ART WATTS In harnessing solar energy, the usual approach is to bolt an array of panels onto the roof of a building and plug it in. But recent advances such as building-integrated photovoltaics (BIPV) allow designers to incorporate solar cells seamlessly into a building's exterior. Canadian glass artist Sarah Hall is taking this idea in a novel direction by using solar technology to create a striking contemporary version of stained glass that illuminates the aesthetic potential of PV. — Published 2012.0606
	DESIGN WITH ENTERPRISE I wasn't always fascinated with architecture and design. I'm not an architect, but I have come to realize how important good design is as an ingredient to better human health and well-being. And how important business skills are to successful practice. — Published 2012.0425
	THE ARCHITECTURAL DETAIL: MAYBECK AND AALTO The San Francisco-based magazine Architectural News ceased publication in 1891 after only three issues, so there is no way of knowing what the specific contents of a planned future issue, a translation of Gottfried Semper's Der Stil by Bernard Maybeck, might have been. There is no evidence that the translation was ever made, of what sections he would have chosen, or what Semper's influence on Maybeck's work might be. — Published 2012.0404
	OSCAR NIEMEYER - BRAZILIAN MODERNIST As the preeminent figure of one of the most innovative national interpretations of architectural Modernism, and a radical critic of orthodox Modernist aesthetic formulae and moralizing ideologies, Brazilian architect Oscar Niemeyer occupies a unique place in the pantheon of great builders. — Published 2012.0201
	NEW WOOD WORK Within these plantations of God, a decorum and sanctity reign, a perennial festival is dressed, and the guest sees not how he should tire of them in a thousand years. In the woods, we return to reason and faith. There I feel that nothing can befall me in life,— no disgrace, no calamity, (leaving me my eyes,) which nature cannot repair. Standing on the bare ground,— my head bathed by the blithe air, and uplifted into infinite space,— all mean egotism vanishes. I become a transparent eye-ball; I am nothing; I see all; the currents of the Universal Being circulate through me; I am part or particle of God. — Published 2011.1102
	PREDOCK'S CANADIAN MUSEUM FOR HUMAN RIGHTS "You never know, even if you think you do, where you're going." —Antoine Predock The Canadian Museum for Human Rights is intended to be an educational museum of ideas rather than objects, where we can "explore the subject of human rights, with special but not exclusive reference to Canada," according to the museum's web site. — Published 2011.0803
	AN EXCELLENT ADDITION Designing an appropriate addition to almost any National Historic Landmark should be seen as a challenge. When the landmark building is by Frank Lloyd Wright, the challenge acquires its own dimension in history. In their new addition to an American masterpiece of religious architecture — Wright's First Unitarian Society Meeting House in Madison, Wisconsin — The Kubala Washatko Architects has risen beautifully to such a challenge. — Published 2011.0525
	MINNESOTA AIA AWARDS The house on Bert Hodus and Donna Brogan's farm takes design cues from a farm icon. With its south facade "warped" by design, the couple's new home evokes the graceful sag of many aging 19th- and 20th-century American barns. The Blair, Wisconsin, house is wrapped in rainscreen siding of locally harvested, rough-sawn white oak, evocative of the clients' own turn-of-the-20th-century red barn nearby. And the window and door openings are few and large. — Published 2011.0202
	ULM MÜNSTERPLATZ Just over 100 miles (170 kilometers) from Freiburg, Germany, the city of Ulm straddles the banks of the Danube River, and although the two cities' cathedral squares — Münsterplätze — have slightly different birthdates, they are virtual twins. They grew up over the same five-and-a-half centuries, only to be laid low in the same bombing raids of 1944. — Published 2010.0929
	AIA MICHIGAN AWARDS 2010 The Richmond Center for Visual Arts in Kalamazoo is striking, with building forms tied to its arts hub functions. Copper cladding, curving in two dimensions, wraps the lobby and front exhibit areas, setting off a large glazed facade section that allows natural light deep into the space. The lightness of the glass and copper, and of zinc that wraps the lecture areas, contrasts with the visual weight of the precast concrete panels cladding the rest of the building. — Published 2010.0811

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