Why is it that, in places where nothing is needed, there is often nevertheless a nagging architectural compulsion to add something…
Happy Trails in 2013
Garden and Gaffe
Leon Battista Alberti famously wrote: “The city is like some large house and the house in turn like some small…
Strange Bedfellows
The image at left shows the construction of the “Instant City” during the congress of the International Council of Societies…
Going Slowly: Cadaval and Solà-Morales
[Originally published in Mark Magazine #39] “Young architects” is a culturally loaded term, often conjuring notions of rebellion, utopian idealism,…
Ill-Fitting: The Balenciaga Museum
Fashion, Architecture, Politics: Image is Everything The inauguration of a cultural institution is normally a cause for widespread celebration; even…
Gaudí’s hanging chain models: parametric design avant la lettre?
It is known that Gaudí preferred modelling architecture over drawing it; especially models made of chains hung from a ceiling, or strings…
Villa Nurbs: a Sad Spectacle
It is June 2012, and after a decade of construction Villa Nurbs is still incomplete. In fact, construction has now seemingly come…
A Reminder to Urban Planners
Given the choice, most children would rather play in a terrain vague than a playground. They would rather make mud…
Not So Different
“Spain is Different” was a tourism campaign slogan coined in the mid-1960s by dictator Francisco Franco’s Ministry of Information and Tourism (!),…
Architectural Art
Art galleries and museums seem to be showing with greater frequency artworks about architecture, many of them by artists who…
Architourism
Tourism is the only ‘industry’ in Spain that is not downsizing in the current (well, actually it’s been five years…
Paragraphs on Architectural Criticism
Pool Typology
We’ve all seen that famous aerial photograph of an American Southwest suburb in which each and every house has a…
Quietly Brilliant: Nieto Sobejano Arquitectos
[Originally published in Mark Magazine #35] Fuensanta Nieto and Enrique Sobejano are truly architects’ architects. They may not be a…
Park, Shop, and Pray
Churches are architecture whereas supermarkets and parking garages are not. At least, that’s what we’ve been taught by Nikolaus Pevsner. What, then,…
Collective Intelligence or Collective Stupidity?
The above image is circulating on the internet representing all sorts of cities on all sorts of continents, showing us…
Calatravaland
El País reported recently that the government of the Autonomous Region of Valencia, when it was presided by Francisco Camps (the…
The Cantilever Race
The skyscraper race is over. It’s been won hands down by an absurdly high building in Dubai which doesn’t look…
Quaderns #262: A Gut Reaction
[Originally published in Quaderns d’arquitectura i urbanisme online] Quaderns d’arquitectura i urbanisme #262 is provocatively titled “Parainfrastructures”, an invented word that…
Criticalista 