replaced or upgraded—along with the addition of air conditioning, something the building sorely lacked.

Continues…

Staten Island Improves Water Quality
By Aaron Slodounik

Butterfly Pond in the Staten Island Bluebelt is one of the many rehabilitated areas resulting from Best Management Practices.
nyc.gov

Event: The Greening of NYC's Flood Control Infrastructure: The Innovative Staten Island Bluebelt Program
Speakers: Dana Gumb, director, Staten Island Bluebelt/ NYC Department of Environmental Protection; Sandeep Mehrotra, PE, senior associate, Hazen and Sawyer
Organizers: AIANY; AIA Committee on the Environment (COTE), NY Chapter; American Society of Heating, Refrigeration & Air-Conditioning Engineers, NY Chapter; Environmental Business Association of NY State, Inc.; U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC), NY Chapter
Sponsors: Benjamin Moore; Computer Floors Inc./ASM; C/S Group; Forbo; Lutron Electronics; Natural Cork; Tate Access Floors; Zeftron and Zumtobel Staff Lighting; New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA)
Location: Center for Architecture, 07.13.06

Instead of paving and sewering Staten Island's watershed as proposed in the 1960s, the NYC Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) is creating a drainage system that melds residential street storm sewers with natural drainage corridors. In order to marry these artificial and natural systems, the DEP began a major capital program in 1997 to build special facilities that mitigate water quality and velocity before entering the watershed. Known as "Best Management Practices," or BMPs, these facilities include extended detention basins, stream restorations, pocket wetlands, outlet spilling basins, and sand filters. Beginning with the southern tip of Staten Island, the agency has built 37 such facilities to date, and has begun to incorporate northern watersheds into the system through land acquisition and facility construction.

Water quality monitoring has shown that BMPs provide a significant reduction in contaminants entering the watershed and create a healthier habitat for wildlife while protecting against flooding. Because of its success, the Bloomberg Administration and DEP plan to expand the program into mid-island areas, including New Creek, South Beach, and Oakwood Beach.

Aaron Slodounik is a freelance art and architecture writer.

Building Brooklyn Awards Celebrate Urban Growth
By Bill Millard

Tim Bade of Steven Holl Architects, Guido Hartray of Rogers Marvel Architects, and Anthony Turturro of Sciame (l-r) at the Building Brooklyn Awards.
Jane Bade

Event: Building Brooklyn Awards 2006
Presenters: Kenneth Adams, president, Brooklyn Chamber of Commerce, master of ceremonies; Daniel L. Doctoroff, Deputy Mayor for Economic Development and Rebuilding, City of New York; Regina Myer, director, Brooklyn Office, NYC Department of City Planning; Douglas C. Steiner, chairman, Steiner Studios; Hon. Marty Markowitz, Brooklyn Borough President, in absentia
Organizers: Brooklyn Chamber of Commerce
Location: Brooklyn Museum, 07.11.06

The Building Brooklyn Awards honor pre-selected winners among the borough's newly constructed projects. This was a celebration of achievements and progress, not a forum for debate over the direction the borough's built environment is taking. Thus, all the contention of recent years over Atlantic Yards, gentrification, subsidies, neighborhood scale, etc. was left outside in the searing heat. Inside the Brooklyn Museum all was cool temperatures, cool heads, avid networking, and warm recognition for striking designs. (But how can it feel like Brooklyn without at least a touch of tsuris?)

Winners in many categories leaned toward flexible, beyond-the-box variants on modernism, with a particular emphasis on sustainability, use of Brooklyn-based vendors in construction, and innovative lighting. The Rogers Marvel Architects/Steven Holl Architects design for Pratt Institute's Higgins Hall renovation, with its glowing Mondrian-cluster geometries, continues to dominate every category in which it's been recognized (Education, this time). The DeKalb Avenue Apartments (SLCE Architects), winner in the Residential Affordable Housing category, also shared the on-the-spot People's Choice Award with the Rheingold Gardens Partnership Homes in Bushwick (Magnusson Architecture and Planning), the winner in Brownfield Redevelopment, implying that affordable homes are on the minds of this audience, skewed toward representatives of local real estate communities.

Much of the evening was devoted to the achievements of two important players in Brooklyn's renaissance: DCP's Regina Myer, whose efforts to stimulate new construction at multiple sites inspired Daniel Doctoroff to rhapsodize about the proliferation of cranes, and Douglas Steiner, whose new Steiner Studios has turned the Brooklyn Navy Yard into the nation's largest film facility outside Hollywood. Brooklyn's industrial past is arguably giving way to a new cultural economy, peaking along the L, F, Q, A, and even the G lines. A full list of winners is available on the Brooklyn Chamber of Commerce website.

Bill Millard is a freelance writer and editor whose work has appeared in Oculus, Icon, Content, and other publications.

The Center Puts Culture on the Map
By Carolyn Sponza, AIA

Courtesy Center for Architecture

Event: City of Culture: New Architecture for the Arts exhibition opening
Speakers: Susan Chin, FAIA, Assistant Commissioner, New York City Department of Cultural Affairs (and Immediate Past President AIA New York Chapter); Randall Bourscheidt, president, Alliance for the Arts
Sponsors: Exhibition Underwriters, FJ Sciame Construction; Sciame Development Inc. Additional support, Arup; BKSK Architects, LLC; FXFOWLE; Gensler; Kallen & Lemelson, LLP; L'Observatoire International; Plaza Construction Corporation; Polshek Partnership; Rafael Viñoly Architects; Stonewall Contracting; Zubatkin Owner Representation. Special thanks, NYC Department of Cultural Affairs.
Location: Center for Architecture, 07.19.06

Visually charting the myriad cultural venues scattered across New York, the massive map towering over the entry to the "City of Culture" exhibition provided a prelude to the event's opening remarks. Speakers Susan Chin, FAIA, and Randall Bourscheidt called the great volume of cultural institutions in New York, "unparalleled in recent history." Unspoken, was the impact these organizations must have on their communities. Focus on these projects weaves the five boroughs of New York together with varied types of arts and cultural facilities, and cross-references both with a variety of architectural interventions—new construction, adaptive reuse, and preservation.

Renderings, models and plans of the 53 projects on display remind New Yorkers that cultural institutions, by definition, expand the boundaries occupied by traditional arts groups, extending to gardens and zoos, as well as nature and science buildings. This fact is highlighted in the presentation of six new buildings: the New Museum of Contemporary Art on the Bowery (SANAA); the renovation of the Bronx Zoo Lion House (FXFOWLE); the new Administrative and Visitors' Center at the Queens Botanical Garden (BKSK Architects); the Weeksville Heritage Center Education Building and Interpretive Landscapes (Caples Jefferson Architects); the restoration of the Snug Harbor Cultural Center Music Hall on Staten Island (Rafael Viñoly Architects); and the transformation of Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts (Diller Scofidio + Renfro).

"City of Culture: New Architecture for the Arts" will be on display at the Center for Architecture through 09.07.06 (See On View). The exhibition is presented by the Alliance for the Arts in partnership with the AIA New York Chapter.

Light Dances on Every Surface at Four Seasons
By Linda G. Miller

The walls of the Four Seasons seem to glow because of the intricate lighting design.
Esto

Event: A Lighting Tour of the Four Seasons
Speakers: Ann Schiffers, lighting designer, Ann Schiffers Lighting Design; Alex von Bidder, general manager & co-owner, Four Seasons
Organizer: Center for Architecture, Illuminating Engineering Society New York Section
Location: Four Seasons Restaurant, 06.24.06

Standing at Table 32, or "Philip Johnson's table," Four Seasons general manager and co-owner Alex Von Bidder spoke of the titans of industry, media moguls, power brokers, politicos, celebrities and other bold-faced names who frequent the restaurant. But the design professionals attending the June 24 tour were more impressed when he and lighting designer Ann Schiffers discussed how architect Philip Johnson, lighting designer Richard Kelly, fixture manufacturer Edison Price, and artist/sculptor Richard Lippold collaborated on the design of the restaurant on the first floor of the Seagram Building that would become a designated interior landmark.

Built in 1957-58, the Four Seasons was the first interior restaurant space to use International Style aesthetics—towering trees, a white marble pool, French walnut-paneled walls, bronze railings, beaded aluminum drapes, a Picasso-designed curtain, Mies chairs adapted for restaurant seating, Philip Johnson-designed banquettes, private party chairs by Charles Eames, and Eero Saarinen hassocks and taboret tables. Every item—from silverware to match covers to uniforms—had a renowned artist, designer, or architect attached to its creation.

The Four Seasons Restaurant exemplifies Richard Kelly's "philosophy of light," which he applied throughout. For example, ambient luminescence was incorporated into the paneled walls. To make them glow, Kelly and Edison Price designed a continuous, linear wall-washing system. Throughout the restaurant, the curve of the unit's bronze-finish reflector provides glare-free illumination, despite the wall's glossy, dark surface. Focal glow was used at the foot of a Picasso painting in the entrance corridor by placing cold cathode lamps behind translucent alabaster panels. In the Pool Room, low brightness, silver-bowl incandescent downlights created a luminous pool of water, and incandescent underwater "cans" were recessed into the planters to uplight the foliage. For a "play of brilliance," Kelly used miniature downlights—or "sparkle lights"—that created the effect of an overhead constellation.

The tour was a sidebar to the exhibition, "Light | Energy | Impact: The Legacy of Richard Kelly" currently on view at the Center for Architecture through 09.16.06.

Exploring the Guts of New York
By Murrye Bernard, Assoc. AIA

Jacket design by Steven Puetzer/Iconica

Event: The Works: Anatomy of a City
Speaker: Kate Ascher, author & vice president, New York City Economic Development Corporation
Organizer: Skyscraper Museum
Sponsors: Skyscraper Museum; Center for Architecture
Location: Center for Architecture, 07.19.06

It was in the wake of 9/11, the least mundane of events, that Kate Ascher, a former Port Authority employee, decided to write The Works: Anatomy of a City celebrating the mundane by exploring the guts of New York City. Ascher was on hand at the Center for Architecture July 19 to answer everything you ever wanted to know—and more—about how the city moves people and freight, supplies power and communications, and keeps itself clean.

Aside from using catchy presentation graphics that compliment the illustrations in her book, Ascher made infrastructure seem sexy by contrasting old systems with their modern equivalents. For example, between 1897 and 1953, mail was transported by the Pneumatic Tube Mail Network, a system of underground pipes featuring steel cylinders that were greased and blown from Herald Square to Grand Central in four minutes. Modern mail is electronically scanned and bar-coded before being delivered, a process that takes much longer than four minutes! Furthermore, when the machine can't read your writing, illegible envelopes are digitally captured and interpreted by a worker at a remote location.

When asked what was the most surprising fact that she discovered while researching her book, Ascher replied, simply, electricity. "Considering all that is involved in its production and delivery, it's amazing that it works 99.9% of the time." Thanks to Ascher, we no longer have to wonder what happens when we flip the switch, flush the toilet, or take out the trash.

A review of The Works: Anatomy of a City will appear in the winter Oculus.

Murrye Bernard, Assoc. AIA, is proposal manager for Polshek Partnership Architects and editor for AIA AssociateNews.

Film Documents Life in Chinese Villages
By Robert McGeachy

Back alleys of "villages within a city" in Guangdong, from "The San Yuan Li Project."
Courtesy People's Architecture

Event: 3×3: A Perspective on China—S[CR]EE[N]ING CHINA Documentaries from China
Speakers: Ou Ning & Cao Fei, filmmakers, The San Yuan Li Project; moderator Wei Wei Shannon, co-founder, People's Architecture
Organizers: People's Architecture; Center for Architecture
Location: Center for Architecture, 07.18.06

Filmmakers Ou Ning and Cao Fei eschew traditional Chinese documentary norms and an overt political message to present the viewer with what is best described as a cine-poem composed of apparently random images that form a touching whole. "The San Yuan Li Project" is a striking tapestry of often compelling vignettes, such as traditional Chinese opera performers putting on makeup as children watch through the windows.

"The San Yuan Project" explores life in a "village within a city" located in Guangdong. "Villages within a city" are being constructed throughout China's vast and rapidly growing metropolises. These communities, inhabited mostly by transitory residents such as migratory peasants, have become the subject of much academic research. The conflicts between modernization and peasant ethos are among the issues studied. This film penetrates the academic veneer to explore the residents' lives in this gritty and at times claustrophobic neighborhood.

The project is actually a collection of films made by individual crew members, each owning a camera; Ning and Fei then wove together the crews' contributions. Months before shooting began, Ning noted during the Q-&-A session, the film crews lived among the residents, gaining their trust. The residents' ease translates into often lively shots and a transfixing journey through this "village within a city."

Robert McGeachy is an Intermediate School Science teacher working in Queens. His stories have appeared in the Journal of the Society of the Study of Architecture in Canada and The Beaver Magazine.

The Figure/Ground Relationship of Fuller/Noguchi
By Jessica Sheridan, Assoc. AIA

Buckminster Fuller with his Portrait by Isamu Noguchi, 1929. Chrome allows for full reflectivity and does not cast a shadow.
Photography by Isamu Noguchi, courtesy The Noguchi Museum, NY

Event: Lessons from Fuller and Noguchi for Contemporary Art and Design
Speakers: Guy Nordenson, principal, Guy Nordenson and Associates; Reinhold Martin, associate professor of architecture, Columbia University & partner, Martin/Baxi Architects; Josiah McElheny, artist; Moderator William Menking, editor, The Architects Newspaper
Organizers: The Architectural League of NY, The Noguchi Museum
Location: The Urban Center, 07.20.06

Figures emerge against a two-dimensional field throughout Isamu Noguchi's work. Buckminster Fuller developed systems that create three-dimensional inhabitable fields. Both dealt with the issue of monument versus field, but their strengths show in different ways, argues architect and professor Reinhold Martin. Noguchi's "Red Cube," 1968, in the courtyard at the Marine Midland Bank, sits on a concrete ground with the bank's curtain wall acting as a vertical field behind it. Noguchi's success lies in the ability to create mystery and paradox, as the cube seems to defy gravity sitting as oblique monument on its corner. Fuller's Geodesic Dome City, 1968, consists of a system-based, transparent skin forming a large dome over NYC. The dome, a modular field, acts as an enormous monument enveloping a two-mile portion of the city. The rationality of the system symbolizes Fuller's strengths.

Although the execution of Fuller and Noguchi's work may differ, their work is similar and in many ways complementary, according to artist Josiah McElheny and engineer Guy Nordenson, who spoke at the Urban Center July 20. Ultimately, the most important issue for Fuller and Noguchi was to create work that generates thought and experience, whether or not it is realized in full scale. Noguchi's "Contoured Playground for Central Park" was never built, but Noguchi saw opportunity to generate discussion by making bronze, table-sized models. Similarly, Fuller's Geodesic Dome City continues to inspire even though there is little possibility that it will ever be constructed. Fuller and Noguchi were not just thinking about practicality of construction, they were trying to reveal a thought process of networks and patterns from which future artists and designers could work.

As they had hoped, Fuller and Noguchi continue to inspire artists, architects, and engineers both conceptually and practically. The original Freedom Tower proposal that Guy Nordenson and Associates developed with Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, incorporated twisted pylons and diagrid bracing referencing Fuller's tensegrity structures and Noguchi's Akari lamps. McElheny's series, "Landscape Model for Total Reflective Abstraction," is based on Fuller and Noguchi's conceptual discussions about human interaction and creating a shadowless space through reflectivity. McElheny creates reflective tables with glass models of Noguchi sculptures. Because of the materials, field and monument meld and no shadows are cast. In addition, once a viewer is introduced, he or she casts a reflection onto the piece fully integrating the viewer with the work.

The "Best of Friends: Fuller and Noguchi" exhibition will be up through 10.15.06. Go to The Noguchi Museum's website for more information.

Mori Unites New Materials with Nature
By Wendy Talarico

The House on the Gulf of Mexico shows sensitivity to endangered species and mid-century architecture.
Courtesy Toshiko Mori Architect, tmarch.com

Event: The Dilemma of our Time: Technology and Culture
Speaker: Toshiko Mori, FAIA, principal, Toshiko Mori Architect & chair, Department of Architecture, Harvard Graduate School of Design
Organizer: AIA New York Technology Committee
Sponsor: ABC Imaging
Location: Center for Architecture 07.11.06

Being architecturally sensitive to the site, culture, history, energy use, ecology, and land consistently threads through the work of Toshiko Mori, FAIA. Whether it's in the materials, preservation, or new construction, her work is designed with simplicity and a rich palette of colors and textures.

"The human perception of materials is ephemeral," Mori said. Her work uses experimental materials that interact with people—thermal paint that changes colors when touched, and glass that emits a breaking sound when one comes too close, for example. A staircase made from seven layers of woven fiberglass with an inner layer of balsa wood showcases her fascination with materials. The entire assembly weighs only 300 pounds and offers the added advantage of being bulletproof.

The House on the Gulf of Mexico, a private guest house for an original Paul Rudolph house in Casey Key is one of several houses in Florida sensitive to endangered species in the area (manatees, loggerhead turtles). The Rudolph House—and many examples of mid-century architecture—are a different kind of endangered species, Mori said. Their preservation should be approached with the same thoroughness.

In describing the challenge of designing the Visitors' Center and Garden pavilion for Frank Lloyd Wright's Darwin D. Martin House in Buffalo, NY, Mori deserves the sympathy of every architect. "How can you build next to Frank Lloyd Wright? You can't win at his game," she said. "You need to be assertive but in harmony." The resulting structure, a simple glass box, "plays chess" with Wright's house: where he is heavy, she is light; where his roof dips down, hers turns up, and so on. In studying Wright's design, the simplest lesson, and one that is most overlooked, according to Mori, is this: "Don't isolate architecture from nature's program."

Wendy Talarico is a journalist with more than 25 years of experience as a writer and public relations and marketing consultant. She is a former senior editor at Architectural Record and This Old House, and former web editor for Metropolis. She is currently writing a cookbook: "A History of the School Lunch," to be published in 2007.

Light Rail Links Newark Community

Newark-Elizabeth Rail Link
Courtesy FXFOWLE Newark-Elizabeth Rail Link, a one-mile-long, $207.7 million line serving five new stations and connecting Newark Penn Station with Newark Broad Street Station, opened July 17 and is being hailed as the next step in the economic revitalization of New Jersey's largest city. The service will provide faster, more convenient commuting options for thousands of employees who work in Newark's downtown business area, as well as visitors to the New Jersey Performing Arts Center, Bears and Eagles Riverfront Stadium, the Newark Museum, and the Broad Street shopping district. FXFOWLE, working with BRW and Parsons Brinckerhoff Engineers, designed each station to reflect the characteristics of its immediate urban context and includes canopies, seating areas, lighting, and landscape elements. The track bed and rail right-of-way, as well as the overhead catenary poles, provide important design features that unify the Light Rail System. This segment is the first of three for the proposed 8.8-mile-long Newark-Elizabeth Rail Link.

North Shore Greets Solar-Hydrogen House

NYIT's entry in the 2005 Solar Decathlon
Courtesy NYIT Green Machine-Blue Space, New York Institute of Technology's (NYIT) entry in the 2005 U.S. Department of Energy's Solar Decathlon, was recently dedicated at the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy (USMMA) in Kings Point, on Long Island's North Shore. The 800-square-foot house, a collaborative effort by the two schools, was the only finalist in a global competition to use a hydrogen fuel cell for energy storage. High efficiency solar panels work with an electrolyzer to generate hydrogen for the fuel cell. The house is composed of modified shipping containers and therefore, can be adapted to any locale. Email Greg Sachs to arrange a tour.

Triangular Glass Tower Grows in Brooklyn

85 Flatbush Avenue Extension
Courtesy Ismael Leyva Architects Taking a cue from the Flatiron Building, New York-based Ismael Leyva Architects is designing a new, glass-encased 21-story luxury condominium building on an angled lot at the intersection of Tillary and Duffield Streets in downtown Brooklyn. The building will contain 108 residences, many with balconies with views of Manhattan and East River bridges, and range from studios to three-bedroom units and duplexes. A triangular plaza with shallow waterfalls and glass pyramid skylights will complement the tower.

Met Opera Launches Art Gallery

The new Metropolitan Opera gallery.
Courtesy Roy Co. design Metropolitan Opera board member Marie Schwartz has donated $1 million to establish "the Arnold and Marie Schwartz Gallery Met" to display original works of contemporary art, and will premiere on September 22 at the opening of The Met's 2006-07 season. The gallery, located in the opera house's south side lobby, was designed by Roy Co. design. The opening exhibition, curated by art editor Dodie Kazanjian, will include six art works inspired by the heroines of the Met's six new productions. So far, artists Cecily Brown (Suor Angelica in Il Trittico), John Currin (Helena in Die Ägyptische Helena), Barnaby Furnas (Euridice in Orfeo ed Euridice), Makiko Kudo (Princess Yue-yang in The First Emperor), Richard Prince (Cio-Cio-San in Madama Butterfly), and Sophie von Hellermann (Rosina in Il Barbiere di Siviglia) will be included in the exhibition. The gallery will be free and open to the public.

Streetscape Makeover to Perk Up LIC
The New York City Economic Development Corporation (NYCEDC) has named Vollmer Associates as lead design consultant for streetscape improvements along Jackson Avenue in Long Island City, Queens. The firm will be responsible for landscape architecture, civil engineering, traffic engineering, lighting design, and public art consulting. A new, cohesive streetscape identity, including landscaped medians, sidewalk improvements, landscape elements, street lighting, street furniture, and other architectural and art components, will establish Jackson Avenue as the central corridor within a new central business and mixed-use district. Construction is expected to begin in 2007 with completion slated for 2008.

W Philadelphia Opens New Doors
The new W Philadelphia will feature 250 guest rooms, including 26 suites, 3 "Wow" suites, and 1 "Extreme Wow" suite, as well as 95 one- and two-bedroom condo residences. Starwood Hotels and Resorts Worldwide, W's parent company, entered into a management agreement with 1200 Arch Street Associates (a joint collaboration between Urban Residential and Parkway Corporation, exclusive to this project) to develop the property, to be located across the street from the Pennsylvania Convention Center and the historic Reading Terminal Market. Starwood will manage the hotel as a W and license the residential units as W Residences.

Handel Architects and AvroKO have been named the architectural and design team, with the former serving as the lead design architect for the project. The new hotel will be located in the Center City District, close to restaurants, high-end retailers, museums, galleries, theaters, and cultural institutions such as the Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts.

ACE-USGBC Form Strategic Partnership
Members of the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) will now have the opportunity to become mentors in the ACE Mentor Program of America (ACE) and share their expertise in building environmentally responsible, profitable, and healthy places to live and work with high school students. ACE was founded in 1995 by Charles H. Thornton, Ph.D., P.E, Hon. AIA, founding principal of Thornton-Tomasetti Group, as an innovative way of attracting students, particularly minorities, women, and the less privileged, into the architecture, construction, and engineering professions.

Architecture as Public Policy is Theme of Summer OCULUS, in Mailboxes First Week of August
Kristen Richards, Editor-in-Chief

Courtesy AIANY/Pentagram

Today, architects, city agencies, developers—and the public—have a greater stake than ever in our built environment. The summer issue of OCULUS tackles the AIANY Chapter's 2006 theme, "Architecture as Public Policy." The subtitle, "Listening, Learning, Leading," represents a set of skills that, when mastered, will boost the architect's influence in the civic arena.

Feature articles include how the NYC Department of Design and Construction is reaching out to architects to ensure better public architecture, and tips about the vital do's and don'ts of public outreach. An affordable housing project, two schools, a police facility, and a memorial offer case studies of architects and civic engagement. There is also a no-holds-barred commentary on post-9/11 architecture and the political process at Ground Zero by five outspoken experts on the topic. And more!

OCULUS is sent free to all members of AIA New York and AIA New York State, and subscriptions are available for $40 ($60 for international subscribers). Click here for the online form. Summer OCULUS is scheduled to mail the first week of August.

New Housing Takes to the Bronx
By Neill McG. Coleman, Assistant Commissioner for Communications, New York City Department of Housing Preservation and Development

Approximately 75 developers, architects, and building professionals attended the NHNY site visit.
Karen Hu, New York City Department of Housing Preservation and Development

The New Housing New York (NHNY) Legacy Project competition site, 40,000 square feet located at the southeast corner of East 156 Street and Brook Avenue in the South Bronx, is steeply sloped and bound at one end by an abandoned single-track railroad and retaining wall. Offering an overview of the community and neighborhood context as well as a summary of the new housing and commercial development projects underway in the area, Ted Weinstein, Director of New York City Department of Housing Preservation and Development's (HPD) Bronx Planning Unit, led a NHNY site tour on July 12.

Housing and commercial development is booming in the Bronxchester Urban Renewal Area. Projects include: the two-story "Hub Retail and Office Center" currently in construction across Brook Avenue; the planned "Plaza at the Hub" office building, shopping mall, and residential complex southwest of the NHNY site; and Melrose Commons, an urban renewal area northwest of the site, which already has over 1,400 new units of housing (out of a projected number of 3,200 units) completed or in construction.

NHNY is the first-ever juried architect-developer design competition for affordable and sustainable housing in New York City. The project encourages new forms of design in developing a mixed-use, mixed-income project, which includes use of approximately 20,000 square feet of air rights located above the adjacent, privately-owned railroad track. In conjunction with the NHNY Legacy Project competition, the HPD and the AIA NY Chapter hosted the visit to the project site. For more information about the competition, go to the NHNY website.

Virtual Southpoint Gallery Online
The Emerging New York Architects Committee (ENYA) AIA New York Chapter has launched an electronic gallery of entries from its 2006 biennial competition Southpoint: from Ruin to Rejuvenation. Over 300 submissions are now available for viewing online. A search engine allows users to browse by citation, name, or location. Click here to visit the site.

Architecture Week—Save the Dates!
Celebrate the Center for Architecture's annual festival with the AIA New York Chapter and the Center for Architecture Foundation from October 6-12, 2006. Mark your calendar for events including:

10.06.06 – Films! Films! Films!
10.07.06 – Family Day (in partnership with openhousenewyork)
10.07.06 – Design-In Marathon—seven hours of uninterrupted dialogue on design
10.10.06 – Going Public Exhibition Opening
10.11.06 – Going Public Roundtable
10.12.06 – Heritage Ball with Dinner Chair MaryAnne Gilmartin will be held at Pier 60 at Chelsea Piers. This year's honorees include: Commissioner David J. Burney, AIA; Walter Hunt, FAIA; Richard L. Tomasetti, PE, Hon AIA; and Nontraditional Employment for Women.
10.12.06 – Party@the Center

For more information on these and other citywide programs and activities, click here. The Center for Architecture will also serve as the Information and Welcome Center for openhousenewyork on October 7 and 8.

Passings…
Memorial services were held July 19 for Martin Gallent, a 19-year member of the NYC City Planning Commission, with 13 years as Vice Chair. Gallent, a long-time resident of Jackson Heights, was a 1959 graduate of NYU Law School. He was a lawyer in private practice with extensive experience in land-use planning and public administration. For many years, he taught courses on New York City land-use planning process and urban politics at Queens College. Most recently, he served on the boards of the Neighborhood Open Space Coalition/Friends of Gateway and Trees New York—environmental advocacy and education groups—and on the local candidates committee of the Citizens Union.

Photo by Michael Falco, courtesy Municipal Art Society

Through 08.28.06
Caddell Dry Dock: 100 Years Harborside

Focusing on New York City's working waterfront, this exhibition showcases documentary photographs by Michael Falco, as well as ship models and related relics, depicting what has changed and what has remained the same in the ship repair industry. Caddell Dry Dock and Repair Company, located on Staten Island, is one of the city's last working shipyards.

The Municipal Art Society; 457 Madison Avenue

Photo by Jackie Neale Chadwick, courtesy Municipal Art Society

Through 08.25.06
Lost in Transition: Williamsburg and Carroll Gardens

This exhibition focuses on recent changes to the built environment of two Brooklyn neighborhoods and features images and text by local high school students and photos by resident photographer Jackie Neale Chadwick. The display is the product of the Urban Memory Project, a multi-school documentation program which aims to engage students in changes to their physical surroundings.

The Municipal Art Society; 457 Madison Avenue

No.1, by Stephen Barnett
Courtesy Alice Austin House

Through 09.12.06
Symbiosis

An exhibition of local artist Stephen Barnett, Symbiosis is a series of black and white images juxtaposed with color abstract images, which demonstrate the interdependence of the mind and the soul. On July 29, at 6:30pm, a special presentation by the Isadora Duncan Dance Foundation will be held, celebrating Alice Austen and Duncan as turn of the century creative women who advocated new ways to experience the environment.

Alice Austen House; 2 Hylan Boulevard, Staten Island

Through 09.12.06
Sacred Landscapes

A collaboration among eight Brooklyn photographers, this exhibition attempts to locate the spiritual experience in nature, sometimes under man-made conditions.

Alice Austen House; 2 Hylan Boulevard, Staten Island

Courtesy Metropolis

Through 09.30.06
25 Years of Metropolis

The exhibition of award-winning covers not only celebrates Metropolis' anniversary, but indirectly references "the evolution from analog to digital, showing the connections between culture and design," among other art milestones.

Steelcase Lobby; 4 Columbus Circle

Pieces from the Urban Forest Project (l-r): Sean Adams + Noreen Morioka, Los Angeles; John Pirman, New York; James Victore, New York
Courtesy Urban Forest Project

Through 10.06
Design Times Square: The Urban Forest Project

Featuring some of the world's most celebrated designers and visual artists, Times Square will be the site of an exhibition of 175 banners, drawing from the natural inspiration of trees. The banners will eventually be converted into tote bags, which will be auctioned off to benefit design education.

Times Square