HOUSE OF PLASTIC

The designs of Japanese architect Kengo Kuma critically engage the materiality of architecture in order to challenge its usual meanings, and in so doing, to thwart the emergence of architecture as an object. As he has shown in many of his projects, Kuma is determined to "dissolve" the materials that he uses, or to choose materials that are less substantial, stating, "If materials are thoroughly particlized, they are transient, like rainbows."

SMALLER CHEAPER BETTER SCHOOL

Do students learn better in smaller environments? A growing number of educators and architects think so, and in Federal Way, Washington, a few of them have created a school that reflects this conviction. Harry S. Truman High School is flexible enough to accommodate the "smaller is better" approach to education and innovative enough to win top honors from the Council of Educational Facility Planners International (CEFPI).

ROOTS AND BRANCHES

Located in a quiet neighborhood of Portland, Oregon, yet near the busy Capitol Highway which connects downtown with its western suburbs, Hillsdale Branch Library occupies a transitional point between single-family homes to the north and a series of commercial buildings to the south.

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