M. ROGERS

M. ROGERS

The architect Richard Rogers, 88, died yesterday. His obituaries invariably started by mentioning the Centre Pompidou, the seriously ill-conceived museum that turned the youthful Rogers and his partner Renzo Piano, into overnight sensations. I remember that when I was...
INSTRUCTION AND INSPIRATION

INSTRUCTION AND INSPIRATION

A reader recently wrote to me citing Frank Lloyd Wright as a model for the future. “Wright’s discipline itself offers us an antidote to the wandering efforts of rudderless students: it can be understood and undertaken by those with a little personal aptitude and a...
PHILLY PHLASH

PHILLY PHLASH

Helmut Jahn (1940-2021) died three days ago in an unfortunate bicycle accident. I don’t know if the world is a better place thanks to his flashy, in-your-face architecture, but his Liberty Place project, once the tallest in Philadelphia, does not make the city a...
POST-MODERNIST

POST-MODERNIST

The headline in Hugh Newell Jacobsen’s obituary in the New York Times describes him as a “famed modernist.” Famed he was, especially as the designer of exquisite high-end houses, but to call him a modernist is inaccurate. He was, rather, a post-modernist. That other...
NEW BLOOD

NEW BLOOD

I recently came across an article in The Architect’s Newspaper titled “The future of our profession depends on diversity.” The author argues that the architectural profession needs to take specific steps to increase diversity. “The architecture profession runs the...
RADICAL CHIC

RADICAL CHIC

The architecture group, Superstudio, was founded in Florence in 1966, the year I graduated from architecture school. I remember their projects from the Italian design mag Domus, which I used to leaf through in the library. I didn’t like them then and I don’t like them...