Hasta La Ideas

How quickly one hundred years pass, huh? It seems like only yesterday that we were posting on our UnBeige Teletype Newsletter that Frank Lloyd Wright‘s historic Taliesin project was finally being completed way out there in Spring Green, Wisconsin. Now it’s the 100th anniversary of the famous piece of architecture and the landmark site has a year of events planned (though starting in April, because we can’t blame anyone for not wanting to be in the Midwest in the winter). Here’s where you can find the full list of activities, dates, and locations, and here’s a quick rundown on some of the bigger events they have planned:

The program of events will be concentrated within the Taliesin tour season which runs May through October. It will include a series of concerts, performances, lectures, exhibits, artist workshops and a closing gala to pay tribute to Frank Lloyd Wright’s home and legacy. Several performances will take place at the Taliesin Estate’s Hillside Theater, including concerts by the Chicago Chamber Musicians and the Third Coast Percussion Ensemble, and dance performances under the direction of University of Wisconsin dance professor Li Chiao-Ping. Wright’s personal photographer, Pedro E. Guerrero, will exhibit a limited-edition series of his photographs titled Wright and Taliesin: a Retrospective.

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Last year was quite a period of transition between Architectural Record, the American Institute of Architects and the magazine Architect. To get you back up to speed, here’s an attempt at a quick recap: First, the AIA decided that it was leaving Architectural Record as their officially-affiliated magazine, and would be moving over to Architect. A few months later, Architectural Record‘s Editor-in-Chief, Robert Ivy, announced that he was leaving the magazine to become the CEO of the AIA, essentially sorta-kinda putting him back near his old journalism haunts, now that the AIA was going to work for Architect. So, phew, after all of that repetition of the letter “A,” the first issue of the new AIA-supported Architect has arrived, complete with a newly redesign website, with its very own dedicated AIA section, and lots of big collaborative plans, beyond the magazine and the new site, from the magazine’s parent company, Hanley Wood:

…Hanley Wood will also run the AIA’s annual national convention, attended by tens of thousands of architects, builders and design professionals. This year, the convention will be held in New Orleans from May 12-14.

A main component of the AIA-Hanley Wood media partnership is a dedicated section in each of the four publications that will focus exclusively on AIA-produced content. Called AIArchitect, it will be a sister publication to the online-only, bi-weekly newsletter that currently serves as the AIA’s primary in-house publication.

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This culture and technology centre based on the shape of a space station is under construction in Vitanje, Slovenia, and was designed by Slovenian firms OFIS Arhitekti, Bevk Perovic Arhitekti, 
Dekleva Gregoric Arhitekti and Sadar Vuga Arhitekti.

The building design takes inspiration from a habitable wheel-shaped space station envisaged by rocket engineer Herman Potočnik Noordung in 1929.

The building will feature a series of interlocking rings that lie on top of each other to create a continuous ramped structure.

The upper part of the building will house a research area, while the lower parts will house exhibition spaces, a multi-purpose hall and an auditorium.

Construction is due to be completed this year.

Read all our stories on OFIS Arhitekti »

The following information is from OFIS Arhitekti:

SPACE WHEEL_NOORDUNG SPACE HABITATION CENTER

The Cultural Center of European Space Technologies (KSEVT)
2008-2011

With its program, The Cultural Center of European Space Technologies (KSEVT) will supplement the local cultural and social activities of the Arts Center in Vitanje.

With its size and typology the existing object already indicates a publicly significant role, but its capacity and technological design no longer suffice for newer collective requirements.

The architectural design for the building of The Cultural Center of European Space Technologies in Vitanje originates from the schematics for the first geostationary space station, or to be more precise its habitation wheel, described in his 1929 book by Herman Potocnik Noordung.

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KSEVT will have emphasized public significance and will generate social, cultural and scientific activities. In the KSEVT building that replaces the existing object of the multifunctional arts center there will be an abundance of social activities, with fixed and temporary exhibitions, conferences and club/study activities.

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The building will therefore be intended for the local population, as well as guests of exhibitions and participants of international symposia and conferences. In the club area at the top of the building researchers of the history of space technology will be able to focus on their work, removed from the activities in the lower part of the building.

The building is a monolithic structure, freely positioned on the allotment between the main road on one side and the stream with a green hinterland on the other. The exterior and interior of the building are determined by two low cylinders.

The bottom one is larger and rises from the North to the South, while the upper one is smaller and it joins with the larger one on the southern side and rises towards the North. The bottom cylinder is supported by the transparent surface of the entrance glazing. The spatial relationship between the two cylinders creates a dynamic effect, which is even more accentuated by full glass rings around the building.

The effect of floatation and rotation of the building on its southern and western side towards the road and the entrenchment into the surface on the other side towards the stream and hill creates an impression of memorable importance of the building in this area, as well as its connection to its immediate surroundings.

Above: Potočnik’s Space Station (illustration (c) by Simon Zajc)

The spatial effects give the building its most distinguishing feature – the effect of artificial gravity due to floatation and rotation. The building has two entrances – the main one to the central space from the square in front of the building on the southeastern side and the northern entrance from the gravelly surface above the stream.

Above: image courtesy of the architects

The main entrance covers the overhanging part of the larger cylinder. Through this “tight” space, past the circular vestibule with a reception, we enter the interior of the hall.

Above: Potočnik’s illustration of inhabitable wheel – side and front view

The vestibule can be separated from the activities in the hall by a curtain. The entrance glazing can be completely opened and can connect the activities in the hall with the square. The circular hall for 300 people is surrounded on both sides by a semicircular ramp.

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This marks the beginning of the exhibition area, which continues from here to the interior of the overhanging part of the larger cylinder. On the west side, along the ramp, there are smaller office areas. Ascending on this ramp also represents a transition from the bright space of the hall to the dark exhibition area.

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The separated vertical connection with a staircase and a large elevator connects the exhibition area directly to the vestibule of the hall.

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The exhibition space continues through the landing between the elevator and the staircase to the smaller cylinder, the multi-purpose hall, an auditorium which is raised like a terrace above the hall. From here there is a vertical view of what is happening below.

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The smaller cylinder is concluded at the highest, northernmost part with the club area – the library, the most intimate part of the entire building.

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MATERIALS AND WORK
The design of the objects creates a feeling of volume, which has a unique, memorable and characteristic expression. For this purpose, the materials are simple and clean.

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The basic construction of the object consists of reinforced concrete. In unison with the rest of the building, the exhibition area is without daylight, with an opaque surface.

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There are windows in the library and the lower part of the hall. The hall is fitted with zenithal lighting. The front in the opaque part is made of various types of aluminum. The interior of the object is made with a combination of self-compacting concrete, paint and wainscot. All of this will be defined in greater detail in the next phases of the project documentation.

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PROTAGONISTS :
Architecture: ( in alphabetical order ) :
Bevk Perovic arhitekti, 
Dekleva Gregoric arhitekti, 
OFIS arhitekti
, Sadar Vuga arhitekti
Noordung Space Technologies Center concept & producer: Dragan Zivadinov, Miha Tursic
Graphic design: 
Atelje Balant
Client / project coordinator: 
Vitanje Community ( for /Srecko Fijavz )

See also:

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Danish Pavilion at Shanghai Expo 2010 by BIG	360 House by Subarquitectura	The Ring by OFIS Arhitekti

We’ve got a bridge to sell you—or at least an event about a bridge. The Museum of the City of New York (MCNY) continues its public programs juggernaut with “The Bridge as Muse,” a January 26 discussion of artists’ and photographers’ enduring fascination with the beloved Brooklyn Bridge. Warhol was a fan (as evidenced at right), and last year Alien Workshop introduced a swell skateboard deck printed with the artist’s silkscreens of the New York icon. Leading the MCNY chatfest will be Richard Haw, author of Art of the Brooklyn Bridge: A Visual History (Routledge). Among the bridge-inspired artists confirmed to participate are Bascove, painter and author of Stone and Steel: Paintings & Writings Celebrating the Bridges of New York City (David R. Godine) and Jonathan Smith, photographer of The Bridge Project. Meanwhile, MCNY curator Sean Corcoran will be on hand to bridge the art and the history with the museum’s own collection of bridge images as well as the current exhibition, “Glorious Sky: Herbert Katzman’s New York,” on view through February 21.

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Danish architects C. F. Møller have won a competition to build a new state prison on the island of Falster in Denmark.

Laid out like a small village, the proposal will integrate various work and leisure facilities alongside green spaces, all linked by a network of streets with a six metre perimeter wall enclosing the prison.

Administration buildings, a library, a religious worship room, sports facilities, a shop and a central square will sit at the heart of the complex.

There will be five separate star-shaped prison blocks located on the outskirts of the facility, one of which will be high-security, where up to 250 prisoners will be housed.

Construction is due for completion in 2016.

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All our stories on C. F. Møller »

Here’s some more information about the project

The winning proposal for Denmark’s new state prison on the island of Falster: C. F. Møller Architects has won the competition to build a new, closed state prison on the island of Falster.

The prison is uniquely designed as a small village and integrates several landscape features, among other things animal husbandry, within the perimeter wall.

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The new state prison for approximately 250 inmates is designed as a low, urban structure, centred round the various leisure and working facilities, which are connected via several streets and a central square.

The design creates an urban environment, interacting with the landscape on both sides of the six-metre tall perimeter wall. For this compact, urban structure means that there is also left space for natural and cultivated areas, areas for animal husbandry and for the integration of sports facilities in the landscape within the perimeter.

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Varied and stimulating environment

Mads Mandrup, who is architect and partner in C. F. Møller and responsible for this project, states: 

”The inmates spend all their waken hours in the prison environment, and the architecture within the prison walls is therefore an extremely important part of their lives and experiential universe. That is why we have deliberately created a very varied and stimulating environment of different spaces and landscape features – hopefully this will contribute to the re-socialization of the individual and to create renewed confidence in the community and mutual respect for society as a whole.”

In the centre are an administration building, an occupation building and a cultural centre with library, religious worship room, sports facilities and a shop. Radiating outwards from here are the prison blocks – four ordinary block wings and one high security block wing.

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Each individual building in the total complex has its own identity. Overall, the complex is in a warm, grey shade of brick. Variation is provided by, amongst other things, the occupation building, which is crystal-shaped and faced with perforated metal plates in green shades, and the cultural centre, which is round, covered with glass and ringed by green slats. 

Dynamic, star-shaped perimeter
With its corners and variations, the six-metre tall, star-shaped perimeter wall creates a dynamic sequence which gives a less restrictive appearance by providing a sense of dialogue with the outside world.

C. F. Møller Architects has won the competition in collaboration with the engineering company Rambøll Denmark and in close dialogue with Marianne Levinsen Landscape, furthermore the design company aggebo&henriksen and the working environment consultants company CRECEA have contributed.

Eight teams participated
Eight teams were prequalified for the competition.

The other architectural companies participating were Arkitema, schmidt hammer lassen, Lundgaard & Tranberg, Erik Møller Arkitekter, PLH Arkitekter, a team of both Kjær & Richter and aart and a team of Henning Larsen Architects and Friis & Moltke,

The jury consisted of a number of expert judges, representatives of the Muncipality of Guldborgsund, representatives of the Danish Institute for Human Rights, the Danish Palaces and Properties Agency, and the Danish Prison and Probation Service.

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Prison by Guillermo Hevia García	Opera and Cultural Centre by C. F. Møller	Ferry Terminal by C. F. Møller