A Weekly Dose of Architecture Books

With the sidebar links of the main page ever growing and growing, it was time to relegate some of them to this "sidebar graveyard." Here you'll find web pages that still exist but that have not been updated in six months or more. More will be added over time, as needed, and pages will be removed from here if and when they disappear completely from the internet. If you administer one of the pages below and feel that the inclusion here is incorrect, that it should be moved back to the sidebar, please leave a comment; please do the same if a web page resumes updates. BLOGS: » adaptivereuse.net » agents of urbanism » Arch | Diaries » ArchiNow » architects who eat their young » ArchitEXploitation » archporn » arktek » Arquitecblog » Beyond Brilliance, Beyond Stupidity » blog like you give a damn » blo(g)oat » Blog on the City » boiteaoutils » bookendless » Built Environment Blog » Candyland » The Center: AIANY Blog » City Bites » The City Desk » Critica...

DBOOK: Density, Data, Diagrams, Dwellings edited by Javier Mozas & Aurora Fernandez Per, published by  a+t architecture publishers , 2007 ( Amazon ) Collections of contemporary architecture tend to ignore the means of their making, even though some are obviously compiled of the architect's own project descriptions and imagery, while others go the extra effort to create original descriptions and use unique illustrations for publicatiton. This impressive compendium of 64 recent multi-family residential projects is the best of both of these methods, and it isn't shy about that fact. At the outset the editors even show the reader a completed form returned by one of the featured architects, addressing the data statistics that shape muc...

Mountain Dwellings in Copenhagen, Denmark by Bjarke Ingels Group Photographs are by Mikael Colville-Andersen . Copenhagen's Bjarke Ingels Group ( BIG ) is a large office with a consistently creative output that questions preconceived notions about architecture. Process yields solutions that only marginally resemble the typologies their buildings fall into. As PLOT , Bjarke Ingels (with Julien De Smedt) created the VM Houses , a self-described improvement over Le Corbusier's Unite d'Habitation that is nothing if not striking, with angular balconies making an aggressive statement in Copenhagen's Ørestad area. The second generation of VM Houses is VM Bjerget , aka Mountain Dwellings, located across the street from its predecessor. Faced with a program of twice as much parking as dwelling units, the architects adopted a strategy of stacking the two functions and terracing b...

The seventh anniversary of the attacks of September 11, 2001 saw the opening of the Pentagon Memorial in Arlington, Virginia, from a competition-winning design by Kaseman Beckman Advanced Strategies . [competition rendering | image source ] The location for the commemoration of the 184 victims of the attack is the actual site of the crash of American Airlines flight 77, on the west side of the five-sided building (the building in the plan below "points" northeasterly). The memorial is reached by foot from either the Metro Station on the building's east side or from a tunnel under I-395, after which one must traverse a large surface parking lot. [location plan | image source ] While the given site for the competition makes the foot approach and ambience of the adjacent traffic less than ideal conditions for a memorial, the specificity was inspiration for the winning team. Julie Beckman and Keith Kaseman's design uses the trajectory of the aircraft as a device for wha...

After the Crash: Architecture in Post-Bubble Japan  by Thomas Daniell, published by  Princeton Architectural Press , 2008. Paperback, 192 pages. ( Amazon ) Architect Thomas Daniell moved to Japan in the early 1990's, as the country's "economy began a leisurely avalanche into now what is known as the Lost Decade." From 1995 (the year of both the Kobe earthquake and the Tokyo gas attack ) to 2005 Daniell worked at FOBA , though in that period he also contributed articles on the architecture of his new home to Archis , L'Architecture d'Aujourd'hui , de Architect , Domus , Mark , and other publications. This decade coincides with the country's "post-bubble" years, as the book title indicates, a time of formal restraint, professional creativity in terms of commissions and output, an embrace of sustainability, a rise in adaptive reuse, and other leaner considerations. Daniell's thoughtful and thoroughly enjoyable essays culled from the abo...

Here's a couple New York City bookstores that I found out about recently and have added to my list of NYC Bookstores . I haven't been to either but hope to soon to find out (and share) what they're like. Airstream Books A seasonal outdoor market on Metropolitan Avenue between Lorimar and Union Avenues in Williamsburg that also sells vintage modern furniture. Potterton Books A bookstore focused on "new and rare titles on interior design, architecture, garden, antiques, & the decorative arts," located in the Design & Decoration Building on Third Avenue, between 58th and 59th Streets.

Thanks to Franco's comment on yesterday's post , I found out this page of mine is Blogger's " Blog of Note " for today . [screenshot from Blogger's Dashboard] Thanks to Blogger for "noting" this blog, and a cheery welcome to any new visitors, especially those who wouldn't normally have a reason to check out a blog on architecture, of all things. Have a look around (best via the monthly archives for older posts, as the labels and other helpers for browsing the archvies need some tweaking on my part to gain full functionality), and be sure to check out my weekly page if you find this page interesting.