The Architectural Review articles from April 2003

The Architectural Review archives from April 2003

The Snow Show. (View).
April 1, 2003... During lunch at a Manhattan restaurant, independent curator Lance Fung and Tuula Yrjola from the Finnish Tourist Board came up with thc idea of hosting a show celebrating ice and snow structures in Finland's Lapland. From February to April next...

AR's MIPIM prizes at Cannes. (View).
April 1, 2003... For the first time, The Architectural Review has offered prizes for architectural excellence in unbuilt development projects at MIPIM (Marche International des Professionels de l'Immobilier), the four day development and property show held...

St Catherine's celebrated. (View).
April 1, 2003... Saint Catherine's Monastery in Sinai has been a centre of religious pilgrimage for over fifteen centuries, and is one of the oldest monasteries in the world. Set against waterless red rock on the upper slopes of Mount Sinai (where Moses is said...

Spectrum lecture and award. (View).(Brief Article)
April 1, 2003... Spectrum 2003, the annual international furniture and interior design show devoted to excellence, takes place between 13 and 16 May in the Commonwealth Institute on Kensington High Street, London. For the first time, the AR is mounting a...

Errata.(Brief Article)
April 1, 2003... The plan of the Cathedral of Our Lady of Los Angeles by Rafael Moneo published in March 2003 inadvertently had the wrong numbering. The correct numbering is shown here (left). The list of credits for the house in Toronto, Canada, by Seth...

Browser: Sutherland Lyall digs into the rich ores of architectural cyberspace. (View).(evaluations of architectural Web sites)
April 1, 2003... Make my Australia day Despite the orthographic infelicities of Rice Daubney's marketing manager ('an' for 'and' and 'here' for 'hear' in our early email skirmishes), this Sydney practice has one of the best architectural websites I've...

Letters.
April 1, 2003... OLD PARADIGM JENCKS SIR: I may be a few swallows short of a summer but to me Jenck's new paradigm sounds very much like the old one. If Jencks had reduced his essay to its subtext of 'a new generator of novel form to refresh top-end...

View from Moscow: as capitalism makes its presence felt in Russia, Moscow has become an architectural boomtown, capital of the new Wild East. Catherine Cooke pulls on her fur coat to survey developments. (View).
April 1, 2003... From its historic centre out to the wooded periphery, Russia's capital is awash with new buildings and as locals say, more rise constantly 'like mushrooms after rain' in any available space. Any student of the city's twentieth-century planning...

Urban interaction: these ingenious electronic screens provide new forms of interactive thrills for Tokyo's jaded urbanites. (Design Review).(Mitsubishi Shoji)(Tokyo, Japan)
April 1, 2003... Mitsubishi is developing a few prestigious blocks at the heart of Tokyo, hoping to turn the broad boulevard that leads from the railway station to the Outer Palace Garden into a japanese version of the Champs-Elysees. Bloomberg, a global,...

Surface travel: as transport shrinks the world, we have a choice between increasing pollution and destruction and enriched urbanity. (Comment).
April 1, 2003... Modern civilization would be impossible without speedy and efficient transport. People travel more and more, though electronic communications improve exponentially. The optimistic proposition that travel (particularly commuting) might be...

French lessons: backed by political will and financial muscle, France's high-speed rail system, with its sleek new stations and infrastructure, is reshaping the country's geography.
April 1, 2003... Compared with Britain's fragmented, dawdling, underfunded rail system, which has become the despair of those who use it, French railways are a paradigm of progress, ambition and efficiency. Shrinking train journey times have contrived to...

On the road: this economical and environmentally responsive new headquarters in Melbourne for highway emergency services is in the best traditions of bold roadside architecture.
April 1, 2003... The fascination and freedom of road travel have long been overtaken by the grim realities of inescapable congestion, featureless motorways, frustrating breakdowns and hazardous accidents. Yet the chivalrous image of emergency services and...

Sky station: in an attempt to tame its suburbs, Vancouver has set up an overhead rapid-transit system. Its stations are designed as memorable and welcoming places.
April 1, 2003... In many ways, Vancouver is the finest city in North America. It has a proper mixed-use urban centre that focuses on a park and stretches along a magnificent site between forested hills and the complex fretted geometry of the coast of the...

Bay gateway: The daily grind of commuting on San Francisco's Bay Area rail system is enlivened by this new local station which forms a strong yet dignified suburban landmark.
April 1, 2003... The origins of San Francisco's Bay Area Rapid Transit system (BART) date back to 1946, when local business and civic leaders began discussing ways of easing congestion caused by the huge post-war migration to the suburbs around the bay and a...

Swiss civility: bus travel may be a marginalized form of transport, but Lugano's new bus station is a big bold roof that unifies and civilizes a disparate urban realm.
April 1, 2003... For both transport planners and users, bus travel tends to be regarded as a marginalized activity (who could possibly prefer taking the bus to the comfort and convenience of a car), and its associated buildings and infrastructure too often...

In the public eye: reorganization of the German railway has allowed Stuttgart to remodel its centre with an underground station that organically links structure and environmental control.
April 1, 2003... Stuttgart is at the end of the line -- or at least it has been up to now, in 1910, Paul Bonatz won the competition for the railway terminus, which he built between 1914 and 1928 as a grand, austere stone structure that in its Spartan way links...

Public image: expansion of a leading advertising agency is another stage in its imaginative flight from stifling corporate design. (Interior Design).(architects design unique office buildings for Chiat/Day Inc., TBWA Chiat/Day Inc.)
April 1, 2003... As a leading advertising agency in America, Chiat Day's business is creating images that subliminally stir the imagination and amuse. In registering its presence in the public mind -- in Los Angeles, New York and, most recently, San Francisco...

Eastern pleasure: in Tokyo, a shimmering white dwelling on the edge of the city's entertainment district appears to be an alien, elegant body dropped into a mire of mess and vice. (Art House).(the Natural Ellipse house)
April 1, 2003... The house, known as Natural Ellipse, was designed by Masaki Endoh and Masahiro Ikeda on a site at the edge of Shibuya, Tokyo's shopping and entertainment district. Surrounded by what the Japanese call 'love hotels', its design is imbued with a...

Ornament on trial. (Royal Academy Forum).(artist Tom Phillips' Summary Treatise on the Nature of Ornament)(Excerpt)
April 1, 2003... Ornament, reviled in avant-garde circles since Adolf Loos associated it with crime, remains an important force in artistic production in many cultures. The Academy Forum invited artist Tom Phillips to present his canonical Summary Treatise on...

Technal. (Product Review).
April 1, 2003... A new operations centre for Phoenix Natural Gas in Belfast. by Cartwright Pickard Architects, has been designed to minimize energy consumption and carbon dioxide emissions. To reduce the cost of heating and cooling, and the use of artificial...

Ame Euro. (Product Review).(Brief Article)
April 1, 2003... Proteus hr, is a new composite rainscreen cladding system produced by ame facades. It is extremely adaptable, offering a range of front skin finishes including steel, aluminium and zinc, which are structurally bonded to an aluminium honeycomb...

GKD. (Product Review).
April 1, 2003... The facade of a new car park at Princeton University. US, had to be extremely robust yet aesthetically convincing. The architects. TEN Arquitectos of Mexico City, have clad it with stainless-steel wire mesh, allowing the underlying structure of...

MERO. (Product Review).(Brief Article)
April 1, 2003... The Lehrter Bahnhof railway station in Berlin by von Gerkan & Marg is the central transfer point in a network of regional and urban railway lines, the subway, trains and buses. The station is halfway between the eastern and western centres of...

Prodema Lignum. (Product Review).(Brief Article)
April 1, 2003... A natural wood cladding which does not discolour or stain over time, Lignum combines the appearance of natural wood with the highest ratings in artificial weathering tests. It is produced by the polymerization of a veneer into a high pressure...

Gasell. (Product Review).(Brief Article)
April 1, 2003... A hangar and a 35m high control tower by Reid Architecture have been erected for Farnborough airport. The hangar, 290m long and 45m deep, is big enough for 6 Boeing business jets or Airbus corporate jets. The hangar and its doors are clad with...

Reynaers. (Product Review).
April 1, 2003... An office development at Chineham Court, Basingstoke, is set in mature woodland in the grounds of an Edwardian manor. The four-storey building, designed by SBT Architects, has fully-glazed facades of Reynaers CW50 curtain walling, a thermally...

Eternit. (Product Review).(Brief Article)
April 1, 2003... Architects Stephenson Bell have designed a new housing scheme at Chorlton Park, Manchester. The facade is a combination of oak-framed balconies (from sustainable sources), and dark grey Eternit high pressure laminate Lamina External. The same...

Vanceva Design. (Product Review).(Brief Article)
April 1, 2003... Designed to complement the surrounding Art Deco buildings, the Lincoln Cinema in Miami, USA, has a facade of laminated glass with coloured Vanceva Design interlayers. The colours, which include yellows, purples and greens, wash the floors and...

Cricursa. (Product Review).(Brief Article)
April 1, 2003... CRI-REGULITE is a laminated glass which allows users to control its light transmission. Based on suspended particle device (SPD) technology, the glass contains a conductive film coated with microscopic light-absorbing particles, which block...

White Papers, Black Masks: Architecture, Race and Culture. (Reviews: Race in Question).(Book Review)
April 1, 2003... Edited by Lesley Naa Norle Lokko. London: Continuum, 2002. [pounds sterling]55 (hb), [pounds sterling]16.99 (pb) White Papers, Black Masks: Architecture, Race and Culture purports to be the first sustained examination of the ways racial...

The Architectural Detail--Dutch Architects Visualise Their Concepts. (Reviews: Designing Dutch).(Book Review)
April 1, 2003... By Ed Melet. Rotterdam: NAi Publishers. 2002. [euro]49 The sub-title says it all. This is a book to show you how leading Dutch architects view the detailing of their buildings. The author looks at the work of 12 architects to see how the...

Sustainable Urban Design--An Environmental Approach. (Reviews: Green Cities).(Book Review)
April 1, 2003... Edited by Randall Thomas. London: Spon Press. 2003. [pounds sterling]26 By the end of the twenty-first century, it is highly possible that three-quarters of the world's population will be city-dwellers. The premise of this book is that, if...

Architecture, Engineering, and Environment. (Reviews: Arup Apotheosis).(Book Review)
April 1, 2003... By Dean Hawkes and Wayne Forster. London: Laurence King. 2002. [sterling pounds]50 This book is introduced with a really comprehensive review of the history of building services engineering from the late eighteenth century up to the...

From Garden City to Green City: The Legacy of Ebenezer Howard. (Reviews: Compost Maker).(Book Review)
April 1, 2003... Edited by Kermit C. Parsons and David Schuyler. Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press. 2003. [pounds sterling ]33.50 Biographers like to remind us that Howard was essentially an inventor (whose big aim was to develop a shorthand-typing...

Dwellings: The Vernacular House World Wide. (Reviews: Lessons in Common Sense).(Book Review)
April 1, 2003... By Paul Oliver. London: Phaidon. 2003. [pounds sterling]35 This is an up to date and fully revised version of Oliver's previous Dwellings: the house across the world, and it may also, perhaps, be seen as a personal postscript to his vast...

Case Study Houses: The Complete CSH Program 1945-1966. (Reviews: Editorial Input).(book review)(Book Review)
April 1, 2003... By Elizabeth A. T. Smith. Cologne: Taschen. 2002. [pounds sterling]100 John Entenza, founder of the Los Angeles-based Case Study House Program under his internationally influential Arts & Architecture magazine, was not English, but could...

Corus. (Specifier's Information).
April 1, 2003... A new hangar building and a 35m high control tower have been built at Famborough airport, as part of a redevelopment plan to establish it as the leading airport for business aviation. The hangar building, designed by Reid Architecture, is 290m...

Pilkington. (Specifier's Information).(Brief Article)
April 1, 2003... Structural glazing systems by Pilkington Architectural have been used in the redevelopment of Piccadilly station in Manchester. The [pounds sterling]55 million project, designed by architect BDP. involved the creation of a low-level concourse,...

TRADA. (Specifier's Information).
April 1, 2003... TRADA, the Timber Research and Development Association, has launched the askTRADA website, a comprehensive reference source of practical and technical information about timber and timber products at www.asktrada.co.uk. Information includes a...

Clauss Markisen. (Specifier's Information).
April 1, 2003... A new external sunshade, known as s_enn, is formed of moulded stainless steel sections. They are connected to form a stable wind-resistant shade which rolls up, like a roller blind, when not in use. The 4mm wide hollow stainless steel sections...

Pilkington Processing. (Specifier's Information).
April 1, 2003... Pilkington Insulight[TM] Therm insulating glazing units, incorporating Suncool[TM] High performance Brilliant, were specified for a [pounds sterling]25 million leisure complex in Cardiff, adjacent to the Millennium Stadium. The units were...

Comar Systems. (Specifier's Information).(Brief Article)
April 1, 2003... Comar Systems comprise purpose-designed ranges of extruded aluminium profiles, components and accessories, designed to create glazed facades and roofs, doors and windows, glazed frames and partitions. They are suitable for new and refurbishment...

Kawneer. (Specifier's Information).(Brief Article)
April 1, 2003... Three new office buildings at Brindleyplace, Birmingham, have been linked to form a new core building for the Royal Bank of Scotland. A combination of Kawneer products has been used, including the 1202 zone drained curtain wall system for...

GEZE UK. (Specifier's Information).(Brief Article)
April 1, 2003... A glass entrance lobby for Holmes Place health club in Farnborough by GEZE, manufacturer of window and door control technology. The lobby is a glass box' with double doors, creating a weather-proof vestibule in a structurally glazed facade....

Delight: in a tiny perfect city in an unfashionable part of Italy, there is a treasure that transports us back to the early Renaissance, an unattainable world, yet inhabited by people we know.(Brief Article)
April 1, 2003... Atri is a perfect Italian hill town. You climb up to it along a snaking road from the valley to a picturesque platform hovering over the Adriatic, ten kilometres away. But it is completely isolated from the ruthless, repetitive, touristic...