New York: The Latest Architecture and News

Details have been released on the New York Public Library’s (NYPL) plan to renovate its Mid-Manhattan branch, while creating more public space within its flagship Stephen A. Schwarzman Building. The news comes shortly after Foster + Partner’s redesign of the the Beaux-Arts landmark was scrapped due to concerns of a ballooning budget. The revised $300 million overhaul suggests a more affordable option of relocating Schwarzman’s main stacks beneath Bryant Park, while establishing a more campus-like connection with a fully renovated Mid-Manhattan branch. All the details, here.

Ubu Gallery is pleased to present Knud Lonberg-Holm: The Invisible Architect, a debut exhibition devoted to this overlooked, yet highly influential, 20th Century modernist. Never-before-seen photographs, architectural drawings, letters, graphic design, and ephemera from Lonberg-Holm’s remarkably diverse career will be on view through August 1, 2014. The exhibition, which consists of selections from the extensive archive assembled by architectural historian Marc Dessauce, will solidify the importance of this emblematic figure in early 20th Century cultural and architectural history. Metropolis Magazine, the national publication of architecture and design, will publish an article on Knud Lonberg-Holm to coincide with this groundbreaking exhibition.

This summer, the American Institute of Architects New York Chapter (AIANY) and the Center for Architecture Foundation will present Open to the Public: Civic Space Now, an exhibition exploring why people gravitate to (or avoid) civic spaces – the places between buildings where people can assemble. Curated by Thomas Mellins and designed by Athletics, the exhibition opens Thursday, June 12, 6:00 PM and runs through Saturday, September 6 in the main galleries at the Center for Architecture, 536 LaGuardia Place.

In celebration of the 50-year anniversary of the 1964 New York World’s Fair, Onishi Project and Kipton Cronkite are pleased to present World’s Fairs: Lost Utopias, the debut exhibition of Jade Doskow’s groundbreaking 7-year photography project. The exhibition will also include a 1968 triptych by Robert Rauschenberg and a dynamic group show---featuring Alexandra Posen, Greg Haberny, Naomi Reis, and Mark Freedman--- inspired by the cultural zeitgeist that surrounded this event.

Social Housing in Spain is intended to be the first of a series of international programs by the AIANY Housing Committee, highlighting exemplary housing design around the world. For the first program of the series, AIANY have invited three leading architects from Spain who are currently teaching in the tri-state area: Carmen Espegel, Iñaqui Carnicero, and María Hurtado de Mendoza. The panelists will present and comment upon innovative projects that follow the country’s strong social commitment to housing.

The Design Trust for Public Space announces The Energetic City: Connectivity in the Public Realm, a new request for project proposals to redefine public space.

New York Mayor Bill de Blasio has addressed the “crisis of affordability” by implementing a five-borough, ten-year plan that will build and preserve 200,000 affordable units over the coming decade. Believing affordable housing to be part of “the bedrock of what makes New York City work,” Blasio hopes the plan will make New York, once again, “a place where our most vulnerable, our working people and our middle class can all thrive.” Review the plan in detail and check out one of the largest affordable housing projects planned for the city, here.

Jonathan Kirschenfeld, founder of the Institute for Public Architecture and principal at Jonathan Kirschenfield Architect PC, has been selected to receive the inaugural Henry Hobson Richardson Award. The award, presented by the New York State chapter of the American Institute of Architects (AIA), lauded Kirschenfeld for his "contribution to the quality of New York State public architecture."

From CLOG. In many countries, architects assume that designing to meet the local building code assures that their buildings are safe for the public. But what if a building’s harm is not in the risk of the building falling down, but in the building performing as intended? If designed for the wrong purpose, can a building be a human rights violation, and if so, what should an architect do about it?

Coinciding with the release of CLOG : PRISONS, the J. Max Bond Center on Design for the Just City and the Masters of Urban Design Program at the Spitzer School of Architecture are hosting a lecture and panel response organized by CLOG that will critically examine the architecture of incarceration.

Throughout 2014, three major New York institutions – the AIA New York Chapter | Center for Architecture, the Museum of the City of New York, and the Spitzer School of Architecture at City College – will be hosting exhibitions and programs that will celebrate Catalan architecture in New York City. These events serve as the foundation for “Barcelona-New York City Urban Bridge 2014: A Year of Catalan Architecture in New York.”