Tremont Art Walk and Sparx Gallery Hop this weekend

Friday, September 14th, 2007
Tremont Ohio

Whether it still is the Tremont Art Walk or the Tremont Art Hop there are still gallery walks going on in Tremont this Friday.

You should probably go.

Also

Saturday, September 15th, 2007
Sunday, September 16th, 2007
All around Cleveland (.pdf)

Yup, Cleveland is chock full of art. Crazy stuff. Go see if you like some.
Sparx in the City.

Brookings Institution says protecting Great Lakes could provide economic boom

There is just something enormously satisfying about reports like this.

The Brooking's Institution recently released a cost/benefit report of A Program to Protect and Restore the Great Lakes (.pdf).

In a nutshell the Institution stated that with a $26 billion dollar investment to halt sewer overflows, combat invasive species and clean up toxic spills (all major issues now) Great Lakes communities (such as Cleveland) could share a $50 billion long term economic benefit projection and that the spending of the money could infuse from $30 to $50 billion into the local economies.

Stating that these restoration activities are not 'just nice things to do for the enviornment they are crucial things to do for the economy of our region."

This seems to fly in the face of the current idea that evironmental actions would hamper the economy but perhaps some decent leadership and strong decision making could result in a change of direction.

more resources:

Great Lakes Information Network
Problems and Issues confronting the Great Lakes system
Great Lakes EPA

Permaculture - Keyline Design Workshop

Tuesday, September 18th, 2007
Wednesday, September 19th, 2007
George Jones Farm

There are plenty of urban agriculture projects already in place in Cleveland, Ohio that are attempting to not only reconnect people to the land but also to supplement our local diet and create a greater sense of identity for our communities. Blue Pike Farm and Kentucky Gardens

While the option of becoming a self sustaining urban center are limited, one of the greatest dilemmas is the rapid use and destruction of the necessary soils in which to grow our crops. Most classic agrarian systems utilized pesticides and fertilizers to speed up the growth of plants, deplenting the necessary nutrients from and quickly destroying the soil.

There are new technologies and techniques however that are arising to combat these problems. Some of which will be demonstrated at the New Agrarian Center by Darren Doherty, a permaculture designer from Australia who has developed the keyline method to restore degraded landscapes in Australia and around the world.

Workshop fee, $125 for 1 day and $250 for 2 days. Scholarships available. For more information, contact Eric Stewart at eric.stewart@oberlin.edu or 440-775-4047 just to name a few, offer centralized urban farming (Blue Pike is a market garden and Kentucky is a community garden).

2007 Urban Harvest Community Garden Tour

Garden Tour .pdf

2007 Urban Harvest Community Garden Tour
Saturday, September 8th, 2007

-Presented by Ohio State University Extension, Cuyahoga County

Check out Cleveland's growing (literally) urban gardening scene!
Check out the tour of community gardens, market gardens, and find out
how neighborhoods across the city are coming together to beautify
their places and grow food for local consumption.

There are 18 gardens listed on the tour (check out the above .pdf with map) and will be open from 9.00am to 4.00pm.

For more information contact the Ohio State University Extension - 216.429.8224.

Homogenous history

Saturday I took the necessary time to take a stroll through the rotunda. I had just come from the Veteran's Memorial Bridge street car tour, which was as typically amazing as it usually is.

So I was in a fairly positive mood. I drove downtown to East 9th with the girlfriend, bent on comparing the grandness of the Rotunda with the accessible area of the Breuer Tower. With this in mind we used the Breuer tower as our entry into the Rotunda.

Let me just mention that I was amazed at the detailing, the clean lines and the feeling of the AmeriTrust lobby. I had always imagined it to be dark and foreboding but it was actually quite nice, if not a little sterile. It had probably the only 'popcorn' ceiling that I had ever seen that I didn't find repulsive. The black granite was amazing and so glossy that even though it was black it bounced light deep into the recess of the space and the extremely tall windows made the lobby feel much larger then it was. I was so overjoyed to see such an amazing example of moddernism and good materiality that I was a little saddened knowing that it was to be torn down.

The Rotunda was also an amazing space, albeit from a distinctly opposing standpoint. The white granite almost glowed under the 60 foot Tiffany dome skylight which is surrounded with small murals by F.D. Millet based on the theme of the 'rise of civilization in America'. The Rotunda building has all the typical railings, arches, columns and other assorted details that give the illusion of being in a truly historic building and I assume that it was in noticing this abundance of detailing that I grew almost weary of it.

I wonder, during what course of our history, does a collection, a conglomeration of standardized historic detailing, become more important or more interesting then something new and groundbreaking. I am not suggesting that the Rotunda be the building with which the brunt of the County should have been felt, it is that I honestly don't think I would have minded so much if it had been the one threatened with demolition.

The Rotunda is amazing. It has it's wonderful moments, but most of those are reflections of ideas that had already been implemented and explored in other buildings around the country. In essence, the Rotunda is nothing more then a gallery for what the ideals of a historic building should be, disseminated from successful structures and tossed together in an attempt at a cohesive assemblage of ideas. I suppose that one could argue that it is rather successful in those regards. That throughout one could find prominent examples of different styles and techniques and that makes the Rotunda a repository for historical notions. I would like to argue that it is this false historic ism that degrades the structure. At no time was it ever meant to be an honest example of ideas or thought, that instead it was a grasp for false stature that is even now being used in the extremely similar and degrading manner to attempt to lift the spirits of the city.

Don't exhume this diatribe as meaning that I dislike the Rotunda building, I don't. I honestly rather enjoy passing it almost every day. The detailing is exquisite and the manner and methodology of it's construction is what elevates it among it's neighbors. I am only simply stating that I find it horrible that so many base our heritage, our history, on nothing more then symbols, constructed to falsify our past when really, we should be celebrating the chances we took, the choices we made and the mistakes that occurred along the way. That is what really defines a city, not a monument to a glory that we falsely possessed.

2007 Dragon Boat Fest

Dragon Boat Festival
Saturday, September 1st, 2007
Sunday, September 2nd, 2007
Cleveland's Historic Flats
Ceremonies at 11.00am
Races from 12.00pm to 5.00pm

Flats Oxbow and Cleveland Rowing Foundation present the 2007 Dragon Boat Festival.

This was just emailed to me and I had to share

I think it captures the spirit of the moment rather nicely.

Come on down, see the Rotunda. Pay no attention to building you have to enter through to get there!

As I walked past the lobby to the Breuer Tower the other day (you may all remember that I might have covered topics on this building before) I noticed quite a lot of activity in the lobby. I thought very little of it.

Then I walked past the Rotunda as I heard word of some beautiful banners for the Celebrate our Heritage Festivus and wanted to check them out.

Let's follow my path and see where it leads us...
- Corner at E9th and Euclid. Note the signs pointing towards the easy ADA entrance and Public Restrooms!








-More signs on the side, by now I may really have had to pee!









-Apparently they plan not to use the Rotunda entrance to actually enter "Our Heritage". That strikes me as a little odd...








-Oh, of course. They are using the Breuer Tower Lobby to enter the Rotunda. I guess this isn't part of our heritage. I suppose to properly celebrate our past we shouldn't be able to use the Lobby to access the Rotunda. We should do it the way our pioneer forefathers (and mothers) did. By, um, yeah. Did no one have to use the restroom in the early 1900's?

At least I will get to see the Breuer Tower before they tear it all down. I am also SURE that they did all they could to abate the horribly invasive and particularly deadly asbestos infestation that I keep hearing about in regards to the Tower before they open it to the public. I mean that was one of the contingencies that necessitated the demolition in the first place.

Right?

Right.

Veteran's Memorial Bridge Tour

Saturday, September 1st, 2007
Veterans Memorial Bridge and Subway Tour
9am - 3pm

Free parking at the County Engineer's Bridge Garage
Free Admission

Way back when, before public transit studies were tied to population and development concentrations, before Cleveland was mostly paved parking lots and people came downtown to work, be entertained and well, get stuff done. Back when Cleveland's heritage was that of one of the 5 largest cities in the country without any playful exaggeration of city boundaries and glowering promises of regionalism there existed a simple and possibly beautifully efficient mode of transport through town called the street car. These simple passenger craft made quick transportation cheap and easy until the advent of the automobile gave people the solitude they didn't know they wanted.

Now, as lightrail systems pop up in cities like Portland, Or and Houstan, Tx and are even being considered for cities like Columbus, Oh, the County Engineers are kind enough to make public the old street car level of the Veteran's Memorial Bridge.

Typically I try to walk it at least twice a year and have yet to be disappointed. The views are amazing and it harkens back to a more prosporous time for the city. Perhaps even pointing out a way that cleveland can reclaim it's proper heritage.

What you call heritage, I call hypocrisy

Friday, August 31, 2007
Saturday, August 31, 2007
11am - 4pm
Cleveland Trust Rotunda

A while back I had posted something about how the County was unintentionally being ironic when it proposed tearing down the AmeriTrust Tower as part of a 'green initiative'. I got yelled at for that. Fine.

This whole thing makes me think the County isn't only corrupt and ironic but actually stupid.

Building on our Heritage is a celebration of sorts. A celebration of Cleveland's heritage, by showcasing the Rotunda building. A fine structure of historical design that celebrates a 'revival' period (City Beautiful) of Cleveland's history. By mentioning the revival period I am pointing out that the historical classicism of the Rotunda building is inherently false and that celebrating it whilst tearing down a building that properly reflected a current design philosophy and claiming the false one as a 'heritage' makes us all look like liars. No need to expand on that one, I think you understand.

Anyway, you can check out the County's flyer but I already created my rebuttal. I find the premise of the event ridiculous, the fact that it is being held in/near/around the Ameritrust Tower which the County wants to tear down to replace with a building of questionable design and merit and resonates the idea of how buildings can reflect our heritage insane. Downright friggin' insane.

I would appreciate anyone that goes to this mess to actually look around at the fabric of the city in the area and question how they would want their 'heritage' defined. Perhaps even makes some choices on whether you want to be defined by anything on that particular corner and what you may consider 'historic'.

Borrowed Manifesto...#44

Sent in by a pal who thought I would find this one VERY interesting...

What then shall we do? Far from being irrelevant to the development of the informal city, architects are much needed. But they will have to be a different kind of architect. At the Urban Think Tank, we propose alternatives to conventional architectural intervention, new guidelines for architects who are prepared to rethink their role in the city:

1. Apply what you already know is true. We all know, for instance, that policies on renewable energy sources and sustainable strategies should be in place. We need to act as though they already were.

2. Do not assume that design innovation – indeed, architectural excellence – and practice in the real world of the informal city or rural settings are mutually exclusive. Architecture schools and design practices can produce creative, workable, cost-effective structures and prototypes for lower income communities.

3.Create incentives for the adoption of environmentally responsible products. Why not a free database of products that lower income communities could sell directly, such as solar panels, dry toilets and housing kits.

4. Make a virtue of necessity. In many cities, the need for security, especially for homes, is unavoidable – but the ugliness and xenophobic messages of coils of barbed wire, walls topped with glass shards, and bars and gates are not. Security devices and structures deserve as much aesthetic as practical attention.

6. Share your knowledge, expertise and advice with those with whom you work. Teaching local developers and residents the principles of sound construction techniques, the properties of different materials, the relationships between form and function gives long-term meaning and value to the architect’s intervention in the community.

7. Help resolve issues of adequate and nutritional food by developing building types that incorporate food production. Green roofs, which could serve both to reduce heating and cooling needs and as kitchen gardens, require further investigation and refinement to make them more widely applicable and cost-effective.

8. Reduce bureaucracy where it inhibits design innovation and the exploration of informal architectural practice.

9. Be proactive.

10. Above all, talk to non-architects, engage in discussions with activists in other disciplines, persuade everyone to become involved. It’s time to stop waiting for governments to act and complaining when they don’t. They can’t implement revolutionary change on their own – and they can’t conceive it without the profession.

It is time for professionals – architects, urban planners, social activists and others – to confront the future by helping to build the common, social spaces of their cities from the bottom up; to interact forcefully but productively with politicians, policy-makers, and community groups; and to participate collaboratively in the construction of more equitable, workable and sustainable cities.

I bring this to your attention, not because I believe that following a specific dogma or manifesto is a requisite for accomplishing something, just that if one were to create a manifesto, this would be probably most closely aligned to my thinking and something that I could possibly feel pretty dang comfortable spending some more time dissecting.

The important thing is whether enough people can feel a certain way to instill a change, even locally.

Of course if you want, you can choose your own

AFH - support Peru earthquake reconstruction

After the devastating 2007 Peru earthquake which killed hundreds and left thousands injured and without homes.

Architecture for Humanity is a non-profit group with a proven track record of international aid through fund raising and through design. They openly admit that they typically 'focus on long term reconstruction, which typically begins four to six months after a disaster.' and that ...'its best to get involved after the relief phase as design and construction professionals can make a more meaningful contribution at that point and can be a burden before then.'

With that in mind they are currently accepting donations to fund community based reconstruction support.

Please take a moment to visit their links including the earthquake resistant shelters on the Open Architecture Network.

Goin' away...

...for a bit. Going to Nashville, searching for meaning and all that. I am going to attempt the mobile blogging thing if I have time but chances are it won't work. See you guys sometime next week.

In the meantime check out the literature for the Avenue District debacle. Could someone please tell me...

-What does 'classically modern' mean.
-Why is an apartment with 9 separated rooms a 'loft'?
-Does sleeping on a big pile of money make it easier at night?

Best to all,
d

Reading about amazing things happening in Buffalo really irritates me

There was an interesting email discussion going around the Cleveland internet a while back on the topic of 'what is good for the city' and whether planning/designing/building better/newer homes was really smarter then rehabbing the extensive amount of abandoned housing that already exists here. As the number of foreclosures in Cleveland skyrockets and the local government scrambles madly to keep track and keep up more and more of the typical 'Cleveland townshacks' sprout up like pustules of cement board on concrete scars of the city. With little to no intention of offering solutions to the problem most local builders are adding to the imbalance of occupied space by attempting to rebuild suburban 'lifestyle centers' (meant to recreate the urban living experience) in actual urban neighborhoods, perhaps in an attempt to capitalize on the marketing campaign of living an 'urban lifestyle', whatever the hell that is.

The gist of the discussion quickly grew in tangent to the prescribed (and possibly useful topic) but the damage was done. There was a seed of something sown in the minds of those who don't mind stating their opinion and gathering all the information they can in order to fix a prescribed problem rather then watch it fester.

From the MOCA Launchpad exhibit grew LAUNCH which attempts to continue the discussion on why architecture/planning and design in this town is just so lazy. So very sickening lazy. So lazy and tired and snivenlly drunken that even the most boring and complacent of ideas seems interesting. Rock, paper, scissors. Square, circle, triangle. No one plays to play anymore, those that can just cheat to win. What is my list of major issues with the way that things are accomplished in this city? For the sake of saving time I will just start by mentioning my top three that have to do with the local design community;

A- Shoddy work that does nothing to further the profession
B- Gross misuse of design ideology and terminology for marketing purposes only (ie. ‘green design’, ‘new urbanism’, ‘mixed use’, etc)
C- Utilizing cronyism and political favoritism to saturate the market and cut out new and smaller firms that could benefit from said projects.

Well, it is getting really hard not being sick or it anymore. I have my plan of action. What are you going to do about it?

what spawned this whole mess