Faux Historicism For Faux Legacies.

I'm not sure what is funnier, that Pres. El Bushie is picking Robert M. Stern to design his Presidential Library, or the 'open house' this weekend at the Cleveland Trust Rotunda. 

Since TOI Studio already has it covered, I'm not going to try to top it. 

As for President Bush's Memorial to Himself, its a pretty obvious pick. Robert Stern specializes in creating faux historic buildings, while Pres. Bush is wishing to create a fake moment to his fake legacy. 

So you know, when history judges him, it judges him correctly. 

A hack architect for a hack president. 

Which oddly, is quite similar to what is going on here in Cuyahoga County. 

Being ironic does have a place in architecture!

Detroit: Cranbrook Academy of Art

Last Thursday I spent most of the afternoon touring the Cranbrook Academy of Art located outside of Detroit, in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan with my studio class.

From Cranbrook's website:

Founded by Detroit philanthropists George and Ellen Booth in 1904, Cranbrook’s campus features the work of world-renowned architects such as Eliel Saarinen, Albert Kahn, Steven Holl, Tod Williams and Billie Tsien, Rafael Moneo, Peter Rose and sculptors Carl Milles, Marshall Fredericks and others. Critics have called Cranbrook "the most enchanted and enchanting setting in America" and in 1989, it was designated a National Historic Landmark.

Outside the Saarinen house at Cranbrook. Finnish architect, Eliel Saarinen, who designed most of the orginal buildings at Cranbrook and the campus plan, and his family (son Eero designed the TWA Terminal at JFK in NYC and the St. Louis Arch) lived here.
Backyard of the Saarinen HouseKivi's Muse by Waine Altonen In courtyard of Saarinen House
Sadly we were not able to take pictures inside the home, but one can view a virtual tour here. What is amazing about Saarinen, not only in this house, but in his design of the entire campus is the way in which he uses slight of hand, perspective, and light to tell a story that leads from one experience to the next. His attention to detail and craft is uncanny. Unlike most other modernists, Eliel's work always playful and unpretentious. He plays games in his designs within the use of pattern, axises, and perspective. His work also is interesting in that it is respectful of fitting into an American vernacular at Cranbrook, yet it is unmistakably modern.

all pictures by theodore

Architorture!

I doubt my friends and I are the only frustrated architecture students who in a moment of sleep deprivation thought that a tv show/movie about the plight of architecture students would be incredibly entertaining.

I mean, who wouldn't want to watch someone do autocad all night long and then witness them pass out on their keyboard with salvia pooling around their mouse.

Well, someone is making that movie.

Architorture, the Ddocumentary

Sagrada Familia Threatened.

And we thought Cleveland made some stupid decisions.

From the Guardian:
Antionio Gaudi's unfinished masterpiece the Sagrada Familia cathedral in Barcelona is threatened by the proposed construction of a tunnel for a high speed rail line less the 7ft from its foundations.

However, during an emotional press conference yesterday, Mr Bonet outlined what he sees as the dangers to the cathedral's foundation and structure.

He also attacked the "arrogance" of the civil engineers working on the project. He said they had assured him that, with modern building materials, the daring architectural feat Gaudi began 120 years ago would be safe.

"They also said the Titanic couldn't sink," he said yesterday.

Mr Bonet said the building, a Unesco world heritage site visited by about 10,000 people a day, was threatened initially by the construction of an underground protective barrier, which begins less than two metres (7ft) from the building's foundations. Any accidental contact during the project could cause cracks in the foundations. Eventually, chunks of the vaulted ceiling could fall on someone, he said.

The construction of the tunnel, which would pass below the water level only 10 metres beneath the 20,000-tonne cathedral, could cause the ground to shift or compress, destabilising the building, he added.

"The whole thing could crack and it would start to crumble," he said.