Archigram

Archigram

''Archigram was an avant-garde architectural group formed in the 1960s - based at the Architectural Association, London - that was futurist, anti-heroic and pro-consumerist, drawing inspiration from technology in order to create a new reality that was solely expressed through hypothetical projects.''  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archigram

Some of their work is very 'psychedelic' and you can tell that it was designed in the 60's. However, some of this work really is at the forefront of design, even by today's standards. You will notice Archigram's references to 'Living Pods' of which I have previously posted modern versions of earlier in the blog as 'state of the art'.


You will also notice reference to space capsules, which was obviously influenced by the space race with the Russians, so they are definitely responsive to current affairs and trends. 

I do very much like their form of CGI, if one can call it that, they have simply used lines to show a perspective, no use of shadow or colour. Although, admittedly I have given them the benefit of the doubt as there wasn't a huge amount choice back then, as a computer would have been the size of a room.

Redjacket

Redjacket
Involved in a lot of the high street retailers that we all know well, Burger King, Costa Coffee, Haagen-Dazs.  The schemes seem to use materials reinforce a brand image as well as providing a functional space, good use of timber (adds a 'natural feel' to a corporate interior, makes it more human).

Good for brand imaging inspiration.

Glenser

http://www.gensler.com/#aboutus
Very impressive portfolio, loads of major international projects, including Airports, Banks Universities, with departments in Architecture, Interior Design, Graphic Design and Brand Imaging.  A firm that doesn't to be afraid to be corporate/commercial, they are there to make money and they are very good at it. 

FITCH

''FITCH is a different kind of company. It’s about enthusiasm, personality and creating something compelling.'' http://www.fitch.com/

I was impressed by their website, but from reading through some of the articles it seems to me that they are quite focused on marketing strategies and creating focal points for selling i.e. exhibitions stands retail outlets, which not something that I am overly interested with reference to subject area, although I am interested to learn more about brand image and how this can be developed for my manifesto and final project.

Diller and Scofidio

http://www.dsrny.com/
Matrix style website, got me rather excited!  But actually when you come to use it, its a bit annoying, I think its trying to be too clever and automatic, if you move your mouse to click on the thing you want, it just sends you off somewhere else.  Goes to show, the pretty, shiny things aren't always the most useful.

The first project on this website that caught my eye was 'The Blur Building'.  ''The Blur Building was built for the Swiss Expo 2002 on Lake Neuchatel. It is an architecture of atmosphere...A smart weather system reads the shifting climactic conditions of temperature, humidity, wind speed and direction, and processes the data in a central computer that regulates water pressure.''  


Please see my 'Seriously Un Cool - Blue Building' page for my thought on this.

''Their influence stems as much, if not more, from their contributions to the theory and criticism of architecture as from their built works.''  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diller_Scofidio_%2B_Renfro

As I worked my way through the website the more I realised that they were focusing heavily on promoting buildings that haven't been built and I could help thinking that a lot of them were just concepts for a reason i.e. they wouldn't work in the real world.  For example, re-building the city of  Venice in Las Vegas; a bit tacky if you ask me.  Whenever I flick through an architecture or interior design firms catalogue of work, I am always disappointed to see buildings that are conceptual and haven't been built, as there is usually a reason for this, either that the building didn't win the competition it was going for, or the firm doesn't have enough in its portfolio, so they use the scheme as a filler.

I also thought that a lot of the work was quite tacky and badly illustrated.  Some of the CGI work looks to me like first year undergrad work.  Not to put down first year work, some of work I have seen is amazing.  The point I am trying to make is that I think that a large scale firm should realise that there is a heavy reliance on good CGIs (many schemes require them for planning), they have to be good, especially if they are used to advertise the business.

Steven Holl

Steven Holl
I stumbled across this an thought that his work is a little bit good!  Steven Holl has done so many large scale projects all over the world, I especially like his 'horizontal skyscraper' in Shenzhen, China, its quite simply like nothing I have ever seen before.  Here is someone who isn't afraid to push the envelope and break boundaries.  

The way he uses light to add different shades to surfaces and his use of really crisp, sharp lines on various geometries  'The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art' Kansas USA, is really inspiring, I think he might just be showing off!

The use of geometry to illustrate the continuation of the 'internal environment' to the 'external environment' shown here is also really great to see.  I'm not sure what the temprature swing is in Kansus, this detail can be difficult to get right wherever you are.  

There is nothing subtle about this man's work, its all 'in your face architecture' and as much as I admire his work, The scale of it are a little larger than what I am interested in for the purposes of this MA..... I'm going to try and be a grown up and work towards something a little more refined.  His website is a break from the norm too.  Without getting bogged down in trying to 'look cool' it has a simple but effective interface that makes you want to read every article.

Bruce Mau

An incomplete manifesto of growth;
Bruce Mau Design 

His manifesto was is interesting, here's some of my favourites:

• 4. Love your experiments (as you would an ugly child).  ''Joy is the engine of growth. Exploit the liberty in casting your work as beautiful experiments, iterations, attempts, trials, and errors. Take the long view and allow yourself the fun of failure every day.''
• 15. Ask stupid questions.  ''Growth is fueled by desire and innocence. Assess the answer, not the question. Imagine learning throughout your life at the rate of an infant.
• 40. Avoid fields.  ''Jump fences. Disciplinary boundaries and regulatory regimes are attempts to control the wilding of creative life. They are often understandable efforts to order what are manifold, complex, evolutionary processes. Our job is to jump the fences and cross the fields.''

Here's a few I didn't really like, or agree with:

• 14. Don’t be cool.  ''Cool is conservative fear dressed in black. Free yourself from limits of this sort.''
• 25. Don’t clean your desk.  ''You might find something in the morning that you can’t see tonight.'' 
• 27. Read only left-hand pages.  ''Marshall McLuhan did this. By decreasing the amount of information, we leave room for what he called our "noodle." 

Great website, I love the colours and the layout, although may I be so bold as to call it little pretentious?......Of course I can, its my blogg!

Expanding on that, I often look at different forms of design from websites, to paintings, to exhibitions and more often than not I come away thinking, that everything I looked at had this air of pretentiousness about it, whether I like the piece or not.  I believe however, that if you aren't schooled in such subjects, your opinions tend to gravitate this way.  For me perhaps its because I am re submerging myself into a culture that isn't necessarily where my talent lies, or its out of my comfort zone; like having a prosthetic limb, or a major operation, it takes time for the body to accept a foreign body.