LAUNCH Roadtrip - Toledo Art Museum Glass Pavilion

Back Seat Architect: Toledo Glass Pavilion
Saturday, January 26th, 2008

In the spirit of seeing what the world has to offer (at least our conveniently located corner) and in lieu of the last roadtrip up to the Henry Ford Museum and Cranbrook some members of the local LAUNCH community (who's new website I am attempting to work on in all my spare time) are organizing another roadtrip to sunny Toledo. Home of the Mud Hens, Klinger, Pilkington Glass and the first non-smoking music venue I ever went to.

This funtime excursion will be to explore the Toledo Glass Pavilion which was designed by SANAA ltd. of which Kazuyo Sejima will be lecturing at Carnegie Mellon on Jan. 22nd.

I suggest if you have the time, would like to talk design with some local folks or just want an excuse to visit the Delmenhorst of the Midwest I would suggest you see Bradley of ClevelandDesignCity who is organizing this event about sharing a ride (save the planet and all that).

White House Redux Competition

What if you were wanting to design what the White House would look like today? Well, it seems you have the chance.

Introducing the White House Redux ideas competition being held by Storefront for Art and Architecture

JURY

Stefano Boeri (Editor-in-chief, Abitare magazine, Milan)
Beatriz Colomina (Director of the Program in Media and Modernity, Princeton University)
Liz Diller (Diller Scofidio + Renfro, New York)
John Maeda (President Elect, Rhode Island School of Design RISD)
Geoff Manaugh (BLDGblog and Dwell magazine, San Francisco)
Mark Wigley (Dean of the Graduate School of Architecture, Columbia University)
Laetitia Wolff (Editorial director, Surface magazine, New York)


PRIZES

The best competition entries from around the world will be exhibited in the Storefront Gallery (New York) in July 2008, and in a special page on the gallery's website. They will also be published in Surface magazine. The authors of the three best projects, as chosen by the jury, will be flown to New York and given three day's free accommodation in The White House Hotel on the Bowery.

First Prize $5,000
Second Prize $3,000
Third Prize $1,500


TIMELINE

January 15, 2008 Competition launched
March 1, 2008 Online submissions accepted
April 20, 2008 Registration and submissions deadline
May 2008 Jury selects winners
May 2008 Winners announced
July 2008 Exhibition and prizegiving at Storefront for Art and Architecture, NYC

Breuer Tower...what can I say. We were smiled upon. Or at least we got a wink and a nod.

There really isn't all that much that I can add to the seemingly incessant coverage of the former Ameritrust Building being being purchased by K&D for $35,005,000.00 today (is the new sales tax part of that?).
K&D is a development group based out of Willoughby, Ohio who does quite a bit of residential development including the, at times, regrettable Stonebridge Condos.

However, one cannot overlook K&D's optimistic outlook for the city. I for one am entirely in favor of the former Marcel Breuer masterpiece being converted into a residential tower (in part) and would actually investigate a cost analysis upon whether it would be at all beneficial to call the tower a domicile. It would be closer to work cutting my commute to mere minutes, I wouldn't have to ever drive into the city at rush hour (unless coming home from someplace else), I could threaten people with my inferred tough demeanor gained by actually living downtown and I could research and document all the amazing places downtown that I ignore on my journey to and from home to work. Heck,I may even purchase enough junk by my own person to necessitate the increase in county jobs by at least one person.

Regardless of how much the building is worth, how much was spent on it and the effort it took us to get here (thanks again to Susan Miller and crew) I would like sigh a brief sigh of relief that I won't have to witness much more ham handed demolition done in the name of some special person who gives all bearded people a negative persona. I am sure his family is very nice, and although I don't like the tie in the picture on his website I am sure he has plenty of nice ones at home that he saves for special occasions.

It has been a big day. I am going to bed.

Check out the ClevelandDesignCity for more such amazing and well crafted/spell checked articles.

Also, what will come of all this? Oh man, are we in for a DOOZY!

Roadtrip - Fuller/ Noguchi and Eero Saarinen

This past Sunday a few of the Cleveland LAUNCH members decided to head up to Detroit to check out the Buckminster Fuller/ Isamu Noguchi exhibit at the Henry Ford Museum and the Eero Saarinen exhibit at Cranbrook Art Museum.

As a special guest (having worked with Eero and student of Fuller, as well as being a Cleveland architectural institution himself) Peter van Dijk was able to join us.

With Detroit being only 3 hours from Cleveland the LAUNCH team decided to take its first impromptu roadtrip and check out the 'local' exhibits. The Buckminster Fuller/Isamu Noguchi exhibit was first on our list. Included was an actual Dymaxion House as well as some sculpture, a Dymaxion Car, some tensigrity models and a few films.

Heading North for half an hour brought us to Boomfield Hills, home of Eero Saarinen's old office and Cranbrook CEC. Unfortunately our Cranbrook alum was unable to make this particular trip (for he no doubt would have steered us to some fine establishments for sustenance, instead we had flaming table side cheeseburgers). The campus of Cranbrook is rather amazing, sprinkled with fine buildings, sculptures and parks. I was lucky enough to visit once during Graduate school at Kent State and was immediately jealous that I did not take that option.

Regardless the Saarinen exhibit was huge. Various models, construction drawings, full scale mock-ups, photos and films overwhelmed the senses. I was trapped admiring the details and hand drawn construction documents for the TWA terminal for quite some time. Once in a while Pete would pull one of us over to a particular exhibit to tell us a story about someone who worked on it or working on the project himself. There were cartoons and photos of the staff on a far wall which were typically being admired by those of us in the profession. Luck also aligned for one of Pete's old coworkers from Saarinen's office to happen to be at the exhibit at the same time as us and we were lucky enough to be introduced.

In fact the whole trip was amazing, in fact I am more than willing to go back. There is something about seeing an exhibition of successful and impressive work that really does invigorate and excite me. I am constantly surprised at how simple it is to really grab some fellows and head out for a quick daytrip to admire some well done work.

I am quite sure that the LAUNCH group will be organizing more trips to come.
*cough cough*

resources:
"Reconsidering Eero" Metropolis Magazine
The Buckminster Fuller exhibit ends the 15th of January
The Saarinen Cranbrook exhibit ends the 30th of March