Bioluminescent Billboards

[Images: A "living neon sign" made of bioluminescent bacteria; via UC San Diego].

Scientists at UC San Diego have made a bioluminescent bacterial billboard. They call it a "living neon sign composed of millions of bacterial cells that periodically fluoresce in unison like blinking light bulbs." Making it all work "involved attaching a fluorescent protein to the biological clocks of the bacteria, synchronizing the clocks of the thousands of bacteria within a colony, then synchronizing thousands of the blinking bacterial colonies to glow on and off in unison."

These are referred to as biopixels.



Two summers ago, we looked at the idea of a "bioluminescent metropolis," where light-emitting organisms could be used to supplement—or even replace—a city's existing sources of illumination, as if scaling the Newnes Glow Worm Tunnel up to size of a whole city (something that might be useful for places where streetlights are being turned off and even physically removed because paying tax in support of public infrastructure is socialist).

In that post, one of my personal favorites here on the blog, we looked at the work of architect Liam Young, who once proposed the creation of bacterial billboards, squirrel-like living screens that would crawl through and inhabit the city. They would nest in trees like LED ornaments and spring up whenever there's news (or advertisements) to display.

[Image: Bioluminescent billboards by Liam Young].

So could this vision of a bioluminescent metropolis be far off? UC San Diego suggests that their "flashing bacterial signs are not only a visual display of how researchers in the new field of synthetic biology can engineer living cells like machines, but will likely lead to some real-life applications." Surely it would not take much work—even if only as a media stunt—to make a full-scale functioning prototype of a bioluminescent streetlight? Or a bioluminescent bathroom nightlight for your kids?

But, then, of course, the inevitable escape from domestication, when invasive bioluminescent organisms, from genetically-modified kudzu and street weeds to super-bright worms and bacterial mats, conquer the city.

(Via Wired UK).

Ice Island Infrastructure

[Image: "From Seismic Arrays on Drifting Ice Floes: Experiences From Four Deployments in the Arctic Ocean" by C. Läderach and V. Schlindwein, from Seismological Research Letters].

In a paper published back in the July/August 2011 issue of Seismological Research Letters, authors C. Läderach and V. Schlindwein from the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research discuss the benefits of tracking deepsea earthquakes using "seismic stations mounted on drifting ice floes." Indeed, they write, because of the lack of fixed ground points, "mounting conventional land seismometers on drifting sea ice is the only way to acquire seismic data in the Arctic Ocean."

In other words, they want to turn drifting fragments of Arctic sea ice into floating research stations, mapping earthquakes at sea.

[Images: "From Seismic Arrays on Drifting Ice Floes: Experiences From Four Deployments in the Arctic Ocean" by C. Läderach and V. Schlindwein, from Seismological Research Letters].

The authors have already seen considerable success with this method. In a short passage detailing how these systems are physically installed, we read that the seismic arrays "are deployed and recovered by helicopters operating from icebreaking vessels." However, "the time for station installation is very limited," due to weather and rough seas.

Station installation requires two people and a helping hand from the helicopter pilot, and takes about 30 minutes with the data loggers being programmed before the deployment flight. The limited time does not allow waiting for the sensor to equalize. Therefore, we only check the sensor response and locking of the GPS position before leaving the station.

While the authors compare this, briefly, to using buoys—indicating that their method is not all that different from other free-floating oceanographic instrumentation systems—the transformation of icebergs into scientifically useful platforms is a compelling example of how a natural phenomenon can become infrastructure with even the smallest addition of equipment. The iceberg has literally been instrumentalized: a temporary archipelago, too short-lived to appear on maps, turned into a scientific instrument.

In this context, it's worth revisiting the story of Drift Station Bravo, one of many inhabited icebergs in the Cold War era that had its own postal system, complete with historically unique stamp cancellations. [Image: Drift Station Bravo postage cancellation mark, via Polar Philately].

As explained on the website Polar Philately, Colonel Joseph O. Fletcher, commander of an Air Force weather squadron stationed in the Arctic, discovered "a large tabular iceberg... that had broken off the Arctic ice shelf... [and] gone adrift." This ice island was soon "codenamed T-1, taken from its original radar designation as a target." Future "ice islands" were codenamed T-2 and T-3.

On March 19, 1952, the U.S. Air Force led by Colonel Fletcher and some scientists landed on this ice island [T-3] in a C-47 aircraft, setting up a weather observation station. Fletcher established a research station that was manned at this big ice sheet for roughly the next 25 years, despite a grim quote given by the head of the Alaska Air Command at the time, a General Old, who was quoted in a Life magazine article of the time as saying "I don't see how any man can live on this thing."

It's worth repeating that Fletcher's team operated this weather station on a repurposed ice floe for 25 years.

Fletcher's Ice Island, and the research station that was located on it, rotated in circles in the Arctic Ocean, floating aimlessly along in the Arctic currents in a clockwise direction. The station was inhabited mainly by scientists along with a few military crewmen and was resupplied during its existence primarily by military planes operating from Barrow, Alaska.

The island—later renamed "Drift Station Bravo"—was inhabited long enough that it actually got its own postal network.

[Image: Letters postmarked from Drift Station Bravo, via Polar Philately].

From Polar Philately:

During the period of active habitation, T-3 covers [postage stamps] were serviced, each stamped with a variety of hand-stamped cachets and markings, dated, and often marked with a manuscript notation of the geographic position of the drifting station on that particular day of ops. The T-3/Bravo covers were often cancelled at Barrow or at a USAF base in Alaska, and then placed in the mailstream.

In other words, envelopes would be stamped with the latitude and longitude of the iceberg at the moment of a letter's departure.

[Images: Postal marking and a letter from Drift Station Bravo, via Polar Philately].

The story takes on clear geopolitical dimensions when we remember that Drift Station Bravo and its ilk—such as Drift Station Alpha, about which you can watch an entire documentary film—were created in direct response to the Soviet Union's own ice island program. The Soviets "already operated six drifting ice camps of this kind," we read in the documentary transcript, downloadable as a 27kb PDF, but, "owing to the particular strategic importance and sensitivity of the Arctic Basin, little information from these early Soviet stations had reached the West."

The transcript goes on to explain how the U.S managed to architecturally colonize these mobile platforms. Military civilization on the ice established itself as follows:

...a ski-equipped C-47 landed on the ice and deployed the first team of workers. It included an Air Force Major as camp commander and several soldiers with technical skills who had volunteered for 6 months duty on the ice, plus four of the typical tough and versatile Alaskan construction workers.

Modular buildings, called Jamesway huts, camp supplies, fuels, two small World War II Studebaker tractors, called Weasel, and a small bulldozer, were dropped by parachutes.

The story expands rapidly from here. In an article originally published in the September-October 1966 issue of Air University Review, we read that competitive Soviet drift stations apparently discovered a "second magnetic north pole... located near 80° N and 178° W, with magnetic medians extending across the Arctic Ocean," and that sulfuric gas fumes from a badly timed undersea volcanic eruption killed at least one unlucky crew member. A particularly eye-popping detail comes when we read that these researchers deliberately generated earthquakes in the iceberg they lived on: "we generated tiny earthquakes in the ice. The propagation of the compressional waves generated in this way are used to study the elastic properties of the ice."

This brings us back to C. Läderach and V. Schlindwein, whose paper in Seismological Research Letters examines the problem of "icequakes," or seismic activity internal to the ice floe on which their equipment rests, thus interfering with accurate measurements. They even mention at least one occurrence of a so-called "bearquake," when a curious polar bear came by to nudge the seismometer and see what was really going on. The authors refer to these events as "special signals."

In any case, will this floating seismic network adrift in the waters of the Arctic also receive its own stamps and postal cancellations? Presumably not, but it would nonetheless be interesting to examine the becoming-infrastructure of these ice floes in a larger geographic context.

We Can Move It For You Wholesale

[Images: Moving Fort Moore High School in Los Angeles, 1886; photos courtesy of the Title Insurance and Trust/C.C. Pierce Photography Collection, USC Libraries].

In 1886, Los Angeles moved the Fort Moore High School. "A contractor who claimed he could accomplish the task hoisted the building onto scaffolding and, using rollers, horses, and human labor, slowly moved the schoolhouse toward its new location," KCET explains. "After work was underway, the contractor decided that the task was impossible after all. The building remained where his crew left it"—unfortunately, not marooned on the stilts seen here, like some steampunk Walking City, but on its new ground-level site blocks away. Once lowered back to earth, it was "repurposed as a schoolhouse for younger students while a new, grander high school was built atop Fort Moore Hill."

It's as if, in a dreamtime state before any of us can remember, buildings once moved around Los Angeles, nomadic titans settling down only with the end of prehistory. Perhaps they will wake up and walk again, criss-crossing valleys, crawling over hills, rearranging roadways around themselves.

Eventually, most of Fort Moore Hill itself was physically removed from the city. "In 1949, construction crews transported away most of the hill by the truckload," we read, turning it into one of the "lost hills of downtown Los Angeles." If only the hill had disappeared, however, leaving all the buildings built upon it stranded on wooden scaffolds in the sunlight, a tablecloth trick in architectural form.

Living Buildings

Near the Pompidou Centre in Paris is another modern building. This one is a bit more natural than metal and plastic tubing though! The men's department of the local department store BHV is housed in a building with a living or green wall. As windows aren't always condusive to a shop, I think this is a brilliant way of covering a facade without leaving a blank slate.

Pompidou Centre

I was prepared to hate the Pompidou Centre, I readily admit to that. However, coming across it while walking through the Marais, I was struck by the sense of scale created by the intricate pieces of its construction and thought "this really fits the neighborhood". Lets backtrack a bit. The Pompidou Centre (or Beaubourg as it is known) was opened in 1977, designed by famed Italian architect Renzo Piano along with Richard and Su Rogers and Gianfranco Franchini. The award winning building has been turning heads ever since.

Paris, that is central Paris, is not known for its modern architecture so the very existence of this building is surprising. The size is immense, however the scale is broken down into bits by the exposed structure and services which bring it down to a city and even human scale. Now that the colors have faded over the years (believe it or not) it blends a little easier into the charming French gray the city is known for.
Love it or hate it, the building is much beloved and locals crowd the adjacent square on weekends, many calling it "Paris's living room".

Book Review: New York Dozen

New York Dozen: Gen X Architects by Michael J. Crosbie
Images Publishing, 2011
Hardcover, 224 pages

The following review appears in slightly edited form in Yale School of Architecture's Constructs, Fall 2011 issue.



A June 2011 report by the Center for an Urban Future on the economic impact of New York City’s architecture and design fields asserts, not surprisingly, that the city has “the largest collection of architecture firms of any city in the U.S.” With 8 percent of the nation’s architects, over 1,300 architecture firms call NYC home; as well the number of designers working in the city has almost doubled in the last decade. This density and diversity of talent make singling out particular architects above the rest a difficult task, but Michael J. Crosbie, Chair of the Department of Architecture at the University of Hartford, has taken it upon himself to highlight a dozen young offices that are emblematic of their generation in these still early days of the 21st century.

Inspired by the popular 1972 book Five Architects: Eisenman, Graves, Gwathmey, Hejduk, Meier—what then New York Times architecture critic Paul Goldberger called the “New York Five,” a moniker that has stuck—Crosbie’s “New York Dozen” includes Andre Kikoski Architect, Architecture in Formation, Arts Corporation, Christoff:Finio Architecture, Della Valle Bernheimer, Leroy Street Studio, LEVENBETTS, MOS, nARCHITECTS, Studio SUMO, Work Architecture Company (WORKac), and WXY Architecture. In a different way Crosbie is also inspired by another former Times critic, Nicolai Ouroussoff, who asserted, when Charles Gwathmey of the New York Five passed away in mid-2009, that in the ensuing decades since the New York Five the country’s creative energy shifted to Los Angeles to nurture a younger generation of architects without equal in New York. (The next day New York Dozen’s Andrew Bernheimer penned an open letter to Ouroussoff at Design Observer, challenging the critic’s assertion.) This collection of 50 projects by 12 firms clearly shows that some of the best architecture of their generation is being created in New York, be it installations, interiors, houses, apartment buildings, or ambitious unbuilt projects of various types. Crosbie’s list, like any, is definitely open to debate, but his semi-objective methods (referencing MoMA PS1’s Young Architects Program and AIANY’s Oculus journal, in particular) have yielded a diverse yet representative crop of architects who embrace collaboration, social and environmental responsibility, and experimentation.

In his introduction Crosbie calls Five Architects “the first self-promotional publication to appear in the new age of media attention to architecture.” Self-promotion in architecture is at an apparent saturation point today, with print and online media encompassing monographs, contemporary collections (of which New York Dozen is a part), magazines, blogs, and architects’ own web pages. In essence, Crosbie’s book resembles the last, in the way it collects photographs, drawings, and the architects’ own words, sometimes adding more than a firm’s own online documentation. Concise statements by the Dozen on their values, philosophies, and practices are helpful lead-ins to the projects, but pushing the content even further beyond what can be found online would have been appreciated; of course, in the print-to-digital content shift underway, that is becoming harder every day.

US: CA: UK:

What is the Nature of Your City?

Across the world, cities are bringing back nature to help address urban challenges.  We are healthier when we are closer to nature.  We have a greater respect for the environment that sustains us.  We are more adaptable to change when we let nature do its work.   

Join us for a free presentation by Dr. Timothy Beatley, renowned expert in sustainable city planning and author of the book BiophilicCities. Dr. Beatley is the Teresa Heinz Professor of Sustainable Communities, in the Department of Urban and Environmental Planning, School of Architecture at the University of Virginia, where he has taught for the last twenty-five years.  He will share his experience and knowledge of cities across the world that have made strides to integrate nature into our neighborhoods and communities. 

A Presentation on Biophilic Cities with

Dr. Timothy Beatley

January 18th, 2012

6:00-8:00 PM

Portland Northwest College of Art - Swigert Commons

1241 NW Johnson

Portland, OR 97209

This event is free and open to the public.

Sponsored by:

City of Portland's Environmental Services and

Office of Healthy Working Rivers,

Illahee,

The Intertwine Alliance, and

The Urban Greenspaces Institute

Architectural Watercolors at home

As I wrote earlier in Paris: Day 5, I was able to meet up with architectural watercolor artists Andrew Zega and Bernd Dams in their stylish Paris apartment.

Long an admirer and collector of their work, I was looking forward to meeting them and could barely contain my excitement walking up the stairs of the 17th century building to their apartment.

The building has been skillfully restored, leaving the best of the original features while bringing it up to date.

The beautiful and large apartment is obviously the home of scholars as books are the focus as opposed to the art which I expected. Built in shelves cover many of the walls while still more books are piled on numerous other surfaces. I felt right at home as I can relate to this in my own apartment!Andrew and Bernd have done a lot of reconfiguration in the apartment during their years there, such as these columns topped with urns which seperate the living room from the entry.This final configuration wasn't exactly their original plan for the space, as evidenced by this watercolor. Originally they had planned on a more architectural solution but over time they abandoned it for a lighter touch which I think makes the space feel larger.Bookshelves continue in the alcove off the living room which contains their reading desk for the hours of research they put into their pieces.
A small den off the alcove contains the tv, computer desk and their collection of architectural etchings.

Be sure to check out their fascinating blog Noted which they update weekly. You'll always learn something new!

Public Space: The square in the contemporary city

International Symposium, 13 and 14 January 2012 UAL Lisbon
Public Space:
The  square in the contemporary city

From its origins to the present time, the square has maintained its role as a public space of excellence in citizens' lives, a place where the streams intersect, influencing the more relevant social transformations. Given the awareness that the square is now consolidated as a city's heritage, what are the current trends and the different approaches for the redesign of squares? How do architects and designers respond to this challenge?

The symposium, consisting of one and a half days (Friday and Saturday morning), intends to open a debate on the role of the square in the contemporary city, taking case studies in Portugal, Spain and Italy. We will explore other areas of thought and research, such as history and philosophy.

The conversation model focuses on the exposure of several speakers per panel, followed by debate.

 

January 13, Friday
Opening of the Symposium
Flavio Barbini (UAL)
Filipa Ramalhete (CEACT UAL)
Paulo Tormenta Pinto (ISCTE IUL)


Panel 1
09h00 to 13h30

The Agora and the Roman Forum
Flavio Barbini (UAL, PT)
-
Middle Ages and Renaissance, the place of the square
Rogério Vieira de Almeida (ISCTE IUL, PT)

Coffee Break
-
The Enlightenment square
Miguel Faria (UAL PT)
-
Squares of the Empire during the Estado Novo
Ana Vaz Milheiro (ISCTE IUL, UAL, U.S.)


Panel 2
15:00 to 18:00

The "anti square"
José Manuel Fernandes (FAUTL, PT)

Public space, Banyoles, Girona
Silvia Brandi (MIAS Josep Mias Architects, Barcelona, ​​ES)

-

The Repugnant Stage
Eamonn Canniffe (Manchester School of Architecture, UK)

Piazza Ugo Dalló and S. Luigi Casiglione delle Stiviere, Mantova
Alberto Ferlenga (Naomi Architetti, IUAV, IT)


Debate moderated by Paulo Tormenta Pinto (ISCTE IUL, PT)



January 14, Saturday


Panel 3
10h00 to 13h00

Public Space
Nuno Crespo (UAL, PT)

The square of the Abbey of Santa Maria de Alcobaça Alcobaça
Gonçalo Sousa Byrne (FCTUC, PT)

-

The Ambivalence of the Public Square
Malcolm Miles (School of Architecture, Design & Environment)
University of Plymouth, UK)

Intervention in the neighborhood and Contumil Pius XII, Porto
Cristina Guedes (FAULP, PT) and Francisco Vieira de Campos (FAUP, PT)


Debate moderated by Ricardo Carvalho (Department of Architecture UAL PT)

Organised DA-UAL - CEACT ISCTE-IUL - CIAAM and dynamic CET

Christmas at Fezziwig's Warehouse

I'Yo Ho! my boys," said Fezziwig. "No more work to-night! Christmas Eve, Dick! Christmas, Ebenezer! Let's have the shutters up!" cried old Fezziwig with a sharp clap of his hands, "before a man can say JackRobinson. . . ."

"Hilli-ho!" cried old Fezziwig, skipping down from the high desk with wonderful agility. "Clear away, my lads, and let's have lots of room here! Hilli-ho, Dick! Cheer-up, Ebenezer!"Clear away! There was nothing they wouldn't have cleared away, or couldn't have cleared away with old Fezziwig looking on. It was done in a minute. Every movable was packed off, as if it were dismissed from public life forevermore; the floor was swept and watered, the lamps were trimmed, fuel was heaped upon the fire; and the warehouse was as snug, and warm, and dry, and bright a ballroom as you would desire tosee on a winter's night.In came a fiddler with a music book, and went up to the lofty desk and made an orchestra of it and tuned like fifty stomach aches. In came Mrs. Fezziwig, one vast substantial smile. In came the three Misses Fezziwig, beaming and lovable. In came the six followers whose hearts they broke. In came all the young men and women employed in the business. In came the housemaid with her cousin the baker. In came the cook with her brother's particular friend the milkman. In came the boy from over the way, who was suspected of not having board enough from his master, trying to hide himself behind the girl from next door but one who was proved to have had her ears pulled by her mistress; in they all came, any-how and every-how. Away they all went, twenty couple at once; hands half round and back again the other way; down the middle and up again; round and round in various stages of affectionate grouping, old top couple always turning up in the wrong place; new top couple starting off again, as soon as they got there; all top couples at last, and not a bottom one to help them.When this result was brought about the fiddler struck up "Sir Roger de Coverley." Then old Fezziwig stood out to dance with Mrs. Fezziwig. Top couple, too, with a good stiff piece of work cut out for them; three or four and twenty pairs of partners; people who were not to be trifled with; people who would dance and had no notion of walking.But if they had been thrice as many, oh, four times as many, old Fezziwig would have been a match for them, and so would Mrs. Fezziwig. As to her, she was worthy to be his partner in every sense of the term. If that's not high praise, tell me higher and I'll use it. A positive light appeared to issue from Fezziwig's calves. They shone in every part of the dance like moons. You couldn't have predicted at any given time what would become of them next. And when old Fezziwig and Mrs. Fezziwig had gone all through the dance, advance and retire; both hands to your partner, bow and courtesy, corkscrew, thread the needle, and back again to your place; Fezziwig cut so deftly that he appeared to wink with his legs, and came upon his feet again with a stagger.When the clock struck eleven the domestic ball broke up. Mr. and Mrs. Fezziwig took their stations, one on either side of the door, and shaking hands with every person individually, as he or she went out, wished him or her a Merry Christmas!

Christmas at Fezziwig's Warehouse by Charles Dickens

All Photos from 2010 Holiday House by myself

Return of the Brick Swarm

A short video has been released documenting the brick swarm project mentioned here last month, in which Swiss architects Gramazio & Kohler deploy semi-autonomous flying robots to assemble a structure of foam bricks. However, it's as if the architects underestimate the interest of their own work, fast-forwarding through the bulk of the assembly process as if no one would want to watch such a thing (or perhaps their robots were less graceful than originally hoped). Either way, check out the results, embedded above.

(Thanks to phenrydelphia for the tip!)

Seasons Greetings

Posts will be slim for the next week or so as I enjoy the holidays.

MERRY XMAS + HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Speleological Superparks

[Image: Downtown Reno on a Saturday night with people queuing up to climb the BaseCamp wall; photo by BLDGBLOG].

As part of an overall strategy to rebrand itself not as a city of gambling and slot machines—not another Las Vegas—but as more of a gateway to outdoor sports and adventure tourism—a kind of second Boulder or new Moab—Reno, Nevada, now houses the world's largest climbing wall, called BaseCamp, attached to the side of an old hotel.

[Image: The wall; photo by BLDGBLOG].

BaseCamp is "a 164-foot climbing wall, 40 feet taller than the previous world’s highest in the Netherlands," according to DPM Climbing. "The bouldering area will also be world-class with 2900 square feet of overhanging bouldering surface."

You can see a few pictures of those artificial boulders over at DPM.

[Image: The wall; photo by BLDGBLOG].

Fascinatingly, though, the same company who designed and manufactured this installation—a firm called Entre Prises—also makes artificial caves.

One such cave, in particular, created for and donated to the British Caving Association, is currently being used "to promote caving at shows and events around the country. It is now housed in its own convenient trailer and is available for use by Member Clubs and organizations."

[Image: The British Caving Association's artificial cave, designed by Entre Prises; photo by David Cooke].

These replicant geological forms are modular, easily assembled, and come in indoor and outdoor varieties. Indoor artificial caves, we read, "are usually made from polyester resin and glass fibre as spraying concrete indoors is often not very practicable. Indoor caves provide the experience of caving without some of the discomforts of natural or outdoor caves: the air temperature can be relatively easily controlled, in most cases specialist clothing is not required [and] the passage walls are not very thick so more cave passage can be designed to go into a small area."

Further, maintaining the exclamation point from the original text: "The modular nature of the Speleo System makes it possible to create any cave type and can be modified in minutes by simply unbolting and rotating a section! This means you can have hundreds of possible caving challenges and configurations for the price of one."

It would be interesting to live in a city, at least for a few weeks, ruled by an insane urban zoning board who require all new buildings—both residential and commercial—to include elaborate artificial caves. Not elevator shafts or emergency fire exits or public playgrounds: huge fake caves torquing around and coiling through the metropolis. Caves that can be joined across property lines; caves that snake underneath and around buildings; caves that arch across corporate business lobbies in fern-like sprays of connected chambers. Plug-in caves that tour the city in the back of delivery trucks, waiting to be bolted onto existing networks elsewhere. From Instant City to Instant Cave. Elevator-car caves that arrive on your floor when you need them. Caves on hovercrafts and helicopters, detached from the very earth they attempt to represent.

This brings to mind the work of Carsten Höller, implying a project someday in which the Turbine Hall in London's Tate Modern could be transformed into the world's largest artificial cave system, or perhaps even a future speleo-superpark in a place like Dubai, where literally acres of tunnels sprawl across the landscape, inside and outside, aboveground and below ground, in unpredictably claustrophobic rearrangeable prefab whorls.

The "outdoor" varieties, meanwhile, are actually able "to be buried within a hillside"; however, they "must be able to withstand the bearing pressure of any overlying material, eg. soil or snow. This is usually addressed by making the caving structures in sprayed concrete that has been specifically engineered to withstand the loads. Alternatively the cave passages can be constructed in polyester resin and glass fibre but then they have to be within a structural 'box' if soil pressure is to be applied."

In any case, here are some of the cave modules offered by Entre Prises, a kind of cave catalog called the Speleo System—though it's worth noting, as well, that "To add interest within passages and chambers, cave paintings and fossils can be added. This allows for user interest to be maintained, creating an educational experience."

[Image: The Speleo System by Entre Prises].

As it happens, Entre Prises is also in the field of ice architecture. That is, they design and build large, artificially maintained ice-climbing walls.

These "artificial ice climbing structures... support natural ice where the air temperature is below freezing point." However, "permanent indoor structures," given "a temperature controlled environment," can also be created. These are described as "self generating real ice structures that utilize a liquid nitrogen refrigeration system."

[Images: An artificial ice structure by Entre Prises for the Winter X Games].

Amongst many things, what interests me here is the idea that niche sports enthusiasts—specifically cavers and climbers—have discovered and, perhaps more importantly, financially support a unique type of architecture and the construction techniques required for assembling it that, in an everyday urban context, would appear quite eccentric, if not even avant-garde.

Replicant geological formations in the form of modular, aboveground caves and artificially frozen concrete towers only make architectural and financial sense when coupled with the needs of particular recreational activities. These recreational activities are more like spatial incubators, both inspiring and demanding new, historically unexpected architectural forms.

So we might say that, while architects are busy trying to reimagine traditional building typologies and architectural programs—such as the Library, the Opera House, the Airport, the Private House—these sorts of formally original, though sometimes aesthetically kitsch, designs that we are examining here come not from an architecture firm at all, or from a particular school or department, but from a recreational sports firm pioneering brand new spatial environments.

As such, it would be fascinating to see Entre Prises lead a one-off design studio somewhere, making artificial caves a respectable design typology for students to admit they're interested in, while simultaneously pushing sports designers to see their work in more architectural terms and prodding architects to see niche athletes as something of an overlooked future clientele.

Two Exhibitions

Two exhibitions worth checking out are now on display in New York City: Design with the Other 90%: CITIES, organized by the Cooper-Hewitt yet exhibited at the United Nations, runs until January 9, 2012; and Civic Action: A Vision for Long Island City is on display at the Noguchi Museum until April 22, 2012. The first "features sixty projects, proposals, and solutions that address the complex issues arising from the unprecedented rise of informal settlements in emerging and developing economies," while the second exhibits "new approaches to development in this area of Long Island City [where the Noguchi Museum and Socrates Sculpture Park are located] that [artists Isamu] Noguchi and [Mark] di Suvero helped to shape." In the number of ways that each is different -- in terms of population, geography, diversity, etc. -- they are also very similar, especially in how bottom-up approaches are embraced for urban change. Some thoughts on my visits to each exhibition follow.

Design with the Other 90%: CITIES:


Design with the Other 90%: CITIES is a follow up to the Cooper-Hewitt's 2007 exhibition Design for the Other 90%, which presented "cost-effective ways to increase access to food and water, energy, education, healthcare, revenue-generating activities, and affordable transportation for those who most need them." In that exhibition the canvas was broad, looking at design from the small and the personal (the cover of the companion book shows a tool for drinking from standing water) to the large and infrastructural. In the successor it's clear that cities are the focus, yet this does not mean that small interventions are not to be found; instead they are situated within the context of the growing urban population -- over half of the earth's roughly 7 billion people live in cities, close to one billion in informal settlements.



The exhibition is structured into six themes -- Exchange, Reveal, Adapt, Include, Prosper and Access -- which are inserted into the public lobby of the United Nations Visitor Center (the Cooper-Hewitt is closed until 2013 for renovation). Given the efforts of the UN towards transforming informal settlements and their residents, especially through its Habitat and Development entities, it makes perfect sense for the exhibition to be housed at the UN, which is actually undergoing its own renovation. A series of parallel walls sit perpendicular to the flow of traffic, with plenty of room between the walls for models and full-scale prototypes; the latter are some of the best aspects of the exhibition.



A couple architectural projects that are illustrated via full-scale mock-ups include "Make a House Intelligent" by Arturo Ortiz Struck and others (above) and the "10x10 Sandbag House" by architect Luyanda Mpahlwa (below). The first responds to the necessity in parts of Mexico City to occupy a lot within 30 days; the architects designed a flexible system of sand, concrete blocks, gabions, and steel beams, which can be erected by five people in less than a week. The second consist of two-story, wood-frame houses with sandbag infill that are replacing dwellings of corrugated metal and scrap materials in Cape Town, South Africa's Mitchell's Plain township. In each case an understanding of the construction that comes from the mock-ups increases an appreciation of the designs and applications.



On a much larger scale is the "Medellín Metrocable and Northeast Integral Urban Project," which also addresses informal housing but does it differently than the two construction schemes above. Instead of tackling housing, the project focuses on access, such that by improving the connections between informal settlements and other parts of the city, "an inclusive metropolis" is created. While this is a top-down approach requiring government spending to build on a large scale, it has as much merit as bottom-up approaches that enable residents to improve their immediate living conditions. Ultimately the two types of development need to happen -- perhaps converging at some ideal point -- for informal settlements to lift themselves up above their origins. The exhibition implies that even though these and other designs are site specific they offer lessons that can be applied in other places in need.



While Design with the Other 90%: CITIES is closing soon, it is "available for travel" in the US and abroad from February 2012, so it may be coming to a city near you. Regardless, a catalog accompanies the exhibition.

Civic Action: A Vision for Long Island City:


Across the East River, inside the Noguchi Museum in Long Island City, Queens, sits the Civic Action exhibition that presents ideas for transforming the neighborhood around the museum and the nearby Socrates Sculpture Park. The two arts institutions collaborated to develop the initiative, in response to new development, rezoning, and an increased residential population. I live nearby in Astoria, but my neighborhood is primarily residential with a little light industry on certain streets; the area around Noguchi and Socrates is much different, marked by more substantial industrial buildings, big box retail, large open spaces, and the Big Allis power generator. The striped stacks of the last are obviously a point of departure for artist Mary Miss and her team's installation, pictured above and below.



Miss's "City as a Living Laboratory" uses floor-to-ceiling poles and tubes to provide a strong visual image and to structure displays for the various phases of the plan: 1-Using the Big Allis stacks as beacons to display the city's energy usage; 2-Repurposing utility poles and other vertical infrastructure in Big Allis-like banding to let visitors know about the new "Research Zone" in the city; 3-Re-purposing everyday elements in the area, such as scaffolding, blank walls of industrial buildings, and trailer-truck containers for, respectively, green walls, park slices, and incubator studios for developing ideas and projects about the city. I'll admit that this project in particular made me see the context around the Noguchi in a new light, as the trucks and other elements seemed to stand out more than normal after my visit. Miss's ideas are the most digestible, stemming from the striped branding and the simple yet thoughtful graphics and composition of the installation.



On the other hand, George Trakas's "Shoreline Walk" is a great idea -- bringing the community to the water's edge -- that is varied and sporadic in execution. The installation is a mix of mapping, history, and music (above) that offers suggestions for knitting the various plots along the waterfront, including Big Allis. This is not surprising to me, as Trakas is responsible for the Nature Walk at the Newtown Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant (PDF link) in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. There Trakas wends the walk past the industrial infrastructure and directly to the water, turning it again 90 degrees to a path planted with native trees. It is a good illustration (and worth a visit) of how connecting to the water can be achieved in a small amount of space and from a point removed from the water.



Natalie Jeremijenko's "UP_2_U" spreads itself across a couple spaces with a variety of ideas on the walls and on tables (above) as part of her "Environmental Health Clinic Civic Action team." This installation reminded me of the Architectural League's Toward the Sentient City, because both integrate technology into the city in various ways. But Jeremijenko proposes more than "real-time 'smart-city' technologies...to close feedback loops and radically upgrade environmental health;" she also proposes fairly low-tech solutions, like "AgBags," that would hang from buildings to "create arable land for new edibles." In the case of the latter I like how it was presented in front of one of the museum's windows (below). The rest of the installation is also thoughtfully put together, be it the X-shaped tables, wall graphics, or the shadows cast by the solar awnings (above).



The most minimal installation is easily "GreenWay and Community Kitchen" by Rirkrit Tiravanija and team (below images). Their plan proposes to re-pave Broadway in Queens, which runs from the N/Q elevated station to Socrates Sculpture Park one block south of the Noguchi. This street is documented in the Ed Ruscha-esque photomontage below, but it is presented as a serrated composition instead of flatly, which emphasizes the smaller pockets of space that can then be closed off for special events, such as markets or film screenings.



Tiravanja's project also features the most overt piece of architecture, a Community Kitchen that would initially be placed in Socrates Sculpture Park. The design (below) is a scaled-up version of Noguchi's YA2 table lamp, a point of reference that links two arts institutions which people might not otherwise see as working together. In that regard it makes sense that Socrates will host the exhibition after it closes at the Noguchi in April next year.



Conclusion:

These two exhibitions may vary in a number of ways -- 90% is international, Civic is local; 90% presents realized examples, Civic is all speculation; 90% comes from various authors, Civic is only four teams -- but they share many qualities, particularly placing a value on creative design for addressing urban problems and prioritizing bottom-up initiatives for making change. Each exhibition requires slow, in-depth visits to best appreciate and understand the various ways of intervening. The Cooper-Hewitt show benefits from an accompanying catalog, so here's hoping the Noguchi and Socrates assemble the ideas from their show in print form, both as a way to share the projects to a larger audience and to help instigate change in their own backyard.