FIVEFOOTWAY

UO: A Caution on Hong Kong Envy

FIVEFOOTWAY — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 16:44:37 +0000

Hong Kong. Photo by Flickr user Thomas Birke.

Despite the impulse to marvel at Hong Kong’s sophisticated planning for and investment in infrastructure and urban density, might people there welcome some New York-style urbanism? Norman Oder, author of the watchdog blog Atlantic Yards Report, recaps two conferences that suggest that New York’s mechanisms for community input on development projects, imperfect as they are, may themselves be worthy of a little envy from concerned citizens facing top-down urban planning regimes. -C.S.

via Urban Omnibus

a place in the shade

FIVEFOOTWAY — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 16:41:06 +0000

Architecture is an agent of change, which is why a leader like Mahatma Gandhi is called the architect of the nation, writes Charles Correa in ‘A Place in the Shade: The new landscape & other essays’ (www.landmarkonthenet.com). “Neither the engineer, nor the dentist, nor the historian. But the architect, i.e., the generalist who speculates on how the pieces could fit together in more advantageous ways. One who is concerned with what might be.” And to do this, in the context of the Third World, we must have the courage to face very disturbing issues, he adds.

The author invites architects to offer their ideas and energy to the society and resurrect the ‘shared aesthetic’ that once existed. Tracing the historic precedent to such sharing, he informs that for throughout most of Asia, the architect’s prototype in the past was the mimar or mistri, i.e., an experienced mason/ carpenter who helped with the design and construction of the habitat; even today in the small towns and villages of India, the practice continues.

“Owner and mistri go together to the site, and with a stick scratch out on the earth the outline of the building they wish to construct. There is some argument back and forth about the relative advantages of various window positions, stairways and so forth. But the system works because both builder and user share the same aesthetic – they are both on the same side of the table.” It was exactly this kind of equation that produced the great architecture of the past, from Chartres to the Alhambra to Fatehpur Sikri, reminds Correa.

Imperative read on a contemplative afternoon.

via The Hindu

Advertisements for architecture

Adib — Mon, 30 Aug 2010 13:59:17 +0000

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What would an advertisement for architecture look like?

OpenHAUS Architecture and DARCH invites design/architecture professionals and students to create an ‘Advertisement for Architecture’. The most outstanding of these entries will be exhibited at the award winning Surry Hills Library and Community Centre, Sydney, Australia from 20 October until 07 November 2010.

Entry + Registration Deadline: 20 September 2010
For more information visit http://openhaus.org/exhibitions/aa2010/
View entries from last year’s edition here

The most exciting street on Street View

Adib — Sun, 29 Aug 2010 05:41:37 +0000

Most of us have used Google’s Street View on Google Maps before- the feature that allows us to virtually navigate the streets of the world via our computer screens. To make this happen, Google sends off cameras fixed onto roving vehicles to document each street around the world and then digitally piece these images together to re-construct the built environment.

What if, the view of the street life that Google captures were constructed as an artwork? This is what the “Street with a view” project attempted to do. Through assembling a cast of characters, a pseudo-street life was created on Sampsonia Way, Pittsburgh and has since been immortalized in the Google servers. Watch the video and head on over to the project’s website and be amazed at ‘the most exciting street in the world’.

via GOOD

West Kowloon Cultural District- Masterplans

Adib — Sun, 22 Aug 2010 06:01:09 +0000

The West Kowloon Cultural District Authority has unveiled three Conceptual Plan Options for the West Kowloon Cultural District (“WKCD”).The three Conceptual Plans revealed were:

Project for a New Dimension – prepared by Office for Metropolitan Architecture, led by Mr Rem Koolhaas.
City Park – prepared by Foster + Partners, led by Lord Norman Foster.
Cultural Connect: Key to Sustained Vitality – prepared by Rocco Design Architects Limited, led by Mr Rocco Yim.

OMA

OMA’s proposal revolves around the concept of creating 3 villages, connected by public spaces, all of which with a strong emphasis on creating vibrant street life and cultural production through which activating the cultural district. The connections with its immediate surrounding is also critical in the proposal with the ambition that this will encourage a vibrant neighborhood.

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Foster + Partners

A massive waterfront city park anchors the project, becoming a venue for outdoor performances and activities while offering views of the harbour and Hong Kong Island. A series of outdoor terraces and promenades will also link the cultural buildings to the waterfront. On top of that, what’s most encouraging of this proposal is the sinking of vehicular routes underground thus restoring the ground plane to bicycles and pedestrians and also its carbon-neutral ambitions.

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ROCCO

With a distinct 3-band urban grid comprising of the Green Terrain, the Cultural core and the City link. Focusing on connections, both physical and visual, the masterplan’s strength lies in its ambition to create multiple activity nodes along the area not only at various key buildings but also the in-between spaces that results.

See all three proposals via the WKCDA website
More at Dezeen

Studio Mumbai builds some Mumbai in London’s V&A

FIVEFOOTWAY — Thu, 19 Aug 2010 11:29:26 +0000

A Mumbai architectural firm impresses a global audience with its poetic interpretation of how an Indian family of eight can live in harmony in a mere corridor of space

it’s a …bus?

FIVEFOOTWAY — Wed, 18 Aug 2010 04:14:12 +0000

China is home to more people than any other country on Earth, and they’re moving into megacities at a rate that’s simply unprecedented. Managing a transport plan for such a colossal number of people presents a traffic congestion and pollution quandary the likes of which we’ve simply never seen before. The Straddling Bus is an amazing public transport solution that drives over the top of the cars on a slightly modified road, able to stop without interrupting the traffic flow and to glide over the top of congestion. This go-go-gadget bus is far quicker and 90 percent cheaper to build than a new subway route, it’s solar/grid electric powered and it’s no pipe dream – construction starts at the end of this year.

via Gizmag

hk, eat your heart out

FIVEFOOTWAY — Wed, 18 Aug 2010 04:01:53 +0000

Hong Kong has always looked down on Guangzhou as its poor mainland cousin. But while the affluent former British colony has stalled for years over plans for a massive cultural district, Guangzhou has gone ahead and built one. Funny that a Hong Kong architect, and a pretty famous British one, are responsible some of the spanking new venues.

more via The New York Times

China’s real estate bubble: bursting?

FIVEFOOTWAY — Wed, 18 Aug 2010 03:43:22 +0000

Bubbles do just that: burst. An apt adjective for China’s building explosion? No pun intended. With the price of copper, aluminium and steel growing steadily while property prices begin to tip over, many wonder if too much has come too soon, even for a country that is 1.3 billion people. And they have good reason to, seeing how the collapse of the Chinese economy could have devastating effects on the world economy. Der Spiegel‘s Wieland Wagner compares today’s Chinese boom to Japan’s building bubble of the 80′s; putting the Japanese in a rut that has lasted in some ways to this day. Others, like the larger-than-life, husband and wife team of Zhang Xin and Pan Shiyi of SOHO fame, remain optimistic that the buying of property will continue to sponsor further construction; amidst fears that rising prices could be too expensive for the millions of migrants making the move from rural areas into bigger Chinese cities. But the buildings will continue to rise, with Zhang claiming that the market, which she follows with both ears to the ground, will have the final say.

Der Spiegel Online – China’s Real Estate Bubble Threatens to Burst

Bloomberg -Beijing Billionaire Who Grew Up With Mao Sees No Housing Bubble

eVolo 2011 Skyscraper Competition

FIVEFOOTWAY — Wed, 18 Aug 2010 01:29:26 +0000

eVolo is pleased to invite students, architects, engineers, and designers from around the globe to take part in the 2011 Skyscraper Competition.

The annual eVolo Skyscraper Competition is a forum for the discussion, development, and promotion of innovative concepts for vertical density. It examines the relationship between the skyscraper and the natural world, the skyscraper and the community, and the skyscraper and the city.

The exponential increase of the world’s population and its unprecedented shift from rural to urban areas has prompted hundreds of new developments without adequate urban planning and poor architectural design. The aim of this competition is to redefine what we understand as a skyscraper and initiate a new architectural discourse of economic, environmental, intellectual, and perceptual responsibility that could ultimately modify our cities and improve our way of life.

The use of new materials, technologies, aesthetics, and novel spatial organizations, along with studies on globalization, flexibility, adaptability, and the digital revolution are some of the multi-layered elements that the participants should take into consideration. This is also an investigation on the public and private space and the role of the individual and the collective in the creation of a dynamic and adaptive vertical community.

There are no restrictions in regards to site, program or size. The objective is to provide maximum freedom to the participants to engage the project without constraints in the most creative way. What is a skyscraper in the 21^st century? What are the historical, contextual, social, urban, and environmental responsibilities of these mega-structures?

www.evolo.us

Details after the jump:

Registration

Students, architects, engineers, and designers are invited to participate in the competition. We encourage you to have multidisciplinary teams.

Participants must register by January 11, 2011.
Early Registration: US $65 until November 16, 2010
Late Registration: US $85 from November 17, 2010 to January 11, 2011
One registration = One project.
Participants may submit various projects, but must register each entry.
There is no limit as to the number of participants per team. Individual entries are accepted.
After your registration has been approved eVolo will send the registration number which will be necessary for submission boards.

Schedule

July 19, 2010 – Competition announcement, registration begins, acceptance of questions
November 8, 2010 – Deadline for submitting questions
November 16, 2010 – Early registration deadline
November 30, 2010 – Answers to questions posted on website
January 11, 2011 – Late registration deadline
January 18, 2011 – Project submission deadline
February 28, 2011 – Winners’ announcement

Submission Requirements

This is a digital competition and no hardcopies are necessary. Entrants must submit their proposal via email no later than January 18, 2011 (23:00 hours US Eastern Time) to the following email address: skyscraper2011@evolo.us

The project submission must contain the following files:

Two boards with the project information including plans, sections, and perspectives. Participants are encouraged to submit all the information they consider necessary to explain their proposal. These boards should be 24? X 48? in HORIZONTAL format. The resolution of the boards must be 150 dpi, RGB mode and saved as JPG files. The upper right corner of each board must contain the participation number. There should not be any marks or any other form of identification. The files must be named after the registration number followed by the board number. For example: 0101-1.jpg and 0101-2.jpg.
A DOC file containing the project statement (600 words max). This file must be named after the registration number followed by the word “statement”. For example: 0101-statement.doc.
A DOC file containing the entrants’ personal information, including name, profession, address, and email. This file must be named after the registration number followed by the word “info”. For example: 0101-info.doc.
All the files must be placed in a ZIP folder named after your registration number. For example: 0101.zip

Jury

Benjamin Aranda [principal Aranda¥Lasch]
Juan Azulay [principal Matter Management, professor at Southern California Institute of Architecture]
Mario Cipresso [principal Studio Shift, professor at University of Southern California]
Ted Givens [associate director RMJM]
Eric Goldemberg [principal Monad Studio, professor at University of Miami]
Jose Gonzalez [principal Softlab, professor at Pratt Institute]
John Hill [editor Archidose]
Mitchell Joachim [principal Terreform One, professor at New York University]
Andrew Liang [principal Studio 0.10., professor at University of Southern California]
Chris Lasch [principal Aranda¥Lasch]
Neri Oxman [principal Materialecology, Presidential Fellow at MIT Media Lab]
Javier Quintana [principal Taller Basico de Arquitectura, Dean of IE School of Architecture]
Rezza Rahdian [Architect, Second Place 2009 Skyscraper Competition]
Michel Rojkind [principal Rojkind Arquitectos]
Michael Szivos [principal Softlab, professor at Pratt Institute]

Regulations

This is an anonymous competition and the registration number is the only means of identification.
The official language of the competition is English.
The registration fee is non-refundable.
Contacting the Jury is prohibited.
Entrants will be disqualified if any of the competition rules are not considered.
Participation assumes acceptance of the regulations.

Awards

1st place – US $5000
2nd place – US $2000
3rd place – US $1000