One of the first lessons every student learns in architecture school is that an architectural design must always be based on a…
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…
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…
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…
The Venetian Front
[Review of the 15th International Architecture Exhibition originally published in Mark Magazine #63. Photos by Sergio Pirrone.] Reporting From the…
Super-Islands
The city block is a fundamental element of urbanism. The Ancient Romans called a city block an insula, or “island”, which is…
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…
Contemporary Ruins II
Further to my last post, here is another Spanish contemporary ruin by a Pritzker laureate: Toyo Ito’s spa near Torrevieja.…
Contemporary Ruins
As is well-known, Spain’s recent building boom-turned-bust has left behind a legacy of halted construction projects that are now in…
Built-In Obsolescence
The other day, out of the blue, my printer suddenly stalled, even though it had been working perfectly for once. Strange warning…
Everyday Camouflage in the Countryside
The building above looks like a military installation of some sort, right? After all, it’s got a camouflage pattern on…
A World Apart: Architectural Autonomy as Artistic Freedom / Un mundo aparte. La autonomía arquitectónica como libertad artística
[Originally presented at and published in Out-onomy, Critic|all II International Conference on Architectural Design and Criticism, ETSAM / Resumen en castellano sigue…
Reporting From the Affront
[Text published in art4d magazine #238] The Venice Biennale is a huge event; architecture’s biggest. It’s so big, if we…
Monolith of Memory
[Text originally published in Mark Magazine #61] The Camp de Rivesaltes, a sprawling military base built in 1938 near Perpignan,…
Dizzying Inequality
Ben Wheatley’s film High Rise, a multi-story about decadence and class war in a Brutalist housing estate in London, brought plenty…
Architecture that Only an Artist can Get Away With
New York’s Guggenheim Museum has just announced plans to install a new artwork by Maurizio Cattelan consisting of a toilet made…
Love-You Architecture
“The envy and hostility of Wall Street leads many to a common goal: to amass enough money so as to…
Avoid the Void
[Originally published in Mark Magazine #60] In recent decades, architecture commemorating violent death has typically relied on a dark, austere and…
Farewell Zaha
Zaha Hadid left us yesterday. She won’t be forgotten for a long time, as she was an architect who actually changed architecture.…
Revisiting Casa Bloc
The architecture of housing differs fundamentally from the architecture of other building types in that it is never a purely qualitative…
Criticalista 