Category Archives: Architecture
Chicago’s 5 Great Buildings + Animation = YAY!!
The best part of interning in Chicago back in 2006 was getting a chance to visit and experience the many great buildings in the city and surrounding areas. As far as the United States is concerned, Chicago is the capital of global architecture; c’mon, it’s the birthplace of the skyscraper for crying out loud! Just discussing and limiting a conversation to only five of Chicago’s great buildings is doing this city a huge disservice, because there are SO MANY! Above is a video is a nice and short animation by Al Boardman showcasing five of the Windy City’s great buildings, including (but not limited to): SOM’s The Willis Tower (formerly Sears Tower), Bertrand Goldberg’s Marina City, and SOM’s John Hancock Center. Enjoy! Read the rest of this entry
Amazon’s New HQ are Biospheres; Like ‘BioDome’, but ALL the Way Around
Man, Pauly Shore and Stephen Baldwin would be proud.
NBBJ’s proposed design for the Seattle campus for internet retail giant Amazon (which you can shop for whatever you want through the PractitioNERD Amazon Store) has three interlocking biospheres that intend on housing around 65,000 square feet of floor space, including trees — yes, TREES — in the double height spaces. The use of biospheres obviously refers to the company’s name “Amazon,” while showing strong environmental awareness, as well as connecting the philosophies of the Whole Earth Catalog publication, architect Buckminster Fuller and anthropologist Gregory Bateson of the linking of cybernetic discourse and architecture. Think of it as finally becoming an example of the actual (or soon-to-be actual) manifestation on the merging of 1960s-1970s hippie culture and counterculture architecture. Whew— I may need to sit down. Read the rest of this entry
Sounds Like A Bargain: The Two-In-One House
As someone who enjoys thrift-shopping for books, clothes, media, electronics and games, it’s obvious that I enjoy looking for deals. I particularly love moments when purchasing one item (say a DVD movie or game), and then a second movie or game is included with the purchase. When I first looked at images of this house, I thought it was a very nice and simple looking house, but it turns out that this is actually a two-unit apartment building! Like, WHOA! Read the rest of this entry
A Kickstarter to Turn Denver Parking Lot into Outdoor Classroom
Remember the first classroom you walked into? Several of my first classrooms had no desks, just tables and books and a large, wide sitting area. Later, it was just your typical run-of-the-mill square or rectangular room with desks aligned in a grid pattern with the teacher’s desk in front and off to the side. I never had a class take place outside until high school — even though it was a one-time thing — but Architecture for Humanity in Denver is seeking to raise funds via Kickstarter to turn a museum parking lot into an outdoor classroom for at-risk and disadvantaged children. Read the rest of this entry
Meet Hypercubus, a.k.a., An Interesting First Impression
After you either responded with “OOHs”‘, “AHHHs”, or “what? wait? I don’t even”, I shall attempt to get you up to speed to give you an understanding of the Hypercubus house, designed by Studio WG3 in Styria, Austria. The concept behind the Hypercubus house is based on three fundamental concepts:
1) Utilizing open areas with available and self-sufficient infrastructure,
2) The construction and transportability of small modular living units, and finally
3) Creating a new regional tourism concept — the prepaid apartment — using a uniform design.
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Kyle Field Redevelopment Reflects Passion of Texas (Aggie) Football
Texas A&M University received approval from the A&M System Board of Regents on May 1st to proceed with one of the largest college football stadium redevelopments in history for the historic — as in “since 1927″ historic — Kyle Field in College Station, Texas. The total cost of the project totals to approximately $450 million, increasing the capacity from 82,589 to 102,500, and making it the largest stadium in the Southeastern Conference (SEC) and the state of Texas –insert “everything’s bigger in Texas” joke here. The reWHOOPification (or as professionals call “renovation” and “expansion”; whatever, man) of Kyle Field will begin immediately following the end of the upcoming 2013 college football season and is expected to be finished in time to open the 2015 season. The Fightin’ Texas Aggie Football Team will show how much they don’t fear construction, concrete and cranes by continuing to play their home games during the reWHOOPification of the iconic stadium.
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Vietnam’s “Blade Runner”-Esque Pavilion Competition Proposal
It’s been a while since I’ve made references to “Blade Runner” in my architecture stories, so — ladies and gentlemen — here’s that follow-up you’ve been waiting for! This is a conceptual design for Vietnam’s Pavilion for the Expo 2015 in Milan, and it focuses on creating a space that mixes settlement and agriculture. Designed by H&P Architects, the building is steel-framed with large modules connected via simple joins and/or overlapping (the longest module is at least 23 feet long).
LOUVERS! Vertical Louvers All Over! NOTHING BUT LOUVERS!
Are you unaware of what louvers are? Would you like me to explain what they are to you? Are you annoyed that I keep asking questions, wasting time being funny, and sidetracking myself from just saying what louvers are? Well congratulations, I’ll help you out with that problem. Anyway, louvers are essentially a set of shutter-like fin devices that allow or prevent light and air from entering any space. To the left (to the left…I apologize) is a house in Japan that is, well, more louver than house, but those giant white fins allow shadows to move around the home’s interior — depending on what time of day it is. Read the rest of this entry
