The Getty Foundation has announced over $2 million in grants for 13 significant 20th-century buildings as part of the Keeping It Modern program. Launched in 2014, this is the final year of grants for this conservation initiative to help professionals worldwide engage in the proactive research and planning needed for the long-term preservation of modern buildings.
Koichi Takada has designed a 43-story mixed-use development, in downtown Los Angeles, inspired by “California’s natural beauty and iconic redwoods”. Hoping to create the healthiest place to live in L.A., the proposed building humanizes the concept of high-rise through the use of natural materials, vertical landscaping, engaging public elements, and creating a between artificial and natural environments.
"Public space" is a legal terminology that tackles the notion of land ownership, suggesting that this type of parcel does not belong to anyone in particular, but to the state itself. Open, free, accessible to all, and financed by public money, these spaces are not only the results of planning, but the consequences of the public practices they hold. Actually, people define how public space is used and what it means.
Protests - powerful political tools for change - from the March on Washington in 1963, the Arab Spring in the early 2000s to recent Black Lives Matter Movements, are altering the world. In times like these, while people still need to "take their issues to the streets" to be heard and seen, public spaces have resurfaced as a topic of discussion.
Pre-leasing for the 31-story high rise residential tower ARQ is set to begin in West Los Angeles. Designed as part of the Cumulus District development, the project is sited between Culver City and West Adams. In creating ARQ, architecture firm Solomon Cordwell Buenz and interior design firm Rodrigo Vargas Design created units with panoramic views of Los Angeles spanning from the Pacific Ocean to Downtown.
Conducted by The Citizens’ Brigade to Save LACMA, a recent poll revealed that only 5% approve of the current Peter Zumthor-designed scheme for a new LACMA, 50% Support the renovation of the existing buildings, and 85% favor encyclopedic collection in one location. The public survey also highlighted 3 designs selected out of the shortlisted six proposals of the “LACMA Not LackMA” competition.
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The Citizens’ Brigade to Save LACMA, had organized a competition entitled “LACMA Not LackMA”, in order to collect ideas “that could contribute to an alternate design for a new Los Angeles County Museum of Art”. The selected six designs are from renowned international firms: Barkow Leibinger, Coop Himmelb(l)au, Kaya Design, Paul Murdoch Architects, Reiser + Umemoto, and TheeAe.
The steel frame of the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art is beginning to take shape in Los Angeles. Designed by MAD Architects, the project takes its name from Star Wars creator George Lucas and will stand at the gateway to the city’s Exposition Park. The landmark project will be MAD’s first museum built in the United States.
The Academy Museum of Motion Pictures by Renzo Piano Building Workshop is set to open this December in Los Angeles. Set along the Miracle Mile, the design consists of the renovation of the May Company department store located at the corner of Fairfax and Wilshire, as well as a new glass sphere addition that will house the 1,000-seat David Geffen Theater.
A $5,000 fellowship awarded for study of historic and architecturally significant residences in LA County. Reports and research findings, and other content developed by FORT Fellows, will be added to the Discovery Center and linked to Trails maps as applicable.
Parking spaces are nothing more than a paradox. It’s a parcel of land that’s so vacant but so crucial that it drives how a city is perceived and functions.
It’s a common reality of how building plans are only approved with adequate or surplus units of these vacant spaces. It’s no surprise our cities look like more parking and less of life at any time soon. This shows how parking spaces have Zero function but have a very inflated value associated with them.
The Los Angeles Department of City Planning has unveiled details on the restoration of the Streamline Moderne Firestone Building. First opened in 1938, the project operated until its closing in 2016. Built by the Firestone Tire and Rubber Company, it was used as a retail outlet for the company’s tires and related automotive products, and the garage remained one of the flagship stores of the company’s operations in Los Angeles.
As 2019 winds down, we're taking a look ahead to the projects we're most looking forward to in 2020. With a mix of cultural and commercial programs, the designs are located across five continents, with many under construction for multiple years. Designed across a wide range of scales, they represent a mix of interconnected landscapes, museums, and the world's newest skyscrapers.
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