Reviews: Places: Design Observer

Reviews

07.27.10: William L. Fox

Spatial Intelligence: New Futures for Architecture
Can buildings makes us happy? On Places, William L. Fox explores this possibility in his review of Spatial Intelligence: New Futures for Architecture, by Leon van Schaik.
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05.17.10: Beth Weinstein

Self-Fab House
Architect Beth Weinstein reviews Self-Fab House, a compilation of the results of a competition sponsored by the Institute for Advanced Architecture of Catalonia.
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05.13.10: Belmont Freeman

Havana: Nostalgia Is a Dangerous Business
On Places, New York architect Belmont Freeman reviews the recent literature on Havana architecture and urbanism, including Havana Revisited: An Architectural Heritage.
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05.10.10: Timothy Beatley

Green Metropolis
On Places, urban planning professor Timothy Beatley, author of Green Urbanism, reviews Green Metropolis, by David Owen, which argues that Manhattan is the greenest city in the U.S.
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04.08.10: Mimi Zeiger

Two Feet High and Rising: On Optimism, Speculation and Oysters
On Places, Mimi Zeiger reviews MoMA's ambitious new architecture and urban design show, Rising Currents: Projects for New York's Waterfront, which explores how New York Harbor might be adapted in the face of rising sea levels.
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03.15.10: Robert Taylor

Words and Pictures
On Places, architect Robert Taylor reviews Fumihiko Maki's collected essays and Shigeru Ban's latest monograph.
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03.01.10: Brian Rosa

Frank Gohlke: Thoughts on Landscape
On Places, Brian Rosa reviews Frank Gohlke's Thoughts on Landscape, a volume of collected writings which shows that this leading American photographer is as eloquent with words as with images.
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03.01.10: Ian Baldwin

Reading Rudolph
On Places, architect Ian Baldwin reviews Paul Rudolph: Writings on Architecture, and makes a compelling case for looking anew at several important but neglected projects.
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01.25.10: Ian Baldwin

Architect, Park Thyself
The auto-urban relationship, writes Ian Baldwin, is "fumbling, overheated, unsatisfying for both parties." Baldwin reviews House of Cars: Innovation and the Parking Garage, currently on exhibit at the National Building Museum, and The Architecture of Parking, by Simon Henley.
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01.14.10: Beth Weinstein

The City's End
Architect Beth Weinstein reviews The City's End: Two Centuries of Fantasies, Fears and Premonitions of New York's Destruction, by architectural historian Max Page — just in time for the season premiere of 24, which finds Jack Bauer and his fellow counter-terrorists relocated to NYC.
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11.15.09: Mimi Zeiger

Our Design Decade
Mimi Zeiger reviews Design USA, which opened last month at the Cooper-Hewitt, marking ten years of the National Design Awards program.
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11.11.09: Gavin Browning

it is what it is
Gavin Browning reviews it is what is is, the 1,000-page monograph of the work of the New York-based multidisciplinary design firm 2x4.
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10.20.09: William L. Fox

Las Vegas
Writer and critic William L. Fox reviews Las Vegas, by Nicole Huber and Ralph Stern, probing the improbable success of the gambling-entertainment world-city constructed in the midst of the Mojave.
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10.13.09: Dorothy Ball

Bienville's Dilemma
New Orleans-based writer Dorothy Ball reviews Richard Campanella's Bienville's Dilemma, a panoramic study of the history and geography of New Orleans that spans from the early 16th century to Hurricane Katrina and its troubled aftermath.
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09.24.09: Barbara Penner

Niagara: It Has It All
Architectural historian Barbara Penner reviews Inventing Niagara, by Ginger Strand, drawing out the contradictory mix of reverence and exploitation inspired by the famous falls.
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09.18.09: Ian Baldwin

The Past Is Promenade
Architect Ian Baldwin contemplates the High Line and sees in New York's newest park a rare and valuable form of urban place: a slow corridor.
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09.16.09: Sandy Isenstadt

Crystal and Arabesque
Sandy Isenstadt reviews Jonathan Massey's Crystal and Arabesque, which retrieves the life and work of the long-neglected early 20th-century architect Claude Bragdon.
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09.12.09: Chris Reed

The Infrastructural City
Los Angeles depends upon vast infrastructural systems that are breathtakingly powerful, yet vulnerable to disruption, even disaster. Landscape architect Chris Reed reviews The Infrastructural City.

09.08.09: Mark Klett

Placing Memory
Photographer Mark Klett reviews Placing Memory, which juxtaposes contemporary color photos of abandoned Japanese-American internment camps, by photographer Todd Stewart, with government-commissioned period images, to haunting effect.
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05.19.09: David Moffat

Interrogating Tradition

05.19.09: Kelly Quinn

The Heart of the City: A Conversation about The Wire

12.15.08: Willow Amam

The Landscape Totems: Speculations on Growth and Decay

12.15.08: Susan Szenasy

In My Rear-View Mirror

12.15.08: Yael Allweil

The Arc: A Formal Structure for a Palestinian State

12.15.08: Elma Tomlinson

America Town: Building the Outposts of Empire

12.15.08: Nicole Huber

Olympic Sculpture Park - Seattle, WA by Weiss/Manfredi Architecture/Landscape/Urbanism

12.15.08: Frederick Steiner

Reading Landscapes

12.15.08: David Thigpen

The Historic Chicago Greystone Initiative by City Design Center, University of Illinois at Chicago

10.15.08: Cassim Shepard

The "Places 25" Symposium

10.15.08: Donlyn Lyndon

The New U.S. Embassy in Berlin
In creating a new U.S. embassy in Berlin, architectural design is just one of the challenges.
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