Results tagged “remkoolhaas”

    The Chrysler Building. The Seagram Building. The Apple Store Soho? The Center for Architecture's executive director Rick Bell made a list of 10 great buildings to see in New York City (presumably for tourists) and spoke to the AP about it. The list spans two boroughs, a classic skyscraper, a beloved transportation hub, and retail stores, and some landmarks are deliberately left off (like the Empire State Building which everyone knows about):
  • Conde Nast Building, for its "environmentally correct" design by Fox & Fowle.
  • Brooklyn Museum, for the modern entry pavilion and plaza, designed by James Polshek, against its Beaux Arts facade; the AP writes the addition makes makes the museum "inviting and accessible, a suitable centerpiece for Brooklyn's burgeoning hipster art scene."
  • Prada New York in Soho, designed by Rem Koolhaas, for the way it "displays the merchandise, it doesn't sell it."

One casualty of MAS's proposal would be the Robert Moses Playground, home of the East End Hockey Association. The mostly featureless lot hosts the local roller hockey league, which is claiming that Robert Moses Playground is the only area of its type on the East Side that it can use. MAS is proposing that the playground be traded to the U.N., which would build a 35-story tower on the land, in exchange for waterfront access to complete the greenway.

The NY Times has a nice profile of Amanda Burden, the influential Department of City Planning commissioner whose policies will shape the city for years to come.

The Whitney's third expansion plan in 20 years may be abandoned if it moves its addition to a site at the southern tip of the High Line. The space opened up after the Dia Art Foundation announced last week that it was not building a museum there.

In what seems like a familiar refrain, neighbors of the Whitney Museum are upset over its 18-floor addition. And now, a residents and the Carlyle Hotel have filed a lawsuit agains the city claiming, as the NY Sun puts it, that "the Board of Standards and Appeals erred in granting the museum variances to zoning regulations, in order to allow the Whitney to go forward with its expansion." The group is still upset over the planned 178 foot tower and a huge crane that is to be installed (to move art around), plus the fact that the Whitney was granted seven variances to move forward with expansion plans.

A five-alarm blaze hit a historic building in SoHo last night that injured six firefighters and one civilian. The fire was brought under control this morning by 198 firefighters and 44 units. 1010 WINS is reporting that the fire is being called "suspicious" as it started in a utility room and spread through the building's ventilation system. The historic 575 Broadway, estimated to be worth $15 million, is home to the flagship $40 million Prada store designed by Rem Koolhaas. The building structure is safe, but a FDNY representative told the Post that "It's pretty nasty."

, a showcase of 25 high-rise buildings designed in the last 10 years. The exhibit takes a look at the evolution of the architectural genre for the 21st century, exploring innovations in structure and program as well as social and urban implications.

Gothamist gets what Pederson is saying, but U.F.O.'s aren't bad: Think about the Guggenheim, both in NY and Bilbao. Another urban building that looks like nothing else around it might seems amazing: The new Seattle Public Library, which Rem Koolhaas and OMA designed. If you're in Seattle after the opening (May 23), architectural tours start on June 5. Check out Herbert Muschamp's review of the building that breaks greg.org's streak of hating Muschamp, for crying out loud.

Nothing says Tuesday night like the launch party for a book with a cover of Kim Jon Il as Terminator, George Bush wearing a freedom-fries hat, and Saddam Hussein as Rambo. Architect Rem Koolhaas's new book, Content, is a follow-up of sorts to the wonderful S, M, L, XL , covering architecture, politics, the economy, and technology, and pubisher Taschen and artist Jeff Koons threw Koolhaas a party at the Women's National Republican Club last night. In a room filled with architects, architect groupies, and bloggers, Koolhaas (in a natty Prada suit) called Content an "experiment in disemmination," having a magazine masquerading as book, printed on a magazine stock, so it could be sold for the low price of "10 Euros." Euros? Speak dollars, man! We Americans hate to think about the world outside of the continental U.S. (yeah, you heard that, Alaska and Hawaii)...and could you calculate the NY state tax too? Anyway, 10 EUROS equals about 12.25 USD, but Content is listed at $14.99 on the Taschen site and it's selling for $19.99 from Amazon. But as the book is considered a non-profit endeavor, and as it is relevant to any Koolhaas or S,M,L,XL fan, the mark-up is worth it.

while the book's cover shows the beauty of Photoshop and some pictures of George W., Kim Jong Il, and Saddam.

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Greg Allen

The "dream teams" of noted architects working together for prestigious projects is the subject of a Times architecture article. Though Daniel Libeskind, dream team of one, won the World Trade Center competition, apparently teamwork is the new black of the architecture world, as evinced by all the other teams who entered. The Times brings up a 2001 quote from design world "star," Rem Koolhaas: "If I pride myself on one thing, it is a talent to collaborate." But then Kevin Kernon, one of the architects in the United Architects team, says, "Rem talks a lot about collaboration, but at the end of the day he isn't that interested in actually doing it himself." Meow!

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