Hasta La Ideas

Dezeen Wire: art and design critics have questioned whether the posters unveiled on Friday to celebrate next year’s London Olympics truly represent the best of British creativity.

Mark Hudson of The Telegraph says that “overall, there are more hits than misses” among the posters by twelve leading British artists. He points to Fiona Banner’s work as the standout example, claiming its typographic combination of evocative phrases “feels appropriate to these challenging times.”

The Guardian‘s Jonathan Glancey also praises Banner’s design, describing it as “the most introspective, serious and moving of all these posters,” while questioning whether some of the designs are “aimed at art fans or athletics fans.”

Patrick Burgoyne of UK visual communication magazine Creative Review reports that members of the graphic design community were disappointed not to be given the chance to participate in the design process but is unconvinced that the results would have been much better given such an open brief.

The BBC‘s arts editor Will Gompertz says that the abstract nature of the posters means they lack context, adding “with this collection, you wouldn’t know where the games are being held. Maybe that in itself is a statement.”

Our readers were largely unimpressed with the standard of the designs – see the story and comments here and all of our stories on the London 2012 Olympics here.

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Dezeen Wire: UK broadcaster Channel 4 reports that a backlash is forming against the prevalence of unpaid internships in Britain, which are particularly popular with graduates in the creative industries.

A number of websites have been set up by graduates and campaigners offering advice to those partaking in internships and rallying support for campaigns that call on the government to introduce tighter regulations – Channel 4 News

Dezeen Wire: winners of the remaining four completed building categories and nine future designs, celebrating projects that are still in development, have been announced at the World Architecture Festival, which is currently taking place in Barcelona.

Winners include a Wild Reindeer Centre in Norway by Snøhetta and the 8 House residential development by Bjarke Ingels Group.

You can see details of the other twelve completed project winners in our previous story and Dezeen will be reporting on the overall winner when it is announced later today.

Here are some more details from the World Architecture Festival:

WAF Awards Day Two Category Winners Announced at World Architecture Festival Awards 2011

Four completed buildings and nine future projects, celebrating designs still on the drawing board, from around the world have today been announced as winners on the second day of the World Architectural Festival (WAF) Awards 2011.

The presentation of the WAF Awards is taking place during the largest global celebration of architecture – the World Architecture Festival, which is being held in Barcelona (CCIB) this week.

Speaking at the WAF Awards 2011 Paul Finch, WAF Programme Director, said: “The World Architecture Festival is the world’s largest, live, truly inclusive and interactive global architectural awards programme. Attracting entries from internationally renowned practices to small local architects, the stellar quality of this year’s designs demonstrates their commitment to designing the world’s most exciting buildings. This year we’ve attracted more entries than ever before, with more than 700 submissions from 66 different countries. Our congratulations go to the winners for truly accomplished projects.”

All the WAF Award category winners will go head to head on Friday 4^th November as they present their projects and compete for the highest accolades in global architecture, which will be decided by a ‘super-jury’¹ of some of the world’s most influential architectural and urban designers, led by the distinguished Michael Sorkin. They will cast their votes to decide the World Building of the Year 2011, Structural Project of the Year 2011 and Future Project of the Year 2011.

The WAF Awards day two winners are as follows:

World Shopping Building of the Year

Decameron, Sao Paulo, Brazil, Studio MK27, Brazil

The showroom of the Decameron furniture store is located on a rented site in the furniture commercial alley in São Paulo. To make the quick and economic construction viable, the architect, worked with the premise of a light occupation combined with industrial elements, which could easily be assembled.

World Display Building of the Year

Norwegian Wild Reindeer Centre Pavilion, Hjerkinn, Norway, Snøhetta, Norway

The Norwegian Wild Reindeer Centre Pavilion is located at Hjerkinn on the outskirts of Dovrefjell National Park, which rises 1200 metres above sea level and is home to Europe’s last wild reindeer herds and is the natural habitat for many rare plants and animals. The 90m² building, which features a rigid outer shell and an organic inner core is open to the public and serves as an observation pavilion for the Wild Reindeer Foundation educational programmes.

World Health Building of the Year

Rehabilitation Centre Groot Klimmendaal, Arnhem, Netherlands, Architectenbureau Koen van Velsen, Netherlands

In the undulating forest landscape around Arnhem in the eastern part of the Netherlands, revalidation centre ‘Groot Klimmendaal’ can be found standing as a quiet deer in between trees. From a small footprint, the building gradually fans out towards the top and cantilevers out over the surrounding terrain. The care concept is based on the idea that a positive and stimulating environment increases the well-being of patients and has a beneficial effect on their revalidation process. The design ambition was not to create a centre with the appearance of a health building but a building as a part of its surroundings and the community.

World Housing Building of the Year

8 House, Copenhagen, Denmark, Bjarke Ingels Group, Denmark

With spectacular views towards the Copenhagen Canal and over Kalvebod Fælled’s protected open spaces, 8 House will not only be offering residences to people in all of life’s stages as well as office spaces to the city’s business and trade – it will also serve as a house that allows people to cycle all the way from the ground floor to the top, moving alongside townhouses with gardens winding through an urban perimeter block.

Future Project of the Year – Commercial

Wadi Rum Resort, Jordan, Oppenheim Architecture + Design, USA

A unique luxury accommodation where desert sand meets desert stone, engaging with the landscape with nominal impact and primal elegance. The boundaries between man-made and nature, interior and exterior are deliberately blurred to establish maximum impact.

Future Project of the Year – Competition Entries

Glacier Discovery Walk, Alberta, Canada, Sturgess Architecture, Canada

The Glacier Discovery Walk is envisioned as an extension of the fractal landscape that defines the Columbia Icefields in Canada’s Jasper National Park. Located along the edge of this dramatic escarpment, the project weaves a continuous thread of experience through united geometric and material forms. This sinuous experience defines the Discovery Walk not only as a singular destination, but as a catalyst and gateway that empowers guests to immerse themselves in the untouched natural environment.

Future Project of the Year – Experimental

The Tower of Nests, Shanghai, China, Kjellgren Kaminsky Architecture AB

Located in down town Shanghai, it is designed to be co-inhabited by humans and animals.  Its outer skin is composed of natural materials to allow birds and bees to inhabit, yet providing a community space.

Future Project of the Year – Education

Women’s Opportunity Center, Kayonza, Rwanda, Sharon Davis Design, USA

On a two-hectare site in Rwanda, the most densely populated country in Africa, the Women’s Opportunity Center is a change-making campus that empowers one small community and, in turn, reframes the way we as architects engage the world.

Future Project of the Year – Cultural

Zhang Da Qian Museum, Neijang, China, Miralles Tagliabue EMBT, Spain

On April 2010, Excellence group invited EMBT to design Zhang Da Qian’s museum in Neijang city, a purpose built museum to exhibit the work of the legendary Chinese painter in his home town. The design philosophy behind the museum would be to integrate the cultural essence of east and west and to express the past and the future and relate to the painter’s friendship with Picasso.

Future Project of the Year – Residential

Wafra Living, Kuwait, AGi Architects, Kuwait

The design for the “Wafra Living” complex, consists of a high rise building set back from the street and an L-shaped building defining the street edge, conceived to maximize privacy within the community, whilst providing ample natural light and usable indoor and outdoor common spaces. Cuts have been made in the front building in order to provide better views for the lower floor apartments in the back tower.

Future Project of the Year – Masterplanning

West Kowloon Cultural District Conceptual Plan, Hong Kong, Rocco Design Architects Ltd, Hong Kong

The proposed Conceptual Plan for the West Kowloon Cultural District (WKCD) aspires to evoke a social energy conducive to the spirit of exploration and discovery, hence the essence for long-term sustainable cultural development for Hong Kong. The programmatic disposition of the master plan is structured on a 3-layer organization: green terrain (south), city link (north) and a cultural zone (centre) for the arts.  Overlaid onto its framework is an urban street-grid. The Conceptual Plane aim is to offer a low carbon sustainable community.

Future Project of the Year – Infrastructure

Hanimaadaoo International Airport, Maldives, Integrated Design Associates Limited, Hong Kong

The new airport, designated as the country’s second international gateway, is located on an island with very limited land mass for an international airport of this size. With airfield infrastructure consuming nearly all the available land our concept of a “floating terminal” has been selected by the Government for its innovative, exciting and eco-friendly approach. The proposed terminal is built entirely on stilts over water without reclamation to preserve the existing environment and the natural coastline. With blue sea, white sandy beach as backdrop the new airport aims to provide passengers with a unique and memorable travel experience.

Future Project of the Year – Health

Binh Chanh Pediatric Hospital, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, VK, 2050 A+P, Nhat My, Belgium

The Centre presents a welcoming and open environment, offering a natural habitat for care whilst still allowing plenty of opportunity for other activities. The double-height ground floor at entrance level facilitates the rehabilitation process with a sports and fitness facility including a swimming pool, and also a restaurant and theatre. As well as patients, family members and members of the local community (schools, theatre groups etc) are invited to use these facilities on a regular basis. The meandering facade of the building allows the forest inside the building.

Future Project of the Year – Landscape

Shoreline Walk, Beirut, Lebanon, Gustafson Porter, UK

The ‘Shoreline Walk’ is a sequence of connected spaces which form part of the reconstruction of the Beirut city centre. The project demonstrates Beirut’s character and resolve.  It guides and reveals Beirut’s history and forms a connective spine to the city. A continuous white limestone line marks the ground and a wide pedestrian promenade. It features four areas to pause and reflect on pre-war city and forgotten memories.

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Dezeen Wire: architecture critics are having their say on plans unveiled yesterday by Foster + Partners and engineers Halcrow for a new transportation hub in the Thames estuary (see our story on Dezeen).

Writing in the Financial Times, architecture critic Edwin Heathcote claims the proposal is “a genuinely innovative and radical plan,” and describes the architect as “a tenacious and consistent innovator,” akin to the pioneering engineers and architects responsible for creating Britain’s urban infrastructure in the Victorian era.

The Guardian‘s architecture critic Jonathan Glancey says the plans are “bold” but expresses concern over whether the country is ambitious enough to implement Foster’s “big-spirited vision of Britain.”

Tom Banks of Design Week says that the proposal may initiate a “call to arms” within the design industry to be more ambitious, adding that it “has put the value of huge, design-led national infrastructure projects firmly in front of Government.”

The BBC reported that not everyone thinks the Thames Hub is a good idea, citing members of Medway council who say its proximity to the world’s largest liquefied natural gas terminals makes it “the daftest in a long list of pie-in-the-sky schemes.”

See our story on the Thames Hub here and all our previous stories about Foster + Partners here.

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Dezeen Wire: in an interview with Farah Nayeri for Bloomberg Businessweek, architect Rem Koolhaas describes the European Union as “an incomplete machine” and claims that it will “disintegrate” unless political leaders complete the task of integration begun when the EU was founded.

Koolhaas also talks about working in China, the global workforce currently inhabiting the countryside and his former employee, Zaha Hadid, who he says was “a very independent and massively talented person from the beginning.”

Dezeen spoke to Rem Koolhaas and other partners from his practice OMA at the opening of OMA/Progress, an exhibition at the Barbican art gallery in London. You can see the videos now on Dezeen Screen.