L: Alejandro Aravena, via Dezeen; R: Michael Kimmelman in Syria, via Next City.
Chilean Challenge: Alejandro Aravena has been appointed as curator of the 15th International Architecture Biennale in Venice. The Chilean architect’s exhibition will focus on architecture’s role in helping to solve global social issues: “There are several battles that need to be won and several frontiers that need to be expanded in order to improve the quality of the built environment and consequently people’s quality of life.”
State of the City: Architecture critic Michael Kimmelman was interviewed by Sky Kalfus of Next City in the run-up to the New York Times’ “Cities for Tomorrow” conference starting this week. Kimmelman spoke about his explorations of Zaatari, the Syrian refugee camp-cum-makeshift metropolis, and reflected on “the basic human desire to urbanize.”
L: Richard Tenguerian in his workshop, via Curbed; R: Atelier Yokyok’s string installation in Cahors, via Fast Co.
Role Models: You may be surprised to find that some of the best looking models in New York City are kept in the basement in Noho, but it’s true: Curbed took a tour of the Tenguerian Architectural Models studio and chatted with its founder about his diverse portfolio of miniatures — from Hudson Yards in Manhattan to the Abbottabad compound where Osama Bin Laden was killed. Four more of New York City’s top architectural model-making studios are also explored in this in-depth report.
High-Strung: Last week, French creative studio Atelier Yokyok constructed their latest ephemeral installation at the heart of the 500-year-old cloister of Cahors Cathedral. Tunnels of brilliant blue yarn cut across the courtyard, striking a contemporary contrast with the surrounding Gothic arches.
L: Frank Lloyd Wright’s Buffalo Filling Station at the Pierce-Arrow Museum, photo via Metropolis; R: Southdale Center by Victor Gruen, photo via Bobak Ha’Eri on Wikimedia Commons.
“Everything He Built Was Dangerous”: So says the owner of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Pierce-Arrow Transport Museum in Buffalo, referring to the late modernist architect, who is apparently having a moment in the city in upstate New York. From pricy restorations to museum-exhibition mockups, some are ambivalent about the resurgent interest; according to expert Philip Allsopp: “His buildings were designed for their specific sites and contexts, and he was perpetually pushing the envelope. He’d be saying, ‘Why take a design that’s a hundred years old and build it now?’”
Mall-Functioning: If you are not the greatest fan of your local shopping mall’s sprawling layout, lost in a seemingly endless ocean of car parking, you aren’t alone: as Quartz reports, Victor Gruen — the “Father of the American Shopping Mall” himself — detested the misunderstood application of his ideas in modern shopping centers across the United States.
Covering the Spread: Journalist Ian Johnson and filmmaker Jonah Kessel of the New York Times tell the fascinating tale of Jing-Jin-Ji, a masterplanned megalopolis for the conurbation of Beijing and its aggressively expanding bedroom communities. To call it ambitious would be an understatement: intended to accommodate 130 million residents across an 82,000-square-mile region, Jing-Jin-Ji represents a singular case of how technology (viz. high-speed rail) hypothetically enables far-flung urbanization. In the meantime, however, the municipal services and transportation network remain spotty at best: retirees literally stand in as proxies for their employed offspring who spend up to five hours a day commuting to the capital city …
Photo at top by Sim Chi Yin for the New York Times.