2000.08.09 14:28
Koolhaas' Seattle Library
As to the Koolhaas phenomenon, you may be a bit extreme in your assessment (even though "extreme-ism" is perhaps one way to explain Koolhaas). I know him and his buildings only through books (excluding seeing an OMA building in Berlin that Koolhaas may not have had anything to do with). I can identify with the "vagueness," but it is exactly that vagueness that gets him all the attention. Haven't you noticed that by and large people don't like direct answers when it comes to design solutions? (I realize I'm potentially going out on a limb with that line of thinking.)
Interestingly enough, I have met with two of Koolhaas's former partners, Elias Zengalis and Eleni Gigantes. From what I can gather, there is an unrelenting drive to be MODERN MODERN MODERN among the present European "stars". Ironically, I believe that Americans (of the USA primarily) are extremely MODERN, and most of the time they don't even think about it. Today's American cities are in a constant battle with their own MODERNITY, which I'm sure you know all too well. American cities are extremely assimilating (absorbing) and at the same time extremely metabolic (equally creative and destructive).
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2002.08.09 15:20
Re: Congregation or Synagogue ?
I revisited Ahavath Israel today, and sadly the facade has been changed, I was told circa 2000. The whole portion of the facade above the recessed entry is no longer brick, but now a salmon colored, textured CMU. This is yet another building to have changed since I last took pictures of it.
It dawned on me last night that both Wright's Beth Sholom and Kahn's Adath Jeshurun are hugely triangular in plan. Wright mailed the preliminary drawings to Rabbi Mortimer Cohen on 15 March 1954. Kahn's design is dated 1954-55. Since Beth Sholom and Adath Jeshurun are neighboring congregations, it wouldn't surprise me at all if architectural rivalry between the congregations was going on, and that Kahn even saw the Wright plans before he came up with his design. Has anyone heard of this possible connection before?
2002.08.09
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040809a Philadelphia base plan 2093i12
040809b Ichnographia Campus Martius 2342i09
040809c Ichnographia Campus Martius actual scale 2342i10
040809d Philadelphia and Ichnographia plans registered at Axis of Life/Benjamin Franklin Parkway 2392i17
040809e Philadelphia cropped to fit within Ichnographia border 2342i11
040809f Parkway palimpsest Ichnographia database 2348i01 b c
08080901 Circle Squared Museum model 2206i15 b
2012.08.09 13:09
The Philadelphia School, deterritorialized
Back in 2003, in to see in Philly, a quondam thread at archinect/forum, I wrote, "There's more obscure early Kahn in the Philadelphia area, kind of like going on a treasure hunt." Since then, someone has actually gone on that "treasure hunt" and published the findings on flickr.
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13080901 Philadelphia mesh grid 2403i11
13080902 Philadelphia mesh grid Tiber river 2403i15
13080903 Philadelphia Tiber Logan/Hadrian registration 2403i13
13080904 Philadelphia ICM Logan/Hadrian registration true north 2403i14
13080905 Philadelphia mesh grid Tiber Porticus Neronianae 2403i15
14080901 ?
18080901 Eclectic Houses Egyptian 1 model 223ai10
18080902 Parc de la Villette Netherlands Architecture Institute Villa dall'Ava Villa Geerlings Maison à Bordeaux IQ63 plans 224ji05 b
18080903 Maison à Bordeaux plans sections elevations 2291i03
18080904 Netherlands Embassy plan work 2338i05
18080901 Smiljan Radic Fondation Beyeler Extension Building Riehen
19080901 Neue Staatsatpicality 001 plan 2483i01
21080901 museum collection Museum Annex plan elevation 2279i08
21080902 museum collection Analogous Building plan elevation 2287i17
21080903 museum collection 1997 Guggenheim Museum Ideal City Reenactment Fragment Museum plans elevations 2271i10
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