http://www.ArchitectureWeek.com/ Full issue contents of ArchitectureWeek - The magazine of design and building en-us Wed, 31 Jan 2007 23:59:00 GMT Wed, 31 Jan 2007 23:59:00 GMT http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss ArchitectureWeek Editorial System editor@architectureweek.com editor@architectureweek.com http://www.ArchitectureWeek.com/2007/0131/news_1-1.html The American Institute of Architects has announced the recipients of two of its highest honors. The 2007 AIA Architecture Firm Award has gone to the Bostonbased Leers Weinzapfel Associates Architects LWA in recognition of their history of design excellence. And the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C., by designer Maya Lin, was selected to receive the 2007 AIA Twentyfive Year Award. Wed, 31 Jan 2007 23:59:00 GMT http://www.ArchitectureWeek.com/2007/0131/news_1-1.html http://www.ArchitectureWeek.com/2007/0131/news_2-1.html Only five times in the 100year history of the American Institute of Architects AIA Gold Medal has the AIA's highest honor been awarded posthumously. Renowned 20thcentury architect Edward Larrabee Barnes, FAIA has now joined the ranks of the others Thomas Jefferson, Eero Saarinen, Richard Neutra, William Caudill, and Samuel Mockbee who did not live long enough to enjoy this well deserved symbol of professional recognition. Wed, 31 Jan 2007 23:59:00 GMT http://www.ArchitectureWeek.com/2007/0131/news_2-1.html http://www.ArchitectureWeek.com/2007/0131/news_3-1.html The GreenBuild Conference, held in Denver, Colorado in November 2006, provided an important rallying of forces against global warming. Architects, builders, nongovernmental organizations, building product manufacturers, and other private companies gathered to announce ambitious plans for confronting the problem. Wed, 31 Jan 2007 23:59:00 GMT http://www.ArchitectureWeek.com/2007/0131/news_3-1.html http://www.ArchitectureWeek.com/2007/0131/design_1-1.html Canadian architecture has always eschewed the dominance of formalism for more complex and integrated solutions reflecting its humanist concerns. The strong socialdemocratic trend of governmental supervision and community control in Canada influences architecture through a complex framework of programming, design guidelines, zoning bylaws, and building codes, within which designers must operate. Such a system is unlikely to allow stylistic concerns to override programmatic ones. Wed, 31 Jan 2007 23:59:00 GMT http://www.ArchitectureWeek.com/2007/0131/design_1-1.html http://www.ArchitectureWeek.com/2007/0131/design_2-1.html An American caricature of a ski chalet has an Aframe roof, enough timber to build a dozen houses, and a trophy elk head over a stone fireplace. Defying this stereotype is the "Stal Tre Hus" by architect Joel Sherman, principal of JLS Design. With a name meaning "steel tree house" in Norwegian, this house features a flat roof, a steel structure, and neither elk head nor traditional fireplace. Wed, 31 Jan 2007 23:59:00 GMT http://www.ArchitectureWeek.com/2007/0131/design_2-1.html http://www.ArchitectureWeek.com/2007/0131/design_3-1.html The most unusual buildings in the U.S. capital city are often those erected by foreign governments for their embassies. Some are insipid interpretations of a country's architectural traditions. Others are inspired efforts to combine the best of a country's past architecture with cuttingedge trends. Wed, 31 Jan 2007 23:59:00 GMT http://www.ArchitectureWeek.com/2007/0131/design_3-1.html http://www.ArchitectureWeek.com/2007/0131/design_4-1.html The new Federal Courthouse in Eugene, Oregon by Thom Mayne and his Los Angeles firm Morphosis, is in some ways an outstanding building for this small city. Mayne certainly delivers a strong dose of visual excitement, but the depth of art in this architecture is more open to question. Wed, 31 Jan 2007 23:59:00 GMT http://www.ArchitectureWeek.com/2007/0131/design_4-1.html http://www.ArchitectureWeek.com/2007/0131/building_1-1.html Sealants are an important part of the building envelope system. I think of them as the third line of defense against water and vapor intrusion. The first line of defense is made up of the building skin, with its coatings, veneers, and sheathings. Membranes and flashings are secondary. Wed, 31 Jan 2007 23:59:00 GMT http://www.ArchitectureWeek.com/2007/0131/building_1-1.html http://www.ArchitectureWeek.com/2007/0131/building_2-1.html The new Center for Embedded Network Sensing CENS building designed by Culver Citybased Studio Pali Fekete Architects SPF:a, is unlike the red brick edifices that grace most of the University of California, Los Angeles campus. Surrounded on all sides by 1960s buildings and occupying a formerly neglected courtyard, the glass and steel structure is like a diamond in the rough. Wed, 31 Jan 2007 23:59:00 GMT http://www.ArchitectureWeek.com/2007/0131/building_2-1.html http://www.ArchitectureWeek.com/2007/0131/building_3-1.html Modular intermodal cargo Containers used to serve primarily for transporting massive amounts of manufactured goods across oceans. But an ongoing imbalance in trade volume between Asia and North America contributes to a surplus of these huge corrugated metal boxes around ports in the United States. And as shipping containers become ubiquitous, architects are increasingly incorporating them into creative buildings. Wed, 31 Jan 2007 23:59:00 GMT http://www.ArchitectureWeek.com/2007/0131/building_3-1.html http://www.ArchitectureWeek.com/2007/0131/tools_1-1.html The new home of the Bridge Academy, a secondary school in a lowincome area of Hackney, London, will be a complex sevenstory, terraced building, fitted into a relatively small site. With a focus on mathematics and music, the school is one of many specialist academies being built by the British government. It is sponsored by UBS, a global financial services firm. Wed, 31 Jan 2007 23:59:00 GMT http://www.ArchitectureWeek.com/2007/0131/tools_1-1.html http://www.ArchitectureWeek.com/2007/0131/tools_2-1.html "Smart geometry" technology has been coming to life in the field of digital architectural design and fabrication. Even those unfamiliar with the parametric modeling approach have seen its effects in innovative building forms over the past few years. Among those collaborating to advance education and research in the area of advanced 3D CAD applications is a small group of scientists, architects, and inventors the Smart Geometry Group. Wed, 31 Jan 2007 23:59:00 GMT http://www.ArchitectureWeek.com/2007/0131/tools_2-1.html http://www.ArchitectureWeek.com/2007/0131/environment_1-1.html In the rolling hills just east of Austin, Texas, a small compound of experimental buildings makes up the Center for Maximum Potential Building Systems CMPBS. Here, Pliny Fisk III, his partner Gail Vittori, and a cadre of researchers and interns explore the depths of sustainable building. Wed, 31 Jan 2007 23:59:00 GMT http://www.ArchitectureWeek.com/2007/0131/environment_1-1.html http://www.ArchitectureWeek.com/2007/0131/environment_2-1.html "Sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs." This definition was written 20 years ago in the Brundtland Report, commissioned by the United Nations. Since then, the goal of sustainable urban development has been embraced, in theory, by many officials and design professionals all over the world. But examples of meeting today's needs seem limited to the more prosperous segments of society. Living conditions today in the slums of many of the world's largest cities are appalling, and not improving. Editor Wed, 31 Jan 2007 23:59:00 GMT http://www.ArchitectureWeek.com/2007/0131/environment_2-1.html http://www.ArchitectureWeek.com/2007/0131/culture_1-1.html Dear ArchitectureWeek, Only a few steps inside the old Croatian coastal city of Trogir is a medieval maze of narrow streets that once helped to thwart enemy attacks. People living here now somehow accommodate their lives and front porches to a newer sort of invasion hordes of tourists tromping through, every day of every long summer. Wed, 31 Jan 2007 23:59:00 GMT http://www.ArchitectureWeek.com/2007/0131/culture_1-1.html http://www.ArchitectureWeek.com/2007/0131/culture_2-1.html Japanese architect Toyo Ito is credited with influencing a generation of younger architects with his ideas about contemporary urban forms. While presenting some of his recent work at an exhibition at the Tokyo Opera City Gallery in 2006, he spoke with journalist Colin Liddell about his designs, his theories, and their origin. Editor Colin Liddell: In all your buildings, you seem to be trying to get away from straight lines. Do you hate straight lines Wed, 31 Jan 2007 23:59:00 GMT http://www.ArchitectureWeek.com/2007/0131/culture_2-1.html