The winners of this year’s Heinz Awards

The Heinz Foundation announced the winners of this year’s Heinz Awards with a special focus on environmental advocacy. For the fifteenth anniversary of the awards, given in memory of the late Senator John Heinz, the foundation is honoring the senator’s long-standing commitment to the environment. Winners include Robert Berkebile, FAIA, sustainable designer and planner, and Ashok Gadgil, Ph.D., a professor and leader in climate science.
Please check http://archrecord.construction.com for more information.

TVCC by OMA on fire

TVCC (Television culture center) was on fire on Chinese traditional Yuanxiao festival. As a part of CCTV complex, TVCC was designed by OMA (Office for Metropolitan Architecture).
The 159-meter (522-foot) TVCC has played a key role in “transforming a part of Beijing that had been an industrial area”. Along with CCTV, TVCC has become major landmark and are central to the creation of a new business district of Beijing.


The follwoing is an rendering for CCTV and TVCC towers.

AIA Announces 2009 Honor Awards

By Braulio Agnese at ARCHITECT Magazine

The American Institute of Architects has announced the recipients of the 2009 Institute Honor Awards, which recognize excellence in architecture, interior architecture, and urban design. All 25 winning projects—chosen from more than 700 entries—will be celebrated at the AIA's national convention this April.

ARCHITECTURE
Jury: David Lake (chair), Lake|Flato Architects; Carlton Brown, Full Spectrum of New York; Michael Lehrer, Lehrer Architects; James Malanaphy III, The 160 Group; Paul Mankins, Substance; Anna McCorvey, AIAS director, Northeast Quad; Anne Schopf, Mahlum Architects; Suman Sorg, Sorg and Associates; Denise Thompson, Francis Cauffman.

* Basilica of the Assumption , Baltimore, John G. Waite Associates
* Cathedral of Christ the Light , Oakland, Calif., Skidmore, Owings & Merrill
* Charles Hostler Student Center , Beirut, Lebanon, VJAA
* The Gary Comer Youth Center , Chicago, John Ronan Architects
* Horno3: Museo del Acero, Monterey, Mexico, Grimshaw Architects
* The Lavin-Bernick Center for University Life, New Orleans, VJAA
* The New York Times Building, New York City, Renzo Piano Building Workshop and FXFowle Architects
* Plaza Apartments, San Francisco, Leddy Maytum Stacy Architects and Paulett Taggart Architects, in association
* Salt Point House, Salt Point, New York, Thomas Phifer and Partners

INTERIOR ARCHITECTURE
Jury: Mark Sexton (chair), Krueck & Sexton Architects; Joan Blumenfeld, Perkins+Will; Elisabeth Knibbe, Quinn Evans Architects; Arvind Manocha, Los Angeles Philharmonic Association; Kevin Sneed, OTJ Architects.

* Barclays Global Investors Headquarters, San Francisco, Studios Architecture
* Chronicle Books, San Francisco, Mark Cavagnero Associates
* The Heckscher Foundation for Children, New York City, Christoff:Finio architecture
* Jigsaw, Washington, D.C., David Jameson Architect
* R.C. Hedreen, Seattle, NBBJ
* School of American Ballet, New York City, Diller Scofidio + Renfro
* Sheila C. Johnson Design Center, New York City, Lyn Rice Architects
* Tishman Speyer Corporate Headquarters, New York City, Lehman Smith McLeish
* Townhouse, Washington, D.C., Robert Gurney
* World Headquarters for IFA, Yarmouth Port, Mass., DesignLAB Architects

REGIONAL AND URBAN DESIGN
Jury: Jonathan Marvel (chair), Rogers Marvel Architects; Samuel Assefa, City of Chicago Department of Planning and Development; Tim Love, Utile; Ivenue Love-Stanley, Stanley Love-Stanley; Stephanie Reich, City of Glendale Planning Division.

* Foshan Donghuali Master Plan, Guangdong, China, Skidmore, Owings & Merrill
* Orange County Great Park, Irvine, Calif., TEN Arquitectos
* Between Neighborhood Watershed & Home, Fayetteville, Ark., University of Arkansas Community Design Center
* Southworks Lakeside Chicago Development, Chicago, Sasaki Associates and Skidmore, Owings & Merrill
* The Central Park of the New Radiant City, Guangming New Town, China, Lee + Mundwiler Architects
* Treasure Island Master Plan, San Francisco, Skidmore, Owings & Merrill

The Watercube Wins Australia’s Highest Architecture Award

The Chinese National Aquatic Center, better known as the Watercube, recently won the most prestigious architecture award from the Australian Institute of Architecture! Although not officially a cube, the incredible aquatics facility is the 2008 winner of the Jorn Utzon Award for International Architecture. The design and construction of the memorable facility was a collaboration between Australian firm PTW Architects, Chinese practices CSCEC and CCDI, and international firm Arup.

The 2008 Top Ten Green Projects

News from AIA - The American Institute of Architects has selected the top ten examples of sustainable architecture and green design solutions that protect and enhance the environment.

Aldo Leopold Legacy Center
The Kubala Washatko Architects, Inc., Cedarburg, WI

Completed in spring, 2007, the 12,000sf building includes office and meeting spaces, interpretive hall, archive and workshop. The Center was envisioned as a small complex of structures organized around a central courtyard. This design provides flexibility in managing energy use based on program requirements, creates outdoor spaces for work and gathering, and reduces the scale of the buildings on site. The Aldo Leopold Legacy Center is the first building recognized by LEED as carbon-neutral in operation.

Cesar Chavez Library
Line and Space, LLC, Tucson, AZ

In order to protect the outdoor and indoor space from the sun’s radiation, the building uses extensive overhangs to create a ‘hat’ in the desert. The scarcity of water led to roof top rainwater collection for irrigation, while water reducing fixtures are used indoors. Always a concern in the desert, an area of high consumption, the building was carefully cut into the site and the excavated material was used to berm the building for further thermal mass. The windows are also properly shaded to reduce solar gains.

Discovery Center at South Lake Union
The Miller/Hull Partnership, Seattle, WA

A primary program element for this particular center, alongside numerous other environmental goals, was to create a building and core that could provide adaptable exhibit space, capable of being reconfigured and reused for the presentation of multiple residential neighborhoods throughout the South Lake Union Region over a lengthy period of time. In addition to creating flexible interior space, the building itself was designed to be demountable, separating at three integrated joints to break into four separate modules capable of being transported along surface streets.

Pocono Environmental Education Center
Bohlin Cywinski Jackson, Wilkes-Barre, PA

The building is designed to reinforce the mission of environmental stewardship and education. Through careful site and materials selection, analysis and design of building systems, the structure outwardly expresses the principles of sustainable design. The building is a flexible, multi-purpose gathering space for dining, meetings, lectures and other environmental learning activities. As part of the site design, native grasses were planted to provide a landscape that is low maintenance and integrates the project into its natural surroundings.

Garthwaite Center for Science and Art, Cambridge School of Weston
Architerra, Inc., Boston, MA

The facility is designed to advance sustainability, creating an exemplar and educational tool through a design process that engaged the entire community. This LEED Platinum design incorporates dozens of green features that students can view as well as measure and manipulate. The result is a compelling model for educational institutions. Fifty-five detailed sustainability goals included renewable energy, no water to be discharged to the local sewer, 100% storm water infiltration on-site, artificial lighting designed to less than one watt per square foot and minimal maintenance for 20 years.

Lavin-Bernick Center for University Life
VJAA, Minneapolis, MN

The existing building was stripped to the concrete frame, expanded by 33% and redesigned with a variety of environmental systems. The hot and humid New Orleans climate is further tempered with strategies for expanding the comfort zone; including programming for thermal zoning, and technically innovative systems for variable shading, moving air and radiant cooling. Despite its high ambitions, the project had a modest budget and was completed for $189/SF, fourteen months after Hurricane Katrina. Since then, Tulane sees the project as a new model for sustainable design in New Orleans.

Macallen Building Condominiums
Office dA Inc. and Burt Hill Inc., Boston, MA

The 140-unit condominium is a conscious and deliberate effort by both client/developer and the architectural and engineering team to incorporate sustainable design measures. It utilizes green design as a way of marketing a lifestyle and concern for the environment, while simultaneously increasing revenue from the design project as a business strategy. The building, just completed in South Boston, is striving for LEED Gold certification in sustainable design. Some of the green building features include innovative technologies that will save over 600,000 gallons of water annually while consuming 30% less electricity than a conventional building.

Malecha added, “This project was built on an environmentally challenged site that was previously unused space. So not only does in enhance the environment, but it provides valuable inner city housing and shows a certain amount of urban savvy.”

Queens Botanical Garden Visitor & Administration Center
BKSK Architects, New York, NY

In looking to the future, the Garden has propelled itself into the front ranks of its field as the first botanical garden in the country devoted to sustainable environmental stewardship. The goal has been to integrate a beautiful contemporary building into the experience of its varied gardens and landscapes, heightening the visitor experience of the natural environment and conveying the key elements of successful sustainability. A water channel surrounds the building and weaves through the garden, fed by rainwater that cascades off of the sheltering roof canopy.

The Nueva School, Hillside Learning Complex
Leddy Maytum Stacy Architects, San Francisco, CA

The 33-acre campus, located in the semi-rural coastal hills of the San Francisco Peninsula, features a thriving coast live oak woodland ecosystem, a variety of dispersed structures and dramatic views of San Francisco Bay. The design is grounded in the desire to integrate straightforward, appropriate and cost-effective sustainable design solutions within the broader language of contemporary architectural expression. Through a variety of simple, observable systems and strategies, reduce site energy use by at least 65% from the national average for schools and meet the 2030 Challenge.

Yale University Sculpture Building and Gallery
KieranTimberlake Associates LLP, Philadelphia, PA

Situated on a former brownfield site, the new complex is comprised of three new buildings. To provide maximum daylight and exceptional energy efficiency, a wall system was designed that incorporates solar shading, a triple glazed low-e vision panel, 8-foot high operable windows and a translucent double cavity spandrel panel. Consequently, the entire skin of the building admits natural light. The green roof on the gallery and native plant landscaping, which includes mature trees, serves as a connective habitat patch for avian species moving through the urban corridor between these parks.

2008 Pritzker Prize_Jean Nouvel

Architect Jean Nouvel of Paris, France has been selected as the 2008 Laureate of the Pritzker Architecture Prize and will receive the bronze medallion and $100,000 grant in a ceremony on June 2, 2008, at the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C.

Members of the jury that selected Nouvel described his career as one of courageously pursuing new ideas and challenging accepted norms to stretch the boundaries of architecture. They cited his abundant "persistance, imagination, exuberance, and above all, an insatiable urge for creative experimentation."

Jean Nouvel (born 12 August 1945) is a French architect. Nouvel studied at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris and was a founding member of Mars 1976 and Syndicat de l'Architecture. He has obtained a number of prestigious distinctions over the course of his career, including the Aga Khan Award for Architecture (technically, the prize was awarded for the Institut du Monde Arabe which Nouvel designed), the Wolf Prize in Arts in 2005. A number of museums and architectural centres have presented retrospectives of his work.

Foster 's Abu Dhabi World Trade Center

Architects Foster + Partners have launched their design for Abu Dhabi World Trade Center, part of the Al Raha Beach development in Abu Dhabi.

The design strategy is a highly specific response to the climate and topography of this dramatic coastal site and the building has evolved through a process of sophisticated environmental computer analysis. The resulting scheme provides shade while also admitting light; is cooled by a natural flow of air but is buffered against the strong desert wind; is asymmetrical and sculptural yet is environmentally and functionally coherent.


The Abu Dhabi World Trade Center is a multi-use building that brings together offices, apartments, a hotel and shops to encourage a constant pattern of economic and social activity throughout the day.

The form of the building is rooted in a sustainable environmental strategy that relies on a series of passive controls. To the south, the building is indented to reduce the external area most vulnerable to direct sunlight. The services and circulation cores occupy most of the remaining exposed areas. At ground level, the overhang of the roof creates a shaded walkway that wraps around the building, and the roof is streamlined according to the prevailing winds to encourage cooling air currents around and through the building.

The project is due to start on site this summer.

Zaha Hadid design the Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum at Michigan

Zaha Hadid, known for bold, unconventional forms, was selected in a competition for the design of the Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum at Michigan State University. The other finalists were Morphosis of Santa Monica, Calif.; Coop Himmelb(l)au of Vienna and Los Angeles; Kohn Pedersen Fox Architects of New York; and Randall Stout Architects of Los Angeles.


The museum, which is expected to open in 2010, will be Ms. Hadid’s first university building and only her second project in the United States, after the 2003 Rosenthal Center for Contemporary Art in Cincinnati.


The museum will be the new home of the university’s art collection, which is currently housed on campus in the Kresge Art Center. The center, part of the university’s College of Arts and Letters, will continue to hold the art and art history department and provide classroom, studio and exhibition spaces.

Tour Carpe Diem - Robert A.M. Stern Architects

Aviva France announced that Robert A.M. Stern Architects has been selected to design a new office tower at La Défense on Jan. 10, 2008.

Robert A.M. Stern Architects is the latest to join this stellar galaxy of architects. The New York City-based firm was selected over Jacques Ferrier Architecte (Paris) and Foster + Partners(London)to design Tour Carpe Diem. Aviva is the world's fifth-largest insurance group and the leading provider of life and pensions products in Europe, with substantial business interests elsewhere around the world.

The project includes a landscaped pedestrian street lined with cafés that leads to an 18-meter-high (60 feet), skylit atrium, and rooftop conference and dining facilities surrounded by a garden and dramatic views of Paris.

The President's Medals Students Awards 2007

The winners of the President's Medals Student Awards 2007 were announced in a ceremony at RIBA last week.

The RIBA has been awarding the President's Medals more than hundred years. The aim of these awards is to promote excellence in the study of architecture, to reward talent and to encourage architectural debate world-wide. Widely regarded as the best student awards in the world, students aspire each year to be selected by their school to enter for the medals and for the opportunity for their work to be recognised and publicly exhibited.

The winners of 2007 are as following.

The Cabinet of Curiosities - Amandine Kastler
The Lost Soul Hotel - Andrew Street
Transology; a Vehicle Manufacturing Plant for Southwark, London - Claudia White
A Script Writers’ Retreat - Sarah Custance
Euphonic Engine, West Smithfield. - Arya Safavi
urban sustention (b) - Akram Fahmi
Greenwich Perceptual Observatory - Steve Westcott
Mies Immersion - Isabel Pietri Medina
DARK FRUIT - Rosy Head
Geological Archive - Ed Butler


Greenwich Perceptual Observatory by Steve Westcott


DARK FRUIT by Rosy Head

Mercedes-Benz Museum by UNStudio wins German Architecture Prize 2007

The Mercedes-Benz Museum in Stuttgart, designed by Ben van Berkel of UNStudio, wins German Architecture Prize 2007. It also wins European Union Prize for Contemporary Architecture Mies van der Rohe Award.












The following is the description of Mercedes-Benz Museum on Unstudio's website.
"The Museum’s sophisticated geometry synthesizes structural and programmatic organizations resulting in a new landmark building celebrating a legendary car. The geometric model employed is based on the trefoil organization. The building’s program is distributed over the surfaces which ascend incrementally from ground level, spiraling around a central atrium. The Museum experience begins with visitors traveling up through the atrium to the top floor from where they follow the two main paths that unfold chronologically as they descend through the building. The two main trajectories, one being the car and truck collection and the other consisting of historical displays called the Legend rooms, spiral downwards on the perimeter of the display platforms, intersecting with each other at several points allowing the visitor to change routes."

Designed to last: Richard Rogers

From Timeonline/Tom Dyckhoff
At 74, Richard Rogers is as busy as ever shaping the future. Slippers are not an option.
And before you ask, no, I’m not going to retire.” You can forgive the preemptive strike. Richard Rogers, Lord Rogers of Riverside to give him the grand title he rarely uses, has fielded a lot of questions about the “r” word lately. The young Turk who gave the world those once futuristic, still shocking buildings with their guts hanging out – Paris’s Pompidou Centre, London’s Lloyd’s Building – nowadays, at 74, looks like nothing more radical than your favourite grandpa, the one with the twinkly eyes and endearingly rambling tales about the war – the war against the Prince of Wales, architectural conservatism and cities gone to the dogs.

He’s reached “that retrospective time of life” – later this month a massive exhibition of his life’s work opens at the Pompidou, marking the building’s 30th birthday – so “they expect you to pop off at any minute”. Rumours mounted after a remarkable year so backed up with plaudits – the Stirling Prize last autumn for his Madrid airport, the Pritzker Prize, and the Venice Biennale’s Golden Lion, for starters – you half-wondered if the juries had got wind of his imminent demise. Final proof? Last year, the name of the firm he established 29 years ago, Richard Rogers Partnership, was changed to Rogers, Stirk, Harbour and Partners, to honour the next generation of young Turks – Ivan Harbour and Graham Stirk – increasingly taking the reins. Slippers and cocoa seemed certain. “Can you imagine?” he breaks out into one of his guffaws, as if the very idea was the most ridiculous thing in the world. “Which it is.” That’ll be a no then. “

I enjoy life too much,” he says. And Rogers really does seem to have a lovely life. His place in history is guaranteed by the Pompidou and Lloyd’s. He still has fulfilling work – more than ever, with Heathrow’s Terminal 5 opening next spring, a City skyscraper, Leadenhall Building, in the offing, and his largest building to date, the Javits Centre in Manhattan, on the drawing board. It’s a buzz of activity in an office which, a few years previously, seemed in hiatus compared with that of his friend and eternal rival, Norman Foster.

His treasured roles as Ken Livingstone’s adviser and Labour peer mean he is still hard-wired into politics, taken seriously. There’s the big artsy family: still on good terms with his first wife Su, five sons all in influential, creative, fulfilling jobs (one, Abe, has designed the exhibition). There’s the lovely office by the Thames in Hammersmith, filled with 180 reverential staff. And, icing on the cake, there’s having the River Café for your staff canteen just by the front door. The cherry on top? Your wife, Ruthie, runs it! Extra portions of chocolate nemesis all round!

With nearly 50 years of hindsight poured through the exhibition, his life’s work seems less about architecture than selling this Pollyannaish, liberal lifestyle to a mercenary, puritanical world. Born to creative, professional, left-wing Italian parents who escaped fascist Italy for Britain in 1938, his view of life is distinctly Italian – “Where public life and family are entwined,” he says, “as long as I was sitting at the family table everything was OK. I was very affected when I was 5, in Florence, and I’d look across the street and see this café, and every morning I saw what I assumed was an accountant, who’d come in, they’d put a table on the pavement, they’d give him a phone, and he’d do his job. And I thought that’s what I want to do. Not to be an accountant, of course. But the idea that you could mix in your lifestyle, your work, your city, your quality of friendship.”

His wish came true. There are few architects who live the worlds they espouse quite so wholeheartedly as Rogers. Foster – with whom he started in business in the early 1960s – may now have the thousand-strong design-factory, but Rogers, you suspect, has the nicer life. Rogers’s high-tech, drenched in old-fashioned modernist optimism for this thing called “society”, has soul and colour, Foster’s has rigour, but no passion. Indeed, once you get past the shock value of his eviscerated buildings, Rogers’s architecture isn’t really about looks at all. He despises the word “style”, instead his buildings – and this is what was so radical about Pompidou – are basically big family tables, public spaces in which people come together arguing, sharing, resolving differences, given form by the life inside. His vision for cities, now applied patchily as government policy, is all about public space, generosity, tolerance.

Not everyone has shared the Rogers vision: the architecturally conservative, for instance will never warm to his Heath Robinson buildings. There are those who quite rightly state that his “guts on the outside” aesthetic was never very practical (he hasn’t used it himself in a while).

Last year his support for Palestine nearly cost him the Javits job in New York. “The office constitution states you have to think before taking on work which is antienvironment, military, and so on. But then people say ‘airports?’ In that case, since an architect alone cannot stop airports being built he should make them as good, as environmentally sound as possible. But it’s a difficult excuse to make. All architecture is political. All work involves debate, compromise. You’re always juggling, questioning yourself.” This is what makes him unique in Britain, where architects, eyes on realising their monuments and plumping the bank balances tend, as far as possible, to eschew politics.

Rogers marched for CND in the 1950s, against Bush in the Noughties. When Margaret Thatcher started dismantling the public realm so dear to him, private politics became professional. The crux came while designing “London as it could be”, highlight of the Royal Academy’s 1986 exhibition, Foster Rogers Stirling, which envisaged London as a Thames-side playground – fantastical at the height of the no-such-thing-as-society era. Thereafter, building took a backseat to campaigning for Britain’s “urban renaissance” through the Reith Lectures, new Labour’s Urban Task Force, battling with John Prescott, and, today, Livingstone. He concedes that he is somewhat on his own: “I do sometimes feel like an eternal refugee.”

When he arrived in 1938, “there was only one espresso machine in London”. Now, he thinks, we’re at last starting on the right road towards civilised life and decent coffee for all. . . Pollyanna again? “There are a lot of big ifs: the distribution of wealth is horrific. But overall, what an evolution – life is a lot better, especially for those of us who are more fortunate. For those who are not, life is tough. But what can an architect do for them?” his voice trails off. “I don’t know... ”

Zaha Hadid wins the 2007 Thomas Jefferson Foundation Medals

Economist Alan Greenspan, architect Zaha Hadid, and international relations attorney and educator Anne-Marie Slaughter have been named the 2007 recipients of the Thomas Jefferson Foundation Medals presented by the University of Virginia.

Hadid, recipient of the 42nd TJF Medal in Architecture, is a native of Iraq whose practice is based in London. Among her best known projects are the Hoenheim-Nord Car Park and Terminus in Strasbourg, France; BMW Central Building in Leipzig, Germany; and Rosenthal Center for Contemporary Art in Cincinnati, Ohio.

Hadid, who received a mathematics degree from the American University of Beirut before studying at the Architectural Association School of Architecture in London, in 2004 became the first woman to receive the Pritzker Prize in architecture.

RAIC 2006 Governor General’s Medals

Recipients
115 Studios – Cirque du Soleil
Les architectes FABG (Montreal, QC) – Design architect: Éric Gauthier

Bibliothèque Municipale de Châteauguay
atelier TAG et Jodoin Lamarre Pratte et Associés Architectes
en consortium (Montreal, QC) – Design architects: Manon Asselin, Katsuhiro Yamazaki (atelier TAG)

Erindale Hall, University of Toronto at Mississauga
Baird Sampson Neuert Architects (Toronto, ON) – Design architects: Barry Sampson, FRAIC and Jon Neuert, MRAIC

Institut de tourisme et d'hôtellerie du Québec
Lapointe Magne + Ædifica (Montreal, QC) – Design architect: Michel Lapointe

Structures d'accueil des jardins de Métis
Atelier in situ (Montreal, QC) – Design architects: Annie Lebel, architecte et Stéphane Pratte, architecte

Maurer House
Florian Maurer Architect, MRAIC (Naramata, BC)

SC3-Smith Carter Workplace
Smith Carter Architects and Engineers Incorporated
(Winnipeg, MB)

Schulich School of Business, York University
Hariri Pontarini Architects, Robbie/Young + Wright Architects
In Joint Venture (Toronto, ON) – Design architect: Siamak Hariri

The Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics
Saucier + Perrotte architectes (Montreal, QC) – Design architect: Gilles Saucier

Théâtre du Vieux-Terrebonne
atelier TAG et Jodoin Lamarre Pratte et Associés Architectes en consortium (Montreal, QC) – Design architects: Manon Asselin, Katsuhiro Yamazaki (atelier TAG)

Théâtre Espace Libre
Lapointe Magne et associés (Montreal, QC) – Design architect: Michel Lapointe

Unity 2
Cormier, Cohen, Davies architectes (Atelier Big City)(Montreal, QC)

Katsuhiro Yamazaki lecture on Architecture + Design

Mar. 28, 2007
Katsuhiro Yamazaki, partner of Atelier TAG, gave his speech on architecture + design last night at UBC, Vancouver. He briefly introduced his 5 projects including the theatre in terrebonne and Chateauguay Municiple Library which won 2 RAIC Governor-General's Medals for 2006.


The new Theater of Vieux-Terrebonne is located in the city’s civic park, overlooking the spectacular riparian landscape of the Mille-Isles River.

The concept proposed explores the primordial link with nature that constitutes Terrebonne’s most important heritage since the 17th century. In part intertwined, in part superimposed, the architecture of the theater blurs the limit between the cultural facility and its natural setting. The theater interior topography of interconnected social stages simultaneously engages the exterior landscape as another stage for observing and being observed. The intimate, 658-seat multi-use hall presents everything from plays, concert and films, to visits from Quebec’s astoundingly popular stand-up comics.


The new Municipal Library of Châteauguay is located in the city’s civic park, adding to the existing core of municipal services provided on site.

Upon its landscape of green dunes, the new Municipal Library appears as the city’s ‘’standing stone’’. Symbolically, the library‘s fieldstone cabinet of books levitates above the landscape and provides a new gateway for the park.

The program of the library is structured vertically in two main strata. The ground floor is conceived as a fluid ‘public place’ in continuity with the natural grades of the landscape, while the library proper is housed on the above two floors. The new Library gives access to more than 150,000 documents, including periodicals, reference and audio-visual material.

Renzo Piano's tower menaces Boston's Rudolph building

An 80-storey skyscraper designed by one of today’s biggest names, the Italian architect Renzo Piano, has triggered a roaring battle in Boston. Paul Rudolph’s 1960 Blue Cross/Blue Shield office building could be demolished to make way for Piano’s Trans National headquarters, against the will of preservationists who see the building as a seminal example of mid-century Modernism.
On March 13 the Boston Landmarks Commission plans to consider the developer of the new skyscraper’s application for a demolition permit for the Rudolph building, at 133 Federal Street, in the city’s financial district, the New York Times reported.
In an interview, Mr. Piano said he wanted his tower to have a “light presence,” hovering above the proposed 70-foot-high public plaza. Without the vast open space, he said, his tower will seem too aggressive, and only demolition of the Rudolph building will make that wide plaza possible.
By www.demaniore.it

The American Institute of Architects Announces 19 Recipients of the 2007 Housing Awards

By AIA
Washington, D.C., March 9, 2007 — The American Institute of Architects (AIA) announced today the 19 recipients of the 2007 Housing Committee Awards. The AIA’s Housing Awards Program, now in its seventh year, was established to recognize the best in housing design and promote the importance of good housing as a necessity of life, a sanctuary for the human spirit, and a valuable national resource.

The 2007 jury consisted of Jury Chair, Katherine Austin, AIA; Don Carter, FAIA; Jane F. Kolleeny of Architectural Record; Lisa Stacholy, AIA; and LaVerne Williams, AIA. The award recipients were selected from a record 236 submissions. The recipients will be recognized May 3 at the AIA 2007 National Convention and Design Exposition in San Antonio.

The jury recognized projects in four award categories: One/Two Family Custom Housing, One/Two Family Production Housing, Special Housing, and Multifamily Housing.

One/Two Family Custom Housing
The One and Two Family Custom Residences award recognizes outstanding designs for custom and remodeled homes for specific client(s).

House at the Shawangunks, New Paltz, N.Y.
Bohlin Cywinski Jackson, Wilkes-Barre, Pa.
The pristine beauty of this steeply sloped, wooded site called for simple geometry and clean, basic materials; Opening its face to the southeast, the house’s cubic volume projects from the hillside against the backdrop of the Shawangunk Ridge. A rectangular volume rises behind the cube, anchoring it to the sloping landscape and the cube’s black stained concrete foundation forms a pedestal.

“A whimsical, fun house nestled wonderfully in the trees…the simple, organized plan and details are exquisite inside and outside,” the jury said. “The house is respectful of its environment and pleasing to the eye.”

1532 House, San Francisco, Calif.
Fougeron Architecture, San Francisco, Calif.
This new 3,200 sf house includes two distinct volumes separated by an interior courtyard. The front structure has a garage at street grade and a painting studio above; the back volume is the main house, with bedrooms on the lower level, living spaces in the middle, and a master bedroom suite on the top floor. Floor-to-ceiling windows, glass floors and skylights manipulate natural light and allow it to penetrate deep into all rooms.

“A wonderful, tiny, narrow home that fits perfectly into the sloped site, the house has a street presence that doesn’t overpower anything on either side. The plazas, balconies, and courtyards are very inventive uses of a limited space,” jury members said.

Loblolly House, Taylors Island, Md.
Kieran-Timberlake Associates LLP, Philadelphia, PA
Positioned between a dense grove of loblolly pines and a lush foreground of salt meadow cordgrass and the bay, the architecture is formed about and within the elements of trees, tall grasses, the sea, the horizon, the sky, and the western sun that define the place of the house.

“Really innovative prefabricated home using local materials which can be dismantled and put back together easily …The design is quite remarkable and unique with its exterior façade and beautiful location. A lot of work was put into the facades and how it would respond to the light,” said jury members.

Tye River Cabin, Skykomish, Wash.
Olson Sundberg Kundig Allen Architects, Seattle, Wash.
The Tye River Cabin is essentially a wooden tent/retreat on a platform that opens to the forest and the river. The materials were allowed to weather in keeping with the natural tone of the site.

“This project is a simple, elegant solution to having shelter but remaining one with nature…The modest size makes you feel like you’re in the forest with no boundaries. The house is a pure statement that is not over powering…the colors and details are lovely,” said jury members.

Delta Shelter, Mazama, Wash.
Olson Sundberg Kundig Allen Architects, Seattle, Wash.
This project is a 40-acre site restoration and planning of a 100-year-old horse ranch located on a flood plain. Due to the flood plain, the project sits on stilts, which also lets it have minimum impact on the land. It is a little house on a big landscape with pre-fabricated metal frame, shutters, stairs and “gizmo” to mitigate construction site activity.

“The natural materials blend beautifully with the context in terms of materials and volume…Elevated position respects the flood plane and ensures durability,” Jury members said. “This project is gorgeous and seems in harmony with the site”

A Ranch House in the San Juan Mountains, Telluride, Colo.
Michael Shepherd Architect AIA, Telluride, Colo.
The remoteness, vast openness, and topographical qualities solicit a strong connection to the land. Conceptually the design of this house is an attempt to synthesize regional vernacular and the more universal qualities of modernism. Recycled oaks and Douglas fir were used for interior flooring, doors, and cabinet work. Solar power and propane are the primary energy sources.

The jury said, “The project is wonderfully understated; the views and light are just gorgeous. It is very respectful of ranch tradition of architecture and works with the vernacular of that area...Timeless…Serene!”

One/Two Family Production Housing
The One and Two Family Production Homes award will recognize excellent design of homes built for the speculative market.

Danielson Grove, Kirkland, Wash.
Ross Chapin Architects, Langley, Wash.
This project was developed to demonstrate the market for detached housing alternatives for small households and was built to meet the 4-Star rating of the Master Builders Association BUILT GREEN program. Each home is on a private lot facing a garden courtyard. Residents share a Commons Building, a place for potlucks, family gatherings, and meetings.

“Lots of texture and detail and works well in the context of its environment; the central courtyard with community building is a great organizing feature…beautiful…green,” the jury said.

The 505, Houston, Texas
Collaborative Designworks, Houston, Texas
Natural cross-ventilation, exceptional day-lighting, permeable ground coverings, stack-vented rain-screens on the East & West facades, radiant barrier roofing, recycled / sustainable materials & finishes, tank-less water heaters, and high efficiency appliances & equipment all combine to give the project an environmentally responsible footprint.

“Really liked the street frontage; it respected the character of the neighborhood. This was a clever plan, handled well,” said jury members. “Elegant use of materials that gives richness to the structure, all within the low budget”.

Special Housing
The Special Housing award recognizes outstanding design of housing that meets the unique needs of other specialized housing types such as single room occupancy residences (SROs), independent living for the disabled, residential rehabilitation programs, domestic violence shelters, and other special housing.

The DESIGNhabitat 2 House, Greensboro, Ala.
The DESIGNhabitat 2 Studio School of Architecture, Auburn University, David W. Hinson, AIA, Auburn, Ala.
This home is the first designed for Habitat for Humanity to integrate high design quality goals, climate-appropriate design features and energy performance with the modular construction process and offers valuable lessons and perspectives for future initiates to integrate modular construction and affordable housing development.

“Well thought out spatial organization and environmental factors included for really efficient energy consumption. Organization of the house is simple and really responds to its environment…wonderful…sophisticated simplicity,” the jury said.

The Plaza Apartments, San Francisco, CA
Leddy Maytum Stacy Architects & Paulett Taggart Architects in Association, San Francisco, CA
Its ground floor commercial space, theater entrance, and residential courtyard enhance the streetscape and the colorful exterior signals a new direction for the neighborhood. Over 100 new mini-studio apartments provide permanent housing with on-site mental/physical health services for chronically homeless people.

“This project has taken a wonderfully whimsical approach to the façade that relates to the existing neighborhood. City of San Francisco is actively trying to alleviate the homeless situation and this project has the potential to change the situation,” said jury members.

Patrolia Loft, Boston, MA
Ruhl Walker Architects, Boston, MA
This interior fit-out of an existing concrete-shell apartment for a wheelchair-bound user starts with the proposition that “Accessible Design” should first and foremost be good design. Specific accommodations for his mobility limitations are incorporated honestly; without unnecessary concealment and also without becoming unattractive afterthoughts or distractions.

“Great use of materials which goes beyond universal space… Wonderfully organized… the bathroom is really elegant and functional,” jury members said.

Shirley Bridge Bungalows, Seattle, Wash.
Ron Wright and Associates / Architects, PS, Seattle, Wash.
The project responds to the critical shortage of affordable, appropriate housing for people disabled with AIDS who are low-income and is publicly funded via HUD Section 811 funding, along with other public and private sources. The six colorful cottages were organized around a central common space to foster interaction between residents.
A forced-air heating system was also provided to increase ventilation and air quality.

“This small housing development is very serene, comforting and welcoming…a real improvement to the neighborhood and a good new neighbor for the community,” said jury members.

Regional Homeless Center, Los Angeles, CA
Jeffrey M. Kalban & Associates Architecture, Inc., Los Angeles, CA
This project was a major renovation of an abandoned 1960’s 3-story office building that was originally built for a liquor company, to a multifaceted 40,000 sq. ft. regional Homeless Center. Vibrant colors and playful uplifting forms were used to create a facility that evokes a positive, non-institutional, image and delivers a sense of hope and possibility to its users.

“This is an amazing transformation of a fairly brutal building which enhances its environment and makes it a welcome addition to the neighborhood,” jury members said. “The ground floor is beautifully detailed and the organization is terrific.”

Multifamily Housing
The Multifamily Housing award recognizes outstanding multifamily housing design. Both high- and low-density projects for public and private clients were considered. In addition to architectural design features, the jury assessed the integration of the building(s) into their context, including open and recreational space, transportation options and features that contribute to livable communities.

High Point, Seattle, Wash.
Mithun, Seattle, Wash.
The 120-acre project replaces 716 subsidized housing units erected after World War II with 1600 units designed in a fresh take on traditional residential forms. Fifty percent of the new homes are designated for low-income residents, with the remaining market value homes built by private sector builders. The neighborhood integrates a variety of incomes, ethnicities and family structures.

“The architecture was done in a public way... love the sense of community this project creates while still allowing individuality,” said the jury. “The community garden and architecture is very much in context with Seattle.”

1247 Wisconsin, Washington DC
McInturff Architects, Bethesda, Md.
Situated on historic Georgetown's main shopping street, this project restores two mid-19th century commercial/residential buildings and fills the remaining site behind them with additional retail space on the street level. Above this new space, and in the upper levels of the historic buildings, six luxury residential units create a little rooftop village floating above the bustle of the city.

“Absolutely love it! A sensitive and gorgeous way to use the space…The project is clever and respectful of the existing fabric of the city… beautifully detailed,” said jury members.

156 West Superior Condominiums, Chicago, Illinois
The Miller/Hull Partnership, LLP, Seattle, Washington
The steel frames support cantilevered decks for outdoor entertaining in each unit and a large common roof deck provides stunning views of downtown Chicago for all the residents. The building is meant to invest an image of structural architecture, conveying a sense of economy, efficiency, discipline and order, essential characteristics of Chicago’s steel and glass architectural history.

“It is nice how the project fits in the context, but not in a scale that feels overwhelming. The building is beautifully sited on narrow constricted site,” said jury members.

The Union, San Diego, CA
Jonathan Segal, FAIA, San Diego, CA
The architect took a sustainable approach and acting as owner/developer/contractor decided to adaptively reuse the old textile manufactures union hall as a fully sustainable edifice with two affordable live work lofts and his own architectural office. The homes have significant individual presence on the street and substantial private outdoor space connected to the interiors by an abundance of glazing.

“Very modern, green design on the edge of a transitional neighborhood that invigorates the neighborhood…Two story volumes with affordable units,” jury members said.

Bridgeton Hope VI, Bridgeton, N.J.
Torti Gallas and Partners, Silver Spring, Md.
Rather than rebuilding on the existing public housing site, the new housing knits into the historic fabric, filling vacant lots and blocks. The existing site was restored as riverside parkland reconnecting the city to the Cohansey. Porches, cornices, surrounds, siding, and trim, all painted with a varied historic palette, allow the houses to blend with the neighborhood context.

“Absolutely appropriate and wonderful…sensitively detailed. The site plan is very much contextual to the rest of the city,” said jury members. “Transforms the neighborhood back to what it probably was”

Salishan Neighborhood Revitalization, c/o Tacoma Housing Authority, Tacoma, Wash.
Torti Gallas & Partners, Inc., Silver Spring, Md.
This project is a H.O.P.E. VI Grant with the goal of creating a livable, vibrant community and restoring/protecting the natural resources of the neighborhood, particularly Swan Creek. The architects were able to create a connective, eco-friendly, pedestrian-friendly neighborhood through the integration of a variety of parks, paths, and swales.

The jury said of this project, “Takes an existing temporary housing for shipyard workers and transforms it to multi-generational and multi-ethnic population…The project is warm and has a sense of permanence.”

About The American Institute of Architects
For 150 years, members of The American Institute of Architects have worked with each other and their communities to create more valuable, healthy, secure, and sustainable buildings and cityscapes. AIA members have access to the right people, knowledge, and tools to create better design, and through such resources and access, they help clients and communities make their visions real. www.aia.org

The American Institute of Architects Announces the 2007 Recipients of Education Honor Awards

By AIA
Washington, D.C., March 9, 2007 — The American Institute of Architects (AIA) awarded the recipients of the 2007 AIA Education Honor Awards for excellence in course development and architectural teaching. The Education Honor Awards program, now in its 18th year, recognizes collegiate faculty achievements and contributions to education and the discipline of architecture. The awards were officially announced today during the ACSA Awards Ceremony at its annual meeting in Philadelphia. The awards will be presented to the 2007 recipients in May during the AIA National Convention in San Antonio.

The following are the recipients of this year’s Education Honor Awards: ecoMOD, University of Virginia; SCI-TECH I-IV, Iowa State University; and Visioning Rail Transit in Northwest Arkansas: Lifestyles and Ecologies, University of Arkansas + Washington University in St Louis.

The jury looked for evidence of exceptional and innovative courses that dealt with broad issues, particularly in cross-disciplinary collaboration and/or within the broader community, contributed to the advancement of architecture education, had the potential to benefit and/or change practice, and promoted models of excellence that could be appropriated by other educators. “All of the Award winners took on something new, were innovative models of architectural education, and used technology to facilitate their process,” said jury members.

The 2007 AIA Education Honors Award Winners:

ecoMOD
University of Virginia
Development team: John Quale, ecoMOD Project Director and Assistant Professor of Architecture University of Virginia School of Architecture; Paxton Marshall, ecoMOD Engineering Director and Professor, University of Virginia School of Engineering and Applied Sciences

ecoMOD is a research and design / build / evaluate project that aims to create a series of ecological, prefabricated and affordable housing prototypes. The goal of this architecture and engineering school partnership is to demonstrate the environmental and economic potential of prefabrication, and to challenge the modular housing industry to explore this potential.

Jury comments: “The project took on several topics: ecology, modular construction, and affordable housing. It put them together in a variety of prototypes that can be customized by the user.”

SCI-TECH I-IV
Iowa State University
Development team: Jason Alread, AIA, Assistant Professor; Thomas Leslie, AIA
Associate Professor, Director of Graduate Education (interim), Iowa State University Department of Architecture

SCI-TECH is an intensive, four course sequence designed to rapidly familiarize graduate students in a first professional degree program with building technology’s fundamental principles and applications. The sequence encourages connections between technology, studio, and history/theory by adopting practice as its basis.

Jury Comments: “SCI-TECH pulls together challenging subjects in a core curriculum for students in a first professional degree program. This sequence of courses is an excellent example for architectural programs that want to integrate building technology into the curriculum.”

Visioning Rail Transit in Northwest Arkansas: Lifestyles and Ecologies
University of Arkansas + Washington University in St Louis
Development team: Stephen Luoni, Director, University of Arkansas Community Design Center; Aaron Gabriel, Assistant Director, University of Arkansas Community Design Center, Adjunct Assistant Professor, Department of Architecture; Jeffrey Huber, LEED AP, Project Designer, University of Arkansas Community Design Center; Eric Kahn, AIA, Professor, SCI-Arc, Fay Jones Visiting Professor of Architecture, University of Arkansas, Principal, Central Office of Architecture, Los Angeles; William Conway, AIA
Associate Professor, University of Minnesota, Visiting Professor of Architecture, University of Arkansas, Principal, Conway + Schulte Architects, Minneapolis; Dr. Tahar Messadi, Assistant Professor, University of Arkansas; Greg Herman, Associate Professor, University of Arkansas.

The challenge of the studio is to assist Northwest Arkansas (NWA) in understanding the community design possibilities in the development of a regional rail transit system.

Jury comments: “This is an effective use of scenario planning with legible, impactful graphics that can be shown to the community. There is an appealing levity in the work.”

About The American Institute of Architects
For 150 years, members of The American Institute of Architects have worked with each other and their communities to create more valuable, healthy, secure, and sustainable buildings and cityscapes. AIA members have access to the right people, knowledge, and tools to create better design, and through such resources and access, they help clients and communities make their visions real. www.aia.org

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U.S. contribution to globe warming

By The New York Time
The Bush administration estimates that emissions by the United States of gases that contribute to global warming will grow nearly as fast through the next decade as they did the previous decade, according to a long-delayed report being completed for the United Nations.
The document, the United States Climate Action Report, emphasizes that the projections show progress toward a goal Mr. Bush laid out in a 2002 speech: that emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases grow at a slower rate than the economy. Since that speech, he has repeated his commitment to lessening “greenhouse gas intensity” without imposing formal limits on the gases.

Kristen A. Hellmer, a spokeswoman for the White House on environmental matters, said on Friday, “The Climate Action Report will show that the president’s portfolio of actions addressing climate change and his unparalleled financial commitments are working.”

But when shown the report, an assortment of experts on climate trends and policy described the projected emissions as unacceptable given the rising evidence of risks from unabated global warming.

“As governor of Texas and as a candidate, the president supported mandatory limits on carbon dioxide emissions,” said David W. Conover, who directed the administration’s Climate Change Technology Program until February 2006 and is now counsel to the National Commission on Energy Policy, a nonpartisan research group that supports limits on gases. “When he announced his voluntary greenhouse-gas intensity reduction goal in 2002, he said it would be re-evaluated in light of scientific developments. The science now clearly calls for a mandatory program that establishes a price for greenhouse-gas emissions.”

According to the new report, the administration’s climate policy will result in emissions growing 11 percent in 2012 from 2002. In the previous decade, emissions grew at a rate of 11.6 percent, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.

The report also contains sections describing growing risks to water supplies, coasts and ecosystems around the United States from the anticipated temperature and precipitation changes driven by the atmospheric buildup of carbon dioxide and other heat-trapping greenhouse gases.

Drafts of the report were provided to The New York Times by a government employee at the request of a reporter. The employee did not say why this was done, but other officials involved with producing it said they have been frustrated with the slow pace of its preparation. It was due more than one year ago.

The report arrives at a moment when advocates of controls are winning new support in statehouses and Congress, not to mention Hollywood, where former Vice President Al Gore’s cautionary documentary on the subject, “An Inconvenient Truth,” just won an Academy Award. Five western governors have just announced plans to create a program to cap and then trade carbon-dioxide emissions. And on Capitol Hill, half a dozen bills have been introduced to curb emissions, with more expected.

Ms. Hellmer defended Mr. Bush’s climate policy, saying the president was committed to actions, like moderating gasoline use and researching alternative energy, that limited climate risks while also increasing the country’s energy and national security. She said Mr. Bush remained satisfied with voluntary measures to slow emissions.

Myron Ebell, who directs climate and energy policy for the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a group aligned with industries fighting curbs on greenhouse gases, said Mr. Bush was right to acknowledge the inevitability of growing emissions in a country with a growing population and economy. Mr. Ebell added that the United States was doing better at slowing emissions than many countries that had joined the Kyoto Protocol, the first binding international treaty limiting such gases.

“Since 1990, for every 1 percent increase in emissions the economy has grown about 3 percent,” Mr. Ebell said. “That’s good, and it’s better than the European Union’s performance.”

Several environmental campaigners said there was no real distinction between Mr. Bush’s target and “business as usual,” adding that such mild steps were unacceptable given recent findings by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and other research groups tying recent warming more firmly than ever to smokestack and tailpipe gases.

“If you set the hurdle one inch above the ground you can’t fail to clear it,” said David D. Doniger, the director of climate policy for the Natural Resources Defense Council, which has long criticized the administration and sought binding cuts in greenhouse gases.

The report is the fourth in a series produced periodically by countries that are parties to the 1992 Framework Convention on Climate Change, a treaty signed by the first President Bush. It is a self-generated summary of climate-related trends and actions, including inventories of emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases, research on impacts of climate change, and policies to limit climate risks and emissions.

The last such report, completed in 2002, put the administration in something of a bind because it listed many harmful or costly projected impacts from human-caused warming. Environmental groups used those findings to press President Bush to seek mandatory caps on greenhouse gases, while foes of such restrictions criticized the findings and criticized the administration for letting them stay in the document.

While that report was approved by senior White House and State Department officials, Mr. Bush quickly distanced himself from it, saying it was “put out by the bureaucracy.”

The new report has been bogged down for nearly two years. In April 2005, the State Department published a notice in the Federal Register saying it would be released for public comment that summer.

Several government officials and scientists involved with preparing or reviewing parts of the report said that the recent departures of several senior staff members running the administration’s climate research program delayed its completion and no replacements have been named. The delays in finishing the report come even as Mr. Bush has elevated global warming higher on his list of concerns. This year, for the first time since he took office in 2001, he touched on “global climate change” in the State of the Union Message, calling it a “serious challenge.”

The draft report contains fresh projections of significant effects of human-caused warming on the environment and resources of the United States and emphasized the need to increase the country’s capacity to adapt to impending changes.

Drought, particularly, will become a persistent threat, it said: “Warmer temperatures expected with increasing concentrations of greenhouse gases are expected to exacerbate present drought risks in the United States by increasing the rate of evaporation.”

Water supplies in the Northwest and Southwest are also at risk. “Much of the water used by people in the western United States comes from snow melt,” the report said. “And a large fraction of the traditionally snow-covered areas of this region has experienced a decline in spring snow pack, especially since mid-century, despite increases in winter precipitation in many places.” Animal and plant species face risks as climate zones shift but urbanized regions prevent ecosystems from shifting as well, according to the draft report.

“Because changes in the climate system are likely to persist into the future regardless of emissions mitigation, adaptation is an essential response for future protection of climate-sensitive ecosystems,” it said.