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08.05.08
August is here, and it’s time to savor the last month of summer. There are so many places to go around town. For some ideas, see Kristen Richards’ “Summer Walkabout” photo essay in this issue.
- Jessica Sheridan, Assoc. AIA, LEED AP
CLICK ON BLOG CENTRAL: AIANY BLOG: The AIANY Chapter has launched a new blog. Blog Central features opinion pieces on architectural issues relevant to NY-based designers, firms, and projects, along with spotlights on debates and discussions at the Center for Architecture and AIANY, and is an informal discussion board. Be sure to check it out regularly and contribute to the dialogue.
Of interest:
· AIANY Policy. Have you wondered how AIANY establishes its policy positions? Laura Manville, the AIANY Policy Coordinator explains all.
To become a regular contributor to Blog Central, please e-mail e-Oculus. Pen names are welcome.
Event: New York City Plaza Program Information Session
Location: Department of Transportation, 07.16.08
Speaker: Andy Wiley-Schwartz — Assistant Commissioner, Office of Planning and Sustainability, NYC Department of Transportation
Organizer: NYC Department of Transportation
Before and after image of the Plaza Program’s potential.
Courtesy NYC Department of Transportation
With the NYC Plaza Program, the Department of Transportation (DOT) is looking to create “vest pocket parks” — small, modestly landscaped plazas on existing marginal sites such as traffic islands and underused turning lanes. At a recent information session, Andy Wiley-Schwartz, assistant commissioner of the Office of Planning and Sustainability, presented how the department could use its authority over the public right-of-way to displace or divert streets and parking to create easily accessible plazas, complete with benches and plantings.
To be designed by the city and managed in cooperation with neighborhood nonprofit groups who will apply to DOT to enter the Plaza Program, the criteria for acceptance will favor community organizations in low-income areas with inadequate public space but with the means to maintain the proposed plazas. But there’s the catch. Local groups are expected not only to provide upkeep and programming, but also to assume liability for the new public spaces, according to the program’s proposal guidelines. The cost of insurance alone could make the plazas prohibitively costly for the very neighborhoods where they’re most needed.
However, with construction still two years away and a relatively modest $14 million on hand expected to fund about four plazas a year to start, the NYC Plaza Program is only one small piece of a much larger urban puzzle — a signal, along with the midtown Broadway Esplanade from 42nd to 34th Street opening mid-August, of a shift in the Bloomberg administration away from automobile traffic towards a more pedestrian-friendly streetscape for New York.
Ian Volner is a writer and critic living in Manhattan.
Event: Restoration of Bauhaus Building
Location: Museum of Modern Art, 07.09.08
Speakers: Winfried Brenne & Franze Jaschke — Partners, Brenne Gesellschaft von Architekten (Berlin)
Moderator: Barry Bergdoll — Philip Johnson Curator of Architecture and Design, Museum of Modern Art
Organizers: The World Monuments Fund with support from Knoll
The external staircase and balcony that wrapped around the ADGB Trade Union School was walled off with concrete under East German rule (left). Brenne Gesellschaft von Architekten restored the original building to appear as intended in 1930.
Courtesy wmf.org
One of the successes of the Bauhaus school was the completion of the ADGB Trade Union School in Bernau, Germany. The building marked commercial and architectural success for the influential functionalist school. Designed by Bauhaus Director Hannes Meyer and architect Hans Wittwer, it became one of the most significant completed Bauhaus projects. Sited near Berlin in the former East Germany, its condition was for many years unknown and its existence almost forgotten by the West.
The 1930 building complex, consisting of administration, classroom, dormitory, refectory, and gymnasium space, was unlike other Bauhaus buildings of the time. Built out of butter-toned brick and stretches of red steel-framed glazing and glass block, it stood apart from the white-walled buildings associated with the Bauhaus style. In the dormitories, walls were color-coded according to floor and building — yellow, green, blue, and red.
When the project to restore the ADGB School began, these details were submerged beneath layers of architectural debris added by two totalitarian regimes. The National Socialist Party and the German Democratic Republic consecutively enclosed the complex’s broad glass walls beneath layers of brick and paint. The school was gradually surrounded with new buildings designed in the modern classical style favored by the itinerant regimes.
Rediscovering the colors locked beneath the additions was key to rehabilitating the school. The partners of Berlin’s Brenne Gesellschaft von Architekten, Winfried Brenne and Franz Jaschke, took an archeological approach to unearthing the hidden layers. Demolishing walls had to be carried out with care as clues constantly emerged about the design philosophy and how the building was originally finished. Sifting through original documentation, they re-oriented the complex to return to its original functional intent.
For the office of Brenne Gesellschaft, confronting a historic puzzle proved to be an ongoing challenge. Many original details featured construction methods and materials no longer available, requiring in-depth research on how to reproduce them. Facing budgetary constraints and constant new discoveries, the architects were continually involved in the process of evaluating information and creating solutions on the fly.
The inaugural World Monuments Fund/Knoll Modernism Prize, awarded for the preservation of modern architecture as part of the Modernism at Risk Initiative, was awarded to the Berlin firm for their work in revitalizing the ADGB School, representing a new focus on the forgotten challenges facing Modern buildings.
Robert Santos, Assoc. AIA, is a junior architect at Gruzen Samton Architects.
In the last few weeks I was fortunate to get sneak-peaks of two projects. First, the recently opened (and oooh-inspiring) “Madagascar!” habitat. FXFOWLE Architects’ transformation of the Bronx Zoo’s 1903 Heins & LaFarge-designed Lion House into a LEED Gold fantasyland of lemurs, crocks (13 feet!), and oh-so-Art Deco-looking (really!) hissing cockroaches. This should be on everyone’s “must-see” list this summer.
Welcome to “Madagascar!” No kidding about the magic — there’s no visible barrier between humans and lemurs.
Kristen Richards
Sustainable features such as geothermal wells and gray water re-use make this the first NYC landmarked building to achieve LEED Gold.
Kristen Richards
The restored 1963 Paul Rudolph Art & Architecture building and the new Jeffrey Loria Center for the History of Art, Gwathmey Siegel & Associates Architects’ tour-de-force at Yale, is set to open soon. A recent hard-hat tour led by Charles Gwathmey, FAIA, offered a peek at what’s in store.
Abutting Rudolph’s Brutalist concrete and glass, Gwathmey’s contemporary Loria Center clad in limestone, glass, and zinc holds its own very comfortably. Over the years, the Rudolph building had been partitioned into warrens of work spaces; now the light pours in.
Kristen Richards
Stairways have been restored, some floors have been raised, and unobtrusive ramps installed to make all 37 levels in the nine-story building fully accessible; personal experience of the levels: at one point we kept going up and down stairs, but always ended up on the 3rd floor.
Kristen Richards
Home Delivery at MoMA.
Jessica Sheridan
As much as I have learned about prefabricated housing, never have I seen a comprehensive overview spanning eras dating back to the early 1900s. The Museum of Modern Art’s Home Delivery: Fabricating the Modern Dwelling exhibition does just that; however, the curators (Barry Bergdoll, the Philip Johnson Chief Curator of Architecture and Design, and Peter Christensen, curatorial assistant in the Department of Architecture and Design) present a one-sided review that seems to discredit contemporary efforts.
MoMA divides the exhibition into five eras broken down into categories relevant to the time periods — from prefabrication and the spirit of invention, through prefabrication and necessity, to postfabrication and the digital era. The exhibition’s strengths are in the survey of Modern architects exploring prefabricated ideas. Included are: a model of Thomas Edison’s Single Pour Concrete House (1906), Le Corbusier’s drawing on trace paper of Maison Dom-Ino (1914), and intricate details of the General Panel System developed by Walter Gropius and Konrad Wachsmann (1942). There is even a full-scale mock-up and images of a series of prefabricated homes exhibited in MoMA’s museum garden in the 1950s, placing MoMA at the center of prefab design.
With such a complete collection of drawings, models, ideas, and mock-ups, I got a real sense of the complex thought that has gone into developing prefabricated housing over the last 100 years. When I approached the contemporary examples, however, the complexity falls short. Full-scale prototypes exhibit how the digital age has influenced design. Wall prototypes made with laser cutters and CNC milling machines inhabit the space leading to the exhibition. In an empty lot down the block, Burst*008, one of five prototypes in the lot, by Jeremy Edmiston and Douglas Gauthier is comprised of laser-cut wood pieces, specified down to holes under the house to store umbrellas. KieranTimberlake Architects designed the Cellophane House, complete with solar strips integrated into the façade. But nowhere do we see the thought process — study models, sketches, ideas. Without this, the prototypes seem almost unplanned, as if the architects plugged a formula into a computer and out came a building.
Even though digital fabrication is interesting, I believe there is so much more that goes into prefab housing today than mass production. The eras represented in the exhibition are coming together to create contemporary prefabrication that exists out of necessity, invention, experimentation, as well as digital design. If MoMA had chosen to include examples of buildings that are built, or at least in planning phases, such as MVRDV’s Silodam in Rotterdam or the 150 Make It Right prototypes being built in New Orleans, the exhibition would have more relevance and urgency needed to put the many current prefab ideas into production.
In this issue:
· Visitors Will Experience Chanel Handbag… from the Inside
· Light Reflects From Tribeca Rooftop
· Canadians Renovate The Garden
· Health Department Breathes New Life into Landmark Quality Buildings
· West Point Salutes New Library and Learning Center
· NJ Students Given Room for their Robots to Compete
· A “Rocky” Start to New Natural History Museum
Visitors Will Experience Chanel Handbag… from the Inside
Zaha Hadid’s rendering of the Mobile Art pavilion to be installed in Central Park’s Rumsey Playfield this fall.
Courtesy CHANEL
Central Park will serve as the sole American venue for Mobile Art, a traveling international exhibition housed in a pavilion designed by London-based Zaha Hadid, Hon. FAIA. Commissioned by CHANEL, and conceived by the company’s designer, Karl Lagerfeld, Mobile Art presents changing installations by contemporary artists from around the world, each of whom has designed a unique piece for the project exploring the convergence of fashion and art. Marking the 50th anniversary of the iconic CHANEL “2.55″ stitched-leather handbag designed by Coco Chanel, the handbag was presented to participating artists as jumping off points. Assembled from 700 components, Hadid’s pavilion is designed to appear as an abstracted handbag. According to Hadid, the 20-foot-tall, 95-foot-wide organic form of the building is a torus, a donut-like circular geometry found in nautilus shells. The pavilion’s 2,300 square feet of interior exhibition space wrap a central court illuminated by a translucent plastic skylight. The pavilion will be open and free to the public from 10.20-11.09.08.
Light Reflects From Tribeca Rooftop
Skyloft Penthouse.
Courtesy Stribling & Associates
The Skyloft Penthouse at 145 Hudson Street, crowning a 14-story Art Deco building in Tribeca, is on the market. The circa 1920s former printing factory was redeveloped into a mixed-use commercial and residential condo. The 7,500-square-foot rectilinear duplex is sheathed in glass within a metal framework designed by James Carpenter Design Associates. The northern and southern exposures are composed of vertical glass modules with glass “fins” that redirect and refract light, while the eastern wall has two rows of 10-foot-high high-performance glass panels interspersed with operable windows. In addition, the windows are equipped with a sensor system to automatically close in inclement weather. The four-bedroom residence, with interiors and finishes designed by Rogers Marvel Architects, includes a double-height library/observatory that cantilevers over the spa area with a hot tub and shower.
Canadians Renovate The Garden
Madison Square Garden has selected Ottawa-based Brisbin Brook Beynon as the project architect and Skanska as construction manager for the arena’s $500 million renovation. Using existing space, the project will include: a redesigned Seventh Avenue entrance; more seating with better sightlines; wider and more spacious public concourses; new lighting, sound, and LED video systems in HDTV; 68 new mid-level suites; and 20 new floor-level suites. Construction is slated to begin in Spring 2009. The Garden will continue to operate during the renovation, with no impact on the New York Knicks’ or New York Rangers’ schedules, and should be complete in time for the 2011-2012 sports seasons.
Health Department Breathes New Life into Landmark Quality Buildings
The NYC Department of Design and Construction (DDC) has contracted Swanke Hayden Connell Architects (SHCA) to design the rehabilitation of three health centers located in “landmark quality” buildings run by the NYC Department of Health. The facilities include: the Astoria District Health Center (circa 1935), a Classical Revival building in Queens; Bedford District Health Center (1950), a Modern/Art Deco building in the Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood of Brooklyn; and the Fort Green Health Clinic (1938), an Art Deco style building, also in Brooklyn. The scope of the work primarily involves exterior building envelope rehabilitation and ADA-accessibility upgrades. The NYC Public Design Commission (formerly the Art Commission) approved the proposed changes. Construction is under way, with completion slated for October 2008.
West Point Salutes New Library and Learning Center
Jefferson Hall-USMA Library and Learning Center.
Holzman Moss Architecture
This September, West Point will open the new Jefferson Hall-U.S. Military Academy Library and Learning Center, planned and designed by NY-based STV in collaboration with Holzman Moss Architecture for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Sited on the edge of academy’s 70-acre training field and athletic space known as the “Plain” (a historical landmark), the $62-million, 141,000-square-foot building will serve the institution’s 4,400 cadets and faculty. Divided into three masses with step-backs echoing the form of surrounding structures, the six-story granite and glass building keeps with West Point’s Gothic tradition. Two granite-block end towers bookend a full-height curtain wall comprised of blast-resistant glass and pre-cast concrete mullions, framing views of the campus and Hudson River. Additional design elements include amber-colored glass brick to filter light into an archival area, and exposed structural clay tile walls in the entry lobby and collection areas. The building has achieved a bronze rating under the Army’s SPiRiT program — the equivalent of LEED certification.
NJ Students Given Room for their Robots to Compete
Robotics Center.
Terrence O’Neal Architect
Construction is underway on the 6,500-square-foot Robotics Center in the Central Ward in Newark. Designed by Terrence O’Neal Architect and commissioned by Newark Public Schools, the facility will provide a dedicated space for high school students who excel in math and science to design and build robots able to compete in robotics tournaments. The building, which can accommodate 65 students, will include a robotics practice and competition field, computer lab, and machine shops. Completion is slated by September 2009.
A “Rocky” Start to New Natural History Museum
The Utah Museum of Natural History.
© Red Square, inc. for Polshek Partnership Architects, LLP, and GSBS Architects
Ground was broken for the Utah Museum of Natural History at The Rio Tinto Center overlooking the Salt Lake Valley. The new 161,000-square-foot building, designed by NY-based Polshek Partnership Architects with UT-based Gillies Stransky Brems Smith Architects, and exhibitions designed by NY-based Ralph Appelbaum Associates, will double the size of its current facility and allow the display of 1.2 million objects. Conceived as an abstract extension and transformation of the land, the building rests on a series of terraces that lay along the site’s contours. The use of concrete, stone, and copper is intended to illuminate Utah’s geological and mineralogical history. The exhibitions will be organized in a series of eight thematic areas and three embedded learning labs; media is integrated throughout, from reflective sit-down experiences and multi-player interactive installations, to ambient soundscapes. The museum will open to the public in winter 2010-2011 and is anticipated to be certified LEED Gold.
In this issue:
· Passing: Paul S. Byard, FAIA
· Passing: Michael Goldsmith, AIA
Passing: Paul S. Byard, FAIA
Paul S. Byard, FAIA, died on Tuesday 07.15.08. He is remembered as the Director of the Historic Preservation Program at the Columbia Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation, an adjunct professor for over 30 years, and a partner at Platt, Byard, Dovell & White. Most of all, he is remembered for his enthusiasm for the field of architecture and preservation, and his dedication to his students and colleagues. Please click here to read the New York Times article about his life.
A memorial service at Columbia University is being planned for the fall. In the meantime, send thoughts and condolences to Rosalie Byard at 50 Plaza Street East, Brooklyn, NY 10024.
Passing: Michael Goldsmith, AIA
Ludwig Michael Goldsmith, known as Michael, of Upper Montclair, NJ, died 07.23.08 of complications resulting from open-heart surgery. The 57-year-old architect was the owner of Ludwig Michael Goldsmith, Architects, an award-winning, Manhattan firm he founded in 1991. A registered architect in NY, NJ, and CT, Goldsmith specialized in interior design, architecture, and planning in both the private and public sectors.
Goldsmith earned a Bachelor of Architecture from Cornell University and a Masters in Urban Planning from City College of the City University of New York. He served as an engineering officer in the U.S. Navy for over four years. Throughout his 30-year career, Goldsmith donated countless hours to pro bono projects, giving his time, advice, and professional assistance. Goldsmith’s funeral was held on 07.24.08. Donations can be made to Cornell University, College of Architecture, Art & Planning; Planned Parenthood; and any organization dedicated to fighting AIDS.
The Home Delivery show at MoMA highlights prefab housing. What do you think about its potential?
Note: Results from this poll are non-scientific.
With the Dymaxion Study Center and "Fly's Eye Dome" at the Center for Architecture and the opening of the retrospective exhibition at the Whitney Museum, there are many discussions about Buckminster Fuller's significance. What's your opinion of his influence on contemporary architecture?
Note: Results from this poll are non-scientific.
The wonders of NYC nature never cease. Two new developments were announced in the last couple of weeks:
Prospect Park Commemorative Tree Program. Prospect Park’s website has added a new “tour” of the park’s notable trees. Fourteen of the rarest, oldest, and tallest specimens are displayed on a map with supplemental information and images.
Gowanus Canal Microbes. It was reported this week that New York City College of Technology professors are studying organisms living in the Gowanus Canal. If organisms can survive the intense pollution, they hope that extracts from the microbes will be potential sources of antibiotics or inhibitors. Read “Microbes in filthy Gowanus Canal may hold breakthrough vs. AIDS, heart woes,” by Edgar Sandoval and Rich Schapiro, Daily News, 07.31.08.
This year’s winners of the Public Design Commission (formerly the Art Commission) awards are: streetscape improvements, including an installation by Brian Tolle, on Flatbush Avenue from Tillary Street to Lafayette Avenue, Brooklyn; construction of the 121st Police Precinct on Staten Island by Rafael Viñoly Architects; signage as part of the rehabilitation of Flatbush Caton Market by Alexandra Ching and David Akey, NYC Department of Design and Construction; “Wall Drawing #1252: Scribbles (Pier 88)” by Sol LeWitt; Children’s Library Center, Queens Central Library, by 1100: Architect; Bronx River House and adjacent site work, by Kiss + Cathcart; and a Special Recognition Award for Expansion of the Hospital for Special Surgery, by Smith-Miller + Hawkinson Architects, Cannon Design, Ysrael A. Seinuk, and R.A. Heintges & Associates…
The Illuminating Engineering Society of New York (IESNY) 2008 Lumen Award winners include, in the following categories: Citation for Exterior Lighting of Historic Façade — Alexander Hamilton U.S. Custom House, RS Lighting Design; Citation for Integration of New Technology into a Historic Restoration — The Fragonard at the Frick Collection, Renfro Design Group; Citation for Increasing Public Awareness of LEDs — Times Square Ball, Focus Lighting… Awards of Merit — Art Cave, Renfro Design Group; Brooklyn Central Library, Arup Lighting; HBO Shop, HDLC Architectural Lighting Design; Nelsons-Atkins Museum of Art — Interior, Renfro Design Group; The New Museum for Contemporary Art, Tillotson Design Associates; Awards of Merit — Energy and Environmental Design — New York Times HQ, SBLDstudio; Miyake Madison, Lightfield; United States Air Force Memorial, Office for Visual Interaction… Awards of Excellence — Nelsons-Atkins Museum of Art — Outdoor, Renfro Design Group; School of American Ballet at Lincoln Center, Tillotson Design Associates; The Renee and Henry Segerstrom Concert Hall, Cline Bettridge Bernstein Lighting Design…
The New York Area Chapter of the Society for Marketing Professional Services (SMPS-NY) has announced a new vice-president elect, Patricia Neumann, CPSM; treasurer, Julie Pampuch; secretary, Susan Steinberg, and three directors, Maria Miranda, David Grant, and Stephanie Lin, to the board for the 2008-2009 term,…In addition, President-Elect Lauren Hlavenka, Assoc. AIA, will assume the presidency on 09.01.08, when the new term begins…
Juliet Kinchin has joined MoMA as Curator in the Department of Architecture and Design… Ray Gastil, the director of the New York City Department of City Planning’s Manhattan office, is leaving to become Seattle’s Planning Director…
Chris Reynolds, AIA, has been promoted to principal at Cooper Carry… The New York Office of M Moser Associates is moving to 490 Broadway in Soho… WSP Flack + Kurtz is the new name of the global mechanical and electrical engineering firm…
07.30.08: Designing the High Line: Gansevoort to 30th Street book launch party under the High Line.
AIANY Executive Director Rick Bell, FAIA, (left) with Robert Hammond, co-founder, Friends of the High Line, under the High Line.
Kristen Richards
07.24.08: Openhouse newyork hosted a summer soiree. Curators at Creative Time provided a tour of “Playing the Building” by David Byrne in the Battery Maritime Building.
Scott Lauer, openhousenewyork founder (left) and Mark Beasley, curator and producer at Creative Time, play the building.
Hae-In Kim
Oculus 2008 Editorial Calendar
If you are an architect by training or see yourself as an astute observer of New York’s architectural and planning scene, note that OCULUS editors are looking for writers for the Winter issue. The theme:
Competing for Space. Explore the growing competition between expansionist institutions on limited sites and the interests of adjacent communities, many in residential areas with moderate-income families.
If you’re interested, please contact OCULUS editor-in-chief Kristen Richards. with a brief outline and full contact information.
08.01.08 Winter 2008-09: Competing for Space
08.08.08 Call for Entries: Park(ing) Day
On Park(ing) Day — launching on 09.19.08 — people will reclaim parking spots for a single day, transforming them into vibrant, functional, public spaces. The NYC Streets Renaissance in partnership with the Trust for Public Land will reserve 50 spots this year, and they are seeking architects, landscape architects, designers, and artists to help bring inventive installations to the streets by building collaborative Park(ing) Spots. Projects will be a partnership between the designer/firm and an NYC community group; they should reflect the social, cultural, and aesthetic context of the community in which they are built.
09.05.08 Call for Entries: Social Habitat and Development Competition
The Colegio de Arquitectos of Ecuador invites architectural design professionals to participate in this international competition as part of the XVI Quito Pan-American Architecture Biennale to be held 11.17-21.08. All participating projects will be published in the Biennale catalogue. The BAQ/2008, in partnership with the Department of Housing Development and Management of the University of Lund, Sweden, and under the Program PROMESHA created the award to acknowledge efforts to improve the lives of the most vulnerable urban populations within a sustainable framework, and to provide better living standards and an improved quality of life.
09.15.08 Call for Nominations: Richard H. Driehaus Prize
The $200,000 prize, administered through the University of Notre Dame School of Architecture, is awarded annually to an outstanding architect or firm whose work applies the principles of Classicism, with respect to sustainability, in the built and natural environment. Practicing architects, firms and their representatives, as well as industry leaders, architectural students, and classical enthusiasts are encouraged to submit nominations for consideration for the 2009 laureate.
09.15.08 Call for Entries: From the Ground Up: Innovative Green Homes
This competition seeks to provide a new model for formerly vital, urban residential neighborhoods through the creation of sustainable, affordable housing. Selected teams will work on infill sites, proposing designs for a 1,100- to 1,500-square-foot, single-family home to be built in the Near Westside neighborhood of Syracuse, NY. The goal of the competition is to create innovative designs for cost-efficient, green prototypes sensitive to the scale and composition of the existing conditions, while providing a new vision that is legible to a wide array of existing and potential residents.
09.19.08 Call for Submissions: P/A Awards
The P/A Awards recognize unbuilt projects demonstrating overall design excellence and innovation. Architects and other design professionals practicing in the U.S., Canada, or Mexico may enter one or more submissions. Proposals may be for any location, but work must have been directed and substantially executed in offices in any of the three countries. All entries must be commissioned by paying clients for execution. Winners will be honored at a celebration in NY in January 2009, and published in the January 2009 issue of ARCHITECT.
09.19.08 Call for Architects: Smithsonian Institution African American Museum Design
The Smithsonian Institution is calling for initial ideas to build the newest museum on the National Mall, which will be dedicated to black history. The National Museum of African American History and Culture is scheduled to open in 2015 and officials hope to name an architectural team by spring 2009. Submissions will be narrowed down to between three and seven firms for a design competition. Congress has pledged to provide half of the museum’s $500 million cost, with private fundraising to cover the balance. The Smithsonian is encouraging minority architects to participate, but teams submitting proposals are not required to include minorities.
10.01.08 Call for Entries: Make Some Green Competition
Keeseh Studio invites students and design enthusiasts to pursue ecodesign that utilizes waste material. The goal is to promote “upcycling,” or the use of waste material as raw material for other products or processes, by generating innovative designs and redefining the standards of environmental sustainability. Three entries will win media coverage of their product or process and one will win a cash prize of $1,000.
10.15.08 Call for Entries: 2008 Beyond Green High-Performance Building Awards
The Sustainable Buildings Industry Council SBIC will recognize initiatives that shape, inform, and catalyze the high-performance building market, as well as the real-world application of high-performance design and construction practices. Award winners will present their projects in January 2009 in Washington D.C., in conjunction with an awards reception. Winning projects will also receive a plaque, be published on the Whole Building Design Guide website, in SBIC’s newsletter, and included in SBIC technical guidelines and publications.
Center for Architecture Gallery Hours
Monday-Friday: 9:00am-8:00pm, Saturday: 11:00am-5:00pm, Sunday: CLOSED
Join an Architalker for a Hosted Tour of Center for Architecture
Exhibitions
Join us for free Architalker-hosted tours of the Center for Architecture exhibitions Fridays at 4:00pm. To join one of these tours, meet in the Public Resource Area on the ground floor of the Center for Architecture.
CURRENT EXHIBITIONS
July 17 — September 27, 2008
South Street Seaport - Re-envisioning the Urban Edge
The Emerging New York Architects Committee (ENYA) presents the Third Biennial Ideas Competition, South Street Seaport | Re-envisioning the Urban Edge. This competition encouraged participants to envision new connections, both material and metaphoric, between this richly historic neighborhood and Manhattan’s contemporary urban fabric.
South Street Seaport | Re-envisioning the Urban Edge provided an opportunity, uncommon for students and young professionals in the field of design and architecture, to engage the ongoing evolution of the South Street Seaport. More than 200 participants entered the competition, representing a broad spectrum of domestic and international architects, landscape architects, urban designers, and graphic artists. From over 100 entries, a jury selected four top prizes, five honorable mentions, and additional Jury Selections, all of which are presented in this exhibition.
ENYA partnered with the Seamen’s Church Institute (SCI), whose headquarters have been in the neighborhood since 1832. The principal element of the program is a community center for local residents and gallery space to house the SCI’s collection of maritime art and artifacts. In addition, competitors were encouraged to make community-building interventions in open spaces throughout the site in order to preserve the neighborhood’s intriguing history, while re-imagining its future edge condition on the downtown New York waterfront.
Exhibition organized by the AIA New York Chapter and Center for Architecture Foundation in collaboration with the Emerging New York Architects Committee (ENYA)
Exhibition organized by the AIA New York Chapter and Center for Architecture Foundation in collaboration with the Emerging New York Architects Committee (ENYA)
ENYA Co-Chairs:
Megan Chusid, Assoc. AIA
Harry Gaveras, AIA
Exhibition and Competition Developers:
Anne Leonhardt, Assoc. AIA
Heather Mangrum
Joel Melton, Assoc. AIA
Sean Rasmussen, Assoc. AIA
Exhibition Design:
Steven Mosier
South Street Seaport: Re-Envisioning the Urban Edge
Emerging New York Architects (ENYA)
Underwriter: F.J. Sciame Construction
Sponsor: Gensler; Propylaea Architecture; Richter+Ratner
Friends:
Service Point USA and A. Estéban & Company
Food Sponsor: Acqua Restaurant
Beverage Sponsor: Barefoot Wine and Brooklyn Brewery
June 23 — September 14, 2008
Buckminster Fuller Dymaxion Study Center
Galleries: Libary
The Dymaxion Study Center will display over four hundred volumes of books by and about visionary inventor and theorist, Buckminster Fuller, whose work has influenced generations of architects and environmentalists. These volumes will include the complete and extremely rare set of Buckminster Fuller’s Synergetics Dictionary edited by Ed Applewhite, as well as other well-known works by Fuller, such as Synergetics and Nine Chains to the Moon. The Study Center will include selections from Fuller’s “live book squad” of influential texts and a Dymaxion timeline, outlining the evolution of Fuller’s geodesic designs in the context of their co-evolution with the Dymaxion map, organized in collaboration with Bonnie DeVarco, former Fuller Archivist and Shoji Sadao, President of Fuller and Sadao PC.
On Monday, June 23rd, 2008, the Center for Architecture will also unveil the Buckminster Fuller’s Fly’s Eye Dome, courtesy of the Buckminster Fuller Institute and Max Protetch Gallery, New York, in conjunction with NYC Department of Transportation’s Temporary Art Program and Friends of LaGuardia Place. The dome will be temporarily displayed at LaGuardia Park between Bleecker and West 3rd Streets. Its presence will draw attention to the imminent re-design of the park by landscape architect, Adrian Smith, ASLA, working with students and Friends of LaGuardia Place.
“The Fly’s Eye domes are designed as components of a ’livingry’ service. The basic hardware components will produce a beautiful, fully equipped, air-deliverable house that weighs and costs about as much as a good automobile. Not only will it be highly efficient in its use of energy and materials, it also will be capable of harvesting incoming light and wind energies.” - Buckminster Fuller, Critical Path, 1983.
The Center for Architecture’s Dymaxion Study Center will offer audiences an in-depth view of Buckminster Fuller, his influences, his words, and works.
Organized by: AIA New York Chapter and the Center for
Architecture Foundation in association with the Buckminster Fuller Institute
Exhibition and Graphic Design: Project Projects
Underwriters: NYC Department of Transportation’s Temporary Art
Program
Friends of LaGuardia Place, Center for Architecture
Foundation
Lead Sponsors: Spring Scaffolding
Sponsor: Richter+Ratner
Supporters: New York University; Purchase College, State University of
New York
Media Sponsor: Metropolis Magazine
May 22 — September 6, 2008
Ecotones: mitigating NYC’s contentious sites
Galleries: Margaret Helfand Gallery, Gerald D Hines Gallery, Public Resource Center
Given the global and local challenges of climate change, the Landscape Architecture profession is at the forefront of New York City’s sustainability efforts. Collaborating with governments, regulatory agencies, community groups, and design professionals, Landscape Architects are transforming ecological problems into opportunities for habitation and recreation. With Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s sustainability plan, plaNYC, in place, the challenge is to understand the interconnectedness of the City’s green spaces.
Ecotones are transition zones between adjacent ecosystems. In urban environments they emerge as contentious sites located between disparate or opposing forces: where industry meets the river; where community and industrial uses collide; where public and private interests merge. These areas are often the unconsidered result of infrastructure improvements and building developments yet have the potential to be cultural and ecological mitigators. The projects in this exhibition show us how sustainable practices, specifically, the collecting, cleansing, and reclaiming of water, can be used to mediate conflicting circumstances, integrating technical solutions with the social and cultural considerations that make for vibrant urban spaces.
Organized by the AIA New York Chapter and the Center for Architecture Foundation in collaboration with the American Society of Landscape Architects New York Chapter
Curator: Tricia Martin
Exhibition Design: Moorhead & Moorhead
Graphic Design: PS New York
Patron: Alcan Composites USA
Sponsor
H.I. Interior Corp
Duggal Visual Solutions
Supporters: Delta Fountains; H.M. White Site Architects; Landscape Forms; Langan Engineering and Environmental Services; Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates, Landscape Architects
Friends: EDAW; Lee Weintraub Landscape Architecture; Mathews Nielsen Landscape Architects; Sawyer/Berson, Architecture and Landscape Architecture
June 13 — August 23, 2008
Building Connections: 12th Annual Exhibition of K-12 Design Work
Join us in celebrating our young designers! This annual exhibition of K-12 explorations into the built environment showcases models and drawings from Learning By Design:NY, our school based residency program, as well as work from our youth programs at the Center for Architecture.
Exhibition Design: Arquitectonica
Exhibition Graphics: Casey Maher
Exhibition organized by the Center for Architecture Foundation and the AIA New York.
Building Connections was made possible with generous support from the following organizations:
Sponsor: Kramer Levin Naftalis & Frankel; Robert A. M. Stern Architects
Supporters: Ingram, Yuzek, Gainen, Carroll & Bertolotti; Robert Silman Associates
Friends: Archetype Associates; Baldinger; Bentley Prince Street; Cline Bettridge Bernstein Lighting Design; Fisher Marantz Stone; InterfaceFLOR; Langan Engineering and Environmental Services; Murray Engineering; Petty Burton Associates; Pustorino, Puglisi & Co.; RMJM Hillier; Tamarkin Architecture; Weidlinger Associates; Linda Yowell, FAIA
Spend the Summer@theCenter!
For more information go to www.cfafoundation.org, or contact 212.358.6133 or info@cfafoundation.org
Explore Governor’s Island, Saturday, August 9, Meet at 9:45am at the Ferry Building
“The Adventures of La Coronita,” 2008, video still, Mike Estabrook (left); “Pimp My Piragua,” 2008, pushcart prototype (Puerto Rico Schwinn Club at left), installation with color video with sound (right).
Queens Museum of Art
Through 10.16.08
Corona Plaza: Center of Everywhere v.2
The Queens Museum of Art has commissioned four temporary, site-specific artworks in Corona Plaza (103rd Street and Roosevelt Avenue). These artworks are part of a larger Heart of Corona initiative in which the museum and community partners work together to improve the health of residents, beautify the neighborhood, and activate public spaces. The artists — Mike Estabrook, Lin + Lam, Miguel Luciano, and vydavy sindikat — developed projects specific to the plaza’s conditions and engage the public to highlight urban mythologies, visual perception, and everyday artistry.
Queens Museum of Art
New York City Building, Flushing Meadows Corona Park, Queens
Practice of Encroachment.
Courtesy parkfoundation.org
Through 10.25.08
Practice of Encroachment: From the Global Border to the Border Neighborhood
The PARC Foundation presents an exhibition of projects by Estudio Teddy Cruz. His research-based architectural studio, located at the San Diego-Tijuana border, uses neighborhoods as sites of experimentation to research new forms of affordable housing and social density. The projects on view include conceptual works presented through videos, photographs, drawings, models, and cartographies.
The PARC Foundation
29 Bleecker Street, NYC
“Palmtree Island” (Oasis), project, NY, NY 1971, by Haus-Rucker-Co (Laurids Ortner, Manfred Ortner, Günther Zamp Kelp, and Klaus Pinter). Cut-and-pasted printed paper with gouache and graphite and cut-and-pasted painted paper on silver gelatin photograph on board.
Wendy Evans Joseph Purchase Fund, courtesy MoMA
Through 10.27.08
Dreamland: Architectural Experiments since the 1970s
Works drawn from MoMA’s architecture and design collection explore ways that NY’s landscape has inspired architects with visions of utopia since the 1970s. Rem Koolhaas’s book Delirious New York (1978) and several drawings made for the book, including the recently acquired watercolor “Plan of Dreamland” (1977), are the exhibition’s departure point. Other recent acquisitions include works by Diller + Scofidio and Simon Ungers. The centerpiece of the gallery is a display of architectural models organized as a kind of fantasy city juxtaposing unbuilt visionary projects and realized buildings; architectural drawings complement and supplement the dreamscape of models.
Museum of Modern Art
11 West 53rd Street, NYC
eCalendar includes an interactive listing of architectural events around NYC. Click the link to go to to eCalendar on the Web.
The Public Information Exchange (PIE) is an AIANY initiative designed to create an archive of NYC projects, proposals, programs, and exhibitions presented or discussed at the Center for Architecture. It is a forum for public discussion, both general and professional, that includes continuous commentary from users and participants. Click the link to take part.
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Looking for help? See resumes posted on the AIA New York Chapter website.
Junior Architect:
Our 25 person, design-focused New York architecture firm does a range of residential, commercial and institutional work. We are looking for individuals with exceptional design skills, Masters Degree in Architecture and 1-2 years office experience. Please e-mail jmurphy@mbbarch.com
Architect
Saratoga Associates, an award winning design and planning firm, seeks Architect for our NYC studio. Applicants needs Architectural degree, minimum 3 years experience, rendering and drafting ability using AutoCAD, and Photoshop, Adobe Creative Suite, 3d Studio Max and MS Office proficiency. Revit experience and LEED accreditation a plus.
Please e-mail resume and portfolio samples to the e-mail below.
Please limit e-mail attachments to 2 MB.
E-mail Ivy Lee at: ilee@saratogaassociates.com
Visit us on our website at: www.saratogaassociates.com
Public Architecture, a national nonprofit organization based in San Francisco, is seeking a program manager to join its fulltime staff of four. The program manager oversees all aspects of Public Architecture’s pro bono design campaign, called “The 1%,” including architecture firm and nonprofit recruitment, project scoping and matching, as well as the development of related resources.
For a position description and application instructions, please visit: http://www.publicarchitecture.org/downloads/ProgramManagerPosition2008.pdf
Senior Architect/Designer
Senior level architect sought by high-end, Manhattan-based residential design firm. Lead our team of designers, design and oversee diverse, innovative, attention-getting projects including lofts, apartments, townhouses. Looking for a key team member interested in high growth potential position. Highly stable, creative, collegial environment. Salary range 90 to 100K with benefits. Must have minimum B.A. in architecture, design management skills, minimum 10 years experience with 7 years of NYC residential design experience, knowledge of NYC codes, AutoCad proficient, Photoshop.
E-mail resume to kathy@moulinassociates.com
Consulting For Architects, Inc. / Architectural Recruiting
We seek talented architects and design professionals at all levels to present to our New York City clients. This is an opportunity to work on a project or permanent basis at a leading NYC firm. BFA, B Interior Design, B Arch or M Arch and CAD skills typically required.
What is the CFA Difference?
In a word, experience.
CFA is owned and operated by experienced design and staffing industry professionals 100% focused on the architecture and building design community.
It’s what we know. It’s all we do.
CFA has a proven track record of successfully placing professionals interested in working on a project or permanent basis at all levels since 1984.
CFA is located at 236 5th Ave., NY, NY 10001. Please email resumes / work samples to recruiters@cons4arch.com or phone (212) 532-4360.
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