Boktalk on Books

Last September 11 at the Chocolate Kiss Cafe in UP Diliman, six boks shared their passion for books (and shared some books too). Here are some excerpts from the discussion:

Fongi
Fongi is currently reading Balzac and the Chinese Seamstress and the Screwtape Letters. She also plans to read books by Dan Brown, Understanding Islam, Religion and Science, and the Oxford History of the Twentieth Century. "Right now, I'm trying to widen my collection... I'm trying to get away from fiction for a while, kasi fiction enriches your imagination pero (but) non-fiction, it develops your logic and how you think." For her, reading books is a way to relax. "When I don't want to face reality, I read a book." Fongi cites Balzac and the Chinese Seamstress as a good example of fiction that allows you to experience another way of life. She also recommends the Tipping Point, because it explains in a light and simple manner trends and human behavior from a good mix of perspectives.

Lem
Lem is reading the Teachings of Buddha, Essential Buddhism: Beliefs and Practices, and the Life of Buddha.
For books related to architecture, he is reading the Death of American Cities, explaining the migration of city dwellers to the suburbs, and the formation of ghettoes. Lem shared some of his experiences visiting that part of the world and recounted how frightening some of the dilapidated areas were. Lem recommends A Pattern Language by Christopher Alexander because of its emphasis on "socially responsible design." "You want to engage people (who are using the space) in a lively interaction." The book, he said, explains how spaces influence human behavior, and calls for a comfortable and livable architecture.

Pon
Pon has read Summit Books' Wander Girl by Tweet Sering, "chick lit" on female empowerment. She has also read the Superstring Theory by Brian Greene, a book that puts forward a theory that the world is made up of vibrating strings like parallel dimensions. Pon recommends Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond. It explainins why the west conquered the east and not the other way around. Pon has been avoiding fiction lately is because of its concentration on dysfunctional characters who are much more interesting than normal people. She plans to read non-fiction by Ken Wilbur.

Yo
Yo just finished reading We Can Build You by Philip K. Dick. He is reading Ray Bradbury's Collection of Short Stories. "I think he is one of the best writers I've ever read."
Yo is into fiction. He collects anthologies: science fiction, fantasy, and horror. "One of the best short stories are horror: Edgar Allen Poe... Twilight Zone... M. Night Shyalaman." He makes up for not getting out much by reading.
Yo is interested in the science fiction of the 1950s and 1960s. "At that era, the books were about Utopia." He talked about Ursula Le Guin, who wrote in detail about the clash of different societies. On the other hand, he also mentioned books about Dystopia like Blade Runner. He likes the way science fiction attempts to predict the future. He spoke of William Gibson, and his fairly accurate predictions about the internet and virtual reality. For science fiction, he recommends Aldous Huxley's A Brave New World. Other recommends include books by David Brin and Neil Stephenson.
When asked how his reading choices have influenced him, Yo believes he is more open to new ideas as a result of reading science fiction and horror: "nothing shocks me anymore."

Ray
Raymond is reading Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars Trilogy. "It's all about people getting together to build something new." He also reads William Gibson. "I read both utopian and dystopian at the same time para may (for) balance"
The very first book that truly sustained Raymond's interest was Contact by Carl Sagan, followed by other non-fiction books by the same author: Cosmos, Broca's Brain, and the Dragons of Eden. "It (Carl Sagan's books) explains some things that religion doesn't, like what makes us different from other (forms of) life?" The books explore the physiological qualities that make us human and what defines intelligence. He recommends the Dragons of Eden.
He also recommends Alvin Toffler's Creating a New Civilization. "It is actually Powershift and Third Wave combined in a very thin book, so it's really for popular consumption."
Raymond's reading choices help him respect other views and understand the reasons behind certain things sometimes taken for granted. "I'm interested in the future, what the future holds and what I can do to prepare for it."

Kons
Kons reads Ekistics by Doxiadis, and books on history like the 100 Events that Shaped the Twentieth Century. He is mainly interested in how societies evolve and planning for it.
Kons also enjoys screenplays. The last screenplay Kons read was A Few Good Men. He recommends Raging Bull, a film that somehow parallels Martin Sorsese's life, and Citizen Kane, a ground-breaking film loosely based on William Randolph Hearst's life that invited a lot of controversy, suspiciously losing the Academy Award to How Green is My Valley due to William Randolph Hearst's influence. Finally, he recommends The Graduate, the first film that successfully tackles teenage angst. He maintains that many contemporary films still borrow scenes from the The Graduate.
Kons would like to see a screenplay based on Jose Rizal's Noli Me Tanghere and El Filibusterismo set in current times. He feels that the message of both books are still relevant today.

Megastructures Week on National Geographic

the biggest, deepest, tallest AnD LONGEST STRUCTURES

We take many of the world's architectural miracles for granted, but how DO you build a 50km train tunnel deep beneath a seabed, or construct an aircraft carrier that can go for 20 years without refuelling? Megastructures Week examines some of the most staggering engineering feats of the modern day.

From the world's tallest hotel in Dubai to the longest double-deck suspension bridge in Hong Kong, each night viewers are transported around the globe to witness the construction of these mammoth structures.

Megastructures Week reveals the drama, personal stories and the remarkable technological innovation behind some of the world's most impressive structures. How could architects construct a building that has no straight lines? Curves examines how the undulating facade of the Guggenheim Museum in Spain was made possible by the same technology used to design jet airplanes. In a similar manner, Oasis explores how a floating restaurant is seemingly suspended 200 meters above the Arabian Gulf.

It's too BIG an event to miss
Megastructures Week:
Sunday 19 - Friday 24 September at 9pm
on the National Geographic Channel

lifted from http://www.nationalgeographic.co.uk/explore/megastructures/index.asp

kids! naiinis ako busy ako this week didn't get to catch the first two episodes! (actually, was watching queer eye monday night and totally forgot about ngc. but last night was badminton night so...) sana may re-run. super cool raw sabi ng officemate ko. grrr. nood tayo, and we can discuss it in the next bok talk!!! haha :p

Boktalk Audio

The proceeds of the last Boktalk on Books are available for download as edited MP3 files at the files section of the Arkiboks yahoogroup. I'll link them and prepare the write-ups soon.

Bookish Boks

The last bok talk turned into a book exhange club. And guess what the discussion topic was? Books. Raymond will be posting the summary of the discussion (right, raymond? :)

First Woman Wins Pritzker Prize

Zaha Hadid Becomes the First Woman to Receive the
Pritzker Architecture Prize


Los Angeles, CA—Zaha Hadid, an Iraqi born British citizen has been chosen as the 2004 Laureate of the Pritzker Architecture Prize marking the first time a woman has been named for this 26 year old award. Hadid, who is 53, has completed one project in the United States, the Richard and Lois Rosenthal Center for Contemporary Art in Cincinnati, Ohio; and is currently developing another to co-exist with a Frank Lloyd Wright structure, the Price Tower Arts Center in Bartlesville, Oklahoma.

Her other completed projects in Europe include a fire station for the Vitra Furniture Company in Weil am Rhein, Germany; LFone/Landesgartenschau, an exhibition building to mark the 1999 garden festival in that same city; a car park and terminus Hoenheim North, a “park and ride” and tramway on the outskirts of Strasbourg, France; and a ski jump situated on the Bergisel Mountain overlooking Innsbruck, Austria.

She has numerous other projects in various stages of development including a building for BMW in Leipzig, and a Science Center in Wolfsburg, both in Germany; a National Center of Contemporary Arts in Rome; a Master Plan for Bilbao, Spain; a Guggenheim Museum for Taichung, Taiwan; and a high speed train station outside Naples; and a new public archive, library and sport center in Montpellier, France.

In announcing the jury’s choice, Thomas J. Pritzker, president of The Hyatt Foundation, said, “It is gratifying to us as sponsors of the prize to see our very independent jury honor a woman for the first time. Although her body of work is relatively small, she has achieved great acclaim and her energy and ideas show even greater promise for the future.”

Pritzker Prize jury chairman, Lord Rothschild, commented, “At the same time as her theoretical and academic work, as a practicing architect, Zaha Hadid has been unswerving in her commitment to modernism. Always inventive, she’s moved away from existing typology, from high tech, and has shifted the geometry of buildings.”
Continuing, Lord Rothschild said, “In her fourth year at the Architectural Association in London, as a student of Rem Koolhaas (himself a recent recipient of the Pritzker Prize) her graduation project was called Malevich’s Tectonik. She placed a hotel on the Hungerford Bridge on the Rivers Thames, drawing from suprematist forms to meet the demands of the programme and the site. It’s a happy coincidence therefore that this year’s prize ceremony should be taking place in St. Petersburg, Russia, where Malevich lived and worked, a city of extraordinary beauty and originality.”

The formal ceremony for what has come to be known throughout the world as architecture's highest honor will be held on May 31, 2004. At that time, a $100,000 grant and a bronze medallion will be bestowed in the State Hermitage Museum followed by a reception and dinner in the Grand Peterhof Palace. The prize presentation ceremony moves to different locations around the world each year, paying homage to historic and contemporary architecture.

Juror Frank Gehry, who is also the 1989 Pritzker Laureate, said, “The 2004 laureate is probably one of the youngest laureates and has one of the clearest architectural trajectories we’ve seen in many years. Each project unfolds with new excitement and innovation." A new juror this year, journalist Karen Stein who is editorial director of Phaidon Press, commented, “Over the past 25 years, Zaha Hadid has built a career on defying convention—conventional ideas of architectural space, of practice, of representation and of construction.”

Rolf Fehlbaum, chairman of the board of Vitra, who also became a juror this year, said, “Without ever building, Zaha Hadid would have radically expanded architecture’s repertoire of spatial articulation. Now that the implementation in complex buildings is happening, the power of her innovation is fully revealed."

Juror and architecture critic Ada Louise Huxtable said of the choice, “Zaha Hadid is one of the most gifted practitioners of the art of architecture today. From the earliest drawings and models to current buildings and work in progress, there has been a consistently original and strong personal vision that has changed the way we see and experience space. Hadid’s fragmented geometry and fluid mobility do more than create an abstract, dynamic beauty; this is a body of work that explores and expresses the world we live in”

Another juror, Carlos Jimenez from Houston who is professor of architecture at Rice University, said, “Presaged by an inimitable graphic and formal exuberance, Zaha Hadid’s work reminds us that architecture is a siphon for collective energies, a far cry from the stand alone building, perennially oblivious to the vitality of the city.”

And from juror Jorge Silvetti, who is a Professor of Architecture, Graduate School of Design at Harvard University, “Zaha Hadid’s buildings are today among the most convincing arguments for the primacy of architecture in the production of space. What she has achieved with her inimitable manipulation of walls, ground planes and roofs, with those transparent, interwoven and fluid spaces, are vivid proof that architecture as a fine art has not run out of steam and is hardly wanting in imagination."

Bill Lacy, an architect, spoke as the executive director of the Pritzker Prize, “Only rarely does an architect emerge with a philosophy and approach to the art form that influences the direction of the entire field. Such an architect is Zaha Hadid who has patiently created and refined a vocabulary that sets new boundaries for the art of architecture.”

The purpose of the Pritzker Architecture Prize is to honor annually a living architect whose built work demonstrates a combination of those qualities of talent, vision and commitment, which has produced consistent and significant contributions to humanity and the built environment through the art of architecture. The prize was established in 1979 by The Hyatt Foundation.

Hadid is the third architect from the United Kingdom to be awarded the Pritzker Prize: the late James Stirling of Great Britain was elected in 1981, and in 1999 Lord (then Sir Norman) Foster. Philip Johnson was the first Pritzker Laureate in 1979. The late Luis Barragán of Mexico was named in 1980. Kevin Roche in 1982, Ieoh Ming Pei in 1983, and Richard Meier in 1984. Hans Hollein of Austria was the 1985 Laureate. Gottfried Böhm of Germany received the prize in 1986. Kenzo Tange was the first Japanese architect to receive the prize in 1987; Fumihiko Maki was the second from Japan in 1993; and Tadao Ando the third in 1995. Robert Venturi received the honor in 1991, and Alvaro Siza of Portugal in 1992. Christian de Portzamparc of France was elected Pritzker Laureate in 1994. The late Gordon Bunshaft of the United States and Oscar Niemeyer of Brazil, were named in 1988. Frank Gehry was the recipient in 1989, the late Aldo Rossi of Italy in 1990. In 1996, Rafael Moneo of Spain was the Laureate; in 1997 Sverre Fehn of Norway; in 1998 Renzo Piano of Italy, and in 2000, Rem Koolhaas of the Netherlands. In 2001, two architects from Switzerland received the honor: Jacques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron. Australian Glenn Murcutt won the prize in 2002. Danish architect Jørn Utzon was chosen in 2003.

The field of architecture was chosen by the Pritzker family because of their keen interest in building due to their involvement with developing the Hyatt Hotels around the world; also because architecture was a creative endeavor not included in the Nobel Prizes. The procedures were modeled after the Nobels, with the final selection being made by the international jury with all deliberations and voting in secret. Nominations are continuous from year to year with hundreds of nominees from countries all around the world being considered each year.

For more information on the Prize, visit:
http://www.pritzkerprize.com

Architects urged to copy India

Renowned Indian architect Charles Correa has said housing designs from his home country offer the key to eco-friendly buildings of the future.

Correa, who is famed for design principles based on low-density, low cost architecture at a reduced environmental cost, wants architects to examine low-rise, high-density urban areas such as Rajasthan as a way of best using natural and local resources.
"The basic principle of housing in a country like India is that you have very limited resources," Correa told BBC World Service's Masterpiece programme.
"Therefore you have to use great ingenuity. That's when you really learn to respect what traditionally is done.
"If you look at a village in Kerala, everything is re-used and recycled. Leaves which fall from palm trees are used again for the roofs.
"There's nothing like poverty to be the mother of invention. As an architect, looking at those solutions, I was absolutely stunned by it."

Rubbish dumps

The explosion of the Indian economy in recent years has triggered massive expansion in the heart of India's major cities.
Correa, who said that Indians use space "extremely intelligently", explained that in India, tower blocks - "going high" - do not attract many people, and therefore better use of space in low-rise buildings has to be achieved.
Correa has played a part in designing some of the large number of developments which have begun springing up.
He said that this had been a chance to put his principles into practice - not only environmentally-sound buildings, but ones that fit with their surroundings too.
"In New Bombay, this new centre, what we've done is try to use some very simple, direct housing which uses open-to-sky space, which is very important in the tradition," he said.
"A courtyard, a terrace, is actually another room."
As environmental concerns become ever more prevalent, some architects are moving away from the glass, steel and concrete model of modern city building.
One example has been the rebuilding of houses in Afghanistan using waste polystyrene.
A similar scheme has now been tried in south London, where polystyrene from local rubbish dumps is mixed with cement to form lightweight yet durable building blocks.
But Correa stressed that the knowledge of how to work with the environment, climate and materials had long been available - but modern architects had "forgotten and forsaken" it.
He cited the Alhambra Palace as a "machine for dealing with the hot desert climate of southern Spain".
"The walls and water fountains are not just decorative elements, they are a way of trapping the dry air and humidifying it.
"Today that is done by mechanical engineers... the architects make any arbitrary shape they want, and then the engineers step in and make the thing liveable.
"We must understand that's the big difference in the process. We have abdicated something very important to architecture, and that is the well-spring of imagination that comes from a response to some basic elements."

Traditional solutions

However, Correa conceded that in the West, sustainable architecture is not cheap.
He said that one environmentally-friendly element on one building could pay for electricity for a Kerala village for a year.
"It is very cold and so you have to use brick and steel in order to build," he said.
"While you're doing that, people go in for high-rise buildings."
Some new buildings are taking this into account - the new Swiss Re tower in London has been designed to maximise daylight and natural ventilation so that it uses half the energy typically required by an office block
Meanwhile Correa said that his best example of environmental sustainability was not a building, but the city of Yazd in Iran.
The main feature of the city is its "windcatcher" houses and towers, which take the dry desert air down into the basement, where it is humidified by water and then circulated through the houses.
"The whole thing is a masterpiece of connected spaces," Correa said.
"What I've learned, living here in India, is that the most wonderful traditional solutions exist which exemplify all the concerns of the environmentalist today.
"We don't have to invent these things again."

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/south_asia/3553376.stm
Published: 2004/09/08 16:29:10 GMT© BBC MMIV

Architect E. Fay Jones dies

Architect E. Fay Jones, a student of Frank Lloyd Wright whose glass-and-wood Thorncrown Chapel was honored in the United States as the nation's top design of the 1980s, has died.

Here is an excerpt from his AIA gold medal acceptance speech:

In the future - in a changing world - whatever the sources of our creativity - whatever stirs our imagination - whatever architectural language we choose to speak - as architects, we have the potential to build well-composed places, large and small, that will not only accommodate our functional needs, but will stand as models which represent the best of our ideas. We have the power - and the responsibility - to shape new forms in the landscape - physical and spatial forms that will illuminate - and nourish - and poetically express - our human qualities at their spiritual best. As architects, as transformers of our living environment, we must eventuate that potential.

E. Fay Jones

Gearing Up the Filipino Planner for National and Global Change

Gearing Up the Filipino Planner for National and Global Change
PIEP NATIONAL CONVENTION 2004
October 29-30, 2004, Century Park Hotel
599 P. Ocampo St., 1004 Malate, Manila Philippines

Day 1:
Registration and opening Ceremonies
Keynote Address

Keynote speech 1: Planning for a Legacu to National Development: Charting Directions for the MTPDP.
* Localizing the Millenium Development Goals
* The National Urban Development and Housing Framework
* Federalism and the Parliament: Their Implications in Planning
* Population Management for Sustainable Development

Lunch: Investiture of New Fellows

Keynote Speech 2: Creating New Urban Centers towards Planning for Decongesting Metro Manila
* Restructuring Metro Manila: From Primacy to Priming Up New Urban Centers
* Towards More Progressive Housing and Land Use Regulations: Initial Findings
* Priming Up the Subic-Clark Growth Corridor
* Industrializing the Countryside

Day 2
Keynote Speech 3: New Directions in Planning Education and the Profession
* Enhancing Planning through GIS Technologies and Instruments
* Attuning the Profession to Global and National Change
* Integrating Environmental Planning and Management in the Professional Service
* The Local Planning and Development Coordinators: The Key to Local Development Planning and Implementation
* Impact of the Clean Water Act on the Planning Profession

Lunch: PIEP Business Meeting

Keynote Speech 4: Socio-Economic and Cultural Challenges for Urban Planning
* Packaging the LGU for investors: Best Practices
* Role of the Private Sector as Partner in the Planning of Towns and Cities
* Small is Beautiful: Planning a Place for the Entrepreneur
* The Mall: Catalyst for Local Government?
* Pride of Place

Conference Resolutions and Closing Ceremonies

Registration Details
Sign up for By Sept 30 After Sept 30
1. PIEP Member Php3,000.00 Php3,500.00
2. Student Php2,500.00 Php3,000.00
3. Non-PIEP Member Php4,000.00 Php4,500.00
4. Foreign Participant US$150.00 US$200.00

Registration fees,contact PIEP, UP SURP, 920-9705 / 927-3595

Ground Zero : Architects Weigh In

The following is one of 24 architect's opinions on the new WTC in New York, as taken from Architectural Record Online. For more updates on the WTC design, planning, and construction process, go to Ground Zero - Three Years Later.

Moshe Safdie, Moshe Safdie and Associates

The debate over what should replace the World Trade Center pits two impulses against each other: the impulse to rebuild, as an affirmation of our optimism, and the impulse to perpetuate emptiness in the name of remembrance, by turning the area into a memorial park. Neither alternative is a satisfactory response to the tragic vacancy in the heart of New York. The emptiness alone would allow the terrorists to permanently erase a place full of life and energy; rebuilding alone would be disrespectful to those who died. We must therefore build, and also not build, affirming life while remembering the dead.

The footprint of the two Trade Center towers, each measuring 208 feet square, should be declared sacred ground; literally and metaphorically a cemetery for the 6,000 who died. No great artist commission is necessary, not even remnants of the towers’ charred steel frame. Rather, simply arranged on the two squares of land should be a stone for each person, with his or her name carved upon it, set in a meadow. The rest of the site, including the surrounding damaged buildings, should be rebuilt as a vital, diverse complex of business, culture, and residences – a model of the values we cherish in our cities.

Were it even practical to rebuild the complex exactly as before, as some propose, such a project would ignore the cultural wisdom we have acquired since the early 1970s, when the towers were completed. The towers were conceived in the Formalist tradition – Formalist meaning that a single underlying concept of design takes precedence over all other environmental and programmatic requirements. Symbolism takes precedence over human needs. And so it was that the two extended obelisks, the tallest towers ever built at that time, equated height with power (in the tradition of Babel), without deference to the activities within them. Because of their height, their outer walls were made up of closely spaced columns giving them an almost solid appearance. From within, the buildings lacked transparency, light, and view, the very qualities we seek in a high-rise environment. Walking in the plazas and streets nearby, the towers were more overwhelming than they needed to be.

Much has been written in recent days about the need to replace this Formalism with “a progressive architecture” and, in tribute to the dead, “a humanist architecture.” But it’s not often clear what people mean by “progressive” and “humanist,” or how they propose to achieve it. Surely progressive does not simply mean up-to-the-minute, fashionable geometric configurations. Rather, the new complex must be a vital urban place, enhancing our understanding of publicness. Public spaces (piazzas, boulevards, and gallerias) – almost taken for granted from classical times to the nineteenth century – require good access, a diverse center that draws a variety of people for a variety of reasons and at various times, and a comfortable setting with good micro-climate, shelter, and sunlight. These have proven difficult in the twenty-first century because of the congestion, vehicular traffic, and privatization of space in our cities.

To achieve this ideal publicness, the new high-rise complex must be an inspiring place for work and for living, sensible in its use of resources and materials. Giant undifferentiated floor plates where only 10 percent of the workers sit by a window while the majority spends the working day in artificial light are depressing, so buildings with smaller footprints should be designed. And when thousands are concentrated in towers, garden-like spaces should be provided for relief and amenities. Moreover, for safety as well as for convenience, the towers should not be isolated from each other, but connected at several levels. These connections should be structural – able to transfer wind, earthquakes, and other shock stresses – in addition to providing pedestrian bridges that connect one tower to the other, perhaps every 15 floors. The crossover levels would become natural locations for hotel lobbies, conference centers, gardens, health clubs, and the like. They would facilitate contact between related businesses and departments, and multiply the options for emergency exiting.

The new complex should also improve efficiency. It should consist of a number of towers, probably four or five. They should not be 100-plus stories, since towers of this height require disproportionately more space for elevators and stairs and take away from usable space. Instead a cluster of towers should measure 50 to 60 stories. That would also allow the structures to be built from concrete, which is more fireproof of even the fire-protected steel of the Trade Center. Moreover, ingenious designs have demonstrated that incorporating natural ventilation and sun control can greatly improve the energy efficiency of sealed towers, which normally bake in the sun, require vast quantities of air conditioning, and rely almost entirely on electric lights.

The towers’ primary use, as workspace, should be complemented by residential and hotel uses. Vertical zoning should devote two-thirds of the buildings to offices, crowned by floors of apartments and hotels. Mixing these uses within the towers offers many advantages; in particular, it creates high-level residences with views. It can also result in an extraordinarily beautiful silhouette on the skyline, because residences that crown tall buildings lend themselves to delicate sculpting. On the lower levels should be retail, cultural facilities, and indoor and outdoor public spaces, designed to connect to and reinforce street life rather than siphoning public life off the streets. Furthermore, the presence of residences downtown would contribute to nighttime and weekend activities, overcoming the evening and weekend abandonment from which the area suffered.

These solutions may sound, in their details, mundane. But the resulting architecture – with the cemetery at its heart – could be transcendent. Any rebuilding at the site of the World Trade Center will be, by definition, fraught with symbolism. People will question meaning and seek expression in every element of the design. Still, it is precisely because symbolic associations abound that the rebuilding must progress beyond the business-as-usual architecture that it will replace. Now, more than ever, downtown New York must represent the best that a free and undaunted society can conceive.