In the past two weeks, ArchDaily readers have held debates on the preservation of the past in OMA's Fondaco dei Tedeschi in Venice, and discussed the future for the people of Makoko in Lagos after their much-praised floating school designed by NLÉ collapsed due to heavy rain. Read on to find out what they had to say about these stories and more.
The past month has seen a variety of potential topics of discussion - but when it comes to the most thoughtful comments, it seems ArchDaily users have been preoccupied with one theme: quality of life. From a discussion about micro-apartments, to a critical take on the supposedly "romantic" portrayal of favelas, and even to a prediction that soon the design of virtual reality will take precedence over the design of actual reality, it seems our readers have been thinking a lot about living conditions in many spheres of life. Read on to find out what they had to say.
The past two weeks have seen an interesting mixture of comments on ArchDaily. Topics of conversation have ranged from Brutalist preservation to the future of living, and from neoliberal planning systems to restrictive copyright laws, raising insightful questions, interesting ideas and impressive arguments. Read on to find out what has been occupying our readers’ minds these past two weeks.
Of course, the top story in recent weeks has been the sudden death of Dame Zaha Hadid, who passed away last week in Miami. At just 65 years of age, and at the height of her powers as an architect, the news of Hadid’s passing was a shock to many and unsurprisingly was met with grief from many of our readers. Read on to see what tributes those readers left, along with opinions on other stories from recent weeks.
When we began these bi-weekly round-ups of readers' comments back in October, we did so with one key aim: to encourage open, democratic debate with a very low barrier for entry - the type of internet-enabled debate that many architecture critics and publications have given up on. This week, we got a taste of just that kind of rational, professional debate as our readers picked apart the popular opinion in the wider media that the renovation of Cádiz Castle was "a perfect example of how not to restore an old castle." Alongside debates on whether architecture is a form of art and what the AIA should be doing about sustainability, read on to see what our readers had to say after the break.
The past two weeks in architecture have provided plenty to talk about in thanks to some big news stories, such as the opening of Santiago Calatrava’s World Trade Center Transportation Hub, and some hotly-debated articles, such as Lance Hosey’s critique of the AIA’s sustainability leadership. As a result, it’s been a busy couple of weeks in our comment section - read on to find out what ArchDaily readers had to say.
Recent weeks have seen a period of big plans in the architectural world, with Dubai planning another show-stopping skyscraper, this time by Santiago Calatrava, and Paris looking to “reinvent” itself with a variety of entries to its government-led design competition. Naturally, such big proposals attracted the attention of ArchDaily’s commenters - read on to find out what they had to say.
In the past two weeks, the topics of discussion in the ArchDaily comments section have been incredibly diverse: from a debate over a light-hearted approach to getting the architectural job of your dreams, to a serious argument over the exploitation of young workers in the industry; and from criticism of a Zaha-like “melted yellow cheese” design to a favorable analysis of an intellectual postmodernist landmark. Read on to find out what our readers had to say.
The announcement of the Pritzker Prize is often the biggest news story of the year in architecture. This year it seems will be no different: the accolade went to Alejandro Aravena, with the jury paying particular attention to his social housing work, and with the Aravena-directed Venice Biennale right around the corner, it seems that this year we'll be talking a lot about the 48-year-old Chilean.
That discussion has already begun in our comments section, where readers debated the pros and cons of the decision by the Pritzker Jury. Read on to find out what our readers had to say about Aravena and the other big stories of recent weeks.
We may be emerging from the holiday season, but the weeks of quiet merriment haven’t slowed down our readers. Over the last few weeks, a small number of stories have kept the comments flowing in - among them a gothic-inspired skyscraper, a museum that is a little too baroque for some tastes, and a statue that most agreed was simply poor taste. Read on to find out what our readers had to say about some of the most noteworthy stories of recent weeks in the latest of our "ArchDaily Readers Debate" series.
In the past two weeks, it seems all the big stories have been emerging from London: this week, the crowning tower of the City of London’s skyscraper cluster, a restrained design by Eric Parry Architects, was unveiled; last week, it was the Chelsea Stadium plans by Herzog & de Meuron that grabbed attention; and almost as if to demand attention for a brief that wouldn’t otherwise make headlines, at the start of the month Will Alsop’s aLL Design unveiled a characteristically outlandish residential tower in Vauxhall.
The resulting conversations from our readers touched on everything from the coherence of London’s future skyline to Will Alsop’s design lineage. Read on to find out what they had to say in the latest installment of our "ArchDaily Readers Debate" series.
The past two weeks have seen a number of high-profile designs unveiled, including OMA in Manchester, SANAA in Budapest, Libeskind in Vilnius, Foster + Partners in Chicago and two projects involving BIG in Pittsburgh and New York. As ever with such renowned practices scooping up work, opinions flew and in some cases also produced reasoned debate over the new projects. Read on to find out what people had to say about them.
Awards season is in full swing in the architecture world, with - among others - the World Architecture Festival and the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat recently handing out prizes for the best new buildings worldwide (OMA + Ole Scheeren's Interlace and Stefano Boeri's Bosco Verticale, respectively). However, it has been relatively quiet in our comments section; are we to assume that there are few strong objections to these winners?
Nevertheless, a quiet period doesn't mean there weren't some great discussions had in the comments over the past two weeks, with opinions shared on the success of BIG, the problem of negativity in architecture, and more. Read on to find out what our readers had to say.
In the past two weeks, it seems the big stories in architecture have been focused around the world's biggest cities, with developments in London, Chicago and San Francisco grabbing headlines.
Continuing our series of round-ups of ArchDaily readers' responses to such attention-grabbing stories, recent articles sparked interesting arguments about MAD's newly-approved Lucas Museum, Snøhetta's almost-complete extension to SFMOMA, and Renzo Piano's recently-revealed "Skinny Shard" in London, as well as discussions over the power of developers to shape architecture in New York. Read on to find out what readers had to say.
In the past two weeks on ArchDaily there have been plenty of stories to provoke discussion: from the Stirling Prize (or more accurately the protests over the shortlisting of RSH+P's NEO Bankside) to the Solar Decathlon, and from Santiago Calatrava's European Prize for Architecture to Perkins+Will's appointment to design a new "airport city" in Istanbul.
In the second of our new series highlighting the best recent comments on our stories, our readers had discussions on politics in architecture, color in kindergartens and urban development in Turkey. Read on to find out what they had to say.
In the introduction to her essay "Losing My Illusions About Open-Source Criticism" in Volume's 2013 edition "Critical," Naomi Stead writes: "There was a time not so long ago when many of us, myself included, thought that a brave new world of architectural commentary and criticism was about to open, by virtue of the democratizing capacities of web 2.0." She goes on to describe her former hope that a diverse and networked discussion would overthrow "the tyranny of the cultural gatekeepers" in the same way that Rotten Tomatoes or TripAdvisor revolutionized reviews of film or travel destinations, respectively. But she concludes: "By and large the blogs didn't eventuate, the comments didn't come, or if they did, they were likely to be in the form of a flippant one-liner or a nasty unfounded attack."
Since I read Stead's piece, this attitude has concerned me. Are we really ready to dig the grave of collective criticism? What steps, if any, have been taken to remedy this situation? At ArchDaily, we believe there is still hope for the comments section, and I've written about the importance that our readers play in shaping architectural culture before - we even consider this collective criticism an important part of our editorial strategy, as implied by my introduction to Mark Hogan's article about shipping container housing. That's why in the discussion in the comments of Hogan's article, Hisham's suggestion that it would "be interesting to 'post-post' a second comment article... so that your readers get hinted to the broader public discussion" caught my eye. It's an idea that we've had before, but the timing was never right... until now.