A Weekly Dose of Architecture Books

Provocations: The Architecture and Design of Heatherwick Studio Cooper Hewitt June 24, 2015 - January 6, 2016 Thomas Heatherwick: Making by Thomas Heatherwick and Maisie Rowe The Monacelli Press , 2015 (Revised and expanded edition) Paperback, 640 pages ( Amazon ) On June 24 the third leg of the traveling exhibition Provocations: The Architecture and Design of Heatherwick Studio opened at the Cooper Hewitt in New York; the exhibition started at the Nasher Sculpture Center in Dallas last year and stopped off at the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles earlier this year. Coinciding roughly with the exhibition's opening at the Cooper Hewitt is a revised and expanded edition of Thomas Heatherwick: Making , published by Monacelli Press and released on July 7. This review takes a look at both the exhibition and book. First I'll discuss the book, since I reviewed the first edition of the monograph in 2012. If the first Making were released closer in time to my 2011 post on arc...

Here are some photos of Houses Sete Cidades (2015) in São Miguel, Portugal, by Eduardo Souto de Moura and Adriano Pimenta Arquitectos , photographed by José Carlos Melo Dias . To contribute your Flickr images for consideration, just: :: Join and add photos to the  archidose pool To contribute your Instagram images for consideration, just: :: Tag your photos #archidose

30 Years of Emerging Voices: Idea, Form, Resonance by Architectural League of New York, published by  Princeton Architectural Press , 2015. Hardcover, 304 pages. ( Amazon ) There is a certain ebb and flow to architecture, by which I mean the culture at large – practice, publishing, awards, exhibitions, conferences, etc. In one of these areas – awards – each year sees, to name a few, the naming of a Pritzker Prize laureate in early spring, a bevy of AIA awards leading up the annual convention in late spring/early summer, the WAF awards in October, and a cluster of "best-ofs" near the end of the year. About a month before the world is inundated with Pritzker hype the Architectural League of New York announces the winners of its annual Emerging Voices awards, which are given to typically eight architects/firms from Canada, Mexico and the United States. Although Thom Mayne is, I think, the only winner who has gone on to win the Pritzker, the League's award could be cons...

Here are some of my photos of COSMO by Andres Jaque / Office for Political Innovation at MoMA PS1 in Long Island City, Queens. COSMO is on display until September 7, 2015. To contribute your Flickr images for consideration, just: :: Join and add photos to the  archidose pool To contribute your Instagram images for consideration, just: :: Tag your photos #archidose

Here is a miscellaneous smattering of photos posted recently to the archidose Flickr pool . Click on photos for more information, including the photographer. To contribute your Flickr images for consideration, just: :: Join and add photos to the  archidose pool To contribute your Instagram images for consideration, just: :: Tag your photos #archidose

Solid Wood: Case Studies in Mass Timber Architecture, Technology and Design by Joseph Mayo, published by  Routledge , 2015. Paperback, 346 pages. ( Amazon ) Last week I spoke with Joseph Mayo about his new book, putting together a piece over at World-Architects that highlights a few buildings featured as case studies in Mayo's book. An excerpt: While obviously geared toward architects, given the voluminous technical advice in its pages, Solid Wood is hardly an esoteric read. Following an introductory section where Mayo gives a short history of building in wood, speaks about the carbon-sequestering benefits of mass timber construction, details various solid wood materials and concepts, and addresses concerns of building with wood (structure, fire, etc.), he then presents the case studies in eight geographical chapters: England, Norway, Sweden, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, North America, and New Zealand and Australia. For each case study he clearly describes each proj...

For as long as I can recall, the website of Timothy Hursley – architectural photographer extraordinaire – was just a splash page with some photos of the "Broken Silo" near Greensboro, Alabama. But recently Hursley updated his website so it functions as a retrospective of his photography. I spent some time digging through the photos and took screenshots of a few of my favorites and put them into an animated GIF (pardon the GIFfy graininess – the versions on his website look much better): Head to Timothy Hursley's website to see more of his Architecture Retrospective .

Young-Old: Urban Utopias of an Aging Society by Deane Simpson Lars Müller Publishers , 2015 Hardcover, 576 pages My review of Deane Simpson's Young-Old is published in the June 3, 2015, issue of the Architect's Newspaper . Click here or on the image below to read the review in larger PDF format.

Saarinen Houses by Jari Jetsonen and Sirkkaliisa Jetsonen, published by  Princeton Architectural Press , 2014. Hardcover, 224 pages. ( Amazon ) I have never been to Finland, so the only Eliel Saarinen house I've seen in person is his own residence on the campus of the Cranbrook Academy of Art outside Detroit. It was probably fifteen years ago that I saw it, and even though I was more excited by the prospects of the newer campus buildings by Tod Williams and Billie Tsien, Steven Holl, and Rafael Moneo, the tour of the Saarinen House was a highlight of the visit. Though pleasantly integrated into the campus landscape, and with its own garden courtyard, it was on the inside where the house shone. Each room was distinct and designed down to the fraction of an inch, from its scale and proportions, to its windows and furnishings, much of the last built-in. It was clearly a home as work of art, a phrase used by Jari Jetsonen and Sirkkaliisa Jetsonen in the introduction to their...

Here are some photos of Underwood Road (2015) in London by Brady Mallalieu Architects , photographed by Andrew Carr . To contribute your Flickr images for consideration, just: :: Join and add photos to the  archidose pool To contribute your Instagram images for consideration, just: :: Tag your photos #archidose

Earlier today I received a newsletter with updates on the work of Losada Garcia Architects , a firm based in Spain and San Diego, California. One of their projects, La Gota Cultural Center - Tobacco Museum in Cáceres, Spain, was inaugurated on Wednesday . The design of five shifted boxes is a decent one (attributed, by the architects, "to the structure of the tobacco plant based on principles of equality and diversity that are seen in their leaves"), but what draws me to the project is LG's multifaceted documentation of it, which reveals the various media architects use in the design process as well as the numerous steps in a building's construction. There's a LEGO model: An illuminated model (of foam and cork, it appears): A line drawing showing natural ventilation: A full-blown rendering: A construction photo showing the Domino-like concrete columns and slabs: The glass window walls installed and the concrete slabs painted: And the installa...