Interview with Denise Scott Brown and Robert Venturi
Denise Scott Brown and Robert Venturi—the architects who architects love to hate most—talk about their roots, their writing, their architecture, their politics, and their legacy.
Adam Marcus On Architecture and Other Things
Featured
Zion on the Prairie
A look at the visionary architecture of Yearning for Zion, the city in Eldorado, Texas constructed by the FLDS, a breakaway Mormon sect that practices the principle of plural marriage. It’s a complex story of migration, polygamy, alleged pedophilia, vast sums of money, and of course, great controversy. But perhaps more than anything, it’s a story of one of the most radical and compelling utopian experiments in recent American history.
News Log
PATTERNING / FALL 2010
I’ll be teaching once again this fall at the undergraduate architecture department at Columbia/Barnard. The course will in many ways be a continuation of last semester’s Positioning Parametric Design class and will focus specifically on pattern recognition and generation in contemporary architectural practice. More details to follow…
AIA New York State Design Award Citation
The Toni Stabile Student Center, a Marble Fairbanks project at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism that I managed from start to finish, has won a citation from the 2010 AIA New York State Design Awards jury.
Stabile Center at Center for Architecture
I’ll be presenting the Toni Stabile Student Center at the 2010 Design Awards Symposium at the Center for Architecture on Saturday, June 19 at 11:00am. The project, an honor award winner in the Architecture category, is also featured in the Design Awards 2010 exhibition, up until July 3.
Viva Ugly and Ordinary Cont’d
My interview with Denise Scott Brown and Robert Venturi (published last month in Museo XIV) has been noted recently in Archinect, things magazine, and m.e.t.r.o.n.o.m. Thanks to all for the mentions and for validating my longtime hunch that there are more Venturi Scott Brown partisans out there than meet the eye.
Spring Semester Wrap-Up
“Positioning Parametric Design,” the combined seminar and design workshop I taught this semester at Columbia/Barnard, wrapped up with a very productive final review and exhibition earlier this month. The students broke in the undergraduate department’s new laser cutter and developed some great projects… check out the collective class blog for images and more. Many thanks to Joe Vidich, Hye-Young Chung, and David Benjamin for coming to the final review and offering such great feedback to the students.
Viva Ugly and Ordinary
The new volume of Museo is live, and among other fine pieces it features my interview with Robert Venturi and Denise Scott Brown. Bob and Denise are the architects who architects love to hate most, but the discipline still has much to learn from these two iconoclasts. It pleases me greatly to have had the opportunity to meet with them, talk about their long and eventful careers, and unpack some of the popular misconceptions regarding their work. Many thanks again to Bob and Denise for the great conversation.
AIA Design Honor Award
The Toni Stabile Student Center, a Marble Fairbanks project I managed from design through construction, has won a 2010 Design Honor Award from the New York AIA.
Positioning Parametric Design, Spring 2010
Check out the collective tumblelog for the seminar “Positioning Parametric Design” I am teaching at the undergrad program at Columbia/Barnard this semester. The students are learning the ropes with Grasshopper and Rhino and are about to jump on the department’s new laser cutter… more updates to come as the semester progresses.
Forthcoming
I was fortunate enough to spend yesterday morning at the lovely home of Denise Scott Brown and Robert Venturi, interviewing them for a feature to be published in the next issue of Museo. It was a real treat, especially for this connoisseur of all things ugly and ordinary. Many thanks to Bob & Denise for their generosity, candor, and spirited wit!
Parametric Design Redux
I’ll be teaching once again this spring at the undergraduate Department of Architecture at Barnard/Columbia Colleges. The class, Positioning Parametric Design, will be a hybrid seminar & workshop and will investigate what exactly it means to design using parametric modeling software. We’ll have an added bonus this year breaking in the department’s brand new laser cutter, which will no doubt play a huge role in the class. Stay tuned for more.
Design Review Award
The Toni Stabile Student Center at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism, a Marble Fairbanks project I worked on for about 2 years, has recently won an Annual Design Review award from Architect magazine. This was my baby from design all the way through construction, so it’s pretty cool to see it as the winner in the “Grow” (education/science/healthcare) category.
Zion in New Jersey
I’ll be giving a lecture on the FLDS’s (mis)adventures in utopia at New Jersey Institute of Technology this Friday, October 30.
Cooper Hewitt Teen Design Fair
Once again I’ll be one of the guest designers at the Cooper Hewitt’s annual Teen Design Fair this coming Monday, October 19. The fair is part of National Design Week and is held for high school students visiting from around the country who are curious about careers in design.
Fully Operational
The Toni Stabile Student Center at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism, a project I worked on from start to finish at Marble Fairbanks, is up and running. It features extensive use of custom perforated metal as well as what we like to think is the largest double-hung window in New York: an operable facade comprised of two giant pieces of glass that opens to the outside plaza in nice weather. Check out the recently redesigned Marble Fairbanks site for images of the building as well as an extended project journal which documents the design process… and if you’re on campus, try to catch the open door before the weather gets too cold!
Soft Launch
So, the revamped website is still a work in progress… but I figured I’d go ahead and put it online anyway. There’s not much up yet, but I hope to get more content online in the coming weeks. Stay tuned.