Architecture Rap

Classic 80s synth/pop/rap/hip-hop/groove/beat.

Bonus: Great British curmudgeons in bowler hats at :50 sec



This originally aired on 10/30/1987.

Lego Architecture Series

I have always loved Legos, from the moment I first played with the giant red "Duplos." (Remember the big red 2x6 block with the bright yellow wheels? You could build all kinds of crazy structures on that.)

Now aging generations of architecture lovers, who probably owe their early inspiration to these simple blocks, can rejoice and play again.

Lego and Brickstuctures, Inc. have announced a collaboration to create collectors sets of great architecture.

Click on the images for larger detail. Links follow.

Landmark Series:
Empire State Building

John Hancock Tower

Seattle Space Needle

Sears Tower


Frank Lloyd Wright Series:
Falling Water

Guggenheim Museum


The packaging design and accessories that each set comes with is impressive.

Lego's Architecture series website here.

Brickstructure's Website here.

No news as to when these will be available.

Best of the Worst Reviews

Below are a just few of the best one-star reviews from Amazon.com. These are reproduced exactly, so I will avoid using "sic".



Great Gatsby

"Gatsby is the miz an and daisy is a sliz to the iz ut. Scott Fitzgerald i wish u were alive so i could kill u. Love DGS!!!"

Wizard of Oz

"the wort movie ive ever seen .I mean they clorized once color tv came out and there special effects are lame ,the costumes are ugly the props are ugly so never buy this film!!!!"

To Kill A Mockingbird

"This book is the worst book in the world. I read half way through the book and gave up because it made no sence"

Casablanca

"I expected a lot more action. I’m pretty sure I will enjoy it a lot more when Warner Bros finally gets around to releasing the colorized version, the way this movie needs to be seen - the world is not black and white, why should our movies be?"
"... Also Ingrid Bergman is no Maryland Monroe."

The Jungle

"Bad book toooo manyyyy words n not enough pitures"
"This book is fun for its first two-thirds, what with the rats and all."

Schindler's List

"Mr. S should stick with kiddie flicks like ET - although even there he was cruel to the actress who performed inside the ET suit."

Moby Dick

"Moby Ick's more like it. A PIECE-O-TRASH! SENSELESS"

Sound of Music

"This movie was made in the sixties, we live in the 21st century, GET OVER IT!"

Huckleberry Finn

"Twain has over used words once again. I wish someone would have told him that it's quality, not quantity."

Lord of the Flies

"Not sence reading the crystal Star and the Black Fleet Crisis Trilogy have i detested a book! If you want the point of the book watch the Simpsons parody."

Lawrence of Arabia

"I am used to seeing movies with fast action or at least a good story. This movie has neither. Some british guy goes to the mideast and fights with turks. The screenplay never explains why he would do that."

Rabbit Run

"Uggh!!! Updike can't write worth spit! This is just pure junk. Not only is it dull, but it's about nobodies. A total waste!"

Singin' in the Rain

"Sorry folks, but this is the biggest BORE-FEST I have ever seen. The plot is cheesy and uninteresting. The acting is old-school ham"
"I have now seen 1 musical so you cant say, 'well you have never seen one' when I say I hate musicals."

Underground Graphics

During a recent vacation to D.C., I was admiring the modern simplicity of the Washington Metrorail system.

The system was originally designed in 1966, so the planners were able to avoid nearly a century worth of aggregated mistakes of subway systems in larger and older cities. The system is a simple 5-line system, each with it's own color, heading in and back out of the city-center.

Having been planned after significant development of the city, the stations are located near population centers or attractions, and have names that match those destinations. Because of this, the residents of D.C. refer to locations as being "on the green line" and destinations are "off the blue line at federal triangle". There is an inherent value to property located "on the red line" for instance, indicating a freedom from everyday traffic headaches.


From an end-users standpoint, however, what really sells the system is the simplicity of the map. It is not a true cartographic representation (it is not-to-scale) and only has scant landmarks shown. Looking at the map convinces you of the value of the system, because landmarks that are not near the system are not shown. You are only seeing what's convenient to the system.

The style of the map was a revolutionary concept when Harry Beck, an engineer for the London Underground System, created his "simplified map system" in 1933.

The graphical simplicity of Beck's design would later influence Massimo Vignelli, when he redesigned the New York Subway map in 1972. In reality, these transit routes were a rats-nest of squiggly, criss-crossing lines that followed the contours of the land. On the map, however, the system was a simple system of lines, never deviating beyond a 45-degree snap, and often running side-by-side in harmony.



On our way back from D.C., I decided on a lark to see what a simplified transit map would look like, if overlaid onto the greater Rochester Metro Area. It was an interesting excercise, attempting to serve the greatest population centers, and landmarks, with the fewest amount of lines. I ended up with four lines running through the center city and back out to a village center. One of the benefits of the Metro system was being able to pop-up in the center of an outlying village, like Alexandria. I tried to apply this concept to the Monroe County Map.


Click on the image below to view a pdf of the the map. The second page is a detail view of the city center.


Click Here to download a map of the routes in Google Earth.

Architectural Competitions for Summer 2008

USA Newest to Oldest

Lifecycle Building Challenge 2
Submission Deadline: July 31 2008
LBC2 is a national competition that challenges creative minds to develop lifecycle building strategies to facilitate deconstruction and building material reuse. Student and professional contestants can submit entries in 2 categories: building and innovation. Lifecycle building reduces construction waste and conserves the embodied energy of buildings. Construction waste totals more than 100 million tons per year, and the embodied energy of building materials accounts for 12% or more of the total energy used in a building. Outstanding achievement awards will be given to Best Greenhouse Gas Reduction, Best Residential, and Best School entries.
Link

Round Building Reuse: 360 -Open Ideas Competition
Submission Deadline: August 8, 2008
Downtown Orlando is changing. The citizens of Orlando and Orange County have approved the much needed and highly anticipated 3 Venues projects, Including the Orlando Events Center, The Citrus Bowl expansion and modernization and the Dr. P. Phillips Performing Arts Center (DPPAC). The American Federal Building (The Round Building) occupies the southwest corner of the site of the DPPAC and is scheduled for complete demolition. The aim of Round Building Reuse : 360 is to promote awareness and seek the preservation of Florida's mid-century modern architecture. It is the competition objective to have the competitors develop an innovative reuse of the Round Buildings precast concrete brise soleil on another site or sites. Competition entries will provide valuable creative material to support the preservation effort of Central Florida Modern. Designs and Ideas will be used to create excitement, support, funding and a new purpose to a vestige of Central Florida's Modern heritage.
Link

Socio Design
Submission Deadline: November 21, 2008
Socio Design is a foundation that encourages social change through design-based dialog, a dialog fostered through an international student architecture competition. The competition asks students to question how prisons are used throughout today's world: what are the affects of prison design on employees, occupants and adjacent societies. Students are required to design a philosophy on what imprisonment should be, and express that philosophy architecturally.
Link


International Newest to Oldest:

Kings Cross, London, International Urban Design Competition
Submission Deadline: EOI August 1st 2008
Camden Council and Network Rail are seeking expressions of interest from architects, landscape architects and urban designers for the design of a brand new, urban square at Kings Cross, London. King's Cross Square is destined to become one of the great public places in London. Set against the magnificent backdrop of the Grade 1 listed façade of King's Cross railway station, it will be used daily by thousands of commuters, visitors and residents - a unique addition to the Capital's palette of memorable street scenes. To create this new public plaza, an international two-stage design competition has been launched. This search for a world-class exemplar design is jointly sponsored by Network Rail and the London Borough of Camden - recognising not only the Square's role as a major travel hub but also as a catalyst for wider urban regeneration.
Link

International Competition for the Development Proposals for the Olympic Village as Part of the Planning for Candidate City Madrid 2016
Submission Deadline: August 28, 2008
The object of this tender is the selection of the best architectural proposal for the development of the future Olympic Village. This tender of ideas, announced by the Empresa Municipal de la Vivienda y Suelo de Madrid, will be developed as an open single-phase competition on a draft level. The winning ideas will be ceded to the EMVS and may be used for the presentation of Madrid's candidature for the Olympic Games 2016. If Madrid succeeds in becoming the venue for the Olympic Games 2016, the EMVS undertakes to entrust the winner with the complete construction of one of the buildings contained in the proposal.
Link

Open international competition for the realisation of Mobile Floating Architecture
Submission Deadline: September 15 2008
Organiser: Internationale Bauausstellung (IBA) Fürst-Pückler-Land GmbH. The topic of the competition is the design of a mobile floating house to be used as a holiday house or dwelling house in the Lusatian Lake District. The houses should have a possibly high degree of autarky and mobility. The design should typify the life on the water
Link

Oslo Public Library - Restricted Plan and Design Competition
RFQ Deadline: September 15 2008
HAV Eiendom AS invites teams to submit requests for qualification, for the New Oslo Public library Design Competition in Björvika, Oslo. Competitors will be requested to propose urban design strategies that integrate the library's organization and programmatic requirements with the building immediate context; the overall objective is to establish a unique set of relationships between the Library, the City and the Fjord. This invitation is open to international teams and the competition languages are Scandinavian and English.
Link

Got a competition you want listed?
email me
Next competition update is October 1

Getting Ready for Opening Day

As the Art Director for the Brick Street Market, we have been feverishly preparing for the grand opening on July 4th weekend.

This shop will be located in the town of Delavan, Wisconsin (about 1 -1/2hrs north of Chicago and an hour south of Madison)

It is going to be a sweet little shop, where you can get your fix of the finest cheeses, and some other gourmet foods, from small farms around the region.

Laura Jacobs-Welch is the proprietor and she certainly knows her cheese.

If you're in the area, stop in and tell Laura, "Gary sent ya" and she will set you up with some of the finest selections of fromage you have ever had.

Microsoft "rocks"

It's really not surprising Microsoft is suffering a massive PR hemorrhage.
Particularly when you see leaked movies like this designed to educate internal operatives on techniques to force, urge, cajole, convince, beg companies to buy Vista.

How did this get produced?
Did anyone at Redmond hear the pitch? Read the script? Watch the rough cuts?
If a media company, no matter how "mom and pop," was hired by Microsoft to make this, wouldn't they feel any compunction to advise their client against it?



Well, who's to argue with "Bruce ServicePack and the Vista Street Band" when they claim that "selling optimized desktop value is a pitch that never fails"? There's a whole lotta microspeak in this 3-minute gem.

Also, although it doesn't seem possible, I have it on good authority that this movie is not a joke.

I love the CEO saying "Vista, Gotta Get Me Some!" Classic.

Architectural Competitions for Spring 2008

USA Newest to Oldest

Reinventing Grand Army Plaza
Submission Deadline: April 2008
To catalyze Grand Army Plaza's rebirth, the Design Trust for Public Space, in partnership with the Grand Army Plaza Coalition, is launching an international ideas competition, "Reinventing Grand Army Plaza," to generate new visions for every aspect of the plaza's design. Grand Army Plaza is New York City's greatest unrealized asset. Home to the Soldiers' and Sailors' Arch, the elegant Bailey Fountain, the entrance to Frederick Law Olmsted's greatest park, and a major transit hub, the sum of these parts is today emphatically less than the whole. Currently an underdeveloped public amenity, the redesign of Brooklyn's Grand Army Plaza will invigorate surrounding communities, just as the re-conception of Manhattan's High Line set off an explosion of activity in West Chelsea. Top submissions will be exhibited at either the Brooklyn Pubic Library or Brooklyn Museum of Art in the summer of 2008.
Link

Contrabands and Freedmen's Cemetery Memorial
Competition entries due by 5pm April 25, 2008:
This Competition seeks design submissions from architects, landscape architects, artists, students, and other interested individuals to memorialize and honor those who are buried at Contrabands and Freedmen's Cemetery in Alexandria, Virginia. The site was established in 1864 as a burial ground for African Americans who fled slavery, seeking a safe haven in Union-controlled Alexandria during the Civil War. More than 1,800 people were buried there over the five years that the federal government managed the cemetery. While other physical sites that recalled the once-considerable African American presence in Alexandria have been lost, the City of Alexandria acquired the property in 2007 in order to remove the buildings, reclaim the cemetery, and create a memorial.
Link

White House Redux Competition
Registration and submissions deadline: April 20, 2008
What if the White House, the ultimate architectural symbol of political power, were to be designed today? Over two hundred years ago the winning design of an 18th century architecture competition became the residence of the president of the United States at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. To mark the election of the 44th president of the US, Storefront for Art and Architecture, in association with Control Group, has opened White House Redux, a challenge to design a new residence for the world's most powerful individual.
Link

New York Designs: Threshold
Submissions by April 16, 2008.
The Architectural League created the New York Designs juried lecture series in 2003 to provide a forum for the presentation of innovative and accomplished work built in New York City. This year's theme, 'threshold,' focuses on projects whose design mediates distinct conditions. A 'threshold' might be understood literally as a transitional space that interfaces public and private; that bridges inside and outside; that connects nature and the city ­ or as a conceptual space of overlap between materials, disciplines, cultures, the client and architect, the past and future. What limits, opportunities, and compromises shape thresholds in the city? What can thresholds tell us about the experience of building in New York City and contemporary design practice? The jury seeks portfolios that situate a project within this liminal space. Submissions should demonstrate how a space of transition and the act of mediation informed the final project.
Link

Trans-Atlantic Newest to Oldest:

Belgium: Interieur 08
Registration: deadline: 15 July 08
Interieur 08 is a biennial competition for creativity in interior design, organised by the Interieur Foundation, located in Kortrijk, Belgium. Centred on three thematic subjects, it focuses on new, functional, creative and contemporary prototypes. All entries will be on display during the 21st Interieur Biennale, where they will be seen by potential manufacturers, professional visitors and the general public.
Link

UK: Lex Walsall
Entries by 30th May 2008
Working with partners Advantage West Midlands, Walsall Council and Walsall Regeneration Company, Urban Splash are working on Phase One of the Waterfront development just near The New Art Gallery - a collection of buildings designed by SMC Alsop and shedkm which are set within a public realm designed by Grant Associates. Urban Splash has now been invited to come up with plans for Phase Two, the Lex site, and are looking for a great architect to work with them to deliver more award winning buildings. It. Aspirations for this site are typically high -they are looking for excitement, flair and imagination to be the defining piece of architecture for Walsall.
Link

Denmark: Toftegard Square South International Design Competition Copenhagen
Registration Deadline 14th May 2008
Toftegards Plads Syd (Toftegard Square South) has remained largely unused for several years. In its current form it far from reflects the fact that it is one of the most important and most distinctive gateways to Copenhagen. The City of Copenhagen has decided to launch a competition to obtain ideas for the creation of a lively, human and vibrant urban space of high architectural quality. Entrants in the competition may also include proposals for new buildings, various types of coverings and other structures in the square. The new square must be part of the ongoing development that will turn the southern part of the Valby district into one of the most interesting areas in Copenhagen.
Link

Italy: New Schools for the City of Cultures Competition, City of Prato, Italy
Dossier to arrive no later than 12 o'clock noon on April 24, 2008.
The competition's goal is to generate two distinct preliminary proposals for the construction of two new nursery schools (each housing six classes) and the organization of the outdoor spaces and the green areas for recreation on the school grounds. The first plot is located in the Galcetello zone, in via Marie Curie, and the other in the Ponzano zone, in viale Montegrappa. See the drawings for further details. The two projects will be constructed out in two functional phases, each made up of three sections, as is further specified in the preliminary document.
Link

Germany: Designer´s Workstation
Closing date: April 22nd
This competition, promoted by the Design Institution is aimed at designing the ideal work station for the designer of the XXI century. Competitors may choose the area of design of their proposal: industrial design, interior design, architectural design, fashion design, etc. The competition is aimed at professional designers and design students.
Link

Trans-Pacific Newest to Oldest:

Japan: 3rd Nitori One-House Total Coordination Competition 2008
Entries by June 30th 2008
Nitori develops products based on the concept of One-House Total Coordination Merchandising (OTCM), in which all the spaces of a house are totally coordinated. In this Competition, Nitori invites the public to propose totally coordinated designs of fabrics, furniture and interior accessories that match the idea of OTCM. This competition aims to commercialize excellent designs and sell them at Nitori stores as well as discover new designers to work with Nitori.
Link

Vietnam: Thu Thiem New Urban Area: Ho Chi Minh City.
Submissions: May 19th, 2008
The Investment & Construction Authority for the Thu Thiem New Urban Area (The Thu Thiem ICA) of Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam announces an open, international Design Competition in two stages. The focus of this Competition will be on the "Central Plaza, Crescent Park, and Saigon River Pedestrian Bridge". The Thu Thiem project has an area of 740 hectares and is located in the heart of Ho Chi Minh City on the east bank of the Saigon River, opposite the existing historic city center. The Central Plaza will be the largest integrated park and plaza within Ho Chi Minh City; the Crescent Park will be Ho Chi Minh City's great waterfront park and promenade; the Saigon River Pedestrian Bridge will be an impressive architectural symbol and represent the future city.
Link

Got a competition you want listed?
email me
Next competition update is July 1