A Weekly Dose of Architecture Books

Leaves of Iron: Glenn Murcutt, Pioneer of an Australian Architectural Form by Philip Drew Angus&Robertson, 1991 (first published in Australia in 1985 by The Law Book Company Limited) Paperback | 10-1/2 x 11 inches | 148 pages | English | ISBN: 9780207173271 | AUST $39.95 DESCRIPTION FROM BACK COVER : For over 200 years, Australia has been searching for its identity. Often, this has led to the imposition of inappropriate European cultural values on a very different, very harsh, southern continent. In architecture, most of all, the manifest error of implanting old world styles in this new world landscape has led to a desperate need for an open, independent architecture. That need is answered by Glenn Murcutt and his development of a strong and attractive, yet practical, architectural form. He has achieved this through a close scrutiny of, and a great sensitivity for, Australian landscape and climate. In Leaves of Iron , Philip Drew has produced a work which, in its sensitivity an...

Amos Rex Art Museum – JKMM Architects Edited by Tomas Lauri Arvinius + Orfeus Publishing , May 2021 Hardcover | 7-1/2 x 10 inches | 120 pages | English | ISBN: 9789189270022 | 38€ PUBLISHER'S DESCRIPTION : Since its opening, the Amos Rex Art Museum, designed by JKMM architects, has been a great public and architectural success. It is tucked away underground in the ancient glass palace in the heart of central Helsinki. Through its architecture, it has set new boundaries for what a museum can and should be. With its huge arched exhibition halls and eye-catching lanterns that make it feel as though it is above ground, the building never fails to surprise. Art museums seldom manage to be fully functional for all types of art, new and old, and at the same time deliver an architecturally strong experience that changes the city. But here, everything is in place, states Lars Nittve in one of the book’s essays. In this book, a close-up of the museum is drawn in words, sketches, and pict...

The Turning Point in Architectural Design: A Historical Scenario for the Future by Helmut C. Schulitz Hirmer Publishers , 2021 Paperback | 9-1/2 x 10-1/2 inches | 240 pages | 657 illustrations | English | ISBN: 9783777436760 | $45.00 PUBLISHER'S DESCRIPTION : Over one hundred years ago, Adolf Loos had already complained: “The architect has caused architecture to sink to a graphic art.” He was pointing to a problem that had gone unnoticed for centuries. But today, in the age of digitalization, the separation between design and building practice that Loos had lamented is expanding immeasurably. Nowadays, CAD enables architects to design forms that they could neither imagine nor draw before. But where form becomes more important than function, context, and construction, architecture becomes arbitrary. Technology by itself will not bring about a turning point in building. It must be preceded by a turnabout in architectural design that can introduce further potentials of digitalizat...

Into the Light: The Art and Architecture of Lauretta Vinciarelli by Rebecca Siefert Lund Humphries , February 2021 Hardcover | 7-1/2 x 9-3/4 inches | 168 pages | 91 illustrations | English | ISBN: 9781848224124 | $79.99 PUBLISHER'S DESCRIPTION : Into the Light: The Art and Architecture of Lauretta Vinciarelli centres on the interdisciplinary work of Lauretta Vinciarelli (1943-2011), a key yet relatively unknown figure who inhabited a world of 'firsts': she was the first woman to have drawings acquired by the Department of Architecture and Design at the Museum of Modern Art (in 1974); she was among the first women hired to teach architecture studio courses at Columbia University (in 1978); and she was the first and only woman granted a solo exhibition at Peter Eisenman’s influential Institute of Architecture and Urban Studies in New York (also 1978). Raised in northern Italy and educated at La Sapienza University in Rome during the tumultuous 1960s, Vinciarelli would b...

Imagining Ground Zero: Official and Unofficial Proposals for the World Trade Center Site by Suzanne Stephens, with Ian Luna and Ron Broadhurst Rizzoli /Architectural Record, October 2004 Hardcover | 9-1/4 x 12-1/4 inches | 252 pages | English | ISBN: 9780847826575 | $60.00 FROM THE FLAPS : The most important building competition in the world today, and the most important one since the international design competition for the Chicago Tribune Tower in 1922, is for the reconstruction of the World Trade Center in lower Manhattan. It has inspired a multitude of designs and has engaged architects on a global scale in the re-imagining of the twin towers' vacant sixteen-acre site. Published in conjunction with Architectural Record , the preeminent architecture journal in the United States, Imagining Ground Zero: Official and Unofficial Proposals for the World Trade Center Site  documents not only the master plan competition, won by Studio Daniel Libeskind and sponsored by the Low...

Drawing Matter Extracts 2: Women Writing Architecture Edited by Helen Thomas Drawing Matter , 2021 Paperback | 16-1/2 x 11-3/4 (5-1/2 x 11-3/4 inches folded) | 44 pages | English | £10 PUBLISHER'S DESCRIPTION : Drawing Matter Extracts 2: Women Writing Architecture is edited by Helen  Thomas and collects together 24 texts written by women in architectural  practice and connected disciplines. The anthology is published to  coincide with the launch of the Women Writing Architecture website , an annotated bibliography of writing about  architecture by women.  Women Writing Architecture includes texts by Helen Thomas, Sheila O’Donnell, Stephanie Macdonald, Philippa Lewis, Caroline Voet, Iris Moon, Desley Luscombe, Zoe Zenghelis, Mari Lending, Maria Conen, Deanna Petherbridge, Marie-José van Hee, Roz Barr, Asli Çiçek, Ana Araujo, Sarah Handelman, Emma Letizia Jones, Anahat Chandra, Emily Priest, Angharad Davies, Deepiga Kameswaran and Emerald Liu. Helen Thom...

MultiStories: 55 Antique Skyscrapers & the Business Tycoons Who Built Them by Mark Houser Houser Talks, November 2020 Paperback | 6 x 9 inches | 233 pages | 55 illustrations | English | ISBN: 9780578807362 | $19.99 PUBLISHER'S DESCRIPTION : Skyscrapers are an American original.  More than 100 years ago, towering marvels like New York's Flatiron Building thrilled the public and transformed cities across the country. Now take a tour of the best of these elegant landmarks still standing today in 31 U.S. and 5 international cities. Packed with colorful tales of the powerful executives and self-made millionaires who commissioned the country's first skyscrapers, MultiStories also traces the emergence of modern corporations in banking, media, transportation, insurance, manufacturing, entertainment, and other industries that fed the explosive growth of American cities at the start of the 20th century. Learn the surprising and inspiring stories of Gilded Age rags-to-riches...