Foster on Prouvé

There was a time in our evolving society when the making of things was considered not only honourable but was inextricably linked to their aesthetics. Perhaps, in retrospect, that is why we see integrity and consistency in the work of those individuals who were raised in the craft tradition.

Like Mies van der Rohe, whose knowledge of [...]

Biomimcry in Architecture

A few months on from the 10th anniversary in March of the Eden Project, Michael Pawlyn, one of its central architectural actors, has published a book on the ecological philosophy at the heart of the strange and exciting plant-filled biomes.
Biomimicry in Architecture is a primer to an all-encompassing way of approaching building culture. It steps [...]

Keith William Architects: Marlowe Theatre

Christopher Marlowe is arguably Canterbury’s most famous son, the Elizabethan playwright and contemporary of William Shakespeare who was stabbed to death in a bar-room brawl in Deptford, south London, at the age of 29.
The Marlowe Theatre has now switched on the lights and opened its  doors following an extensive redesign, almost an entire rebuild, by Keith Williams [...]

OMA/Progress

One have might forecast that an exhibition surrounding OMA, the world’s most self-critical architecture practice, was never going to just another homogeneous exhibition. Indeed, at the moment of approaching the Barbican’s illusive west entrance – originally conceived as the entrance to the art gallery but never used – there is a sense that any other [...]

Out and Down In Paris

Filmmaker and artist David Lynch has applied his idiosyncratic vision to designing a Paris nightclub, a departure from film-making that’s not as far-fetched as it first appears. Silencio in Paris, which opened in September, is inspired by the identically named Club Silencio, which is a key location in his critically acclaimed film noir from 2001, [...]

Maggie’s Centre Nottingham: CZWG and Paul Smith

CZWG and Paul Smith have completed their Maggie’s centre in Nottingham after an 11th month construction period. Maggie’s Nottingham serves the Mid Trent Cancer Network and is situated next to the Breast Institute at Nottingham City Hospital. The Mid Trent Cancer Network covers the populations of Nottingham, North Nottinghamshire and Lincolnshire – approximately 1.3 million [...]

Going With the Grain

This October, one of the principal buildings of the King’s Cross masterplan opens its doors to 4,500 students. Central St Martins is one of the most famous design schools in the world, with an illustrious alumni including artist Sir Peter Blake, fashion designer Stella McCartney and Pulp vocalist Jarvis Cocker. The school is moving nearly [...]

King’s Cross Reborn

London is an amorphous organism, spreading and shifting over the landscape, expanding and contracting in waves of development; building up a residual history of material and architectural languages, creating districts of prosperity and pockets of desolation. Architects, planners and developers regularly seize upon parcels of land and even whole districts to insert urban models that [...]

The Time Machine

Edgar Martins’ photography takes us to strange locations and makes them stranger still. His latest project, The Time Machine, is the result of  a ‘topographical survey’ of 20 hydro-electric power stations in Portugal. They penetrate a deserted industrial world, as if frozen in time and chanced upon by a future explorer.
In Martins’ photographs, the built [...]

Stanley Tigerman – Ceci n’est pas un Reverie

‘Stanley Tigerman calls himself a “post-Holocaust, post-Vietnam architect”,’ says Emmanuel Petit, Yale professor and friend of the Chicago-based architect. ‘He is sceptical of all optimism.’ In an exhibition at Yale spanning 50 years of Tigerman’s career, Petit has painted him as a realist as well as a dreamer. Paradoxically, Tigerman has remained on the periphery [...]

The Use of Ornament

Ornament vs. Structure! Art vs. Kitsch! Intellectuals vs. Taxi drivers! Tanktops vs. sunrise frocks! These were the vital questions wrestled with at the ICA when they hosted the ‘What is the Use of Ornament in Contemporary Art and Architecture?’ discussion on September 1st.
Artist Grayson Perry, celebrated for his vases and dress-sense, was the first to [...]

10 Years On

Stepping on to the National Memorial at Ground Zero it is hard to feel anything but awestruck by its flatness. The plaza, a plateau 3.2 hectares (8 acres) across downtown Manhattan, is due to open on 11 September to mark the tenth anniversary of the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center towers. It is [...]

Profile: Daniel Libeskind

Since the completion of the Jewish Museum Berlin in 1999, Studio Daniel Libeskind has been globally positioned as the prevalent practice with an intrinsic ability to design in response to history or trauma for a specific need of memorialisation. Libeskind’s ability to recount tales of loss and tragedy through the built environment creates powerful emblems [...]

Lille Star

Sitting at the intersection of high speed rail linking the capital cities of France, Britain and Belgium, Lille is a city of ambition. The growth of Rem Koolhaas’ imposing ‘Euralille’ business district over the last 15 years is a conspicuous reminder of this city’s new found place in Europe and the heady days before the [...]

Comment: Neil Spiller

The received wisdom embodied in Victorian materials and 20th century ways of doing things is tyrannous. Architecture students need to be taught in a different way, to help them free themselves and seize opportunities says Neil Spiller
I have often said ‘it is a good time to be an architect / designer’. The world is [...]

Comment: New York

New York, New York, so good they made it twice. This time, the city is being reinvented as the Big Green Apple, with ‘liveability’ at its core, writes Greg Clark.
For New York City, the challenge to stay ahead and keep its lead in the world league of cities is not solely about regaining its economic [...]

High Line

When the first part of High Line opened in 2009 it was greeted as a triumph of urban salvage. Variously named the hanging gardens of New York, park in the sky and the green ribbon, the story of how the 1.45 miles of decommissioned elevated railway was transformed into a vibrant public park has captivated [...]

Flowing Sculpture

The construction of a new building is a brutal and traumatic act for a city. Even the tiniest of architectural moves requires a readjustment in the delicate balances within this complex organism. ‘The question is does Wakefield want a museum: will the body accept its transplant?’ asks David Chipperfield.
The RIBA Gold Medallist acknowledges that architects [...]

Penguin Beach at ZSL

London Zoo opened for scientific study in 1828 and for public view in 1847. It has since become as much an exhibition of architecture as a collection of animals. The grounds were designed by Decimus Burton, the zoo’s architect from 1826 to 1841, and it now holds an impressive assortment of listed buildings by an [...]

Profile: Thom Mayne

Pritzker-winning polemicist Thom Mayne  is a gifted talker who isn’t easy to stop once he’s started, as the audience at this year’s Royal Academy of Arts annual lecture will no doubt discover. ‘I’m really talking to myself when I give a talk,’ he says. ‘It lets the audience know what’s going on in my brain’. [...]