Monday, Monday

My weekly page update:

Jian Wai SOHO in Beijing, China by Riken Yamamoto.

The updated book feature is Highrise of Homes, by Site.

Some unrelated links for your enjoyment:

Inside City Hall
San Jose's new City Hall by Richard Meier is set to open. See a slide show here of the building and its construction. (Thanks to Kiel for the link)

Redd Omaha
"Reporting and reviewing the good, bad, and ugly" in Omaha, Nebraska.

The Eisenman Principle
Article on ol' Peter in the Cornell Alumni Magazine.

Wish You Were Here

Taken on the bike ride into work today.

Tidbits

Some bits & pieces this fine Friday:

:: Lynn Becker reports on some technical and algae problems at Millennium Park's Crown Fountain.



:: Stage I finalists have been chosen for the Ray and Joan Kroc Corps Community Center. (via Archinect)

:: Miss Representation says Lewis Tsurumaki Lewis' latest interior, Tides, is a good thing.

:: Styrofoam cups never looked so cool.



:: London Architecture Diary, a great idea with an equally great interface.

:: The Guttersniper is ... Jeffrey Kipnis?

Thursday Inspiration

Fire and Police Station in Berlin, Germany by Sauerbruch Hutton. Photograph by Bitter Bredt.

The Herzog & de Meuron Files

Herzog & de Meuron are one of the few popular architects who haven't gotten their act together to create their own homepage, so online searches of their work tends to yield a plethora of sites with a little bit of information, including my own. A little bit here, a little bit there. One site that comes close to being a thorough, though not exhaustive, overview of the Swiss duo is the NAI Web File, a companion to the Winter/Spring 2005 exhibition "Beauty and Waste in the architecture of Herzog & de Meuron".



The "File" provides links to other web pages with information on the firm, a list of relevant books, links for artists they have teamed with, and documentation on nine key projects with appropriate links. While Herzog & De Meuron are blessed with having more than nine notable buildings, the selection - from an early Ricola warehouse to the stadium in Beijing - is varied, indicative of their output. Let's hope the duo decides to unleash their own web presence on the rest of the world someday soon, though for now this File will more than do.

Nolli V2

Good 'ol V&V posts about The Interactive Nolli Map Website, which "Presents the 1748 Nolli map of Rome as a dynamic, interactive, hands-on tool." The influential original illustrates Rome as figure/ground with the buildings darkened and the public spaces (streets, piazza, courtyards, even church interiors) in white. In many ways it's still appealing because it illustrates what many city's sorely miss today: an emphasis on the spaces between buildings, especially shared, public spaces.



The University of Oregon Dept of Architecture's update overlays graphics like the Tiber River, the city gates, and fountains over the map. But most fun is the satellite image that, when toggled on and off, appears to fit with timeless precision over the Nolli image.



Thorough features on the interactive website help explain the natural features, architecture, social factors, and cartography of Nolli and his time.

Monday, Monday

My weekly page update:

The Art Wall in Surry Hills, Australia by Dale Jones-Evans Architects.

The updated book feature is The Long Emergency, by James Howard Kunstler.

Some unrelated links for your enjoyment:

Polar Inertia
Journal of nomadic and popular culture. (via Pruned)

American Mile Markers
3,304 photos by Matthew Frondorf, one for every mile across the US of A. (via Things)

Take two Cloud Gates, call me in the morning
A nice little write-up on yours truly in Flavorpill, a publisher of free cultural emails.

Kinky Friedman
Aka the Kinkster, musician, mystery writer, and the next Governor of the state of Texas.