There are somewhere between 90 and 130 automobile manufacturers in China. Many are groups under the umbrella of one or more the four state-owned manufacturers but there are also many that aren’t. The list and breakdown on Wikipedia seems comprehensive. On China roads in Wenzhou – a fairly prosperous Tier-3 city – I see BMWs, Mercedes Benzes, […]
We don’t have debates anymore about whether or not architecture is an art, but I don’t remember there ever having been an answer, as if we all agreed to be tired of the question. Yet, I do remember not too long ago when buildings of a certain kind were praised as “sculptural” even though sculpture […]
Since my Architecture Is Not Architecture post of three weeks ago, I’ve been more aware of designers wanting me to engage with something on some emotional level and of their unsolicited desire to create “stories” that resonate for me. As much as I’m grateful for being the object of their attention, I smell a rat. […]
A few bits of information. These past six years I’ve been embarrassed more than once for not having visited Hangzhou, so this recent May Day long weekend I wanted to remedy that. My list of things to do and see quickly became unachievable in three days. Also, in a city recognized as “the cradle of […]
Achitecture loves a bon mot and the more enigmatic the better. Yangsong Ma has form in the genre. His declaration in the eponymous 2010 exhibition “Feelings are facts” had us stroking our chins. I made my peace with this fairly quickly since, on some level, all feelings are emotional truths but this is dangerous territory […]
LI Yu (李漁; Lǐ Yú) 1611–1680 was a Chinese playwright, novelist and publisher. He was born 19 years after Michel de Montaigne died and five years before William Shakespeare died. Montaigne wouldn’t have known about Shakespeare because Shakespeare’s first play was written between 1589 and 1594 and Montaigne died in 1592. However, we do know that […]
I’ve always been interested in how the idea of a building is communicated visually to clients and have written about it at least twice – the first time in Keeping It Real. I’m not that interested in how buildings are communicated visually to the media because that’s career building as opposed to building building. However, […]
My selection here isn’t intended to be exhaustive. Bridges are covered for all sorts of reasons but usually for a practical one. In northeast USA for example, there’s the Cornish-Windsor Bridge between New Hampshire and Vermont. It was built in 1866. Pedestrians can walk across but at some risk as the bridge is only wide […]
The site identifier C5 says nothing of landscape, topography or the potential of the site. I knew what to expect from the contour map but, when I saw the site I found it difficult to imagine a Japanese garden there because I couldn’t imagine a palace or temple or even a house of a high-ranking […]
Water I’ve already mentioned that my first proposal had a split pavilion in the middle of a pond created by damming the valley. Early doubts regarding long-term maintenance and safety led to the depth of the pond being reduced and reduced until there was no more pond. In the end, this wasn’t a bad thing. […]
Site Perhaps unfairly, the most important thing to do when creating a Japanese garden is to choose its location carefully and with regard to the vegetation and topography already there, the possibilities for the creation of mountains and ponds, and for the opportunity to borrow scenery from outside the site. Many Japanese gardens are designed […]
In October last year the department of architecture at my university was asked to provide proposals for pavilions and gardens to represent various countries at next year’s Wenzhou International Horticultural Exposition to be held in Wenzhou between April and July next year. The exposition will have general facilities, as well as gardens and pavilions representing […]
I’ve been interested in this topic on and off for decades and the other week’s post on Gio Ponti and The Art of Too Much started me thinking about it again. One thing Gio Ponti’s designs for interiors have in common is that there was no scope for rearrangement, substitution or flexibility of the items […]
While most of our attention this past year has been taken up by the next AI assistant and what to do with it, robotics has made some stunning advances. Some of this activity has wisely been directed towards real-world applications such as inspection and assembly. Boston Dynamics’ website (https://bostondynamics.com/solutions/) emphasizes their efforts in this direction. […]
