A Weekly Dose of Architecture Books

[All images (c) Ann Beha Architects / Gensler] Boston's Ann Beha is an architect versed in historic restoration and contemporary architecture, a rare breed. Many people see these as polar concerns without common ground, but Beha's work acknowledges old buildings without letting them determine a recipe for new additions. Or to put it another way, she neither mimics nor overpowers existing buildings, instead finding qualities that should be extended in a new intervention, such as scale, texture, and materiality. The New England Conservatory 's first building in over 60 years is a good example of her contemporary contextualism. Per the architect's statement, the New England Conservatory "occupies 2.5 acres and offers undergraduate and graduate degree programs, a continuing education program, and a preparatory program for students ages 3-18." Beha is no stranger to the music institution, having restored Jordan Hall , the core of the campus in Boston...

I must admit I was baffled upon seeing this ad for Zurich Service Corporation on the back page of The Atlantic . After all, Madison Square Garden is the increasingly unloved replacement for the much loved (often nostalgically) Penn Station, which was demolished in the mid-1960s to make way for the circular sports arena. Recently even, New York Times critic Michael Kimmelman has called for moving the Garden , saying that the "present arena is a flimsy, aging eyesore." For his predecessor, Nicolai Ouroussoff, it was tops on a 2008 list of candidates for demolition in which he called the Garden "cramped and decrepit." Most people hate the Garden for what it did to the remains of Penn Station underneath it -- "one of the city’s most dehumanizing spaces: a warren of cramped corridors and waiting areas buried under the monstrous drum of the Garden", again Ouroussoff. The Garden may be an eyesore, but remove if from atop one of the busiest transit hubs ...

As promised last week , here are more photos (39, to be exact) from my tour of Via Verde in the Bronx.

Back in April I posted about James Turrell's Skyspace at Rice University , which is officially described as a flat-topped, 72-foot-square pyramid housing a seating area for viewers. The Skyspace opened on June 14, and Rice has posted a video with commentary from some of the people involved (unfortunately not Turrell) and some students impressions of the new addition to the campus's public art. (Video via Rice University News and Media )

a+t 38: Strategies and Tactics in Public Space edited by Aurora Fernández Per and Javier Mozas, published by  a+t , 2012. Paperback, 176 pages. ( Amazon ) The third installment in a+t 's Strategy series takes aim at an increasingly popular subset of architectural design: tactical urbanism, D.I.Y. urbanism, provisional urbanism, whatever one wants to call it. As I also mention in this week's dose , a trio of actions in Brussel's Red Light District by Alive Architecture, it can be defined as the localized, bottom-up approaches and subsequent interventions for small pockets of urban space around the world. Proof of its popularity lies in books like this one, which document and theorize the fairly uneven terrain of tactical urbanism (the preferred term I'll use here). As the name of a+t 38 implies, the issue is split between strategies (space-based landscape urbanism) and tactics (time-based interventions). This split arises from Michel de Certeau...

RE:ACTIONS in Brussels, Belgium by Alive Architecture, 2012 Popular today is a phenomenon that is alternately called tactical urbanism, D.I.Y. urbanism, provisional urbanism, or some other such name describing the localized, bottom-up approaches and subsequent interventions for small pockets of urban space around the world. Proof of its popularity lies in essays, such as Mimi Zeiger's four-part Interventionist's Toolkit at Design Observer; books, like a+t's latest Strategy and Tactics publication reviewed this week; and the United States contribution to the upcoming 2012 Venice Beinnale, titled Spontaneous Interventions . And of course proof lies in the numerous projects sprouting up all over the place, being shared in these and other blogs, publications, and exhibitions. One project recently brought to my attention that fits this mold is Alive Architecture 's RE:ACTIONS for the Red Light District in Brussels. The local practice headed by Petra Pferdme...

Here are some photos of the Schaulager Satellite in Basel, Switzerland by Herzog & de Meuron (2012). The temporary pavilion was built for Art Basel, June 4-17. Photographs are by Trevor Patt . To contribute your Flickr images for consideration, just: :: Join and add photos to the archidose pool , and/or :: Tag your photos archidose

On Tuesday I attended a press tour of the Via Verde development in the Bronx, designed by Grimshaw and Dattner Architects. The project is getting plenty of coverage, and I will feature the building on my weekly page soon, but in the meantime I wanted to post some of my photos showing the building in its physical context, since most of the professional photography on the project (such as this Domus review ) isolates the building from its surroundings. I'll be adding more photos to my flickr set from the visit soon. For reference the building is located at 700 Brook Avenue, just north of the baseball diamond visible in this aerial . [The approach from the south along Bergen Avenue - Street View ] [Looking north from the corner of East 153rd Street and 53rd Avenue - Street View ] [Looking east from East 155th Street and Elton Avenue - Street View ] [Looking south from East 156th Street across the parking lot serving the neighboring NYCHA development - Street View ]

Here are some photos of the Almedina Bookstore at Arrábida Mall in Gaia, Portugal by Manuel and Francisco Aires Mateus (2002). Photographs are by Paulo Tavares Pereira . To contribute your Flickr images for consideration, just: :: Join and add photos to the archidose pool , and/or :: Tag your photos archidose

Think of books with holes cut through the pages -- not children's books, mind you -- and probably nothing comes to mind. But I couldn't help trying to recall other books with holes after seeing Columbia GSAPP's Abstract 2010-11 . While I'm boggled by the potato gracing the cover, it's clear that three differently sized circles are cut through the entire book, cover to cover. [ Abstract 2010-11 | image source ] The first book that came to mind, one I actually used to own, is Chora L Works , which documents Peter Eisenman and Jacques Derrida's competition entry for Parc de la Villette in Paris. Square holes are cut through the book until it's midway point, where full pages create color backdrops for the cutouts. The diagonal grid of red squares are those cutouts. It's a frustrating book, since the cutouts don't relate to the page layout (minus some of the drawings), so words are missing from the already difficult text. No wonder I got rid of i...

Architecture for Humanity's "I Love Architecture" Charity Auction on ebay collects some pretty big names, including Frank Gehry, Steven Holl, Renzo Piano, Richard Meier, Bjarke Ingels, and Daniel Libeskind. Most of the pieces -- 100% of the proceeds benefit Architecture for Humanity -- are reproductions of older sketches and other drawings, though some of the (mainly) architects did special drawings for the occasion. If you're interested in donating money to AFH, and getting a fine artifact in the process, all of the pieces are worth browsing (be sure to scroll past the thumbnails on the main auction page for the full list). Below are close-ups from a few of my favorites from the roughly 70 pieces up for auction from June 19-29. [ Richard Rogers | The Centre Pompidou Signed screenprint on archival paper 24x36 ] [ Olav Lunde Arneberg Astrid Rohde Wang Pick Up Chicks w/ Blocks & Bricks Painting ] [ Eskew+Dumez+Ripple Estuarine Habitats & Fisheries Ce...

Friday, June 22 to Sunday, June 24 is Dwell on Design at the LA Convention Center. One part of the fair is Screenplay , an installation by longtime favorites Oyler Wu Collaborative . While the installation won't be unveiled until Friday at 7pm, below is a preview.

Citizens of No Place: An Architectural Graphic Novel by Jimenez Lai, published by  Princeton Architectural Press , 2012. Paperback, 144 pages. ( Amazon ) Increasingly, buildings are not the sole medium by which architects are defined. Many architects, for various reasons, gravitate toward installations, tactical urbanism, and even words and/or images on paper. The last has helped make Architectural League prize-winner Jimenez Lai a common name in architectural circles, particularly from being published in just about every archizine that hits the street. It's not hard to find the appeal in Lai's archi-comics, which manage to do something most architects fail to accomplish: insert fiction into architecture. I'm drawn to the lines that preface the first chapter, "Conversations with a Developer" in his Citizens of No Place : "Fiction is an impetus to architecture. Imagination is an upstream process toward making the fake become real. The f...

Hansha Reflection House in Nagoya, Japan by Studio SKLIM, 2011 When I visited Tokyo, Japan some years back, in addition to the numerous Tadao Ando-designed buildings and structures by other architects of note, I really wanted to go see Klein Dytham's Under Cover Lab . Tucked away on a side street close to and parallel to Omotasando -- a shopping street home to flagships designed by Herzog & de Meuron, SANAA, Toyo Ito, Kengo Kuma, and Tadao Ando -- is KDa's small cantilevered jewel of a building. It is a design indicative of the creativity required when dealing with the city's expensive real estate and small lots. Under Cover Lab comes to mind when I first saw the Hansha Reflection House in Nagoya, Aichi Prefecture by Singapore's Studio SKLIM . The Nagoya context for the house is not as dense as that of the KDa project; it's more suburban than urban. On a smaller scale, the architects have also created a cantilever, a second floor that reaches t...