S K Y L I N E | The Return of the Model
Trend-spotting during final reviews
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Final reviews are in the air, and there couldn’t be a better opportunity for trend-spotting!
With most schools back to some kind of “normal,” students and instructors alike are acquainting themselves with the new-old possibilities of in-person architectural instruction and production. The following observations pull from my own experiences teaching at the University of Illinois Chicago (UIC) and from the impressions of others with first-hand knowledge; the social media pages of various universities were also consulted.
After almost two years of online or hybrid education, this academic year saw the return of physical models at schools such as Harvard GSD, UIC, UC Berkeley, and SCI-Arc. We are not talking puny study models here, but models the size of a (small) human being! Pedagogically, the physical model tests the “truth” of the digitally produced image. More than that, it embodies the desire to reground architectural production in physical reality, especially regarding materiality, which becomes a site for design, experimentation, and even critique. Also, big models just look darn cool!
At the same time, we are seeing a deepening interest in all things digital: video games, virtual reality, alternative platforms such as Twitch, on which Failed Architecture hosted an event this week and which was recently used as the venue for a review at Kent State University.
I see these antithetical but complementary trends originating from a kind of anxiety that predated the pandemic and intensified with the extreme isolation experienced by so many: a need for meaningful connections of any kind.
— Palmyra Geraki
DISPATCHES
5/6: American Framing on American soil
Wrightwood 659
CHICAGO (IRL)—A few years ago, PAUL ANDERSEN and PAUL PREISSNER, architects and colleagues at the University of Illinois Chicago (UIC), were each working on houses at similar stages of construction. Upon seeing the buildings as just framing, they both had the same reaction: this is kind of beautiful. Later, Andersen, who runs the Denver-based Independent Architecture, and Preissner, whose eponymous office is based out of Chicago, collaborated on a pitch for the U.S. Pavilion for the 17th International Architecture Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia—what eventually became American Framing.
Exhibited in Venice last year, the project recently traveled to Prague and Chicago, where it is on view at the Wrightwood 659 gallery through July 16. It examines, per the curators, the “overlooked and familiar architecture of the country’s most common construction system”: softwood construction.
Speaking at the launch of the Chicago edition, Andersen and Preissner reiterated their belief that daringly original architecture can be found in and created through the mundane. That idea is borne out at the exhibition, especially by the three-story installation situated in Wrightwood’s atrium. (At Venice, the structure was four stories tall, while the Prague version was significantly scaled down.) Given spatial constraints, Andersen and Preissner inverted the gable roof, resulting in a compelling form that looks beguilingly different from the top-floor mezzanine. In the galleries, the duo collected objects and materials under the appropriately unassuming guise of mere observation, reproduction, and documentation. On the walls are photographs by DANIEL SHEA and CHRIS STRONG documenting day laborers and the material culture surrounding timber construction. Sprinkled throughout are furniture by UIC faculty members ANIA JAWORSKA and NORMAN KELLEY, which reproduce historic furniture pieces in common dimensional lumber. And in the limelight: scale models of wood-framed buildings researched and designed by UIC STUDENTS.
The furniture is comfortable, the photos are eloquent, the models are instructive. A model of Spike's doghouse glimpsed in a 1952 episode of Tom and Jerry sits alone on a massive table; for a moment you think there might be something missing. In the end, what you see is what you get, but you see more with every look. American Framing is the ultimate exercise in “show, don't tell”; and it’s kind of beautiful.
— Palmyra Geraki
5/6: An Eventful Night in Bethlehem
Southside Survey: Housing Futures for South Bethlehem with Wes Hiatt
BETHLEHEM, PENNSYLVANIA (IRL)—“Look! I can see my house,” I overheard a passerby say at the one-night-only exhibition Southside Survey: Housing Futures for South Bethlehem, which was designed by WES HIATT and ROBERT HON of the Brooklyn-based firm Borough Works. Over the course of the three-hour event, it became clear that the duo’s proposal—to reframe the potential of the “alley house” typology common to Bethlehem as a solution to the growing need for workers’ housing—resonated with the over 300 locals, city planners, and affordable housing advocates in attendance. Hiatt and Hon’s designs for five new alley houses were grounded in a rigorous investigation into the architectural character of South Bethlehem and “the general building organization, frontage, entries, and landscape features” of its prevalent residential typology. The designers hoped that the prototypes will “fit in” with their context and meet the needs of the community. The exhibition format was just as novel. Instead of curating yet another rarified gallery show about housing futures, the Southside Survey organizers spent time in a place, met with people in that place, and exhibited in that place—surrounded by those excited to see their houses thoughtfully drawn and considered.
— Anthony V. Gagliardi
5/7: And the yays have it!
5 WTC: What Next?
CHINATOWN (IRL/Zoom)—It was open-mic night on Saturday at the Clemente Center’s Flamboyan Theater, as 50 odd architects and activists (and another 50 or so by Zoom) gathered to watch presentations of designs for a 100% Affordable 5 World Trade Center. After each architect made a three-minute presentation, the crowd voted, using red or green cards, their proposal up or down: Make an affordable vertical urban factory? Yes! Make love, not lofts? Yes! Reclaim 432 Park as a symbol of equity? Yes! Build a second, upside down freedom tower? Yes! Forgo a tower, and use the space as a single-story daycare? Resoundly defeated. Don’t try to save New York City through architecture? Yes!
I played MC to the event, and after boasting about our team’s logistical prowess in pulling off a hybrid presentation, karma struck and tech woes abounded, leading to the omission of videos submitted by remote participants. These we look forward to sharing in the near future.
The hosts from the Coalition for a 100% Affordable 5 World Trade Center concluded the evening by exhorting architects to reclaim the political mantle so many took up at the tragic beginning of the World Trade Center saga. Though there was much humor in the night, do not be mistaken: the participants are ready to venture into the arena, and have fun while they are at it.
— Nicolas Kemper
5/12: Games, Cocktails, and Activism: In support of the Good Cause Eviction bill
Guest Crit Season 2 Premiere: Apartments with Cea Weaver, Michael Nicholas, Kevin Rogan, Kate Wagner
(TWITCH)—Have you ever scrolled through StreetEasy? In a city that was once likened to a “luxury good” by none other than its mayor (Bloomberg), we penurious tenants might wonder why we continue to put up with the cost of living here. Is there a masochism at play? Well, we can dull the pain by getting together around a shared screen and laughing about how bad it is, which is exactly the tactic employed by FAILED ARCHITECTURE on the latest installment of its Twitch-based guest crit series, with special guest CEA WEAVER, of Housing Justice for All.
The panel roped attendees into playing a game of “guess the price,” whereby all involved judged a series of Craigslist apartments—ranging from a unit in the luxury, BIG-designed VIA W57 high-rise to a no-frills Bushwick studio that lacked an oven to a possible PornHub set in DUMBO. Co-host Kate Wagner presided over the fun, contributing her fair share of millennial meme-speak. (At some point, someone pointed out that “Kate has made joke quota.”) At around the 47-minute mark, things took a more serious turn. As Weaver reminded us, we have just two weeks to push the Good Cause Eviction bill through Albany—a bill that, among many things, defines an unreasonable rent increase as an eviction.
Weaver is staging an intervention in Albany on May 17. Bus up there with her and other organizers fighting for this bill. If you can’t, party with them tonight (May 13) at Starbar in Bushwick, where you can sip on anti-eviction-themed cocktails (I recommend the Good Cause Collins) while your tab helps them raise funds.
— Emily Conklin
EYES ON SKYLINE
In Skyline 68, readers were equally intrigued by the announcement of… Olson Kundig’s new office in New York City and the challenge of The Great Saunter, an epic 32-mile urban hike around the island of Manhattan.
IN THE NEWS
Mass timber condos hit the New York City marketplace for the first time…
…NYCxDESIGN kicked off this week, celebrating its 10th anniversary (a full list of events can be found here…)
…David Chipperfield Architects’ rehabilitation of Venice’s Procuratie Vecchie proves the firm’s prowess at sensitively modernizing historic structures…
…In El Salvador, a new city on the side of a volcano will be built with Bitcoin…
…A desertification prevention tower wins the 2022 eVolo Skyscraper Competition…
…Sadly, even the Internet’s first meme is not safe from the NFT craze…
— News contributed by Anna Gibertini
DATELINE
The week ahead…
Another week, another event about housing: If you’re reading this before your morning coffee, you might have time to catch some of the conversations at an interdisciplinary conference about New York’s housing crisis, hosted by the Center for Architecture. At noon, tune in on Zoom to find out how you can offer remote freelance work to Ukrainian design professionals affected by the war.
Friday, 5/13
NYC’s Housing Crisis with Alicka Ampry-Samuel, Karen Blondel, Nicholas D. Bloom, Rafael Cestero, Ingrid Gould Ellen, Moses Gates, Lisa Gomez, Michael Kimmelman, Brian Loughlin, Cathleen McGuigan, Marc Norman, Muzzy Rosenblatt, Jamie Smarr, Maria Torres Springer, Michael Wadman
8:00 AM | Center for Architecture, Stavros Niarchos Foundation Library
Information Session with the Hire Ukrainian Designers Initiative with Kinder Baumgardner, Alina Nazmeeva, Angelina Stelmakh, Doug Suisman, John Wagner
12:00 PM | The Architectural League
‘Disobedience‘ Symposium by the Critical, Curatorial and Conceptual Practices of Architecture, GSAPP Columbia University with Felicity Scott, Mark Wasiuta, Sophia Stamatopoulou-Robbins, Bruno Bosteels, Gabriel Tupinamba, Daniela Gandorfer, Keller Easterling, Mindy Seu, Amy Yao, Beatriz Colomina, Eduardo Cadava, Mitch McEwen
2:00 PM | Critical Curatorial and Conceptual Practices (CCCP) at GSAPP
In-Person Tour: Madison Avenue, High Fashion and Historic Preservation with John Arbuckle
5:00 PM | Center for Architecture
Saturday, 5/14
Store Stories: Exploring the History and Design of Retail with Alexandra Lange, Emily M. Orr
3:00 PM | Cooper Hewitt
Monday, 5/16
Infrastructural Legacies, Borderland Transformations with Kenny Cupers
12:00 PM | The Society of Architectural Historians of Great Britain
Bryan Young: "Figure - Cast - Frame"
9:30 PM | University of California Los Angeles Architecture and Urban Design
Tuesday, 5/17
Bordering and Political Geographies; Border Sites and Politics and Society with Hakan Unay, Ezgi Isbilen, Maria Kouvari, Neil Jackson, Cesar Lopez, Andrea Canclini, Aya Jazaierly, Marianna Charitonidou
10:00 AM | The Society of Architectural Historians of Great Britain
Wednesday, 5/18
Streets for Commerce with Sulin Carling, Ed Janoff, Michael Blaise Backer, Claire Weisz
6:00 PM | Urban Design Forum
Thursday, 5/19
Book Launch: Ayala Levin, "Architecture and Development: Israeli Construction in Sub-Saharan Africa and the Settler Colonial Imagination, 1958-1973"
9:30 PM | University of California Los Angeles Architecture and Urban Design
Friday, 5/20
Borderlands, Islands, Taxonomies with Savia Palate, Mark Hackett, Alex Seo, Lukas Pauer, Wenjie Su, David Chandler, Robert Proctor
10:00 AM | The Society of Architectural Historians of Great Britain
Our listings are constantly being updated. Check the events page regularly for up-to-date listings and submit events through this link.
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