Institute for Urban Design » Detroit

Fellows in the News: Dubbeldam, Griffin, Jones, Kelley, Libeskind, Locke, Manfredi, Safdie, Sollohub, & Stern

admin — Mon, 19 Dec 2011 15:12:50 +0000

Curbed included Board Member Winka Dubbeldam’s 597 Greenwich Street on their list of Innovative Residences You Need to Know Right Now; Mayor Dave Bing announced the re-launch of the Detroit Works program, with Board Member Toni Griffin heading up the development of a long-range development plan for the troubled Rust Belt city; Mary Margaret Jones (whose Olympic Park in London, pictured at left, was just completed) has been selected to design a new public entertainment waterfront attraction in Corpus Christi, Texas; Bill Kelley is leading the charge to add more sidewalk cafe space to Greenwich Village’s West 8th Street; good news came for two skyscrapers designed by Daniel Libeskind: the developers of his Zlota 44 building in Warsaw secured financing to complete construction, while his Eden Center in Jerusalem received official approval to move forward; Anne Locke spoke to WestfairOnline about the recent boom in medical facilities construction; “The Mobius,” Michael Manfredi’s entry to the Portal to the Point ideas competition in Pittsburgh, was featured on ArchDaily; Moshe Safdie released renderings for a massive $3.1 billion, six-tower, 10 million-square-foot mixed-use complex planned for Chongqing, China; a course designed by NJIT’s Darius Sollohub in collaboration with Habitat for Humanity was featured in a round-up of innovative and unconventional college courses around New Jersey; and Robert A.M. Stern was interviewed about his skyscraping One Horizon Center project in Gurgaon, India.

Fellows Events & Exhibitions: May 15-31, 2011

admin — Mon, 16 May 2011 17:03:13 +0000

SOM Chicago principal Philip Enquist will speak about ‘The Endless City’ at Penn Design’s 2011 commencement ceremony on 5/16; Rick Bell and Laurie Kerr will both participate in Fit City 6 at the Center for Architecture on 5/17; Lance Jay Brown will participate in the Better City/Better Life: North-South Initiative symposium at the United Nations Headquarters in Manhattan on 5/18; a reception for the exhibit Downtown Brooklyn Commons [PDF], featuring design proposals from the Rus en Urbe studio led by CCNY’s Denise Hoffman Brandt, Elisabetta Terragni, and Barbara Wilks, with a model created in charette with Michael Sorkin’s graduate urban design studio, will take place at Brooklyn Borough Hall on 5/19; Deborah Berke will speak at the Miller House Symposium in Columbus, Indiana on 5/20 (the titular modernist residence is pictured at left); Peter D. Cavaluzzi will join a panel on Firm Identity in an Age of Mergers & Acquisitions at the CfA on 5/23; Enquist will join David Dixon and other noted urbanists for a series of discussions at the Detroit Public Library’s Detroit By Design event on 5/24; and Toronto’s Urbanspace Gallery will host a book launch party for Ken Greenberg’s aforementioned Walking Home on 5/25.

Fellows’ Events & Exhibitions: May 1-15

admin — Mon, 02 May 2011 14:14:25 +0000

Olympia Kazi will participate in a panel discussion at the 2011 D-Crit Conference on 5/4; Ethel Sheffer will participate in the panel Riverside Center: Did the Public Process Work? at the Center for Architecture on 5/9; then, on 5/12, you can return to the Center to see Deborah Gans moderate the panel Housing Innovation New York; Winka Dubbeldam will join a panel on design at WANTED: Design in New York on 5/14; and Art & Architecture, an exhibit of the work of architect-developer John Portman (a la Detroit’s Renaissance Center, pictured at left), is on view at Beijing’s Capital Museum from now through June 12th.

Fellows in the News: Bubriski, Flint, Frugiuele, Greenberg, Griffin, Hoal, Holl, Kazi, Kerr, Mayne, Pasquarelli, Rogers, Thompson, Whalley, & Williamson

admin — Tue, 05 Apr 2011 14:38:48 +0000

Wanda Bubriski jumped into the public debate surrounding Architect Barbie at BWAF’s new blog; a recent CNN feature on urban agriculture included two projects by Colin Cathcart; Anthony Flint (whose Wrestling With Moses has been garnering fresh attention lately) wrote an article for Boston.com on Ben and Jane Thompson’s storied Design Research store in Cambridge, calling Jane’s new book on DR’s history “wonderful”; a developer announced plans for a floating marina complex (pictured at left), designed by Carlo Frugiuele, on the Jersey City waterfront; Ken Greenberg is working on a plan for the pedestrianization of part of Toronto’s famed Yonge Street; Board Member Toni Griffin and Fellow June Williamson both contributed to a Times Room for Debate feature on “the Incredible Shrinking City”; John Hoal is leading a six-team visioning process for St. Louis’ Ackert Walkway; Stephen Holl talked to the Scotland Herald about his Glasgow School of Art project, which was unanimously approved by the city; Olympia Kazi’s Van Alen Institute has been busy, announcing the mid-April opening of its design bookstore in Manhattan and launching the Life at the Speed of Rail design competition, the jury for which will include IfUD Board Member Thom Mayne; Treehugger talked to Laurie Kerr about NYC’s pioneering Local Law 84; the Architect’s Newspaper posted video of Gregg Pasquarelli discussing SHoP’s design for the Botswana Innovation Hub; Rob Rogers’ firm Rogers Marvel will handle restoration work on Manhattan’s Pier A, which will become a retail and event space; and Metropolis visited Andrew Whalley at Grimshaw Industrial Design’s new Chelsea office.

Fellows in the News: Blaik, Gorlin, Libeskind, Palmieri, Safdie, Sennett, Sheffer, Stepner, Walker, & Wong

admin — Mon, 21 Mar 2011 14:32:49 +0000

Detroit is abuzz with talk about Omar Blaik’s revitalization plan for the historic Midtown neighborhood, which recently got extensive write-ups from the Detroit News and the Free-Press; the latest issue of Dwell features a two-page spread on Alexander Gorlin’s The Brook development in the Bronx; a torquing tower designed by Daniel Libeskind will soon join a new cluster of skyscrapers rising in Jerusalem; John Palmieri recently visited Belfast as a guest lecturer for the city’s State of the City Development Debate; the Architect’s Newspaper recently visited Moshe Safdie’s studio for a look at his current projects, while the Huffington Post featured a slideshow of the architect’s daring Golden Dream Bay Sky Garden Apartments in Qinhuangdao; Richard Sennett wrote an article in the Guardian on the recent funding scandal at the London School of Economics; New York magazine talked to Ethel Sheffer about the uniquely depressing quality of long-vacant storefronts in newer buildings; Michael Stepner spoke to the Voice of San Diego about the challenges presented by “invisible parks”; construction is just getting underway to transform a disused stretch of Sydney’s waterfront into the 15-acre Headlands Park, designed by Peter Walker; and HuffPo visited the serenely swooping gardens (pictured at left), designed by John Wong, at the base of the world’s tallest building, Dubai’s Burj Khalifa.

Portman Honored at ALIS Awards

admin — Fri, 25 Feb 2011 15:16:06 +0000

Atlanta-based Developer/Architect and Fellow John C. Portman, known for massive projects like his hometown’s Peachtree Center (pictured at left), Detroit’s Renaissance Center, and the Embarcadero Center in San Francisco, was presented with the prestigious Lifetime Achievement Award at the 2011 Americas Lodging Investment Summit in San Diego.

Fellows’ Events & Exhibitions: November 8-14, 2010

admin — Mon, 08 Nov 2010 14:00:34 +0000

Omar Blaik and Board Member Toni Griffin will both participate in CEOs for Cities’ Urban Leaders Summit 2010 in Detroit on 11/8/10 (and while we’re on the subject, don’t miss this excellent profile of Griffin’s work in Detroit in Architect); Kate Orff will speak about Living Cities at the NY Botanical Garden on 11/8/10; Michael Manfredi will join an Architectural League-organized panel in New York about Muju, Korea’s planned Taekwondo Park on 11/9/10; Barbara Wilks will join another League panel discussing Hudson River Park on 11/13/10; Las Vegas Studio, an exhibition of images from the archives of Patrons Robert Venturi and Denise Scott Brown (pictured at left), opened at Chicago’s Graham Foundation on 10/28/10 and will run through 2/19/11; and Chris Hardwicke’s Ravine City is featured in the urban-ag exhibition Carrot City at Parsons in New York now through 12/15/10.

(Image provided courtesy of Venturi, Scott Brown, and Associates, Inc.)

Fellows in the News: Arad, Bell, Berman, Bubriski, Griffin, Handel, Mayne, Norten, Sauerbruch

admin — Fri, 17 Sep 2010 15:04:46 +0000

Winning proposals from the Sukkah City competition, which were selected by a panel of judges that included Michael Arad, Rick Bell, and Board Member Thom Mayne, go on view from September 19-20 in New York’s Union Square; Matt Berman’s (pictured at left) firm workshop/apd was recently named [PDF] a “Generation Next” firm in Departures Magazine’s September style issue; Wanda Bubriski has been invited to join the board of the Society of Architectural Historians; the most recent issue of Next American City magazine features an interview with Board Member Toni Griffin on her work in Detroit; Steven Handel has been named the new Editor-in-Chief of the journal Ecological Restoration, a quarterly published by the University of Wisconsin Press; and both Mattias Sauerbruch (who was recently awarded the commission for the M9 Museum in Venice) and Board Member Enrique Norten will serve as judges at this year’s World Architecture Festival in Barcelona.

Fellows in the News: Bee, Blaik, Dixon, Durst, Dykers, & Thompson

admin — Mon, 13 Sep 2010 15:03:46 +0000

A group of innovative multifamily infill housing developments produced by Carmi Bee’s firm RKT&B was covered recently (photo at left); Omar Blaik’s firm U3 Ventures produced a report of their own on an exciting strategy for recovery in Detroit’s Midtown district (subscription required); David Dixon led a team that produced a 25-page report challenging the current plans for the massive Charity Hospital reconstruction project in New Orleans; Douglas Durst was recently profiled for his leadership of the Durst Organization; Craig Dykers’ firm Snøhetta was just profiled in the Wall Street Journal; and don’t miss Boston.com’s look back on the storied careers of Jane Thompson and her husband Ben, who founded Design Research in 1953.

Institute Board Member Toni Griffin to Take On New Role in Detroit

admin — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 19:06:50 +0000

Institute board member and urban planner Toni Griffin was recently featured in Time for her new assignment to “downsize Detroit,” with the backing of Mayor Dave Bing, the Kresge Foundation and the Brookings Institution. Time notes that her assignment “might be the most ambitious urban makeover in American history,” citing that Detroit is built for a population twice its current size.