A Weekly Dose of Architecture Books

A Feeling of History by Peter Zumthor, Mari Lending, published by  Scheidegger & Spiess , 2018. Paperback, 80 pages. ( Amazon ) Swiss architect Peter Zumthor finishes buildings so sporadically that the presence of each in various strands of architectural communication lasts years rather than days or weeks. It was five years, for instance, between two recently completed works: the Steilneset Memorial (2011) and the Allmannajuvet Zinc Mining Museum (2016), both in Norway. When I saw Zumthor speak with Paul Goldberger at the Guggenheim in February 2017, these were the two projects Zumthor focused on. In general, discussions around these and other Zumthor projects unfold over time, unlike projects by prolific firms such as BIG or Kengo Kuma Associates, where lots of attention follows an opening, only to give way quickly to the next project's completion. In turn, Zumthor's slowness invites interviews — but ones that play out over time rather than ones that take place in o...

Here are some photos of  Midtown Center  (2018) in Washington, DC, by  SHoP Architects . (Photographs by  Trevor Patt .) 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

"Book Briefs" are an ongoing series of posts with short first-hand descriptions of some of the numerous books that make their way into my library. These briefs are not full-blown reviews (though some might go on to get that treatment), but they are a way to share more books worthy of attention than find their way into  reviews on this blog .  On Sunday, November 25th, the 2018 Venice Architecture Biennale wraps up its six-month run. Back in June I featured a half-dozen publications , including the main catalog, from my visit to the Biennale when it opened in May. Not all exhibition catalogs were available at the time, so here are a few that followed (with one from the 2016 Biennale): on the Australian, Chinese, Catalan, and Spanish pavilions. Repair: Australian Pavilion, 16th International Architecture Exhibition, La Biennale di Venezia 2018  edited by Mauro Baracco, Louise Wright | Actar | 2018 |  Amazon  /  IndieBound How does one translate a...

Archive and Artifact: The Virtual and the Physical October 23 - December 1, 2018 The Cooper Union, Foundation Building 7 East 7th Street View this post on Instagram A post shared by John Hill (@therealarchidose) on Nov 10, 2018 at 1:03pm PST Archive and Artifact  "celebrates The Irwin S. Chanin School of Architecture's experimental and influential pedagogy by presenting undergraduate Thesis projects completed at the school over the past 50 years." The show, in Cooper Union's Foundation Building, includes some big names (Elizabeth Diller, Daniel Libeskind, Stan Allen) but mostly people who didn't go on to such familiarity. Of course, the show isn't merely a before-they-were-famous peek at the student work of architects; it is an expression of the influence of founding School of Architecture dean John Hejduk (1975-2000) as well as how Anthony Vidler (2001-2013) and Nader Tehrani (2015-present) have ...

The Man in the Glass House: Philip Johnson, Architect of the Modern Century  by Mark Lamster Little Brown, 2018 Hardcover, 528 pages Mark Lamster had me in the Prologue. The Dallas Morning News architecture critic begins his biography of Philip Johnson on the famous architect's death bed. Like his iconic Glass House from 1949, Johnson's life was full of myth, arising from his architecture, his words, and his actions — all of them controversial throughout his many decades. But Lamster opens  The Man in the Glass House  by focusing on Johnson's humanity: his ill health, his difficulty in eating, the list of drugs he took to prolong his life, the tai chi master that came to the house a few days a week. When Johnson dies on the last page of the Prologue, I actually shed a tear; not out of sadness for Johnson's passing, which happened in January 2005 just shy of his 99th birthday, but because of Lamster's sensitive and eloquent portrayal of it. The Prologue's...

Here are some photos of 520 West 28th Street (2017) in New York City by Zaha Hadid Architects . (Photographs by Maciek Lulko .) 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 are some photos of  Muzeum Ognia  (2014) in Żory, Poland, by OVO Grąbczewscy Architekci . (Photographs by  M. M. Czarnecki .) 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