...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
Friday, August 17, 2007
Tuesday, August 14, 2007
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
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
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