A Weekly Dose of Architecture Books

Here are some photos of Quinta de Lemos in Viseu, Portugal, by Carvalho Araújo 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

[All photos courtesy of deMx architecture's Facebook page , unless noted otherwise] I just learned about SUMO (Sustainabile Urban MObility), an "electric, mechanized mobility service [that] is the Western Hemisphere's first car sharing service based on street-legal, low-speed electric vehicles (LEVs), thus one of the greenest forms of motorized mobility in the world," per their website . Appropriately, their new headquarters is located in a shipping container stuffed into the porte cochère of an old building in Fayetteville, Arkansas. Specifically, the SUMO headquarters is located at West and Lafayette streets: [Image courtesy of Google Maps] Here is a photo of the building before it received the shipping container: The project was designed by SUMO founders Bob Munger and Mikel Lolley with the assistance of Fayetteville's deMx architecture , which posted these photos to their Facebook page . It's one of the more creative uses of shipping contain...

OfficeUS Atlas edited by Eva Franch i Gilabert, Ana Miljački, Ashley Schafer and Michael Kubo, published by Storefront for Art and Architecture/ Lars Müller Publishers , 2015. Hardcover, 1,250 pages. ( Amazon ) The 2014 Venice Architecture Biennale was one of the most anticipated since it started in the 1970s. Rem Koolhaas served as director and he aimed to unify the various national pavilions under one theme: "Absorbing Modernity 1914-2014." In most years the national pavilions do their own thing, often exhibiting the work of native architects; that is already the case with 2016 for the United States, which decided to focus on Detroit even before Alejandro Aravena was named director. But Koolhaas demanded more time and got it so he could leverage a bit more control and make the Biennale a bit more unified. For the most part it worked, with for the most part each country covering 100 years of architectural production. For the U.S. Pavilion, curated by Eva Franch i Gila...

Here are some of my photos of Alloy Development 's DUMBO Townhouses (2015) in Brooklyn, New York. 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

A couple years ago I featured some of the illustrations created by André Chiote , an architect who also dabbles in creating "a set of images in which the aim is to simultaneously outline the emblematic and distinctive side of the building while creating a graphic composition whose expression could speak out beyond the building itself." Earlier today he sent me some illustrations of the work of Brazilian architect João Batista Vilanova Artigas, who would have been 100 years old in June. His most well known work is the FAU Center at University São Paulo, a large concrete building with a skylit gathering space at its center. Other notable buildings include the Jaú Bus Terminal: And the Louveira Residential Complex: See more of André Chiote's illustrations on his website and Facebook page .

Here are some photos of the Investcorp Building (2015) at St Anthony's College, Oxford, by Zaha Hadid Architects , photographed by Iqbal Aalam . 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

This one is hard to resist: the 538th issue of a+u is devoted to Louis I. Kahn's Kimbell Art Museum, presenting drawings as well as some photographs and essays by Lawrence Speck and Carlos Jimenez.

World Atlas of Sustainable Architecture: Building for a Changing Culture and Climate by Ulrich Pfammatter, published by  DOM Publishers , 2014. Hardcover, 584 pages. ( Amazon ) The back cover of this hefty book purports a total of 333 projects in its nearly 600 pages. With so many projects, the question in any book is how to structure them. The words "world atlas" in the title, as well as the weather map image on the cover, point to a geographical structure, but that is not the case. Instead the projects are arranged thematically in a complex, nested array of sections, chapters, subchapters and sub-subchapters. It's a very logical structure that responds to, if anything, how architects work on projects, particularly in regard to site planning and other "big picture" areas. Nevertheless it's a bit unwieldy at times, such that sometimes the structure seems to overwhelm or take priority over the content. Let's look at one portion from Sectio...

On the occasion of being named the director of the 2016 Venice Architecture Biennale , here are some photos of buildings by Alejandro Aravena/Elemental culled from the archidose Flickr pool . The Biennale will run from May 28 to November 27, 2016. UC Innovation Center - Anacleto Angelini : Siamese Tower : 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