Mirrors on the walls have been popular since the unveiling of great hall of mirrors at Versailles in 1678. Adds to the sparkle and apparent size of the room. Exterior walls of mirror glass begins in the early 1970s in the USA by architects like Cesar Pelli and I.M. Pei. Reduces the scale on the street and skyline. Merge with the sky. But mirrors on the ceiling?? The first reference is the … [Read more...]
Best of the Week in Public Art
Friend me at glenn.weiss.100 for the originals in real time. Two best finds of the week are the giant mural in Syria complete this year in the middle of the war and the Smokey Hollow Memorial to the African American Community that was demolished in the late 1960s. Most popular this week is the Edmonton, Canada, pavilion by Marc … [Read more...]
Return of the Dome and Bubble Pavilion
The dome structure has a mundane and glorious history from the African thatched house to the soaring dome of dome of Florence. In the 1960s and 70s thorough Buckminster Fuller and Hippies, the dome returned to world fairs and rural, self-built homes. Today the digital design software combined with computer controlled routers or jet cutters have brought a resurgence in small structures that range … [Read more...]
Dallas Park Pavilions: CooperJoseph outshines Snohetta
In 2003, the City of Dallas passed a bond to renovate its parks. The bond included generous budgets for new picnic pavilions as architectural features. After a series of pavilions from regional firms, Dallas hired CooperJoseph and Snohetta. If this was a football game, the final score would be CooperJoseph, 45 and Snohetta, 10. A few years ago, I heard Ai WeiWei describe his frustration with … [Read more...]
Dallas Memorials: Kennedy and Police
Never been to Dallas, Texas. Two memorials to learn from: JFK Memorial , 1970, by Philip Johnson and the Dallas Police Memorial by Ed Baum. Both are under-successful works of architects caught in transition. Johnson has several quirks such as tiny, tiny experiments with decoration showing a crack in his modernist faith. He raises the walls to show the feet and calves of visitors inside the … [Read more...]
Funny Pavilions in Shanghai
A certain ugliness of architectural work has emerged in China. Ugliness is normally made by long-term neglect or the original laziness by the designer. But many architects of all nationalities in working in China seem to be working on a style based on a quasi-organic "flow" and plastic injection toy manufacturing. Perhaps I am just out-of-date. Glenn Weiss "Living in urban surroundings … [Read more...]