Prince Charles in the White House? Expressway toll booth of the future ©Paul Spreiregen Recent news about a new U.S. government policy concerning the design of public buildings under President Trump bears a striking resemblance to the controversy surrounding that very issue in the U.K. in the second half of the 20thcentury. It was then that Prince Charles appeared on the scene to challenge the use of modern design in architecture. Prince Charles’ career as architecture critic on the public stage began in 1984 with his criticism of Mies van der Rohe’s design for a new tower on Mansion House Square in London. Unfortunately for Britain’s architects, the voice of the crown carries some weight in British society, and the Mies tower was scrapped, replaced by a post-modern structure by James Stirling—which the Prince also did not like. According to the Prince, those modernist buildings resembled “Frankenstein monsters.” According to U.K.-based architects who had to deal with Charles’ pushback on modern design during that period, he was the “worst thing that happened to architecture here.” Since then, Prince Charles’ influence in blocking the evolution of modern design in the U.K. has diminished considerably with the ascendance of modern architecture as a common staple—led by architects such as Norman Foster, Richard Rogers, Amanda Levete, Zaha Hadid, John McAslan, Nicholas Grimshaw, Thomas Heatherwick, and others. Although not taken seriously by his European neighbors on the continent, Prince Charles’ ideas did find fertile ground in the U.S.—both in municipalities and even in academia, where classical architecture became a staple at such programs as Notre Dame and, to a lesser extent, Yale. At the latter, I learned from a former student there that Prince Charles even surfaced on a list of “architects” one could choose from as a topic in one seminar. Instead of peer review, federal architecture under the auspices of the General Services Administration (GSA) now will apparently be at the mercy of a “beautification” panel, which will see to it that modern architecture recedes into the background, if at all. U.S. architects may see themselves placed in the uncomfortable position German, Italian and Russian architects experienced under their totalitarian regimes in the 1930s. By embracing the primacy of classical architecture as a blueprint for public buildings, the Trump regime certainly has helped the National Civic Art Society reach its ultimate goal, at least at the federal level—requiring American architects to turn to the replication of 17thand 18thcentury-style buildings as the preferred design model. Assuming that happens, Prince Charles would be a welcome visitor in the White House. Addressing this issue, Paul Spreiregen FAIA, architect and professional adviser for the Vietnam Memorial competition states: “Architectural history is not a copybook. Rather It is a textbook, to be read with a deep understanding of the many principles upon which architecture comes into being. The history of architecture is not served by aping it but by building on it, addressing the programmatic needs of each new building in its own time and place, its neighbored respected, thereby reflecting and honoring the culture it serves. To use the “styles” of the past as a cloak for the new is a lie, a subterfuge for respectability and supposed prestige. That is the work of authoritarian governments. Stalin, Hitler and Mussolini were its more recent and notorious promoters. They produced not architecture but laughable if not tragic cartoons of architecture. All the great works of architecture of the past were, in their own times and places, masterpieces of ancient principles seen anew. That practice has been the glory of the best of American architecture.”** *Letters to the Editor, The Washington Post, 17 February 2020 https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-glory-of-american-architecture-comes-from-building-on-its-history/2020/02/17/00296bd0-4f7d-11ea-967b-e074d302c7d4_story.html |
Young Architects in Competitions When Competitions and a New Generation of Ideas Elevate Architectural Quality  by Jean-Pierre Chupin and G. Stanley Collyer published by Potential Architecture Books, Montreal, Canada 2020 271 illustrations in color and black & white Available in PDF and eBook formats ISBN 9781988962047 What do the Vietnam Memorial, the St. Louis Arch, and the Sydney Opera House have in common? These world renowned landmarks were all designed by architects under the age of 40, and in each case they were selected through open competitions. At their best, design competitions can provide a singular opportunity for young and unknown architects to make their mark on the built environment and launch productive, fruitful careers. But what happens when design competitions are engineered to favor the established and experienced practitioners from the very outset? This comprehensive new book written by Jean-Pierre Chupin (Canadian Competitions Catalogue) and Stanley Collyer (COMPETITIONS) highlights for the crucial role competitions have played in fostering the careers of young architects, and makes an argument against the trend of invited competitions and RFQs. The authors take an in-depth look at past competitions won by young architects and planners, and survey the state of competitions through the world on a region by region basis. The end result is a compelling argument for an inclusive approach to conducting international design competitions. Download Young Architects in Competitions for free at the following link: https://crc.umontreal.ca/en/publications-libre-acces/  Aerial view of site – Courtesy National Finnish Museum When major cultural institutions in Finland plan a new building project, one can almost always assume that an open competition will be the vehicle by which the client settles on the building’s design. The only question is, will this be organized in a format open to local, Scandinavian, or international architects. In the case of the National Museum of Finland annex competition, it was open to architects throughout the world — resulting in 185 entries. Read more…
The Opening of Taichung’s Central Park by Catherine Mosbach/Philippe Rahm
 View from the south with downtown Taichung in the distance image: ©Mosbach/Rahm
The abandonment and closing of airports, including decommissioning those that were used for military purposes, has presented design communities with several opportunities to convert them entirely to civilian purposes. Notable among those which have been the result of competitions are Orange County Great Park, Irvine, California (Ken Smith Landscape Architects), The Estonian National Museum (Dan Dorell, Lina Ghotmeh and Tsuyoshi Tane), and Toronto’s less successful Downsview Park competition, whereby the winning design by OMA, with trees as the primary feature, has been basically ignored. Instead, the area has become the site of numerous commercial and residential projects.
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SMAR’s Winning Entry Gets the Green Light  Image: ©SMAR Architecture The winning competition entry in the 2016 Science Island competition in Kaunas, Lithuania by SMAR Architects may only take five years to realize—from the date of the competition to completion. This is encouraging news, as the duration of such projects resulting from a competition can often take much longer—sometimes up to 8-10 years. Read more…  Night view of the memorial tapestry from Independence Avenue, with Gehry’s sketch of the Normandy cliffs. Explaining the contributions of a World War II hero and later President of the United States on a very modest site on Independence Avenue just off the Washington Mall is tantamount to asking an author to describe the life of this person in no more than one paragraph. But on September 17th, after a long and bumpy journey, lasting almost 20 years and navigating a warren of the DC approval processes and public scrutiny, the Eisenhower Memorial finally was dedicated and opened to the public. Designed by Frank Gehry, it has received mixed reviews, the majority being more positive. But most have pointed out that the memorial is more impressive at night than in full daylight. This is due primarily to the illumination of an almost block-long metallic tapestry—featuring a sketch by Gehry, which depicts his interpretation of the cliffs of the Normandy coastline where the Americans landed on D-Day. Read more…  Professional winner: Brooklyn Bridge Forest (image © Pilot Projects Design Collective) While looking for new adventures on a visit to New York City, friends suggested that I take time to walk across the Brooklyn Bridge—certainly a New York icon. For those intending to undertake this trek across the bridge for the first time, the bridge consists of layers, with a large platform for pedestrians on top of a lower level for cars and the metro system. Traversing this connection for the first time between Manhattan and Brooklyn is not just about getting from one place to another, but experiencing a great scenic view of both boroughs and occasionally interacting with other bridge crossers. As for the latter, they provide a flavor of the city’s demographics, as opposed to similar experiences one might have of the city’s inhabitants when riding the city’s subway system. Read more… |