I’m a walking nightmare, an arsenal of doomI kill conversation as I walk into the roomI’m a three line whipI’m … More
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A New Low: the World’s Tallest Building
Faced with a half-day layover in Dubai recently, I decided to visit the tallest building in the world. I could … More
Fake Architecture News?
A few weeks ago, I received a curious e-mail from someone representing “a digital marketing agency currently working with a … More
Spongifying the City
Esponjamiento urbano, a Spanish term that literally translates as “urban spongification”, refers to the process of aerating dense, historical urban … More
Notes from a Recent Construction Site Visit
I was recently fortunate enough to be shown a truly interesting work of architecture currently under construction in Barcelona: La … More
Vinylizing the Barcelona Pavilion
The Barcelona Pavilion is as white as Greek yoghurt right now. All the Roman travertine, ancient green marble, green Alpine … More
Archispeak in Political Propaganda
The Catalan independence movement has for years been churning out a great deal of propaganda in order to win over … More
Award Politics
Architecture’s top award is the Pritzker Prize, as we all know. Often referred to in the media as the “Nobel … More
Vacation Ruin
Ruins are as sad as they are beautiful. Building abandonment is never a happy occurrence, but when it precedes building inhabitation, it’s … More
Monomateriality
Material purity is highly valued in contemporary architecture. The ideal that buildings should be materially consistent inside and out seems … More
Why Be Normal
Recently, I visited two buildings that provoked me to seriously question everything I learned in school. One is a student residence … More
Experitecture
Empirical experimentation has always been intrinsic to architecture. Attempting to build something that has never been built before in terms of form, height, … More
Vernacular Precedent?
When I first saw an image of De Rotterdam, by OMA, I knew I had seen something vaguely similar before … More
Scatological Cantilever?
Unlike so many contemporary cantilevers whose only purpose, seemingly, is to out-do other cantilevers in depth, height or width, the tiny … More
Architecture Without ‘Parti’
One of the first lessons every student learns in architecture school is that an architectural design must always be based on a … More
The Barcelona Pavilion as Cozy Christmas Home
Here’s yet another advertisement that features the Barcelona Pavilion. This one isn’t a print ad for a famous German brand … More
Building on top
Sometimes, the best option is one on top of the other. It might be because available space is too constricted, because an opportunity is … More
The Definitive Solution to All Gentrification Everywhere
Gentrification is like cancer: everything seems to cause it, and there’s no cure; there’s no answer. We all know by now that … More
Super-Islands
The city block is a fundamental element of urbanism. The Ancient Romans called a city block an insula, or “island”, which is … More
Temporary Permanence
Earlier this summer, to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the reconstruction of Mies van der Rohe and Lily Reich’s German Pavilion for … More
