Welcome to the CFA blog

David C. McFadden, CFA Founder/CEO

This Blog was born on May 5, 2009 for the purpose of reaching out to the architecture & interior design community with interesting architecture, industry news,  advice & job advice. Your comments and suggestions are welcome.

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Island House by IROJE KHM Architects

From the Karmatrendz Blog

Floating site on the river

This site, where is floating on river and confronted the graceful landscape, was strongly recognized to me as a part of nature, from the first time that I met. From then, I started to visualize “the architectural nature” as a place of recreation. Form of site = Form of architecture = Maximum efficiency of landuse. While maximizing the efficiency of landuse, the leaner concrete mass, that cherishes the courtyard where is filled with the water and the greenery, was laid out on this site along the irregular formed site line. This courtyard is “The architectural nature” and a central recreation space as extended river that communicate the river and architecture. Continuous circulation of stepped roof garden – Creation of new green land in this site The whole part of the step typed roofs, where is moving upward with various level, are directly linked to the bed rooms in upper floor. Finally, this stepped roof gardens are linked to both sides of the inner court at where swimming pool is. The inner court where is filled with the water and flower and fruit, and the whole of the roof gardens are circulated as the continuous landscape place and that is the place as “architectural nature” in concept. Sucking in dynamic-surrounding landscape Naturally, all of the rooms inside this site-shaped-mass are laid toward the picturesque landscape to enjoy the graceful scenery surrounded this site. The huge panoramic view framed with sloped ceiling line that is composed with the lines of stepped roof gardens and the bottom line of the inner court, is the major impression of inner space of this house. Promenade inner space of skipfloor made the promenade roofgarden-space of skipfloor. Skip floor plan of inside of this house produced various dramatic spaces. Floating boxes with bamboo garden – Dynamic, unrealistic sequence of interior space. As “The architectural nature”, floating white polyhedral masses that have the built-in bamboo gardens, produced the various stories of vertical space Landscape architecture – Harmonizing with the surrounding landscape The shape of the mountain type composed of irregular polygonal shaped concrete mass and metal mesh was designed to harmonize with the context as “the architectural mountain”. There was the intention to be a part of the surrounding context that consisted of the river and the mountain. Architectural Island – Island House As a result, this house was to be “The island house” as an “architectural island”.

More photos and information from the Karmatrendz Blog

The Shaw house by Patkau Architects

The Shaw house by Patkau Architects, practicing in Vancouver, BC, Canada won the American Institute of Architects National Honor Award in 2005 – But take another look…it’s still way ahead of its time.

Check out more photos at the Patkau website.

Where Does the Freelancers Union Stand on Healthcare Reform?

Freelancers Union strongly supports the national effort to increase quality, affordable coverage for our members and all independent workers.

The current health care system is failing, and it hurts independent workers more than most.

Freelancers Union has been building solutions within, around, and despite our nation’s crippled health care and insurance system for over ten years. We have confronted some unpleasant realities along the way—from skyrocketing medical costs to an outdated employer-based system.

We have also found many inspiring models, some of which have not only informed our work but are also reflected in the health reform proposals being crafted on Capital Hill. But with the debate moving into high gear, politics and buzzwords are overshadowing conversation about priorities and goals.

 What kinds of reform have the potential to truly benefit Freelancers Union members? We’ve outlined five measurements of success and explained the ideas behind them and the policies that could achieve them. We hope these pages will help you better understand our organization and the freelancer’s place in the national debate.

Learn more about where they stand here.

CFA is a member of the Freelancers Union but does not endorse all policy or advocacy positions taken by them.

Danish Architect Bjarke Ingels: 3 warp-speed architecture tales

If you cannot spare 18 minutes now, be sure to come back when you can.  This is a must for architects, designers, green & sustainability enthusiasts and thinkers of all kinds.

From TED.com TEDTalks podcasts

Danish architect Bjarke Ingels rockets through photo/video-mingled stories of his eco-flashy designs. His buildings not only look like nature — they act like nature: blocking the wind, collecting solar energy — and creating stunning views.

About TEDTalks

TEDTalks is a daily video podcast of the best talks and performances from the TED Conference, where the world’s leading thinkers and doers give the talk of their lives in 18 minutes. Featured speakers have included Al Gore on climate change, Philippe Starck on design, Jill Bolte Taylor on observing her own stroke, Nicholas Negroponte on One Laptop per Child, Jane Goodall on chimpanzees, Bill Gates on malaria and mosquitoes, Pattie Maes on the “Sixth Sense” wearable tech, and “Lost” producer JJ Abrams on the allure of mystery. TED stands for Technology, Entertainment, Design, and TEDTalks cover these topics as well as science, business, development and the arts.

I. M. Pei to Receive British Royal Gold Medal

Via Bustler

Chinese-born American architect I. M. Pei, who is best known in Europe for his transformation of the Louvre in Paris, has been named today as the recipient of one of the world’s most prestigious architecture prizes, the Royal Gold Medal.

Laureate of the British Royal Gold Medal: I. M. Pei (Photo: Owen Franken)

Given in recognition of a lifetime’s work, the Royal Gold Medal is approved personally by the Queen of England and is given to a person or group of people who have had a significant influence “either directly or indirectly on the advancement of architecture”.

I. M. Pei is one of the most prolific architects of all time having completed over 170 projects and more than 50 master plans. At the age of 92, he remains actively engaged in architecture. His work easily spans the divide between commercial and cultural architecture, and he is equally respected and sought after by clients in all fields.

Glass Pyramid at the Louvre in Paris, France by I. M. Pei (Photo: pmorgan)

Ieoh Ming Pei (always known as I. M.) is a Chinese American architect, born in China in 1917. He traveled to the United States in 1935 to study architecture, and never returned to live in his home country. He graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and received a Masters degree from Harvard Graduate School of Design, where he studied under Gropius and Breuer, coming under the influence of the International Style which was to inspire his work for almost 70 years. His first commission was for the noted planner-developer William Zeckendorf: the Miesian Mile High Center in Denver. He set up his own practice in 1955. His best known buildings are probably the National Center for Atmospheric Research Boulder, Colorado (1961-67), the East Wing of the National Gallery Washington DC (1968-78), the John F Kennedy Library, Boston (1965-79), the Bank of China, Hong Kong (1982-89), the Grand Louvre expansion and renovation (1983-93) and the Miho Museum in Shiga, Japan (1991-97). In recent years he has completed major museum projects in Luxembourg, China and Qatar. His only building in the UK is a private commission: a tiny pavilion in Wiltshire.

Deutsches Historisches Museum (German Historic Museum) in Berlin, Germany. Extension premises by I. M. Pei (Photo: Mazbln)

I. M. Pei has been honored by America, France, Germany, Japan and the UK where he is an Honorary Academician of the Royal Academy of Arts (1993). He has been awarded the Thomas Jefferson Memorial Medal for Architecture (1976); the American Institute of Architects – the Gold Medal (1979); the American Academy of Arts & Letters – Gold Medal for Architecture (1979); La Grande Médaille d’Or of l’Académie d’Architecture, France (1981), the Pritzker Architecture Prize (1983); the Praemium Imperiale for lifetime achievement in architecture, Japan (1989); Officier de La Légion d’Honneur, France (1993) and the Thomas Jefferson Medal for distinguished achievement in the arts, humanities, or social sciences (2001).

Bank of China Tower, Hong Kong by I. M. Pei (Photo: WiNG)

Speaking from New York, I. M. Pei said of the honour,

‘It is a great honor to receive the Royal Gold Medal from the Royal Institute of British Architects. I am humbled indeed to read the names of those who have preceded me as recipients. I look forward to attending the ceremony in February, and to thanking personally RIBA President Ruth Reed and the Honors Committee, and David Adjaye, who nominated me.’

I. M. Pei was nominated for the 2010 Royal Gold Medal by David Adjaye. His citation concludes with a personal tribute: ‘When I began my studies in architecture, I. M. Pei was already a giant in the cannon of greats. His work seemed effortlessly capable of creating extraordinary clarity out of complex and conflicting demands. His is an agile ability, working with Heads of State, Kings and Queens, “hard nosed” developers and non profit institutions, in each case creating revealing, extraordinary works of precision with quality and detail.

‘I remember as a young student first visiting the Louvre in Paris and marveling at its extraordinary ability to unify and modernize what was a much loved but disparate institution and behold its magnificent, gravity defying, glass pyramid. He became a role model for me as a young architect.’

RIBA President Ruth Reed, who chaired the Honors Committee which selects to Royal Gold medal winner said,

“Chairing the Honors Committee was my very first duty as President and it was an honor for me too. The Royal Gold Medal is a most auspicious award and we have chosen in I. M. Pei a very special winner. He is one of the greats of 20th – and 21st – century architecture; a man whose work I have always admired. A list of his influences and those he has influenced reads like a roll-call of the Modern Movement. Seldom has such a reward been so overdue or so just.”

I. M. Pei will be presented with the Royal Gold Medal on February 11, 2010 at a ceremony at the Royal Institute of British Architects in London, when the 2010 RIBA International and Honorary Fellowships will also be presented.

The Royal Gold Medal was inaugurated by Queen Victoria in 1848 and is conferred annually by the Sovereign on ‘some distinguished architect for work or high merit, or on some distinguished person whose work has promoted either directly or indirectly the advancement of architecture.’

Previous winners have included Sir Charles Barry, Sir George Gilbert Scott, Alfred Waterhouse, Sir Edwin Lutyens, Sir Giles Gilbert Scott, Charles Voysey, Frank Lloyd Wright, Le Corbusier, Walter Gropius, Alvar Aalto, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Kenzo Tange, Ove Arup, Sir Nikolaus Pevsner, Louis Kahn, James Stirling, Berthold Lubetkin, Norman Foster, Richard Rogers, Oscar Niemeyer, Jean Nouvel, Rem Koolhaas, Toyo Ito and Alvaro Siza.

This year’s RIBA Honors Committee was chaired by the President of the RIBA, Ruth Reed with David Adjaye OBE, architect, Adjaye Associates; Edward Cullinan CBE, architect, Edward Cullinan Architects; Max Fordham, Environmental Engineer, Max Fordham Partnership; Anne Lacaton, architect, Lacaton & Vassal (Paris); and Laura Lee, Client, Maggie’s.

Volume B Vitra Store by Marcio Kogan

A sublime design by Marcio Kogan for the Vitra furniture store located in Sao Paulo, Brazil.

For full portfolio of photographs vist Plataforma Arquitectura

Namba Parks in Osaka / Japan by The Jerde Partnership

Jump to Ferilli Blog for post

Venice Biennale creative directors named

28 September 2009 | by Gemma Battenbough | Architecture & Design

Architectural photographer John Gollings and Melbourne-based architect Ivan Rijavec will head the creative team for the Australian Pavilion at the upcoming 12th Venice International Architecture Biennale.

The team’s two-part ‘NOW + WHEN Australian Urbanism’ exhibition will highlight three of Australia’s most interesting urban regions as they are ‘now’, before dramatically representing futuristic urban environments as they may be ‘when’ we reach 2100.
 
Opening in September 2010, the exhibition will feature a range of dazzlingly visceral digital stereoscopic (three-dimensional) images, which will fill the two-level Philip Cox-designed Australian Pavilion and represent both the NOW and WHEN components.

On the pavilion’s upper level, NOW will feature current urban environments in Sydney, Melbourne and Surfers Paradise. Stereoscopic visuals will show contrasting views of these cities from macro-scapes at 20,000 feet to ‘helicoptering’ views of urban and architectural icons at close range. All three cities will be filmed at dusk, when the “Australian urban spectacle becomes luminous and articulate in conveying the way our cities work”, the proposal states.
 
On the pavilion’s lower level, WHEN will imagine Australian urban spaces in 91 years time, with the intent of “catapulting urban debate into eye-popping visceral entertainment set in a soundscape”. Australian architects will be asked to submit 3D entries for inclusion by entering ‘Ideas for Australian Cities 2100’, a national competition. A range of entries will then be chosen focusing on the creative potential of architecture.
 
Two stereo screens mounted back-to-back at the rear of the upper and lower exhibition spaces will be the focus of the installation. An urban themed black and white geometric matrix will be projected on the walls, floors and ceilings of both levels leading to two stereo screens, which will feature the urban environments in continuous three-minute loop cycles.  
 
“As countries around the world continue to move into a post-GFC economic recovery phase, it’s vital that Australia maximises every opportunity to reinforce the nation’s competitive strengths and standing on the world stage,” recently appointed Venice Biennale commissioner, Janet Holmes à Court, said.?

The Venice Architecture Biennale, now widely regarded as the most important event on the international architecture calendar, is “un-missable”, Holmes à Court said. The 2008 event attracted 130,000 informed visitors from around the globe over 10 weeks and the 2010 Biennale is expected to eclipse this, she said.??

“I have every confidence that the appointment of our 2010 creative director team – led by John Gollings and Ivan Rijavec – affords us a great head-start in the promotion of the nation’s incredibly rich and diverse architectural talent,” Holmes à Court said.
 
The full 2010 creative directors team comprises Australia’s pre-eminent architectural photographer John Gollings, leading Melbourne-based architect Ivan Rijavec, graphic designer David Pidgeon, astrophysicist Professor Jeffrey Shaw, architect and sound designer Nick Murray and 3D experts Sam Slicer and Daniel Flood.
 
A total of 29 submissions were received for the role of creative director, with five proposals shortlisted in a rigorous selection process ahead of today’s announcement of the winning team.
 
The Venice Architecture Biennale was inaugurated in 1980 and is now held every two years, alternating with the Art Biennale. Thousands of the world’s leading architects and city planners plus more than 52,000 people visited the 2008 Australian Pavilion.

Australia’s attendance at the Venice Architecture Biennale is an initiative of the Australian Institute of Architects, which pledged funding for each of three Venice Architecture Biennales – 2006, 2008 and 2010. Fundraising efforts continue to guarantee an ongoing presence in Venice.