Mini-golf

Design collective La Bolleur have produced this beautiful minigolf course. Mocoloco report it is on its way to Milan next. Great work.

Plans

For a long time it has seemed poor to feature interesting architecture in the media whilst assuming that the public would be 'confused' by floorplans.

So it was a pleasant surprise to find that Wallpaper has been publishing interactive drawings for some time, allowing you to alternate between an orthogonal drawing and photographs of the building concerned. It makes for an easier understanding of the project, whether you're an architect or not. Well done everyone.

Projection

OM Ungers remixed in a simply jawdropping architectural projection. It's surely what pixellated cubic postmodernism was invented for.

(via)

Post-war

As a former resident of a GKC building (albeit for just under a week, aged 0), I was sad to learn this Civic Trust Award winning building had been demolished. Add to this that I spent four years living in an Edinburgh towerblock has led to an affection for post-war Scottish architecture. Nice to see ILike provide a link to Historic Scotland's PDF guide to the genre.

The image here is of Langlee Housing Estate, Galashiels by Wheeler and Sproson from 1967 - crisp primary forms with asymmetric facade compositions which could be mistaken for something more recent.

Emptiness

Architectural representations of a particularly spare kind in the work of Khedoori, quoted in butdoesitfloat. Like Rossi's work, there is latent the invitation to populate the space, as though people will begin to give purpose to their chilly emptiness.

Superimposition

And so to the work of Bas Princen, a Dutch photographer attracted to abandoned urban settings with strong geometric character and their capacity for creating striking abstract images. Many photos deal with the collision of cartesian grids and natural forms, as idealised human form-making meets the real world. No surprise then to find an explicit reference to Superstudio in one of the captions - a micro-tiled concrete skeleton that could be the work of these 60s/70s visionary architects.

Things

Increasingly enjoying the sliced opinion and snapshots of Things magazine, and their regular posts. I might call it 'a sideways look at web presences' if it didn't sound cliched.

It's over here.

Cinema

The Rio by 1:2:3 and Kristoffer Sundin consists of simple well-chosen materials assembled to create an intimate, distinctive space. Cleverly, the way they are put together - and in particular, the lighting - still seem to say 'cinema' without resorting to cliche. I loved this shot of the entrance in the rain.

Zumthor

One of my heroes, Peter Zumthor was announced as this year's Pritzker Prize winner. His work is formally ascetic, but materially rich, born of extended gestation periods completely unfeasible for the everyday architect. As a result, he produces subtle, deep architecture that is anything but everyday, yet whose textural properties resonate with human contact.

His sensual work is summarised by Dezeen here, and my favourite building - his mountainside chapel at Chur - is shown left.

Whitworth

I recently went to the Whitworth Art Gallery in Manchester, and caught the 'Subversive Spaces' exhibition. It draws together disparate fields of artistic enquiry, including situationism, feminist art and psycho-geography to create stimulating reflections. All fall into the category of art from the margins. Artists such as Sarah Lucas, Dali, Lucy Gunning and Guy De Bord are featured.

Retro

The redesigned Architectural Review is available for pre-publication inspection over at Dezeen. I was immediately transported back by its masthead to the RIBA Library and browsing through mid-seventies (I think it was) editions of the magazine - probably looking for a brick housing scheme, or something by Peter Eisenman.

I have a worry that clean well-composed pictures will be disturbed by overlapping tabs and text blocks, though its generally retro feel paradoxically lent the spreads previewed a freshness.

Tumbler

Following Zaha Hadid's (empty) Chanel Pavilion last year, OMA have stepped up to create something equally frivolous for Prada. The Transformer is a pavilion that can be 'tumbled' onto each of its faces to create different layouts. It's like the recession isn't really happening.

However, the website explaining how it works it quite good. Check out the timelapse photography.

Polemic

It seems like a very long time since I've seen an architectural project with any degree of political content or a committed polemical position. Via BldgBlog comes information about a project by Viktor Ramos of Rice University consisting of a provocative architectural solution to the Palestinian-Israel impasse - a bypass.

His scheme proposes a series of spaces which weave under- and overground to form what he terms 'The Continuous Enclave'. The scheme reminds me of Lebbeus Woods' work from the 80's, but with a technocratic machine aesthetic in place of the steampunk feel of Woods. Great to see architecture used in this way again.

More hi-res images are available on Ramos' flickerset.

Caro

The Chapel of Light in Bourbourg received little attention from the architectural press a few months back, and I've just been reminded of it after a talk for LICC in Manchester on the Theology of Architecture. Anthony Caro's work lies at the cusp of architecture and sculpture, and I remember a fine retrospective of his work in the fields of Yorkshire Sculpture Park a few years' ago.

In the neglected shell of a bombed French neo-gothic church he has inserted beautifully-crafted expressions of biblical themes. The three interventions use three materials - metal bas-reliefs in the niches of the apse, oak 'towers' like pulpits in the nave, and a stunning spiral of stone as a baptismal font in the chancel.

Cheesegrater

Good to see Allies and Morrison's new Charles Street car park in Sheffield city centre. Despite being a dull day, the simple idea of rotating a single standard trapezoidal anodised panel still looked lively and intriguing. I've admired their urbane work for a long time, and they've brought their usual distinctive but unassuming approach to a prosaic building form. Oh, and the people have already given it a nickname - did you guess?

The International

'The movie also looks at the role of architecture in our lives and how much it influences emotions. Expensive modern architecture has changed the landscape of so many big cities. It's fascinating architecture: it seems driven by a desire to exude clarity with its lines, yet at the same time it is hard to read.' (from Sight & Sound)

A visual artist's observation on international modernism, as Tom Tykwer describes the key role of architecture in his new film 'The
International'. Looking forward to it - and seeing the always watchable Clive Owen in action.

Biscuits

On Friday, some of my students arrived with parts of a model they are making of Platt Hall in Manchester. They were cut by laser from a sheet of MDF, and as you can see were surprisingly detailed. Platt Hall was built in 1746 in the Palladian style to designs by John Carr of York.

I thought they looked a bit like biscuits.

Seaside

I'm pleased to say Dezeen has picked up on Arca's Silver Cafe in Morecambe, with, I think, the full set of Tim Soar's great picture-set. Tim has captured the two sides to the scheme: a shiny piece of silver flotsam washed-up on the seafront, and a bold space that is happy to hold kitsch seaside paraphernalia.

M+T

The work of Mantilla + Tunon has caught my eye before, notably their Auditorium in Leon, Spain. Its asymmetric window bays were a strikingly original take on the urban facade, avoiding cliches such as the 'barcode' facade and modish colour. All in all, it had a pleasing solidity. Now their show in San Silvestro has popped up on Designboom, with some new projects. The house shown here looks intriguing, with its undulating wall defining interior and exterior rooms as it winds across a site in Nanjing, China.

Depression

Some say design could do with losing some of its frivolous extravagance, born of too much time and money, and indulgent clients out to make a name for themselves. This article in the New York Times makes a good case for our fresh economic woes being A Good Thing, prompting designers to plunder cheap materials and work to innovate. With recollections of Charles and Ray Eames working wonders in wartime and post-war austerity conditions, it is a compelling argument. Let's see what we can do.