July 7, 2010: The Institute for Public Architecture

There are a few architects whose focus is not on profit, but rather on service to the public. To further this Social Contract architects Jonathan Kirschenfeld and Robert Marino have founded the Institute for Public Architecture (IPA)

http://instituteforpublicarchitecture.org/ - a think tank and residential compound to foster independent work by architects and designers.

Think of the American Academy in Rome for architects and artists,

or the MacDowell Colony
http://www.macdowellcolony.org/
 
- and you'll have a good idea of the precursor models for the IPA.

One of the IPA's first civic interventions will be the Portable Street Theater, shown installed at the site of the proposed Jean Nouvell tower next to MoMA on West 53rd Street in New York City:

In our July 7th conversation we will explore the future of civic works, the funding dynamics of public architecture, and the prospects for the location of the IPA campus.

Thanks for listening - speak with you again soon.

30th June 2010: The Dark Prince

The extreme animosity held by the Prince of Wales against modern architecture, which he habitually calls "brutalist" is well known, well documented. From his pronouncement that the Sainsbury wing of the National Gallery was "as a carbuncle on the face of a beloved friend" in 1984 - through last year's interference in the private development of the Chelsea Barracks site in Chelsea, London, Charles Windsor has been a pushy, anti-progressive busy-body and nosy-parker of the highest rank.

He has abused his position. One might think him an Absolute Monarch.

In the case of the Chelsea Barracks, here is what we - the public - knew before this Thursday last, before 24th June 2010:

The Qatari ruling family's development company purchased a stake in the former military complex known as the Chelsea Barracks. They were joint-ventured with the Candy brothers, British real estate developers. Some time just before the site plan designed in part by Sir Richard Rogers - The Dark Prince's chief modernist foe and nemesis - was to be presented for planning approval, the Qataris withdrew their application. They sacked the Rogers team. They flirted with a pedestrian design by a certain architectural plagiarist by the name of Quinlan Terry.

The Candy brothers sued in High Court for damages owing to the Qataris' breach of contract.

The High Court found for the Candy side, but urged reconciliation between the parties - noting the "unwanted interference" of The Prince - and declining, for now, the assessment of monetary damages against the Qataris.

Here is the scheme prepared in part by Sir Richard:

Pretty typical Rogers stuff - articulation of an exoskeletal structure, articulation of facade. Not exactly bold and new, but not offensive - unless you are the Prince of Wales and must needs run your mouth.

WHAT THE PRINCE PREFERRED:

which is a pastiche of stylistic plagiarisms that does nothing whatsoever to move forward the heritage of architecture; it is Disney, writ large, and poorly.

But aha, and oh ho! - someone in the Qatari camp leaked the letter that the Prince sent to the Prime Minister of Qatar - just hours before the High Court was to issue its judgment! On today's program I have read that letter - shame O shame of abuse of high un-elected position.

Here's what a British paper had to say, in summary:

But what to me is more interesting is the penchant for the same original sources - Greco-Romano flourish on the one hand, and homely famer-ish (or as they would and did say in German: bauerische) stylistic content. In a word, the Prince shares with the German National Socialist Party circa 1934 - 45 (the Nazis) a nearly identical viewpoint. Shame.

But this is not to be a surprise, for his mother's uncle, King Edward VIII - you know, the one who abdicated for love to marry Wallace Simpson? - was very close with Lord Oswald Mosley, head of the British Union of Fascists! The same Lord Mosley who married Nancy Mitford - of the Mitford family, famously famous for simply being famous - in Dr Goebbels house. Herr Hitler was in attendance.

This is the symbol of the British Union of Fascists. Pretty chilling isn't it - one half of the lightning-bolt S's of the SS!

So now we know what a fascist Prince might do when displeased: 
communicate directly, from one antique hereditary house of royalty to another.

That he Qataris acceded is no surprise, then. 

And so my freedom-loving friends, here and abroad:









To conclude my foray into history, architectural taste and latent Fascism - I close with this watercolor, produced by the failed painter Herr Hitler:

And here are some views of the Prince's Poundbury:

 I rest my case.

I wish you a Happy Independence Day! This is an example - exact and true and vivid - of what our ancestors (mine included: three men who served during our American Rebellion - all privates, let us not get too heady about it) fought for, succeeded in, and for which we should all be grateful. FOR HERE IN THIS LAND WE HAVE NO PRINCES.


God save the Queen - God knows she needs the help, what with a son like this.

Our music this evening has been:

Jerusalem - the anthem of England
Darth Vader's March - John Williams' Star Wars
Everybody Wants to Rule the World - Tears for Fears
Mad World - Tears for Fears

Thanks for listening. Speak with you again soon.

PS: A few more of Charles' remarks. I have to say that I enjoy a good put-down. [sigh] - It is too bad that he truly does not understand modern architecture:


Royal disapproval
“The Reading Room looks like the assembly hall of an academy of secret police”

The British Library
“Why does it have to be so tall?”

Canary Wharf
“It would be a tragedy if the character and skyline of our capital city were to be further ruined and St Paul’s dwarfed by yet another giant glass stump”

Proposed tower at Mansion House, subsequently abandoned
“Like a 1930s wireless”

Its replacement
“[It] seems like a clever way of building a nuclear power station in the middle of London”

The National Theatre
“I have to say that I was deeply depressed that none of them had risen to the occasion"

A proposed extension to the National Gallery
“It would be a monstrous carbuncle on the face of a much-loved and elegant friend”

Potential designers of the Paternoster Square precinct
“A place where books are incinerated, not kept”

A word from our sponsor

http://www.vimeo.com/12825042

Just a little shameless self-promotion.

23rd June 2010: The Dire Condition of Architectural Education and Licensure

Joining us are two thoughtful and inquisitive architects - Matthew Arnold, a graduate of the Cooper Union - who has been researching the time it takes for recent architectural graduates to become fully credentialed, licensed architects; and Professor Roderick L Knox, also a graduate of Cooper Union, professor of architecture at Cooper Union.

Mr Arnold is preparing a white paper for presentation at the American Collegiate Schools of Architecture convention showing the data in graphic representation. An example of one such stunning analysis shows the dramatic increase in time required to pass the Architectural Registration Examination (ARE) - a standardized set of tests administered in the United States and Canada:

 As you can see, fewer than 10% of graduates complete their preparation within five years or less. The paradigm of our profession has always been that this period of preparation - now referred to as "internship" - should take three years. At a recent roundtable discussion held at the New York American Institute of Architects Center for Architecture, the NCARB's own project manager for Internship Development confided to the audience - without batting an eyelash, or any sense of irony - that his own period of internship "only" took ten years!


I - your host - was licensed in fewer than three years; but I am ambitious and the rules that applied during those times allowed summer internship served between semesters of college.

Remember - you can always listen to our podcasts on either iTunes or at HeritageRadioNetwork.com

Speak with you again soon!

Curtis B Wayne, Architect

magisterarch@gmail.com

The Radio Architecture Project

The Radio Architecture Project

Dear friends and listeners, we're very pleased to announce the next phase in the evolution of  
Burning Down the House –
- your weekly fix on design and architecture.

We will be producing 
Burning Down The House  
through the independent audio production auspices of  
The Radio Architecture Project. 

Steve Smith, of Steve Smith Consulting will produce our next several programs, which we will be recording in the field, in the studios and offices of architects and designers - even at construction sites here in the metropolitan New York region!

As before, we will be providing Burning Down the House for broadcast and podcast on the  

Heritage Radio Network..






Check out all the other great programs of HRN at: www.heritageradionetwork.com

Thanks for listening. Speak with you again soon.

Curtis

Three Kings of Design - Epiphany 2010

On January 6th, the Feast of the the Three Kings, Manuel Saez, Pedro Reissig and Mathias Fernandoborg joined us to talk about their particularly unique attitudes towards design. Our Three Kings of Design, not approaching from the east but rather from the south, all hail from Argentina.

We spoke with Manuel about his CMYK folding electric bike, which won 2nd place in the Cooper Hewitt Museum's "Peoples' Choice" award program this last autumn.

Pedro and Mathias are principal in Vacavaliente (www.vacavaliente.com) - where they express their love for leather as the primary (and sometimes sole) working material for whimsical interior elements:

 

BREAKING NEWS!

 

This program marked the end of the studio-based format for Burning Down the House - because, dear listeners - we are taking the program

ON THE ROAD!

Yes!

2010 will be full of many exciting developments, as we take our recording gear into the field to talk with architects and designers in their studios, builders on their construction sites, and even - we do hope - with construction lenders and bankers in their offices.

STAY TUNED FOR MANY NEW DEVELOPMENTS.

Thanks for listening. Talk with you again soon. 

Curtis

Images for December 16th: Omega Institute

The Omega Institute's Center for Sustainable Living, the Living Building Challenge, and the Cascadia Region Green Building Council were discussed in a lively discussion among Skip Backus, CEO of Omega; Gennaro Brooks-Church, eco-friendly builder from Brooklyn; Jake Alspector, architect; and myself, your host, Curtis B Wayne, architect.

Site Plan of the center (in grey)

View of the Center, with PV arrays in the foreground

Interior view of the "lagoon" area, also showing the "skycatcher" skylights. 

Thanks for listening!

Our next program will air live on 6 January 2010.

Talk with you next year.

Happy Solstice.

December 2nd: Trash talkin' about ----- trash

On this segment of Burning Down the House we're talking trash: trash as a natural resource, trash architecture (all that glitters is NOT gold), and what to do with waste products of life in a sustainable way, with guest Jacob Alspector, Architect.

First up, some images from the Sustainable Lab at Cooper Union, which I visited recently:

Detailed view of a rope made by the students from plastic (polyethylene) grocery bags.

And a bowstring arch, constructed from vitamin water containers - presumably in compression, with polyethylene trash cable as thetension member:

Trashy architecture is a recurrent them througout history. Shanties and shacks in North America, favellas outside of Sao Paolo in Brasil - all constructed of garbage. But what to say when a high-rise residential building approximates the haphazard appearance of a garbage dump? Case in point - and worthy of indictment in Design Court is this recent Visual Crime, designed by the otherwise-acclaimed French architect Jean Nouvel:

Where is Venustas - or delight?

Where is elegance?

This random pile resembles nothing more, or less, than an accretion of discarded, mis-matched windows. A scavenger's paradise, writ large - and ugly - on the landscape.

For this excretion we summon the officers of the Visual Victims Unit.






But waste - real or imagined - need not be ugly. Case in point is the waste-processing features of this new building at the Omega Institute in Rhinebeck, NY:

Photo credit: Gregory Edwards, courtesy of the Omega Institute

More on the Omega Institute Center for Sustainable Living, the Cascadia Living Building Challenge to come in our program of December 16th!

Thanks for listening.

Speak with you again soon.