blog wunderlust: 31st March 2014

The current [urban planning] system doesn't allow people to be sensitive to the environment

Professor Ng Mee-kam

Photo by Shigeru Ban Architects

Why Cities Need to Stop Commissioning Calatrava's Fish Skeletons | Why the UK does not need a formal architecture policy | "One Day, The Only People Doing Architecture in China Will Be Chinese Architects" | The world's top 10 most innovative companies in architecture | How to Be an Architecture Critic | Anupama Kundoo’s handmade architecture | Building with Structural Insulated Panels … or SIPs |

last word: Shigeru Ban Wins the Pritzker Prize, Architecture's Highest Honour

L. Mies van der Rohe - New National Gallery

Another in the excellent architectural film series by Franco Di Capua, this one on the New National Gallery in Berlin, Germany by Mies van der Rohe

TED talks: Diébédo Francis Kéré

Diébédo Francis Kéré: How to build with clay... and community

House of the Week 175: Tellico Cabin

Photography (c) Sara Dario and Harlan Hambright

Located along the Tellico Plains, Tennessee is a cabin designed Hefferlin + Kronenberg Architects. The site has fond memories for the client and the banks of the river and the adjoining valley holds historical significance to the Cherokee nation. The cabin with it's standing seams gabled roofs has walls clad in stone and dark stained cedar and a landscape of plants and vegetation indigenous to the Tellico plains. Inside heavy timbers support the steeply pitched roofs of the cabin that provide sleeping lofts for the guest beds in the raised volume.

The Ibirapuera Park Marquise in São Paulo, Brazil

Ibirapuera Park in São Paulo, Brazil designed by architect Oscar Niemeyer and landscape designer Otávio Agusto de Teixeira Mendes.

blog wunderlust: 17th March 2014

erin go bragh (Happy St. Patrick's Day)

...there exists a need to objectively evaluate our traditional models for their validity in a changing world

Fida Ali

Collapsible woven refugee shelters powered by the sun | Awards scheme highlights female vision of architecture in today's world & “Why Do Women Really Leave Architecture” Is the Wrong Question | Dutch architects building Amsterdam canal house with 3-D printer | Freshly Baked Art: Cookies That Are A Feast For The Eyes | Avant-garde architect builds "ultra ruin" in Taiwan jungle | Re-design of Serpentine Pavilion



last word: Cape Town to Carve New African Art Museum Out of Former Grain Silo

38n9w / Afriplanus (Angola)

Portuguese design and architecture practice 38N9W has partnered with Afriplanus to establish a presence in Angola, to develop a variety of new projects including schools, office buildings, hotels, restaurants and an exhibition centre.

blog wunderlust: 10th March 2014

Architecture is all about scale and this is a grandiose scale. It is a grandiose space. It makes you smile when you walk into the space. It makes you feel good. It talks to you.

Shawn Lawrence

[image source]

The Expansive Designs of Landscape Architect Thomas Woltz | In Indianapolis, a Bike Path to Progress | Inside the Homes of Eight Famous Architects | We cannot absolve ourselves of responsibility for the implications of a project | Energy efficient villas in china by Vincent Callebaut | Levitating Buildings and Floating Extrusions From A+ Finalists | Time stands still: the empty streets of an abandoned inner mongolian city

last word: Arms wide open

blog wunderlust: 3rd March 2014

One of the biggest mistakes in architecture is that we're expecting society to be interested in the specific problems of architecture. [Architects] need to adjust to what society is discussing. We just provide the forms that can translate their problems into solutions.

Alejandro Aravena

[image source]

The World's Most Successful Model for Sustainable Urban Development? | An Office With Just One Table That Is Long Enough To Seat All 125 Employees | Interview: Bruno Simões | Spike Lee’s Amazing Rant Against Gentrification: ‘We Been Here!’ and Cities Mobilize to Help Those Threatened by Gentrification | This House Is Super Cool On The Inside. Which Is Why The Outside Shocked Me So Much | Architect Rem Koolhaas's Protégés

last word: Car park to replace Art Deco house

Protected Intersections For Bicyclists

Protected Intersections For Bicyclists from Nick Falbo on Vimeo.

If you build it

blog wunderlust: 24th February 2014

Good architecture is like a good theory session, a good marriage, a good poem - gently and almost invisibly allowing you to be you, as flawed and as beautiful as you are

Robert Sullivan

[image source]

Robert Redford and Wim Wenders on new architecture film Cathedrals of Culture | Architecture: The Most Romantic Profession in Tinseltown | Alejandro Aravena: architect, equaliser, el visionario | An Amazing Village Designed Just For People With Dementia | Green Globes challenging LEED for market share | A Dictator's Guide to Urban Design | Peak Gentrification | Bicycle roundabout | Architect Rem Koolhaas' Protégés

last word: Jamaican Architecture Students [from the Caribbean] Visit Belize

The Spiral House

Blog Wunderlust: 17th February 2014

In becoming architects, we learn to see the world with intelligent sensuality. Intuitive propositions become the means by which we discover the qualities of location

Jeanne Sillet (Forward to Mega III, Architectural Association, London, 1987)

I love you Building – Happy Valentine’s Day | A bridge that’s a carpark that’s also a park | Frank Gehry Is Still the World's Worst Living Architect | Crossrail brings in top architect behind King's Cross revamp | Israeli-Canadian architect Moshe Safdie laments unfriendly Hong Kong architecture | Sexism in architecture: Remember what Kathryn Findlay said? 'Women, don't be put off by the aggression of men' | The world's first 'selfie building'

last word: Cuba’s Reward for the Dutiful: Gated Housing

The Bridge House

Blog Wunderlust: 3rd February 2014

Architecture can't fully represent the chaos and turmoil that are part of the human personality, but you need to put Some of that turmoil into architecture, or it isn't real

Frank Stella

[image source]

10 Innovative Affordable Housing Designs For Sustainable Living | Vandals break into Le Corbusier's Ronchamp chapel and spark a scandal | Building Faces Wrecking Ball. So Does Couples’ Friendship | An affordable modern home in Atlanta | Far East: Architecture in India | Taiwan architect leads humanitarian building projects | Architect Named to Transform Courtyard at MoMA PS1 | Museu d’Art Contemporani de Barcelona (MACBA) open Motor of Modernity


last word: Colonial gems in T&T

blog wunderlust: 13th January 2014

I'm an architectural academic on a mission to get as many cities as possible to approach their next growth phase with cycling at the forefront

Steven Fleming

[image source]

Kevin Mark Low expands on the position of women in the architectural profession in Malaysia | A Grand Redesign of MoMA Does Not Spare a Notable Neighbor | Lessons from North Korean urbanism | MoMA: A Needless Act of Destruction | I Really, Really Want To Live In This Tiny House. Step Inside And You’ll Instantly See Why | The Abandoned Ruins given New Life | Almost 90% of women think having children puts them at a disadvantage in architecture

last word: Plantations, Ian Fleming and Georgian architecture: Discover another Jamaica

The blog wunderlust is a weekly round up summarizing the architectural highlights, news and web links, that don't otherwise fit the format of this blog. If you have any to share feel free to drop me an email

blog wunderlust: 6th January 2014

First Blog Wunderlust Post of the Year

Mass- production is the realm of the industrial designer and the process engineer – so let them maintain claim over that territory. The bespoke is the true specialty of the architect and the contemporary profession has more facility than ever to implement difference in the most intelligent of ways.

Chris Knapp

We Need More ‘Building’ in Architecture School | Leading architect John McAslan turns his attention from Haiti to Tottenham | Foster + Partners propose 136-mile cycling network above London | Architect Santiago Calatrava wins honor at Vatican and is sued by the city of Valencia as the white elephants (opera house) rot | Bjarke Ingels: An Architect For A Moment Or An Era? | Louvre Abu Dhabi architect Jean Nouvel sees his creation come to life

last word: Ten new year's resolutions for architects in 2014

The blog wunderlust is a weekly round up summarizing the architectural highlights, news and web links, that don't otherwise fit the format of this blog. If you have any to share feel free to drop me an email

2013 Holiday Gift Guide (the Architect's Version)

Tired of people coming up with lame excuses that they don't know what to get you for Christmas because of your discerning tastes, or maybe you signed up for your office's secret Santa and are stumped or perhaps you just need that perfect bespoke piece for that special architect in your life. Looked no further that architechnophilia's 2013 Holiday Gift Guide (the Architect's Version).

An origami style white choker hand made from paper, glue, metal, lacquer

The Sea Urchin Collection hand crafted by Touch by VLS

A stylish yet practical suede leather pencil roll

Previously sold by Merchant 4, Place for Trace is a smart and nearly obvious solution for designers and architects

Pencil - think with your hands

Some other lists from Architizer, Remodelista & ArchDaily (so sorry this is late)

blog wunderlust: 23rd December 2013

Can we architects working in the Third World afford to consider projects in isolation? [...]the issues are more serious than the design of aesthetically pleasing or even good buildings

Yasmeen Lari

(c)Alka Patel, Courtesy ARTstor Alka Patel Archive

Intense, Graphic Photos ‘Whitewash’ Buildings in Los Angeles | The Best (and Worst) Countries to Be a Female Architect | 10 architects were told to create their fantasy home. This is what happened | Los Angeles Bans Heat-Sucking Roofs | Man Builds Fairy Tale Home for His Family – Total Cost £3,000 | What Architecture Schools Get Wrong | 2013 in Review: Top 10 Architecture Projects | Top 10 Deliciously Modern Gingerbread Houses

last word: Islamic Art Scholar Traces Havana’s Mozarabic Influences