GSD News Archive: January 2009
Rem Koolhaas’ OMA wins Taipei arts centre contest >> OMA has won an international competition to design a performing arts centre in Taipei, Taiwan. The 40,000sq m complex will include a 1,500-seat theatre and two 800-seat theatres, which will plug into a central cube clad in corrugated glass. Each theatre can be used independently or in combination with the others. [BD: The Architects’ Website; January 28, 2009] |
Lluis Ortega among 100 select architects proposing projects in Ordos, ChinaA proposal for the ORDOS project in China, designed by Assistant Professor of Architecture Lluis Ortega’s firm, f451, has been featured among others in the January 2009 issue of Perspective Plus . The ORDOS Project involves 100 architects who are each building a 1,000-square-meter villa in the desert of Inner Mongolia. The architects were recommended by architects Herzog and de Meuron, Arthur Rotch Design Critics in Architecture at the GSD. The f 451 project is featured on the first page of the complete article >> |
Prof. Peter Rowe interviewed on Chinese City in East Asian Context >> In an interview by Dan Handel, Professor Peter G. Rowe (Harvard University) elaborates on his study of the contemporary city in the Asian context and its position within the global development of ongoing research, understanding, communication and analysis of the metropolitan environments. The interview was recently published by Moving Cities, a Beijing-based think-thank investigating the role that architecture and urbanism play in shaping the contemporary city. |
GSD students apply BMW design to low-cost housing >> By Phil Patton Chris Bangle, director of group design at BMW, spent part of the fall teaching a class at the Harvard University Graduate School of Design. He was invited to teach jointly with Frank Barkow, an architect whose firm Barkow Leibinger is based in Berlin. The pair had developed a course in which students applied the philosophy of BMW’s GINA Light Visionary Model experimental car to low-cost housing. GINA’s body is made of elastic fabric to be lighter, more flexible and more energy efficient to manufacture. The students had to apply similar principles to housing. [New York Times; January 22, 2009] Related: [Architectural Record; March 2009] Interview with BMW’s Chris Bangle and GINA studio student project “Blowing the Roof Off; Bringing Auto Design Techniques to Home Construction |
Dean Mohsen Mostafavi on “starchitects” and the well-designed building >> In an interview for the article “Edifices Complexes: Everything you need to know about hiring a Starchitect,” which appears in the current issue of Power magazine, GSD Dean Mohsen Mostafavi talks about the role of the celebrity architect and the importance of a well-designed building. “Visuals are seductive,” says Mohsen Mostafavi, dean of Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design, who has spent the last several years analyzing the role of the celebrity architect. An attention-getting design, he explains, lends itself to marketing, magazine articles, design competitions and all of the ways that make an architect into a starchitect. It’s a lot harder to market what it’s like to actually use a building, the set of attributes architects call the “program.” “We ask, ‘What about the inside?’ as a way to recapture the primacy of the experiential, situational qualities of a well-designed building” – something Mostafavi feels has gotten lost in all of the hype. [Power (Hong Kong); January 2009] |
Joint Center for Housing Studies Director Nicolas Retsinas named top housing expert >> GSD Joint Center for Housing Studies Director Nicolas P. Retsinas was among thirty leading innovators in the home building industry and associated institutions who were named the nation’s top housing experts over the past thirty years. The Hearthstone Builder Humanitarian Awards program, now in its 10th year, joined with Builder Magazine’s 30th Anniversary celebration to honor the award-winners at a ceremony at the International Builders’ Show. A sizable grant will be donated to The Home Depot Foundation and Global Green USA charities in their honor. Held January 20, 2009 in Las Vegas, the event included prominent members of the construction arena and financial institutions that support the home building industry. Says Builder Magazine, “We selected these thirty individuals based on their important contributions to the home building industry. These visionaries took risks and developed new rules to shape the future of this industry.”
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New Jersey State Senate resolution honors Prof. Richard Forman for conservation achievementsA recent proclamation by the New Jersey State Senate honored Richard Forman, Professor of Advanced Environmental Studies in the Field of Landscape Ecology, for his “meritorious record of service and commitment to influencing conservation policy in the New Jersey Pinelands,” a 100,000-acre, national reserve. The proclamation also recognized his induction into the Pine Barrens Hall of Fame by the New Jersey Pinelands Preservation Alliance for his critical role in advancing research and promoting sound conservation policy Pinelands reserve. Prof. Forman, who spoke at the induction convocation, edited the book Pine Barrens: Ecosystem and Landscape, which has served as one of the major resources for the creation of the Pinelands Comprehensive Management Plan, the nation’s foremost eco-system-based land use planning system. |
AIA New York Chapter recognizes GSD GINA studio option projects >> Futuristic housing concepts incorporate “elastic skin” technology. [eOculus, January 13, 2009] |
U.S. News report names Landscape Architecture one of the top professions for 2009 >> U.S. News includes Landscape Architecture among the best recession-proof professions for 2009. The magazine has plowed through hundreds of careers, looking for the jobs with the best outlook in this recessionary economy (and beyond), the highest rates of job satisfaction, the least difficult training necessary, the most prestige, and the highest pay. These careers have staying power: They’re smart moves now, and they'll be smart moves for years to come. |
Joint Center for Housing Studies reports decline in remodelingIn its January 2009 Leading Indicator of Remodeling Activity (LIRA) report, the Harvard University Joint Center for Housing Studies indicates few signs of relief for the remodeling industry. A collapsing economy combined with further deterioration of the housing market continues to suppress remodeling and points to a homeowner improvement spending decline at an annual rate of 12.1 percent by the third quarter of 2009. “Uncertainty in the housing market continues to stifle spending on homeowner improvements,” notes Nicolas P. Retsinas, director of the Joint Center for Housing Studies. “In light of escalating job losses, consumers are reluctant to undertake major remodeling projects.” The market has seen steady declines since the middle of 2007, although recently the rate of decline has flattened. “While we may be nearing the bottom of the remodeling cycle, there is little to push spending back into a growth phase until the economy recovers,” explains Kermit Baker, director of the Remodeling Futures Program of the Joint Center. The LIRA measures and projects only a portion of the U.S. home improvement market, namely spending by homeowners on property improvements. Other components of the broader market—spending by homeowners on maintenance and repairs, and spending on improvements, and maintenance and repairs for rental and vacation property—are not included in the LIRA figures. |
