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Field Report: Venice Architecture Biennale 2010

As I recover from the intense heat and severe foot-pounding of the XIIth Venice Biennale of Architecture, I’m at something of a loss as to what to make of it. Trying to use the theme this year, “People Meet In Architecture,” established by Kazuyo Sejima, overall biennale curator and one half of SANAA…

The Omnibus Roundup – Skyscraper Showdown, gubernatorial platforms, In the Footprint, and The Good, the Bad, and the Empty

A “skyscraper showdown” is in headlines this week, making contentious building projects a recurring theme for the summer. This time we have 15 Penn Plaza vs. the Empire State Building. The City Council has approved plans for a 67-story tower to be built two blocks away from, and just 34 feet shorter than, the iconic Empire…

Amplify: Creative and Sustainable Lifestyles on the Lower East Side – on view through 9/15

Are we growing more than plants?  This question — blown up in large pink letters on a white wall in a small gallery on the Lower East Side — frames the core of the Amplify exhibition. Like the Lower East Side, the exhibition, which is the product of over one year of…

A Caution on Hong Kong Envy

Despite the impulse to marvel at Hong Kong’s sophisticated planning for and investment in infrastructure and urban density, might people there welcome some New York-style urbanism? Norman Oder, author of the watchdog blog Atlantic Yards Report, recaps two conferences that suggest that New York’s mechanisms for community input on development projects, imperfect as they are…