Photos courtesy of Dean Liscum
A sign blocks the steps to the porch—plywood with orange spray paint bearing a three-digit address. You step around it and onto the screened porch. Two bright orange stickers from the city’s Code Enforcement Group pasted to the window announce the obvious—you should not be here. This building is condemned and slated for demolition. You hold your hands to the glass and look through your reflection into a house with no roof, no floor, no inside. Beyond your reflection, open to the elements, lies an ovoid hole.
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David Chipperfield speaks at the Menil [Photo by Raj Mankad]
During his presentation to a packed audience at the Menil yesterday, David Chipperfield referred to the Richmont Square apartments as “the great big thing,” “this thing getting in our way,” and a “nonconforming” space. Charged with developing a master plan for an expansion of the facilities for the Menil Collection, he quickly identified the redevelopment of that site as the key to expanding while also maintaining the positive qualities of the current campus.
Before the internationally renowned architect spoke, the director of the Menil, Josef Helfenstein, announced the plan had been unanimously approved by the board.
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Galerías Mall, Maracaibo, Venezuela, courtesy Wilfredo R. Rodriguez H.
Imagine driving across the United States, from San José to New York City, without speaking to anyone. Sounds difficult, right? Credit card swipe machines, internet check-ins, and automated food ordering allowed Andrew Wood to accomplish this feat with only uttering four words, all in the first day of his cross country drive. The journey, among the stories in his seventh book, City Ubiquitous: Place, Communication, and the Rise of Omnitopia, portrays our social landscape as generic and provides the foundation for his thesis: our world “has become condensed into an enclosure of the same place.”
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