blog like you give a damn

Blogeda... what the... ken?

2008-03-12T17:04:00.011-05:00

In an effort to drum up a little conversation, Where is hosting a Blogedanken. This blogedanken (a riff on the German word "gedanken" that translates, roughly, to "thought experiment") starts simply enough: create a wishlist of urban projects for the city you live in. After a few steps though, you'll likely have something completely unexpected and hopefully quite thought provoking!

If that's not enough, Where is upping the ante with a book give-a-way. See below for more details on the offering. The contest ends on Saturday, March 22, so hop on over to Where and check it out!

Participate in the Blogedanken here.
Read more about the contest here.

HYPERBORDER
By Fernando Romero
The Author is also the founder of the Laboratory of Architecture (LAR) in Mexico city "with the ambition of addressing contemporary society through a process of architectural translation and urban study." If you have any interest in border urbanism and the works of Teddy Cruz, this looks like a must-read.

With only one entry so far, your chances of winning if you participate are quite good!

Page 123

2008-02-29T20:16:00.006-06:00

What's this? BLYGAD has been tagged by Brendan @ Where! Here's the game:

1. Pick up the nearest book (of at least 123 pages).
2. Open the book to page 123.
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the next three sentences.
5. Tag five people.

For my entry, Neuromancer by William Gibson:

"If you have trouble walking, just look at your feet. The perspective's a bitch, if you're not used to it."

They were standing in a broad street that seemed to be the floor of a deep slot or canyon, its either end concealed by subtle angles in the shops and buildings that formed its walls.

And becuase the rest of this passage is so great...

The light, here, was filtered through fresh green masses of vegetation tumbling from overhanging tiers and balconies that rose above them. The sun...

There was a brilliant slash of white somewhere above them, too bright, and the recorded blue of a Cannes sky. He knew that sunlight was pumped in with a Lado-Acheson system whose two-millimeter armature ran the length of the spindle, that they generated a rotating library of sky effects around it, that if the sky were turned off, he'd stare up past the armature of light to the curves of lakes, rooftops of casinos, other streets... But it made no sense to his body.

And now I tag (I'm going local on this one):

Paul @ Eyeteeth
Taylor @ Mediation
Ed @ The Deets
Aaron @ S4xton
James @ Up Your Architecture

---

Update!

Taylor's 123rd page is from Targeted: Homeland Security and the Business of Immigration by Deepa Fernandes:

Their underlying question is: who DHS could possibly be protecting from an eldery Baptist minister?

Dantica’s family sees no contradiction in the dual purpose of his visit. He was fleeing Haiti out of a fear of death, but he was also visiting his family, thus fulfilling the stated reason on his visa. Instead he met his death while in U.S. immigration custody. There is mounting evidence that the incarceration that led to Dantica’s death had less to do with DHS viewing him as a threat to society than with his being Haitian. Since Haitians began fleeing politcal violence and repression fifty years ago, there has always been a second tier of justice to deal with those who made it to the United States.

Ed's 123rd page is from Land of Amber Waters: The History of Brewing in Minnesota by Doug Hoverson:

For new president, Franklin D. Roosevelt, the return of beer was not so much a return to cultural tradition as a way to increase tax revenue and to eliminate the drain on the public purse from the cost of the ineffectual enforcement of Prohibition. While total repeal of the Eighteenth Amendment was in the uncertain future, the first steps to return legal beer were taken quickly. The Cullen Bill, passed almost immediately after Roosevelt’s inauguration, modified the Volstead Act to define beer of 3.2 percent alcohol by weight as nonintoxicating and allowed its sale in any state that did not have conflicting prohibition laws.

Friday Photography | The Architecture of Desire

2008-02-08T00:30:00.000-06:00

What better way to pay homage to our favorite manufactured holiday then by taking a virtual tour of the Midwest's premiere fantasy hotel chain, FantaSuites. With names like Jungle Safari, Grecian Bath, & Le Cave; each room tantalizes with the prospect of the unknown. From their website:

From the ancient land of Caesar's Court to the futuristic Space Odyssey, let our FantaSuite Suites transport you to the world of your dreams. Each is a unique experience, an adventure, a romantic retreat designed to completely immerse you in the getaway of your choice...

So what might this world of your dreams look like, exactly?

Unlike another kind of fantasy tourism, FantaSuites is faced with realizing it's escapism with real life brick and mortar. Or as is often the case: plush carpet, creative plastering, and faux plant life. Sadly, about the closest you'll find to a FantaSuites experience online are the wonderful 360° panoramas of each room on their website, all collected here for easy viewing.

Happy Friday!

Visualizing Change: Upcoming Workshops Blend Design & Civic Engagement

2008-01-23T08:21:00.000-06:00

February is always a big month for BLYGAD. With two annual design charrettes that focus on important aspects of our Twin Cities built environment (homelessness and sustainability), it's also a great time for Twin Cities designers to really get involved with the community.

First up is the 3RD ANNUAL GREENLIGHT DESIGN WORKSHOP on February 1st and 2nd. Sponsored by the University of Minnesota's College of Design, Covanta Energy Recovery Center, and Hennepin County, the workshop will take a look the waste-to-energy facility located directly next to the new Twins Ballpark site. Once built, the ballpark will bring thousands of people to the area, so there are many opportunities to design a more sustainable and hopefully inviting public interface. Additionally, necessary roof replacement and site work will allow us to provide options for new sustainable interventions.

All are welcome to participate in this intense day of design: college faculty, community members and of course students and professionals with backgrounds in graphics, design, and sustainability are encouraged to participate. The workshop will be held at Rapson Hall on the East Bank of the University of Minnesota Twin Cities campus. Things get kicked off on Friday night from 5:30 to 7pm. The doors will open at 8am on Saturday for a full day of design, followed by presentations.

TO REGISTER | Please RSVP by January 29th to grnlight[at]umn.edu with your contact information, experience level, and any dietary preferences (vegan, vegetarian, or allergies). See this CDES MEMO post for more information.

Two weeks later is the 21ST ANNUAL SEARCH FOR SHELTER, sponsored as always, by AIA Minnesota's Housing Advocacy Committee. The Boston Marathon of design charrettes, Search for Shelter kicks off the night of Friday, February 15th, lasts throughout the day Saturday, and doesn't usually wrap up until 2 or 3 on Sunday. But I can say from experience that the time you put into it is well spent. Students, professionals and community members work together to benefit local non-profit organizations that focus on affordable housing and homelessness, and by the end of the weekend, produce a semesters worth of design in less then 3 days.

Search for Shelter also takes place at Rapson Hall at the College of Design at the University of Minnesota. The weekend will kick off with an Opening Program on Friday night from 5:30 - 8 p.m., with Kate Swenson from the Enterprise Foundation will present information on the Rose Architectural Fellowship. Saturday is a working day for the teams, including site visits, brainstorming, and design. The weekend concludes with a final presentation at noon on Sunday when designs are shared with clients. Ample substinance (and caffeine) is provided throughout the weekend.

TO REGISTER | For more information and to register for the charrette, visit the Housing Advocacy Committee's website.

If either of these have piqued your interest, please don't hesitate to sign up. And if you have any questions, I'd be happy to hunt down answers for you. 'Design like you give a damn' isn't just a catchy phrase around here, and these two charrettes are great opportunities to show the rest of the nation that Twin Cities designers walk the talk better then anyone.

The Museum of Nature & Possible Zoological Futures

2008-01-17T21:07:00.000-06:00

[Museum I, 2004]

Ilkka Halso is a Finnish artist whose work examines the tensions between our natural and built environments and ultimately, how we act to save and/or destroy both. GOOD Magazine featured his Museum of Nature series in this month's issue and wrote this:

If there's a small upside to global warming, it's surely this: After centuries of neglect and skepticism, we've finally come to appreciate just how real—and personal—our connection to the environment is. The Finnish artist Ilkka Halso imagines a time, perhaps in the less-than-distant future, when that relationship will be even more precious. Nature, or what's left of it, has become nothing more than an attraction.

I'm drawn to his work not only because the subject matter is immediate and the execution superb, but because his fantastic near-future landscapes often involve beautifully realized architectural invasions.

[Theatre I, 2003]

[Kitka River, 2004]

[Cube - inside]

The photograph above, though thematically similar to the three images featured before it, is different in that the human intervention (scaffolding) was actually built. Similar to artist Florentijn Hofman (previously on BLYGAD), I find myself equally drawn to the construction of the work of art as I am to the the work itself.

[stills from Cube, 2004 - a 15 min video]

On a very related note, I just listened to a podcast on the topic of zoos and more specifically what zoos might look like in the near future. WNYC's Radio Lab co-host Robert Krulwich interviews former zoo director David Hancocks about his dream for the zoo of the future. Incidentally, it looks allot more like a Haslo's Museum of Nature then our conception of the modern zoo; it's much more of a natural landscape preserved plus windows into it (real or virtual) for humans, then a faux landscape recreated for humans plus animals.

For a look into this future zoo today, you can find all manner of 'animal cams' online (Animal Cameras Blog is a great resource). For example, check out the award winning MusselCam based out of Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, Canada.

Links
Ilkka Haslo (Finnish) | GOOD Magazine - Statement by Ilkka Haslo (2 high res images) | Art Critic Pessi Rautio on Ilkka Haslo's Museum of Nature series | WNYC's Radio Lab Podcast: Zoo Keeper's Dilemma | Animal Cameras Blog

Related
Friday Photography | The Curiously Large Animals of Florentijn Hofman

Mapping Shanghai with Sim City 2000

2008-01-15T17:40:00.000-06:00

[click the image to see at full size]

Well, it's not really Sim City 2000 - but the map's axonometric vantage point and beautiful pixel art graphics are certainly reminiscent of the game I spent far too much time playing as a kid.

Our good friends at Worrell, Inc linked to this interactive map of Shanghai via their new office there. Here's what Pete had to say:

~~Someone told me there are 4,000 buildings over 25 stories tall here with 1,000 more scheduled to be built in the next few years. To put that in perspective, New York has 2,000.~~

~~4,000 buildings over 25 stories tall... here's what that actually looks like:~~ [See Update below.]

[image by pmorgan]

The map takes on a whole new life once you realize that buildings are really quite accurately modeled. For example, here's a stunning shot of the landmark Oriental Pearl Tower in the Pudong district of Shanghai:

[image by Franck]

And it's pixel art representation in the map:

Pretty cool!

Finally, it was a real treat to find examples of the traditional Shikumen style of building I've previously covered at BLYGAD. You can really get a sense for how out of scale they are with the rest of the city when seen in context like this. Like a cartological Where's Waldo, can you find Shanghai's Shikumen?

Links
Edushi Map of Shanghai
Friday Photography | Shanghai's Shikumen

Updates
It turns out Pete might have gotten some bad info. Emporis tells us that New York City has 5592 buildings over 12 stories while Shanghai has only 946. Thanks Bronson!

Video from inside Kowloon Walled City

2008-01-14T18:41:00.000-06:00

A quick post today following up on my previous effort to make sense of Kowloon Walled City. The first video surfaced on YouTube about 6 months ago. It was apparently filmed in 1990, what would have been 2 years before the city's demolition. This is truly amazing footage, I don't think anything else like it exists. You'll find a quick guide below the video.

0.00 - 0.50 | Kowloon Walled City at a block or two away
0.50 - 6.04 | Street life on the shell of the city
6.04 - 7:49 | Cutting a straight path beneath the city
7.49 - 9.04 | Re-emergence and more from the street

The next clip comes, surprisingly enough, from the Jean-Claude Van Damme fighter flick Bloodsport (1988). It's a 2 minute 20 second clip, of which the last 1 minute 40 seconds are are shot on location within the Walled City. It's kind of an airbrushed version of the clip above.

If anybody has any other resources on Kowloon Walled City that I haven't previously covered on BLYGAD before, do share!

Friday Photography | Kowloon Walled City

Updates
Kowloon City is featured in Ron Fricke's Baraka (1992), see stills here. Thanks Fred!

Archo-Urbo-Blogo-Mania | January '08

2008-01-12T17:30:00.000-06:00

I'm consistently amazed by what my archo & urbo blogging colleagues are coming up with and 2007 only confirmed this amazement. Over the New Year I gave BLYGAD's "Like-Minded Links" blogroll a much needed update and I just wanted feature some of the recent additions that I've really been enjoying lately. Happy reading!

Airoots.org | Airoots is, to me, one of the stand out blogs of 2007. Keywords here are "adventituous roots, urban forests and villages, natural cities, lost tribes, new nomads, and everything inbetween." Infinitely fascinating, Airoots brings a unique perspective and critical eye to some of the fundamental urban issues of our time, but never without a playful sense of unreality. RECENT HIGHLIGHT | A recent post entitled "Tokyo-Mumbai Remix" accurately captures the two author's own urban roots with some fantastically mashed up scenes of urban life from both cities coexisting side-by-side as if one - challenging some deeply seated assumptions about class and urbanism.

Building Minnesota | Building Minnesota is a radio series, podcast and blog by Twin Cities reporter and radio journalist Todd Melby. Todd's work offers a behind-the-scenes and often in-depth look into the Twin Cities built environs. Highly recommended if you're a TC local or simply interested in the architectural process. RECENT HIGHLIGHT | Some of Todd's recent posts reflect an age old debate in our fair city: To skyway or not to skyway. For the record, Todd is an advocate of the skyway system. I tend to fall on the other side of the fence and agree with Jay Walljasper, who recently visited the city and offered this critique: "When you glass in the city, you eliminate the 'bad' days but also all the 'good' days. That is too much of a price to pay. You miss the fresh air, the street life. You may have 20 bad days a year when you want to stay indoors, but 200 good ones you miss. I say you make the city as good as possible for the good days, and that will carry it through on the bad days." BONUS | Todd's podcast covered a great AFHMN project back in 2006.

Civic Nature | The Where Blog recently turned me on to this blog by Peter Sigrist, a Master’s student in the University of Cambridge Department of Geography. Peter is most interested where the areas of "interrelationships between environmental conservation, urban & regional planning, and international development" converge. RECENT HIGHLIGHT | Peter's latest post unearths a report from the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, IRIN, on the effects of post-election violence in Kenya has had on regional slum dwellers.

Critical Spatial Practice | Nicholas Senn writes this blog with a wonderfully critical eye towards our built environment as a reflection (successfully or not) of how we see ourselves - individually and as larger networks of ever shifting communities. RECENT HIGHLIGHT | Nicholas' most recent offering highlights the Lesbian National Parks and Services, of which he writes: "In full uniform as Lesbian Rangers, Shawna Dempsey and Lorri Millan patrol parklands, challenging the general public's ideas of tourism, recreation, and the "natural" environment. Equipped with informative brochures and well-researched knowledge, they are a visible homosexual presence in spaces where concepts of history and biology exclude all but a very few."

The Mobile City Blog | The Mobile City Blog is the companion blog/ homepage to the upcoming Mobile City Conference in Rotterdam. The conference will aim at answering the following question: what happens to urban culture when physical and digital spaces merge? RECENT HIGHLIGHT | In a recent post linking Jane Jacobs, the mobile phone, and urban street life, the author highlights two articles that "can be easily associated with the work of Jane Jacobs, in which the experience of the sidewalk is central to the formation of local communities. As she stated: “word does not move around where public characters and sidewalk life are lacking.” The conclusion of both pieces is very different: One is rather positive and optimist, the other somehwat grumpy, in the ‘how technology killed the authentic experience’-category."

Also new to the blogroll...

And finally, some BLYGAD highlights from 2007 to wrap up one year and bring us into the next.

+ BLYGAD topped out 20,000 hits just in time for 2008. What a nice way to ring in the New Year!
+ East Coast Architectural Review (eCar) recently named BLYGAD in their Top Ten Urbanism Blogs. Thanks Bradley.

+ International Listings, um... listed their Top 100 Architecture Blogs and BLYGAD made number 28. When they aren't listing things like blogs they are "the premier listing service for luxury homes worldwide". Go figure.
+ Live Modern Blogs is now syndicating BLYGAD. Thanks Marshall.
+ BLYGAD has always been ad-free, but thanks to addfreeblog.org, we finally have the button to prove it.
+ Finally, don't forget to check out my latest experiment in online "writing": BLYGAD 2.0, it's built environs & culture streaming at it's finest!

Here's to a great "Archo-Urbo-Blogo" 2008!

Holiday Like You Give A Damn

2007-12-16T21:00:00.000-06:00

[The 2004 St. Paul Winter Carnival Ice Palace as photographed by MNkiteman.]

No matter what you're celebrating this time of year, many of us choose to express our holiday spirit by giving gifts to the people we love. Expanding on last year's short list of alternative gift ideas, here are my picks for the "Holidaze 2008". They might just bring you a little sanity and humanity during the coming hustle and bustle.

Changing the Present on Facebook | For my friend Kristin's birthday this year I sent her a virtual gift through the social networking website Facebook. Just a small image that she can display on her profile page, it's essentially a virtual expression of our real-world friendship. It cost me $1. Well now Changing the Present, whom I featured in last years Holiday Like You Give A damn, has partnered with Facebook so that your $1 gift purchase can go to a non-profit of your choice. If you're linked into Facebook, just run a search for "Changing the Present". Happy gifting!

NEED magazine | Now 4 issues strong, the quarterly NEED magazine has really come into its own since I featured it last year. The magazine proclaims "We are not out to save the world, but to tell the stories of those who are". Stephanie and Kelly Kinnunen, the creators of the magazine (and Twin Cities residents), have been doing an amazing job of it. You can watch Stephanie talk about their work here. A quick and exciting aside: issue 4, now hot off the presses, features a story on the AFHMN/ MNSLFF project in Sri Lanka and photographs by AFHMN's own Richard Koechlein.

Q-BA-MAZE | The Q-BA-MAZE is another very cool gift idea with a Minnesota connection. Andrew Comfort, the inventor of Q-BA-MAZE, studied architecture at my alma-mater, The University of Minnesota. In the same vein as Froebal Blocks and Legos, the Q-BA-MAZE is a beautifully simple set of objects designed to let the user's imagination express itself through the act of building. A gift for children of all ages, I can tell you from experience that you will likely loose hours playing with it. Andrew also writes a blog called Play and Design that features some great posts on the Q-BA-MAZE design and development process.

XO Laptop: Give One Get one | So you probably know the scoop by now: you buy two of these tiny yet robust laptops; one goes to a child in a developing country and the other gets shipped right to your doorstep. Twin Cities blogger Aaron Landry recently "gave one got one" and wrote about his first impressions of the laptop, it's definitely worth checking out if you're interested in the project. The Give One Get One program has been extended through the end of December, but after that you won't really be able to get your mittens on one of these, so act quickly.

Solar Panel Messenger Bag from Voltaic | I can't attest to the functionality of this bag, but I love the concept: 3 photovoltaic panels make it a mobile power generator designed to charge all of your electronic gadgetry while you're on the go. The bag includes a battery so that energy you've collected over the course of the day is stored and can be used to provided a constant charge, day or night. If you're in the Twin Cities metro region, get over to locally owned and operated Sunny Day Earth Solutions to check out this bag and other eco-conscious gift ideas first hand.

Smart Generosity | There are so many non-profits and great organizations out there deserving of your charity that the shear breadth of options can easily become daunting. So how to best figure out where you should donate your hard-earned cash? I think the most important thing is to choose a non-profit working towards goals that are important to you or the people you are gifting. As with any gift, the more thought you put into it, the more it will mean to both you and the receiver. If you're still looking for a place to start, NEED magazine recently published a list that has some truly unique organizations looking for your help.

Happy Holidays from Architecture for Humanity Minnesota and Blog Like You Give A Damn! See you in the New Year!

Friday Photography | Andreas Gursky

2007-12-14T12:53:00.000-06:00

Andreas Gursky's large scale prints are some of the most expensive in the world, but he's new to me. Sometimes measuring up to 10 or 15 feet long, the thumbnails below hardly do his work justice, but I'm sold regardless.

I especially love the two shots below:

+ Listen to a podcast considering the work of Gursky here
+ More information here

Happy Friday!

Solutions Happy Hour on Friday, Dec. 14th

2007-12-14T10:14:00.000-06:00

Over the past year we've heard from audience and presenters alike that they'd like a place to get together and continue the conversations started at previous Solutions Twin Cities events. This is a great idea.

We'd like to invite you to attend the first of many casual gatherings with this in mind. Come to meet presenters from past and future events, talk with other like-minded individuals, and enjoy an end-of-the-work-week happy hour. It'll be fun.

We'll be meeting at the 331 Club in NE Minneapolis between 5 and 8pm on Friday, December 14th (that's today). The 331 Club is located at 331 NE 13th Ave., Minneapolis, MN. Please let us know if you have any questions, we hope to see you there.

BLYGAD 2.0: Predicting the present to better design the future.

2007-12-14T02:46:00.001-06:00

Over the course of the day I often come across 6 or 7 items that I wish I had time to write about here on BLYGAD, but I've always felt pressured by the format to only post here when I had the time to do something substantiative, which can leave this place a little on the quite side at times.

As a possible remedy for this, I've been experimenting with Tumblr lately, appropriately at www.tumblelikeyougiveadamn.tumblr.com. And as you can see from the Tumblr archive image above, I've been having allot of fun with it (56 posts in 12 days to be exact).

I call the site BLYGAD 2.0 and the format is all over the place: images, links, videos, short editorials by yours truly, found quotes... even BLYGAD HEARTS MUSIC, where I've been throwing up a new tune just about everyday, giving the site a pretty fresh soundtrack (in my opinion).

Otherwise, much of the content has been around the intersection of probable technology and culture futures, allowing me to explore a growing thought experiment along of the lines of 'predicting the present to better design the future.' It's also proving to be something of an incubator for future posts here on 1.0.

So if you're looking for a daily dose of Blog Like You Give A Damn, head on over to BLYGAD 2.0 or subscribe to the RSS FEED and thanks for reading!

Friday Photography | National Geographic's International Photography Contest

2007-12-07T18:36:00.000-06:00

Amazing work over at the winner's page. These are some of my favorites:

Happy Friday!

Report from the field: Hindu Temple Charrette

2007-12-06T12:56:00.000-06:00

AFH MN member and charrette participant Maureen Ness has this report for us:

Members of AFH MN and members of the Hindu Temple of Minnesota convened on the evening of October 12^th and morning of October 13^th to engage in a design charrette for a Garden of Remembrance for the burial of the icons damaged by vandalism last year. On Friday evening, AFH MN toured the temple and met with the priest to learn more about the Hindu religion and appropriate guidelines for the burial of damaged statues.

On Saturday morning, AFH MN conducted a site analysis and then broke into two design teams to develop conceptual ideas for the Garden. In addition to the burial place, the teams were asked to include a flower garden for flowers to be used in worship and a vegetable garden for food to be ate at Temple meals. The two design concepts will be presented to the Temple Executive Committee at an upcoming meeting this winter.

Thanks Maureen! Here are the two conceptual site plans the team came up with (click to see full version):

We'll keep you updated with new developments as they happen.

Hey there old friend...

2007-12-04T20:37:00.000-06:00

... it's been a while. I apologize for the lack of posts lately but I've been a bit busy as of late. Here's the quick version:

Solutions Twin Cities (my other labor of love) put together two events over the past two and a half months. The first, at the Walker Art Center, was called "Gift to Forever" and focused on how kids can get active in shaping their world. Part of that was the art-making activity you see below. Read a full report here.

The other event was the second installment of the Solutions flagship Volume serious. If I do say so myself: Wow, what a great time. The space kicked a**, the presenters were amazing, the food was delicious, the music bangin, and the drinks cheap (and for a good cause to boot!). Troy and I are wrapping up post-production this week and next - videos should be out before the new year, if not sooner. Read the full Volume 2 wrap up post here.

zAmya Theater Project reaches climax at Solutions Volume 2, 10/19/07.

In AFH:MN news, the Hindu Temple Charrette went really well. Look for a wrap up post soon. As for whats next: we're looking into a handful of possible projects overseas, have started prep work for a few in our own backyard, & are taking the first steps towards getting our own non-profit and 501c3 status. We are also eagerly anticipating the annual Search for Shelter charrette coming up in February.

On the blogging front... well, I haven't been a total slouch! I started to shake off the cobwebs last month with a little bit of guest blogging over at Brendan's blog, Where. I joined a handful of other guest bloggers much finer then myself to keep things rolling while Brendan focused his pen on NaNoMo (Hey B, if you're reading this: I'm still waiting for my autographed copy). I took over the Weekend Reading segment. My posts?

WEEK ONE: Near future urbanism: how an ubiquitous and multi-layered network might effect our urban environment.
WEEK TWO: Skyways, Snap-Shot-City, I heart Jean Nouvel, Slum Rehab in Mumbai, & 250 Million urban planners.
WEEK THREE: I ate too much turkey.
WEEK FOUR: A little shameless self-promotion: I highlight some of my favorite presenters from past Solutions events.

The whole guest blogging thing was a ton of fun and I highly recommend you check out Where, it's truly top-notch urbanism-blogging from the Windy City.

They say a month without a post means death for any blog... it's been two months and a week. So if you're still reading, thank you. There's still allot of kick left in this BLYGAD and I've got some great stuff lined up, so stay tuned.

3rd Annual Architecture for Humanity Minnesota Design Charrette | A Memorial Garden

2007-09-29T18:45:00.000-05:00

The site of a future Memorial Garden.

We are happy to announce that the 3rd Annual Architecture for Humanity Minnesota Design Charrette is quickly approaching. Here are the deetz:

WHERE
Hindu Temple, 10530 Troy Ln N, Maple Grove, MN 55311
[directions]

WHEN
Friday, October 12th (6pm to 9pm) - Introduction
Saturday, October 13th (9am to 6pm) - Design & Present

WHY
In July of 2006 two young men broke into the then still incomplete Hindu Temple through windows with baseball bats and destroyed many of the sacred deity statues that were to be honored inside the temple. This MPR article provides a good backstory of the vandalism that was the catalyst for the Hindu Society’s request for design help from AFHMN.

Architecture for Humanity Minnesota connected with the Hindu Society of Minnesota through Shivanthi Sathanandan, a member of the Pan-Asian Tsunami Healing (PATH) group who we worked with to design a recently completed community center in Sri Lanka (coincidently, the result of our First Annual Design Charrette back in 2005). She is a very active member of the Temple and thought of us when they started talking about designing a Memorial Garden for the burial of the icons damaged in the vandalism of 2006.

We learned that the traditional way of burying icons is to immerse them in water but that due to State and City code, the temple will not be allowed to bury the icons in this way and has asked us for some creative ideas for their burial and a concept design for a memorial garden next to the temple. The garden will be a place for people to reflect on the events that occurred at the temple and will honor the memory of these important deities.

For more information visit www.afh-mn.org or contact Jeffrey at jeffrey[at]swainhart[dot]com.

We hope to see you there!

Friday Photography | Kowloon Walled City

2007-09-29T11:59:00.002-05:00

Kowloon Walled City in 1915

We "Go East" in tonight's episode of Friday Photography. I wanted to follow up on a previous post about density in which I mentioned the Kowloon Walled City because it really is a fascinating story. I first learned about the city in reading William Gibson's Idoru, and later learned that he took further inspiration from the city for his amazingly realized anarchic sqautter city built into the ~~Golden Gate Bridge~~ Oakland Bay Bridge in his novel Virtual Light. As a real life local, the city has shown up up in various movies, even a Jackie Chan flick (1993's Crime Story). The Walled City even inspired the virtual settings for the video game Shenmue 2. An abbreviated & slightly annotated Wikipedia entry will weave us a short story about the amazing but now demolished Walled City:

The history of the Walled City (known as Kowloon then) can be traced back to the Song Dynasty, where it served as a watchpost defending the area against pirates and managing the production of salt. The Convention for the Extension of Hong Kong Territory of 1898 which handed parts of Hong Kong to Britain for 99 years excluded the Walled City [which at this point was located in the heart of Honk Kong proper], with a population of roughly 700.

[Throughout the next 50 years] the Walled City remained a curiosity - a tourist attraction where British colonials could have a taste of the old China - [that is] until 1940, when during its WWII occupation of Hong Kong, Japan evicted people from the Walled City, and then demolished much of it - including the wall.

After Japan's surrender, squatters [mostly newcomers] began to occupy the Walled City, resisting several attempts by Britain in 1948 to drive them out. With no wall to protect it, the Walled City became a haven for crooks and drug addicts, as the Hong Kong Police had no right to enter the City. Mainland China refused to take care of it. The foundation of the People's Republic of China in 1949 added thousands of refugees to the population.

This is my favorite paragraph. By this time it is the late 1970's and 1980's:

Square buildings folded up into one another as thousands of modifications were made, virtually none by architects or engineers, until hundreds of square meters were simply a kind of patchwork monolith. Labyrinthine corridors ran through the monolith, some of those being former streets (at the ground level, and often clogged up with trash), and some of those running through upper floors, practically between buildings. The streets were illuminated by fluorescent lights, as sunlight was rare except for the rooftops. The only rules of construction were twofold: electricity had to be provided to avoid fire, and the buildings could be no more than about fourteen stories high, because of the nearby airport. A mere eight municipal pipes somehow provided water to the entire structure (although more could have come from wells).

... the story continues:

Over time, both the British and the Chinese governments found the massive, anarchic city to be increasingly intolerable - despite the low reported crime rate. The quality of life in the city, sanitary conditions in particular, was far behind the rest of Hong Kong. After the Joint Declaration in 1984, the Peoples Republic of China agreed with British authorities to demolish the City and resettle its inhabitants. The mutual decision to tear down the walled city was made in 1987. At that time, it had 50,000 inhabitants on 0.026 km², and therefore a very high population density of 1,900,000 / km². At its height, it was one of the most densely populated urban areas on Earth.

Evacuations started in 1991 and were completed in 1992. The 1993 movie Crime Story starring Jackie Chan was partly made in the deserted Walled City, and includes real scenes of building explosions. Kowloon Walled City was destroyed in the same year. Also, as the Walled City was beginning to be torn down, a group of Japanese explorers took about a week to tour the empty walled city, making a sort of map and a cross section of the city.

That last part is fascinating. Whoever that group was, I really hope they published their research. If anybody has any information on it, or on the Kowloon Walled city in general, get in touch! Until then, I'll be keeping my eyes out for it...

OK! Enough chit chat, on with the pictures (all of which were found with a simple Google search):

Kowloon Walled City in 1973

City Of Darkness: Life in Kowloon City seems to be the definitive book documenting the city and what it was like to live there with beautiful full color photographs - this has been on my wish list for years. The only other online resource worth mentioning, besides the Wiki entry above, is this page from Twenty4 - there are some great photographs (presumbly taken from City of Darkness) there.

Happy Friday!

Extreme divides between rich & poor

2007-09-27T12:36:00.000-05:00

Disparity manifest in land use patterns pulled together by the always interesting deputydog.

The first two come to us from Caracas, Venezuela.

This one is taken on the edge of the Paraisopolis Favela in Morumbi, Sau Paulo.

Full post here. Thanks Maureen!

Talk about mixed use

2007-09-22T11:00:00.002-05:00

This is right up there with the Kowloon Walled City in terms of jaw dropping examples of shear density. I have no idea where this video was taken, but it's incredible. File under further evidence of ingenuity in the face of massive over population.

Skip to the end of this one for some beautiful shots from the side of train.

The role of design in global, social, & humanitarian crisis

2007-09-01T10:45:00.000-05:00

The lovely Cassie Neu on why design matters and our approach to it here at Architecture for Humanity: Minnesota - let it be local, let it be sustainable, let it be appropriate, let it be collaborative.

Recorded on May 2nd, 2007 at Solutions Volume 1 in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

Friday Photography | AFHMN in Sri Lanka

2007-08-31T08:30:00.000-05:00

As reported earlier, 4 lucky AFHMNers recently took a trip to Sri Lanka to represent Architecture for Humanity: Minnesota at the grand opening of a new community center in the new village of Hikkaduwa.

Read more about our community center project with the Minnesota Sri Lanka Friendship Foundation here and here.

The built community center.

Inside the library.

Young dancers getting ready to perform at the opening.

Back row - the AFHMNers: Cassie, Jeffrey, Maureen & Rich / Front row - Sri Lankan children (with ball)

They also got to spend some time touring the region and have some great pics to prove it:

Check out the whole set on Flickr. (Thanks to Maureen for making her photos available!)

Happy Friday!

Prefab or Prefad?

2007-08-30T21:20:00.000-05:00

The always thought provoking Witold Rybczynski has compiled a short slide show essay on why the modernist prefab movement hasn't caused the architectural revolution so many are hoping for. (coughDwellcough)

The, in my opinion, superbly designed LV Home by Rocio Romero.

On why this might be so, he quotes Colin Davies’ book The Prefabricated Home:

The strength of the prefabricated house lies in its popularity, its cheapness and the industrial base from which it operates," he writes. "These are precisely the areas in which modern architecture is weakest. Modern architecture is unpopular, expensive and divorced from industrial production. That is why whenever it has tried to extend its field to include the territory of the prefabricated house it has failed and been forced to retreat.

As much as it pains me to say so - Witold, Davies, and other are right. At present date, the reality of the situation is such that the prefabricated modernist movement is not fulfilling its promise of bring good design to the masses. Homes like those pictured above will remain in the realm of second homes and "cabins" for the wealthy while those picture below will remain not only more accessible, but more desirable, to the so called masses...

That is, unless we begin to realize that the systems that make the above suburban monotony possible can also lead to other far more intriguing design outcomes.

[insert shameless plug here]

One example comes from St. Paul based Cermak Rhoades Architects (whom I do happen to work for). They've gone back to the drawing board to design a series of modern homes that utilize the same smart growth principles and well designed house plans already developed for a Greater Minnesota Housing Fund program called Building Better Neighborhoods.

Though none of these homes have yet to be built, the fact remains that good contemporary design can be affordable when you use existing construction standards. From the website:

... these affordable homes are designed in a manner that reinforces a livable and efficient community. Smaller lot sizes, welcoming front porches, and alley access garages all contribute to help make these communities walkable and inviting... clean lines, simple forms, and rich colors.

The problem now is of course that pesky little thing called the "market". It doesn't matter how affordable or well designed it is if people won't buy it.

Check out the other side of the argument, as presented by local prefab gurus, Alchemy Architects (whom again, I think do great work), recorded at Solutions Volume 1:

Brief disclaimer: The contents of this blog reflect only my opinion and not those of any other organization or business, present employer included.

Black Balloons - Making CO2 Real

2007-08-30T13:00:00.000-05:00

The Alliance for Climate Protection has a great advert up on their site called Black Balloons - Making CO2 Real (click for video).

The piece does a great job of making something invisible and possibly hard to comprehend very real and accessible.

(Thanks Jeffrey!)

The Children & The Soldiers

2007-07-23T20:05:00.000-05:00

Three views from Iraq:

If the clips above are extremes on a spectrum of interaction, I have a feeling the one below is more representative of day-to-day life in Iraq. They explode a can of Pepsi, exchange gifts, have a plum fight, and finally debate their views on Michael Jackson.

Pardon the colorful language; these are scenes from a war, delivered unfiltered to your desktop.

Friday Photography | The Curiously Large Animals of Florentijn Hofman

2007-07-18T07:36:00.000-05:00

I just couldn't hold out on these so Friday Photography is early this week. Enjoy!

"A yellow spot on the horizon slowly approaches the coast. People...watch in amazement as a giant, yellow, rubber duck approaches. The spectators are greeted by the duck, which slowly nods its head. The 'Rubber Duck' knows no frontiers; it doesn't discriminate...and doesn't have a political connotation."
- From the artist's website.

The architecture beneath the surface is often equally as interesting as the final product. Florentijn documents the building process of his oversized animals at his website.

Via the SFGate. Happy... Wednesday!?!?

Mission Statement

2007-07-17T17:24:00.000-05:00

New & improved, the Architecture for Humanity: Minnesota mission statement:

We are architects, landscape architects, contractors, and designers who volunteer our time to something we are all passionate about: working with both local and international groups to help their communities with design solutions. It is each group’s knowledge and commitment to their community that makes each project successful. AFH MN serves as their resource along the way. Our philosophy for all of our projects: We design for people, with pride not pity.

AFH MN’s commitment to our clients is grounded in the following design tenants:

Let it be local: Design is informed by what is intrinsically bound to a culture. We respond to that, respect it, and draw upon it.

Let it be sustainable: We design for the health of humanity. Sustainability is about creating a balance between what we build and what is naturally meant to be and ensuring a project’s longevity and financial integrity.

Let it be appropriate: The components of a design are made compelling by their ability to respond to a community’s needs both technically and emotionally.

Let it be collaborative: Successful projects come from the informational input from all parties involved through the dedication of passionate people.

Thanks to Cassie and Pat for all of their hard work on this.

Monday's Odds & Ends

2007-07-16T23:31:00.000-05:00

We begin with a few new links to your right...

Atelier A+D - Almost daily notes from a Seattle based intern architect.
rolu | dsgn - "... A catalog of the things that inspire us" from Rosenlof/Lucas, a Minneapolis based landscape design and installation firm.
Where - "A blog about urban places, placemaking, and the concept of "place" written from Chicago, IL.
The Sky Blue Waters Report - "...environmental news and investigative reporting focused on Minnesota, the Upper Midwest, and the Great Lakes region."

In a bit of exciting AFH:MN news: Jeffrey, Maureen, Rich, & Cassie are set to depart to the south-western tip of Sri Lanka this Sunday. They will be representing AFH:MN at the Hikkaduwa Learning Center Dedication. The Learning Center, initially designed 2 years ago at the first official AFH:MN Design Charrette, is a multi-purpose space for the growing community. At once a Montessori style school, library, and community center, we are very excited to see it completed and functioning. The project was developed by the Minnesota Sri Lanka Friendship Foundation, who also made 100+ new homes possible in the aftermath of the 2004 South Asian Tsunami. Look forward to a full report and pictures when they get back, but for now we'll have to settle for the "near completion" shots below.

In other Architecture for Humanity news, the Venice Beach chapter of Architecture for Humanity has widened their scope to the whole of Las Angeles and have appropriately updated their website. Their current projects include "a mobile education unit made from a shipping container to educate youth about technology and design." You'll see the new Las Angeles link filed under 'Architecture for Humanity' to the right. (Thanks Elliot!)

20 Months After Katrina: Survival & Revival

2007-07-14T12:55:00.000-05:00

At Solutions Volume 1 back in early May Andy Richter presented his work documenting the impact HIV and AIDS are having on African communities living along mainland trucking routes. At the end of his presentation he gave us a sneak peak at his latest body of work documenting the places and people of New Orleans 20 months after Hurricane Katrina struck. This Thursday he is opening a show with fellow photographer Jenny Jenkins called Survival and Revival: Photography of New Orleans at CorAzoN in Downtown Minneapolis.

EVENT DETAILS
Survival and Revival: Photography of New Orleans
Thursday, July 19th | 7pm to 9pm *refreshments and live music
CorAzoN
Minneapolis Warehouse District
Washington and 2nd Ave North

Andy's work is full of gems, both large and small, like the series of photographs below that follow the temporarily repaired London Avenue Canal floodwall.

"The London Avenue Canal Levee and floodwall was breached during or shortly after Hurricane Katrina in late August of 2005. This breach contributed to the flooding of New Orleans. Some has speculated that were it not for the breachs most of western Gentilly may have been spared from major flooding.

... Examinations have shown that high water never topped the floodwalls; the flooding was due to engineering failure of the levees and floodwalls. Allegations of design flaws, shoddy construction, and use of inferior materials are being investigated." - Wikipedia

To see the full extent of Andy's photography in New Orleans, be sure to check out both his "Urban" and his "People" galleries. Combined, these two gallery's show the enormous pride, hope, and spirit still alive in the face of complete urban destruction, even close to two years later.

Hope to see you at the show!

Making the Clean Hub a Reality

2007-07-11T11:58:00.001-05:00

UPDATE: Inhabitat covers the clean hub, 07/13/07.

Deuce Seven & Street Art Reconsidered

2007-07-09T22:00:00.000-05:00

After laying low and working up a local following in the Twin Cities, graffiti artist Deuce Seven (aka: Deuse Sevin, Deuce 7, or just simply 27) recently made two trips to New York City, one in January of this year and then again in March, that catapulted his work into the national spotlight in a surprising way. Unlike other recent graff-world news to draw widespread attention (see the Splasher fiasco here, here, and here), 27's work is noteworthy for its creative merit and beautiful execution - as exhibited below.

photo: Surlygrrrl

I'd like to use 27's work to air out some thoughts on how street art is changing and invite you to do the same if you're so inclined. During 27's second stay in the Big Apple The Village Voice posted a short interview with him and posed the question: "Is a guy from Minnesota the new king of New York street art?" - proving that talent will always trump gimmickry and prolific output, even in the graffiti-saturated New York streetscape.

But there are two aspects of his work that have been yet ill-commented on that interest me most. The first is 27's apparent dedication to and embracement of the temporal characteristic of his medium. Where most graffiti is driven by some combination of 1) real estate of the public realm and 2) ease of accessibility in the cover of night, 27 seems to forgo the immediate limelight in favor of encouraging those interested in his art to seek it out in the liminal and often condemned space of the city.

[Sidenote: This isn't to say he won't paint well known spots. He hit the Williamsburg Bridge (a kind of graff-world landmark in NYC) with beautiful pieces both times he was there.]

photo: GammaBlog

photo: setstatic

The second aspect of his work that interests me is the way in which it has spread. His work is so well represented online that I will go so far as to announce the emergence of a new kind of "street art paparazzi", people compelled to scour urban outer realms, find his work - and the work of others, document it, and share it online.

photo: Luna Park

In this approach, it seems that 27 has at least partially sidestepped the most common argument against graffiti. Rather then "vandalizing" the public realm, he paints in buildings destined for demolition, or in other cases simply screws art into street sign posts. The hunt for his work often takes the viewer far from every day life in the city, but through his cultivation of the street art paparazzi, more people then ever before are able to see his art. It should be said that this is not an entirely new phenomenon, but I do think that 27 is doing it better then anybody else at the moment. At the vary least, the artist's work and recent notoriety in New York City provide a good segue into a larger discussion about the changing place of street art in the city...

... and of course provide me with an opportunity to display a little MPLS pride.

[Thanks is due to the numerous photographers on Flickr and elsewhere who make this often temporary art permanently available to a global audience. Check out their photographs: dancypants, TrespassersWill's, The Curse of Brian, Luna Park, and Artistikfunk and show them some love.

UPDATE: Or you could go straight to the source: Twenty~7's Flickr account via Format.]

New Urban Cartography

2007-05-30T22:48:00.000-05:00

We have a couple of reports from the urban cartography department today, followed by some personal thoughts about the kind of futures this new urban cartography might be pointing to.

First up is truliaHindsight, which maps the growth of cities over time through a massive online real estate database. The image below (Las Vegas, NV) is indicative of the data overlay you will see over most American cities: a massive housing boom in the 1950's that begins a trend pushing the city edge further and further away from the core. truliaHindsight is just one example of how massive information databases are being used and re-used in new and sometimes very surprising ways. Imagine combining this overlay with 200 years of census data... a thesis project on environmental racism just waiting to happen.

The truliaHindsight website was designed by Stamen Design in San Francisco. One of their more abstract pieces of urban cartography is called Cabstopping. "The patterns traced by each cab create a living and always-changing map of city life. This map hints at economic, social, and cultural trends that are otherwise invisible."

Their map is part of a bigger project that works "across the domains of art, design, cultural geography, cartography, information design, sociology, hydrology, marine sciences, and history" for The Museum of Science, Art and Human Perception (a place that I apparently need to visit). Some very cool timelapse videos of these maps can be found here.

Going from abstract and invisible to concrete and very visible, we end with a new project from granddaddies/ mommies of all things searchable. The Google Maps team recently released a new hybrid web application called Street View in which you can navigate through the Google Map as if you were a pedestrian on the street. The people/ hours that must of have gone into this thing are staggering.

It starts out looking like the familiar Google Map, but within the space of a few clicks, you are standing at the intersection of Liberty and Church Streets, looking out over void at the World Trade Center from the comfort of my tiny apartment in St. Paul, MN.

Once in Street View mode, you're free to walk up or down the streets, turn in full 360 degrees, and zoom in for a closer look. Below, I do a 180 and go into full screen mode:

How is this achieved? Let's just say keep an eye out for one of these, coming soon to reflective glass near you.

--- Begin personal thoughts on the topic here ---

What all of this brings to mind is William Gibson's early cyberpunk Sprawl trilogy (Neuromancer, Count Zero and Mona Lisa Overdrive - all excellent novels). This body of fiction, as well as much of Gibson's other work, revolves around his extrapolation that the internet (in its infancy at the time - mid to late 80's) would move beyond information on a screen and become an inhabitable place. In fact, Gibson ended up coining the term "cyberspace" to name his then fictional invention.

Gibson's "cyberspace" literally translated in the film Hackers.

If the Google Street View is any indication of what is to come, we can begin to imagine all manner of information being mapped onto a virtually inhabitable simulacrum of our world. Unlike the cyberspace that Gibson describes in Neuromancer:

"...a graphic representation of data abstracted from banks of every computer in the human system. Unthinkable complexity. Lines of light ranged in the nonspace of the mind, clusters and constellations of data. Like city lights, receding..." (69),

this new cyberspace will be much more familiar to us. It will look and behave in ways we understand - dangerous because the line between real and virtual will be that much more hazed. As the possibilities for exploration, learning, and knowledge building expand - so too will the potential for surveillance, misuse, and abuse.

"Emergent technology is, by its very nature, out of control, and leads to unpredictable outcomes." - William Gibson

Can Google Life really be that far off?

Chernobyl Fungi Feed on Radiation

2007-05-25T13:13:00.000-05:00

Today we have a science fiction-esque follow up to my previous post about Chernobyl tourism in Prypiat, Ukraine. National Geographic reports that three types of fungus have been discovered to grow larger and faster when fed radiation. Scientists were inspired to further study after observing strange fungus growth on the ruins of the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant.

From the paper, published and available at PLoS ONE:

Melanized microorganisms inhabit some remarkably extreme environments including high altitude, Arctic and Antarctic regions. Most dramatically, melanized fungal species colonize the walls of the highly radioactive damaged reactor at Chernobyl and surrounding soils.

The melanin in the fungi apparently gives it a blackish hue. This "pigment may play a role in the fungi similar to that of chlorophyll in plants." The paper points towards further study of melanin and its future potential for energy capture and utilization. In an interview with Ira Flatow on NPR's Science Friday today, lead scientist Ekaterina Dadachova said that this could mean the farming of melanized fungus as a bio-fuel in areas too extreme for conventional farming. Possibilities include underground or even in radiation abundant outer space.

Sadly, I haven't been able to turn up any images of the Chernobyl fungus online. Anybody up for a holiday in Prypiat?

Friday Photography | Visualizing the Numbers

2007-05-11T00:00:00.000-05:00

Photographic artist Chris Jordan is doing an interesting series called "Running the Numbers" that means to visualize the sometimes abstract statistics that define American material culture.

Depicts 1.14 million brown paper supermarket bags, the number used in the US every hour.

Partial zoom:

Detail at actual size:

Depicts 75,000 shipping containers, the number of containers processed through American ports every day.

Detail at actual size:

Depicts 426,000 cell phones, equal to the number of cell phones retired in the US every day.

Partial zoom:

Detail at actual size:

Very sobering. In any case, Happy Friday!

Darfur & the Representation of Atrocity

2007-05-09T18:32:00.000-05:00

I conceived of and put together the images in this post almost exactly one year ago. It would have continued to collect dust in my hard drive had it not been for the latest issue of NEED magazine which also featured the artwork of war-afflicted children.

The concept began simply enough. I was researching the genocide in Darfur for a post and wanted to find the appropriate imagery. But the more and more I saw, the less and less I felt capable of coherent comment or action. To make matters worse, new death tolls were coming out almost weekly at this point, each new figure more and more humbling.

The problem I had was that none of the photographs coming out of Darfur could convey the emotion behind the circumstance. There was something missing. Then I came across a website that was publishing the drawings of child refugees in counseling. The children had reportedly not been prompted to draw images about war or strife, this was their subconscious doodling.

Having just poured through hundreds of photographs depicting the conflict, I was immediately stricken by the raw immediacy the drawings possessed. The photographs I kept seeing portrayed genocide in a past tense, but in the drawings, the atrocities being committed were happening before my eyes, as if in real time.

When I put drawing and photograph together I began to see a more complete story, both present and past, both real and imagined, and somehow so much more then the sum of their parts. And I suppose that is what led me to finally putting them up today: thinking about how we represent and relate to such atrocities when they are happening, right now - in the present tense, half way around the world.

Looking at these again, the question I asked myself was “Why did I feel so ashamed by the juxtaposition I had created, enough so to pack it away, not able to think about it again for a full year?” I think I might have an (at least partial) answer:

By making the relationship between what had happened and what was presently happening more understandable, I had subconsciously realized the difference between "I could have done something", and "I should be doing something."

The photographs in this post were all taken by Brian Steidle, the drawings are by the children of Darfur.

Odegard & AFH:MN Present an Evening with Travis Price

2007-05-07T18:42:00.000-05:00

If you live in the Twin Cities area and are looking for something to do this Thursday evening, look no further. The environmentally and socially conscious local carpet and design firm Odegard Inc. and Architecture for Humanity Minnesota have teamed up to bring you what is sure to be an inspiring and lively evening with architect, philosopher, and author, Travis Price.

". . . pioneering architects and designers are going back to the earth with what critic Vincent Scully calls a 'reverent appreciation for the political landscape.' . . .'such a sustainable world architecture,' says Christopher Alexander , may represent the pursuit of a 'spiritual purity of maker and artifact' . . . Mr. Price designs in both the spiritual and material worlds."

Timothy Jack Ward,
The New York Times

Mr. Price's "intellectually and visually robust" presentation will be inspired by his new book The Archaeology of Tomorrow: Architecture and the Spirit of Place.

EVENT DETAILS:
Thursday, May 10th
Wine & Hor d'oeuvres at 6 pm
Presentation begins at 6:30

Odegard 210 North 2nd St
Minneapolis, MN
612.455.6100

For more information see the online flier. Hope you can make it!

MoPo 2007, Splitted

2007-05-06T10:03:00.000-05:00

Well, about 3 weeks have passed since Eikongraphia released their take on "the twenty-five Most Popular Architecture Blogs of this moment." Titled MoPo 2007, the list was updated 5 days later and more accurately titled MoPo 2007, Splitted. It seemed there was quite a bit of confusion surrounding the first list, something the author tries to clear up in the second list:

The MoPo was actually meant as a satirical joke, as a comment to all selections, lists, awards, prizes, and medals out there. I thought the OMA-AMO reversing of PoMo (Jencks’ Post Modernism) made that clear. With 34 comments, and about the same amount of blogs republishing the list, we can clearly say I am not that good a comedian.

The list seems to have helped to bring some transparency and organization to in the small world of architectural blogging. And maybe more importantly, as others have already pointed out, the list serves to separate ourselves from the rest of the blogosphere and to hopefully give more visibility to us all.

The list is, by the authors own admission, not complete nor fully accurate. His methods for creating the list are as follows:

The mapping of popularity remains the same, with valuing the popularity of architecture blogs by linking blogs (Technorati), subscribers (Bloglines), and hits (Google, and Google Images). As a method it is still not perfect, but these parameters are objective, so it works at least partly.

Overall, I think the list was a gutsy but necessary undertaking and I commend the author for taking it on. It has turned me on to quite a few great blogs that I probably would not otherwise be reading. And likewise, I have definitely seen BLYGAD's daily hits increase since it's inception, as I'm sure many other lesser known blogs on the list have found. For those two reasons, if no others, the list has been successful. So without any further ado:

Top 25 Individual Architecture Blogs
1. BLDGBLOG
2. City of Sound
3. Pruned
4. Tropolism
5. Archidose
6. Gravestmor
7. Jetson Green
8. Eikongraphia
9. A Barriga de um Arquitecto
10. Subtopia
11. Anarchitecture
12. Mirage Studio 7
13. Life Without Buildings
14. Missrepresentation
15. Brand Avenue
16. Architecture.mnp
17. Archispass
18. Architechnophilia
19. Part IV
20. Bird to the North
21. eCar 2.0
22. Archlog
23. Progressive Reactionary
24. Blog Like You Give A Damn
25. Arkitekturbloggen

Top 25 Collaborative Architecture Blogs
1. Worldchanging
2. Inhabitat
3. Archinect
4. Things
5. Edgar Gonzalez
6. Dezeen
7. Plataforma Arquitectura
8. Dezain
9. Urbanity
10. Noticias Arquitectura
11. Death by Architecture
12. …

You'll notice the blogroll to the right has been appropriately updated. Happy reading!

Friday Photography | LincolnWay Energy

2007-04-13T18:37:00.000-05:00

This week Friday Photography takes a road trip about 3 and a half hours south from the Twin Cities to an ethanol plant outside of Ames, Iwoa. I made the trip a with a group that was part Architecture for Humanity: Minnesota and part Solutions Twin Cities (a new project of mine, but more on that later) to participate in a conference called BIGe (the little "e" was for energy), put on by the newly formed Architecture for Humanity: Iowa.

On the last day of the conference, we took a tour of the nearby LincolnWay Energy ethanol plant. As we donned our soylent green hard hats a thick fog rolled in, setting the stage for a surreal tour through the nearly year old,and still pristine, power plant. The process for making ethanol is similar to brewing beer. So much so that they actually refer to the 200 proof corn alcohol they create brew as "beer" throughout the process. Seeing vats labeled as such combined with a strong smell that unmistakably reminded me of childhood tours through the Miller Brew Plant in Milwaukee had me expecting a free sample by the end of the tour.

But enough chit chat, on to the photos!

More photos from the ethanol plant, a passive solar house we visited, and the rest of the conference (with a cameo appearance by the back of Cameron Sinclair's head!) can be viewed here.

Some bonus ethanol fun facts:

• One acre of corn can produce enough ethanol to run a car for some 72,000 miles on E-10 Unleaded.\One bushel of corn yields about 2.8 gallons of ethanol.
• A typical 40 million gallon ethanol plant creates 32 full-time jobs and generates an additional $1.2 million in tax revenue for a community.
• Ethanol production results in a net energy gain – producing 67 percent more energy than it takes to grow and process the corn into ethanol.
• Ethanol production consumed about 13 percent of the nation’s second largest corn harvest in 2005 - some 1.43 billion bushels.

Happy Friday from St. Paul, MN!

Travel Notes from Sri Lanka | Day 2: Five Houses

2007-03-20T23:10:00.000-05:00

Sishir Chang recently spent 5 days in Sri Lanka. His travel notes are reproduced here: raw, unedited, and uncut. One post for each day.

Day 2: Five Houses
The second full day in Sri Lanka started out early with the consulting engineer, Amitha, for the Sri Lanka Student Association project picking me up at 7:30 to go Kalathura to see their project. The drive to the site was through beautiful rice paddies and bustling towns. At one point we passed through a school group and saw several boys in white school outfits climbing onto a moving truck with a Sri Lankan flag.

["Minnesota Happy Structures"]

As we drove I talked to Amitha about a variety of subjects. Amitha is a civil engineer who works for a factory run by Koreans. One thing that he mentioned that was very interesting was that his factory hired a lot of Indians because Sri Lankans wouldn't do the dangerous steel work for as low a wage rate as the Indians. Also that Sri Lankans would unionize and ask for more benefits. This struck me as interesting for my knowledge of Sri Lanka was that they exported labor to work construction in countries like Singapore and Dubai yet here they were importing labor also for work that Sri Lankans wouldn't do. We also talked about the education system in Sri Lanka and that one big problem was that most education was being done in Sinhalese so that there were few English programs and also few people qualified to teach them. This made such programs very in demand but also was hampering Sri Lanka's development. I asked him about if Sri Lanka was developing an IT sector like India and he mentioned they were trying to and were sending people to India to study IT. One big problem he felt that hampered Sri Lanka was the ongoing Tamil insurgency which he blamed both on the Tamils but also do-nothing politicians. He also felt that corruption was a big problem.

[construction workers mixing cement]

At the project site itself the 5 houses in the project weren't quite completed. Three were nearly completed awaiting some finishing while the fourth one was getting its external finish put on and the fifth one was structurally complete but still had finish work just getting started. An official handing over ceremony though had been conducted on January 18th even though they weren't completed. The houses still lacked infrastructure and I was told that the government was planning on adding internal road access to them, currently access to the site was on unpaved paths but the site was adjacent to a new paved road. The government was going to provide water but the engineer felt that that might not be sufficient and so had dug a well at the site and was planning on building a central water tank for the 5 houses that could provide water during even the drought years. Amitha explained that well water in Sri Lanka was also of fairly high quality…

After visiting the site we headed back we passed by a large Buddhist monastery with a giant stupa in Kalathura. The story behind the temple was that a bridge crossing the river in front of the temple had been built a long time ago and at the time it was uncertain that bridge could be built. People prayed at the site and miraculously an island appeared in the middle of stream providing a middle support for the bridge. So the temple was built and people come to pray there for miracles.

We stopped outside of Kalathura to have lunch at a luxury hotel built on the ocean. I asked if this hotel had been affected by the tsunami and they said it had but only to a small extent and looking at the green yard leading to the beach it looked like if it did they had cleaned up quite well. He dropped me off in the early afternoon and later in the afternoon called a driver and headed out to check email. After I had finished checking email we went to a beach south of Colombo and I got to enjoy the sun setting over the Indian Ocean. This beach appeared to primarily cater to locals and there were several of them also enjoying the sunset, playing cricket or swimming. The beach itself was OK but wasn't white sand and seemed slightly dirty the water too wasn't particularly clear.

Travel Notes from Sri Lanka | Day 1: Arrival

2007-03-20T21:52:00.000-05:00

Sishir Chang recently spent 5 days in Sri Lanka. His travel notes are reproduced here: raw, unedited, and uncut. One post for each day.

Day 1: Arrival
I arrived at about 5 PM local time after flying Lanka Air. The flight was OK although I wished I had a window seat to be able to check out Sri Lanka from the air. As it was I got some glimpses of the landscape below that looked interesting especially the central mountain range which while no Rockies or Sierras were larger than I expected and were mysteriously shrouded in cloud. The airport and much of Sri Lanka seems less developed than most places I've been in Asia. The capital of Colombo doesn't seem to possess the size of many other Asian cities and there doesn't seem to be a big modern commercial district. Most of the urban areas look like most other Asian Third World towns with rather narrow streets with small shops and stalls lining them and 3 wheeled tuk tuks on them. Driving in Sri Lanka is an adventure best left to skilled locals as it is in many developing countries. I'm amazed that like China I haven't seen many automobile accidents or even cars with scratches even though cars drive on the wrong side of the road regularly and cram by each other with less than inches to spare.

For the first full day in Sri Lanka I spent mostly in Colombo the capital. First getting a sim card for my cell phone, which appears to be the primary means of communication here, then checking internet and seeing some sights. Internet access is something that back in the US I take for granted but here in Sri Lanka I've been treating it as an almost precious commodity as there don't seem to be many Internet cafés and wi-fi networks almost nonexistent.

My driver dropped me off at a relatively modern shopping mall where he said there was an internet café. Unfortunately the mall didn't open for about an hour so I waited outside. While I was waiting an almost continuous stream of devout Muslims walked by. This was strange to see this as Sri Lanka is a predominately Buddhist society, with a large Hindu minority while the Muslim community vies with the Christian community for third place in size. Yet here in Colombo was a continuous stream of white clad bearded Muslim men wearing tight fitting hats of the kind commonly worn by SE Asian Muslims along with women in white or light colored hijabs toting along small children also white colored but wearing fanciful tight fitting silver hats. I'm not sure where they were going or what they were doing but I had the feeling there might've been a religious festival of sorts.

With the working sim card in hand and email having been checked my day was relatively free so I settled on lunch. My driver took me to an upscale buffet restaurant with a sea view where I had an excellent lunch of Sri Lankan food. I invited my driver to eat which I'm sure isn't standard practice as he seemed relatively surprised to join me but I felt it was a good gesture and as that he could also give me some information about what I food I was eating. Had a meal of a few kinds of rice including a red kind that is popular in Sri Lanka, several kinds of curries and a few types of sambols (spicy sauces) some of which were thick and chunky like chutneys while others were almost like coleslaw. Dessert was a mix of custards, bread pudding, jellies, fruit and something that seemed exactly like a marshmallow.

Other than the food and the view the amount of security precautions at the restaurant stood out. Driving up to the building the car was examined with a mirror underneath and the trunk examined along with the drivers ID. After getting off the elevator we had to walk through a metal detector and have our bags searched. No doubt this level of security was due to the threat of terrorism from the Tamil Tigers and throughout Colombo there were reminders that an active conflict was ongoing with Kalashnikov wielding troops a common sight along with checkpoints.

After we ate, my driver took me to a see another hotel and visit the beach. The hotel was a fairly elegant European style hotel and the beach was decent although relatively deserted. I hiked a bit down the beach and a few hundred yards away the hotel property gave way to a fishing village. It somewhat surprised me that there would be a ramshackle fishing village right against a luxury hotel and also that such a ramshackle fishing village would still be in the middle of a major city. I was invited by a resident of the village to come and see it and he showed me around. The village was fairly small and mostly consisted of single story shacks made of a variety of materials. Running in the back of the village was the coastal railway that had been hit by the tsunami but since then had been fixed so the village was sandwiched on a narrow stretch between the railway and the sea. My host fetched a coconut from a tree and cut it open for me to drink from. Even though I've been to tropical places several times before had fresh coconut I had never had one plucked and cut from a tree right before me. The water within the coconut was warm and not quite refreshing but unlike the processed coconut that we're accustomed to it wasn't very sweet and even slightly salty. Not bad but not quite the thing on a very hot day. The villager also told me that the tsunami had hit the village and that the government had wanted them to move but had not done anything to enforce that order so they went ahead and rebuilt on the same location. As I left the villager made an appeal for some money for his family. I didn't give him the 1,000 Rupees he wanted but he settled for the 300 I did. I had figured he was going to ask me for some money and appreciated the tour and coconut but even 1,000 Rupees (a bit more than $10) is tight when traveling on a budget.

We next briefly stopped at a Hindu temple where they didn't let us enter for pictures and then went on to a small Buddhist temple. This temple was unlike most Buddhist temples I had been too and was octagonal in layout with brightly colored statuary dioramas depicting the Buddha and important events in the Buddha's life along with Buddhism relating to Sri Lanka.

Tsunami Recovery in Thailand | Parts 11 & 12: ONGOING NEEDS & LEAVING PHUKET

2007-02-24T15:54:00.000-06:00

(Parts 11 & 12 of a 12 part series)

Five weeks after the Tsunami hit, Sishir Chang went to Thailand to see how the people there were recovering and to see how those concerned could help. The following segments are the final chapters of his first experience in the aftermath of one of the world's most devastating natural disasters. Originally published in the Southasian, the article is being republished here with the author's permission.
___

Part 11 | Ongoing Needs

From everyone I talked to and seeing for myself the recovery is going very well. There are some places much more damaged than others where it will take a long time to recover but in general reconstruction is progressing well. Almost all of the bodies have been recovered but there are still around a 1,000 still missing and also around a 1,000 bodies still waiting to be identified. There hasn’t been any major health threat from the tsunami and from what I found there is plenty of food, water and medicine available.

In the worst hit areas of Khao Lak and Bang Niang the most pressing need is housing as there are still a few hundred Thais living in refugee camps in that areas. Mental health specialists are also needed to help with the children and adults who are suffering post traumatic stress. According to Sophie Konnaris at the Tsunami Volunteer Center in Khao Lak how much mental health help is needed is difficult to determine because to her knowledge no major mental health evaluation had been done. Another problem that I heard from aid workers is that Western mental health specialist might not be able to help due to language and culture differences.

Also in Khao Lak many resorts were completely destroyed it will be a long time before they can be reconstructed, if ever, and open for business. Job retraining and other economic development is needed. The villagers of Bang Niang were primarily fisherman and they would like to replace the boats they lost in the tsunami to resume fishing and would like power tools to help with fixing boats and building houses.

In Patong and Kamala the biggest need is economic recovery in the form of tourists coming back. In Kamala there is still some need for housing but reconstruction is progressing both for houses and businesses. At both the Kamala health station and the Patong hospital they said that they were well stocked on medicines but still had a need to replace equipment.

Overall the message that I heard from everyone was to come visit and enjoy Phuket. Without tourism the Thais have no chance of economic recovery.

Part 12 | Leaving Phuket

As I was leaving I watched the sun set through the windows of the Phuket airport. Like every other sunset I had seen in Phuket this one was beautiful. I had come as a concerned American looking to see where my aid money was going and also out of curiosity to see the aftermath of one of the worst disasters in human history. As I watched the sun go down I was still trying to comprehend all that I had seen and heard. I had been expecting something simple, survivors and aid workers nobly struggling amidst ruins to save life and restore dignity, but had found a far more complex situation of ad hoc aid, sex tourism, tsunami commercialization, frustration and reconstruction. All of those thoughts mingled in my mind as I watched another day end in paradise.
___

This concludes Shishir's experience in Thailand. Sishir has recently returned from Sri Lanka, where he observed a country still rebuilding, over a year after the same tsunami. BLYGAD is happy to announce a new series from Sishir: "Travel Notes from Sri Lanka", to be posted in 5 segments. Stay tuned.

Friday Photography | Imaginary High-rise Landscapes

2007-02-22T22:42:00.000-06:00

Almost a month with out a post? Criminal!

Truth be told, the AFHMNers have been busy: A community center in Sri Lanka nearing completion, a new project on the books (this one in the congo), a sleeping bag drive for our local homeless, and finally, a very exciting project that has been to blame for my absence on BLYGAD... but more on that later.

All of this recent activity means that BLYGAD has it's work cut out for it. I'll be reporting on the above projects, posting a new Sri Lankan travel diary from Sishir, keeping you up to date on all things humanitarian & architectural, and keeping good on that promise to freshen up the look of the place... hmmm, that's curious, rumor has it AFH International might be doing the same very soon...

In the mean time, enjoy these shots of Russian housing projects. (Thanks for the tip Jeffrey!) If anybody knows more about these curious neighborhoods, please leave a comment!

Happy Friday!

5 Things Meme

2007-02-22T13:17:00.000-06:00

It’s a mashup of the icebreaker games that everybody hates, the old playground standby tag, and the chain letter… and it could only happen in the blogosphere. It’s the 5 Things Meme.

Paul Schmelzer, author of the always excellent Eyeteeth, has tagged BLYGAD (way back here) and who am I to break the chain? I’m supposed to reveal five things you don't necessarily know about me, and then tag five others who should do the same. In this case, the whole AFHMN gang will be getting in on the fun.

So without further ado: 5 things you probably don’t know about AFHMN

1. The first AFH seeds were planted in Minnesota soil in 2005 as Cameron Sinclair came to talk at the College of Architecture and Landscape Architecture at the University of Minnesota (which is now the more inclusive College of Design). The speech Cameron gave then was not so different from the one he gave at the TED Talks last year:

2. In fact, so many were inspired by that talk, the University somehow managed to convince Cameron to come back to Minnesota and find the time to teach a studio. This kick-started a new push, led by Dean Tom Fisher, to position the school as a leader in humanitarian architecture.

3. No grassroots organization is without its growing pains. As we recently made the transition to using Google Groups, we accidentally added our whole mailing list, 140 blessed souls in all, to our “working group”. Needless to say, many of them politely (in most cases) objected to being included in one morning’s nuts and bolts conversation (18 emails deep) about where we should hold the next meeting.

4. AFHMNers have day jobs, imagine that! Check 'em out on the web: Cermak Rhoades Architects, LHB, Swainhart Construction Services, Shelter Architecture, SmithGroup, & Perkins & Will... among others!

5. I’ve successfully gone a full year without using the word blogosphere, on this site or anywhere… until today. Thanks Paul.

And to keep the ball rolling, I tag:
Up Your Architecture
CRA Jotter (with just a smidgen of self promotion)
A Life Without Buildings
Vestal Design Blog
A Daily Dose of Architecture

Have fun!

Friday Photography | Bill Sullivan

2007-01-26T11:00:00.000-06:00

Bill Sullivan creates situational photography. He started by creating a set of rules for himself:

1. The image or photograph must be candid
2. The context of the situation must be clearly established
3. The background behind every subject in a series must be the same
4. The photographer must always be visible to the subject(s) in the photograph
5. The moments the images are to be taken must be defined before the pictures are taken
6. Secondary image(s) can be attached to the primary image if needed to clarify an established context
7. The camera should not play a visible role in the situation unless its visible presence has a role in that scenario

He has created 3 scenarios thus far...

... one in the NYC Metro:

... one in an elevator lobby:

... and one in Times Square:

[Via Archinect]

Happy Friday!

Umoja: American Shantytown

2007-01-21T16:03:00.001-06:00

It's resident's call it Umoja, the Swahili word for "unity" / the city of Miami calls it an illegal eyesore. Brainchild of activist Max Rameau, Umoja is part protest and part experiment. It's existence is a response to the growing housing crisis in Miami. A recent New York Times article reports that the Miami-Dade County planning department estimates Miami will need 294,200 new housing units by 2025, 42 percent of them for 'very low- or low-income households.

The shantytown has successfully fought for the right to exist using a 1998 federal district court ruling that says Miami can not criminalize homeless people for conducting “life-sustaining acts” including eating, sleeping, lighting a fire and building temporary structures on public land if local shelters were filled. Max keeps a blog documenting the project called Take Back the Land.

The small plot of public land is located in Liberty City, a neighborhood of Miami. The video below shows a makeshift city made up of about 16 structures. About 40 formerly homeless people call this place home. At Umoja they are off the streets; sleeping under a roof, cooking and eating with their neighbors, and taking care of each other when sick.

It seems the city has conceded for now:

The city commissioner who represents the area, Michelle Spence-Jones, had tried to shut the settlement down with an ordinance to require a permit for gatherings on public land. But after several visits to Umoja, she withdrew the ordinance and instead promised to arrange for trash pickup at the site three times a week.

Ms. Spence-Jones stopped short, however, at the group’s request for a mailbox. “That sends a whole other message,” she said. New York Times

It will be interesting to see how this develops. If successful, Umoja could prove to be a useful model for the homeless in other cities across the US.

If interested in doing more, you could watch more Umoja videos and then show support by signing Umoja's online petition.

TOMS Shoes

2007-01-09T23:36:00.001-06:00

I just learned about TOMS Shoes over at FMCS and had to post about them here. They are a new company whose sole mission (excuse the pun) is to make the world a more comfortable place. Blake Mycoskie, founder of the company, plans to achieve this goal very simply:

For every shoe you purchase, TOMS Shoes will give a pair of shoes to a child in need.

Check out the video below for more information and (as in my case) some dusty eyed inspiration. (And please let me know if the video doesn't work for you, it's my first time posting one!)

More and more companies and organizations are realizing the power in worldchanging ideas. TOMS Shoes is selling more then just another shoe, they are selling the ability to make a difference, the ability to make your voice as a consumer heard, the ability to vote with your dollar.

Ladies and Gentlemen, there is a new economy forming right in front of our eyes, an economy based on values and reputation.

BLYGAD's New Digs

2006-12-29T00:53:00.000-06:00

Blog Like You Give a Damn will be under construction over the next couple of days but I think that, if you keep your hardhats on, there shouldn't be much trouble getting around the site.

In fact, once I'm finished, it will be easier then ever to find the content you are looking for. The biggest changes are that Blogger has improved their archive system and added a new post tagging feature; both can be seen in the sidebar to your right.

The new collapsible archive system will allow you to search the stacks with ease while the tags will let you view all of the Friday Photography posts at once, or to read all 13 installments of Sishir Chang's Tsunami Recovery in Thailand in one place (well, 10 out of 13 at least... for now).

The other changes will be purely cosmetic, as I play around with the look of the site a little bit. Thanks for your patience, and feel free to drop me a line and let me know what works and what doesn't.

Cheers!

Pamphlet Architecture 29 | Last Call

2006-12-28T16:12:00.000-06:00

The deadline for Pamphlet Architecture's annual competition is quickly approaching: January 16, 2007. They are looking for the best designs, manifestos, ideas, theories, ruminations, hopes, and insights for the future of the designed and built world -- to be published as the next Pamphlet, number 29.

It would be great to see some socially/ environmentally conscious humanitarian work in Pamphlet. Pamphlet Architecture 27, Tooling, was beautiful to look at and intellectually stimulating but would have done a world of good for absolutely nobody.

In Tooling, Benjamin Aranda and Chris Lasch propose a new gateway for the city of Las Vegas:

"Its a place where one can play slots, roulette, get married, see a show, have your car washed, drive up an observatory and ride through a tunnel of love, all without ever leaving your car. Its the first gamble in and the last chance out, a compact Vegas enjoyed at 55 miles per hour."

[Image: Aranda/Lasch, from Tooling]

It's not that I can't appreciate this type of design work, I just don't see how a 10 mile concrete spiral for cars is either essential or urgent. On the other hand, read with tongue in cheek, there is a possibility that Tooling could actually be taken as a ironic commentary on the sad state American architecture. Geoff Manaugh's thoughts on Tooling, and the conversation that followed, were particularly entertaining.

If you'd like to read about how to submit your work to Pamphlet, click here.

Holiday Like You Give A Damn

2006-12-22T10:54:00.000-06:00

[image]

Whether you celebrate Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, or just the fact that you get a couple days off from work, Blog Like You Give a Damn and the folks from Architecture for Humanity | Minnesota would like to wish everybody out there a Happy Holiday. I hope you enjoy this brief seasonal miscellany:

Changing the Present
Americans spend 250 billion dollars every year just buying each other gifts. Imagine what would happen if we could capture just a portion of that and direct it into worldchanging organizations and charities.

OK, now stop imagining, and check out ChangingThePresent.org.

ChangingThePresent envisions a new way to show someone you care. Rather then buy dad a new electric shaver, why not clear 10 square meters of a minefield for him ($30) or help feed an HIV patient for 6 months for him ($60). There are several hundred charities to choose from and ChangingThePresent has put them all at your fingertips, so matter who you are gifting, you will find a cause you can both be proud of.
[Via WorldChanging]

2 New Magazines That Give a Damn (Great Gift Ideas)
GOOD Magazine (6 issues) - $20 (The full amount of your subscription fee goes to the charitable organization of your choice.)

Mission: "While so much of today's media is taking up our space, dumbing us down, and impeding our productivity, GOOD exists to add value. Through a print magazine, feature and documentary films, original multimedia content and local events, GOOD is providing a platform for the ideas, people, and businesses that are driving change in the world."

NEED Magazine (4 issues) - $27.

Mission: "NEED magazine is an artistic hope-filled publication focusing on life changing humanitarian efforts at home and abroad. NEED magazine reveals the remarkable stories of people involved throughout the entire humanitarian aid process: survivors, workers, funders, and heroes. NEED magazine's dynamic visual narrative is not only compelling, but also drives awareness, involvement, personal connection, and contributions."
[Thanks for the heads up Maureen!]

Ikea Gives the Gift of Non-Gasoline Dependent Transportation
Ikea UK has given all 9,000 of it's employees a new bicycle for Christmas, as well as a 15% subsidy on public transportation. "The bike is a fun present but there is a serious message. We all have a responsibility to do what we can to protect the environment," says Ikea's UK manager, Peter Hogsted.

In addition to charging for the use of plastic bags and giving customers the option of planting a tree for one extra dollar when they check out, Ikea seems to be one international corporation that "gets it." More power to them!

Happy Holidays! See you in the New Year!

Cities of the Poor

2006-12-19T00:54:00.000-06:00

I caught the tail-end of this great program on PRI's The World earlier this afternoon. Cities of the Poor is a four part series taking an in-depth look at the circumstances that created the global slum phenomenon and what can be done to help improve life in these new informal mega-cities.

Today's installment by Sheri Fink focused on what life is like in one of Kenya's largest slums: Kibera (possibly the largest slum in Africa), it is the first of four installments. A complete transcript and photos by Fink are included. I believe you can catch the remaining three installments Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday on PRI's The World.

Friday Photography | Our Daily Bread & Manufactured Landscapes

2006-11-30T17:24:00.000-06:00

Friday Photography enters the realm of moving pictures this Friday with two films meditating on our industrial interventions on the natural environment.

Our Daily Bread is a new film by director Nikolaus Geyrhalter. Described as a "meticulous and high-end film experience", the movie has no spoken prompts and no story line, just 21st century industrial agriculture at work. So far it doesn't look like there is a release planned for the Twin Cities (this makes me sad). Click here for a list of American release dates. [via Pruned]

Manufactured Landscapes is a film by director Jennifer Baichwal about the life and work of photographer Edward Burtynsky. A BLYGAD favorite, Burtynsky's photographs are at once horrific, stunningly beautiful, and completely alien. You won't see your world the same way after spending time with his work. I can't wait to see his photographs on the big screen. Zeitgeist Films is has a US release planned for Summer 2007.

For more reading on industrial agriculture and more generally, the fascinating topics of eating, food, & where food comes from, see:

The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals by Michael Pollan

Happy Friday!

Reality Tourism

2006-11-21T15:39:00.000-06:00

Continuing our series of tourism themed posts (here and here), Sandra from AFH San Diego drew my attention to a group called Reality Tours. Based out of Mumbai, India, Reality Tours offers 2 hour walking "Slum Tours" of the nearby city of Dharavi.

"In these small alleys, you will see why Dharavi is the heart of small scale industries in Mumbai (annual turnover is approximately US$ 665 million) and on the tour we show you a wide range of these activities- from making clay pots and leather bags to recycling plastic." - Reality Tours

The idea of a reality tour is not a new one. In 1989 a group called Global Exchange began with the idea that travel could be educational, fun, and positively influence international affairs. In their model, "... travelers are linked with activists and organizations from around the globe who are working toward positive change. We also hope to prompt participants to examine related issues in their own communities." Global Exchange sets each 7 to 14 day trip around a specific issue and focuses events around providing a view of the issue beyond what is communicated through mainstream media.

This type of trip offers a social exchange that you just can't get in a 2 hour walking tour, but both programs try to create a socially responsible experience, and both have been fairly well received in the international press.

Related Posts:
The Evolution of Eco-Tourism?
Friday Photography | Chernobyl Tourism

Curbly.com | Love Where You Live

2006-11-18T15:38:00.000-06:00

The only thing better then learning about something new is when it turns out to be not only cool, but local. That's why it's with much Twin City pride that I'd like to tell you about a new online community called Curbly.

According to co-founder Bruno Bornsztein, Curbly is a place where "people can share the creative stuff they've done with their homes, find inspiration for home-improvement projects, and get advice from experts."

Even as a fairly new website, they already have a ton of user-generated content: "The $3 Table", "Simple, Sustainable Living - 5 Easy Steps", "Kitsch Me Baby", and a multitude of other DIY tutorials drew me in instantly.

The DIY Photo Wall by Ben Edwards | just one of the many DIY tutorials at Curbly

All this on top of finally satisfying my voyeuristic fantasy of being able to peer into the living-rooms, bedrooms, bathrooms, and kitchens of complete strangers... Perfect!

So check it out, and keep your heads up for future Curbly/AFHMN collaborations.

Friday Photography | Taiji Matsue & Murmansk Garage Culture

2006-11-17T13:39:00.000-06:00

Only furthering my fascination with aerial photography, I discovered Taiji Matsue's work over at Pruned a couple of days ago. Described as "pieces from the surface of the earth", these beautiful compositions and many more can be found at L.A. Gallerie.

More information on Taiji:
artnet | take art collection | a biography

These great shots of garages in Murmansk, Russia were found on the BBC, In Pictures. Apparently there is a whole garage culture consisting of men, cars, and apparently… pickles. But what makes this unique is that these garages are all located in the a kind of garage-city located far away from the apartment blocks the men live in and therefore, one can only assume, the cares of everyday life. Their owners call them their 'sea shells'.

See the whole set, with commentary by the perplexed women of Murmansk, here. (Thanks Chris!)

Happy Friday!

"Nature of Change" an Interdisciplinary Performance Art Benefit for Architecture for Humanity: Minnesota

2006-11-09T15:45:00.000-06:00

AFHMN is happy to announce:

“Nature of Change” an Interdisciplinary Performance Art Benefit for Architecture for Humanity: Minnesota

Sunday, November 12, 2006 7:00pm – 8:30pm
$5 suggested donation
at The Center for Happiness
2645 SE 4th Street, Minneapolis, MN, 55414

Presented by The Center for Happiness & Project Educate, Entertain and Empower (Project EEE)… This performance is the culmination of a workshop at the Center for Happiness where participants shared, improvised, collaborated and experimented, interweaving meditation, movement, sound, visual arts, text, theatre and light focusing on the theme “Nature of Change”

The artists will present a series of short abstract vignettes, like visual poetry, to share their discoveries with the audience while inviting them to explore the theme in their own lives, providing a connection between entertainment and socio-political theatre.

With roots in both cabaret and Japanese style butoh (pictured above), the performance promises to be entertaining & provocative. And of course, all proceeds are going to a worthy cause.

Hope to see you there!

Massive Monthly | October

2006-10-25T08:56:00.000-05:00

In an effort to keep BLYGAD readers in the AFH 'know', I'm rolling out the Massive Monthly, a monthly Architecture for Humanity news update that will usually correspond with the AFH monthly newsletter (of course, you could always just go straight to the source and sign up for the newsletter). So, with little time to waste, and a massive amount of news to cover, let's jump in:

AFH LOCAL CHAPTER NEWS
We're happy to welcome three new AFH local chapters to the family: Venice Beach California, Ames Iowa, and Austin Texas. In other chapter news, AFH San Francisco has a new website and is recruiting members. And, as always, You can find links to all of the AFH Local Chapters with a web presence in the sidebar to the right.

AFH INTERNATIONAL NEWS - THE OPEN ARCHITECTURE NETWORK
The Open Architecture Network is an idea on the grandest scale, it's also quite a mouthful to try and describe so I'm going to leave it up to the man behind it all, Cameron Sinclair:

"Since winning the TED Prize in March we've been working with a number of technology companies to develop a new community and gathering place for those interested in improving the built environment to collaborate, implement and research sustainable innovative projects and practices around the world. Architects, community groups, international NGOs and others could post their own projects, search and review the work of others, contribute to shared resources, collaborate with each other and access project management tools to help implement projects in the field. As a place that helps turn ideas into realizable projects, we are also looking into building user-generated content, materials, technologies, building codes, contracts and other resources. Coupled with this is an open licensing system developed through Creative Commons. We imagine a site that not only helps create, support and implement ideas, but also a place that fosters sustainable, replicable, adaptable and scalable design solutions. The network has a simple mission; to generate design opportunities that will improve living standards for all. We want to launch in 2007 so help us get it done."

And on the hush-hush, we've learned that a new AFH International website is in the works. And with it, a new graphic identity for AFH International. The new site will allow humanitarian designers and community groups to interact in new ways as the community expands, as well as offer a better showcase for all of the great projects going on across the world.

WORLDCHANGING AND DESIGN LIKE YOU GIVE A DAMN BOOK NEWS
Some of the hottest design world news at the moment is the release of WorldChanging.com's new book, aptly titled WorldChanging: A User's Guide for the 21st Century. It has a forward by Al Gore, and introduction by Bruce Sterling, and collection of ideas and writings from some of the smartest designers around the world, including AFH's own Cameron Sinclair.

The perfect companion piece to the WorldChanging book is of course the AFH book, Design Like you Give a Damn. And it has just entered it's second printing! Why I haven't mentioned the book here before is inexcusable, so if you haven't heard about it yet, do check it out, it's a beautiful book. With gift-giving season right around the corner, these are two great books to keep in mind for the socially conscious designer in your life.

RIBA GLOBAL WARMING COMPETITION
The Royal Institute of British Architects - USA announced a new international competition called 'Building A Sustainable World: Life in the Balance.' The competition brief calls for

"...a concept for a maximum capacity sustainable community or an urban subdivision to address shifts in global climate, that have been so vividly demonstrated by increasing numbers of flooding and drought catastrophes."

The First Prize is $10,000. Download the full Competition text here.

AND FINALLY, AFHMN NEWS
Just one event to note at the moment. In support of the WorldChanging Book Tour, AFHMN will have some sort of presence at the Minneapolis tour stop. The event takes place on November 8th at the Kingman Studios in Northeast Minneapolis. It looks like it will be a great time.

"There'll be DJs. There'll be snacks and drinks. There'll be chances to meet and mingle with other folks doing worldchanging work in the Twin Cities. There will even be some surprise guests. In fact, we expect that this may be one of most enjoyable events of our entire tour. We hope you can make it!"

Check out the WorldChanging Tour: Minneapolis website here. For information on all WorldChanging Tour stops, check here.

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Now that you're in the know, we'll return to our irregularly unscheduled content shortly.

The Global Rich List

2006-10-12T12:42:00.000-05:00

So just how rich are you?

If you're like me, you might not be used to thinking of yourself in those terms. And admittedly, it's not always that easy to do when some months you feel like you barely have enough to pay your bills, much less buy groceries, and much much less go out for a drink or two on the weekends.

Well, since we all need a wake-up call now and again, Poke, a London based interactive media firm, created the Global Rich List. They write...

"We are obsessed with wealth. But we gauge how rich we are by looking upwards at those who have more than us. This makes us feel poor.

We wanted to do something which would help people understand, in real terms, where they stand globally. And make us realize that in fact most of us (who are able to view this web page) are in the privileged minority.

We want people to feel rich. And give some of their extra money to a worthwhile charity."

Go ahead, give it a shot... just how rich are you?

Friday Photography | USA by Air

2006-10-06T16:56:00.000-05:00

This online photo journal documents a flight from California to Oshkosh, WI and back for the 2006 Oshkosh Airshow back in July. There are some truly fascinating photos here that really show the geography of the US in an unparalleled way.

See some interesting examples below, and just for kicks - I've keyed each geographic location or point of interest to it's corresponding Wikipedia page. Click the pictures to see a larger version.

The Great Salt Lake Desert (crossed in 30 minutes).

The Great Salt Lake... ever wonder what gives it that odd color? Just ask Wikipedia!

"...Dunaliella salina, a species of algae which releases beta-carotene, and halophilic bacteria which together give the water an unusual reddish or purplish color."

Aha!

A massive coal fired power plant.

The mighty Mississippi River. This picture can't be taken too far from AFHMN's very own Twin Cities.

On the way back: Devils Tower.

And of course, what cross-country aerial adventure would be complete without a fly-over of Mount Rushmore? What an amazing photograph!

See the whole trip here, and have a great weekend!

Friday Photography | Chernobyl Tourism

2006-09-28T23:41:00.002-05:00

These gates mark the entrance to Chernobyl county.

The worst accident in the history of nuclear power occurred at 1:23am on April 26th, 1986. The evacuation and resettlement of over 336,000 people throughout large areas of Ukraine, Belarus, and Russia followed the event. Ground zero, the now radioactive city of Prypiat (home of the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant), has sat "officially" vacant until recently.

In stark contrast to another type of power plant tourism we featured last May, you can now take guided tours of the Chernobyl disaster area. The tour itinerary makes for some interesting reading:

9:00 Depart Kyiv. Two-hour ride northwards to the border of the "exclusion zone". The area is 214 km in perimeter.

11:00 - 14:00 Pass the checkpoint "Dytyatky" and enter the "exclusion zone". Visit to the site of Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant - an enterprise once employed more than 5000 staff. Observe object "Sarcophagus" - concrete and steel shelter covering radioactive masses and debris left after the explosion. Experience the peace and quiet of the ghost-town Prypyat - all 47.500 inhabitants had to abandon their homes the next day after the accident. Explore the deserted apartment blocks, schools, hotels, kinder gardens.

14:00 - 14:30 Lunch (the quality of food is guaranteed).

14:30 - 15:00 A briefing conducted by a specialist of the governmental agency "Chernobylinterinform". Get answers to your questions about the accident, current ecological situation and the future of the exclusion zone.

15:00 - 17:00 Visit to the site of contaminated vehicles. Thousands of tracks, helicopters, armoured personnel vehicles are so soaked with radiation that it is dangerous to approach. Meet the self-settlers, elderly people living in the exclusion zone.

17:00 Leave the exclusion zone.

19:00 Arrive Kyiv

Alexandr Vikulov recently took one such tour and has made some of his fascinating photographs available here.

A totally abandoned city. All the trees you see are new growth since 1986: a radioactive urban forest.

All new pipes run above ground as the soil is so contaminated.

This artwork began appearing some time after the disaster. It appears all over the city. Artistic remnants from the cities first post-radiation tourists.

See the whole set here.
Read more about guided tours of Chernobyl here.
Read more about the hauntingly beautiful Prypiat street art at Wooster Collective and at Wormwood Forest.

Related Posts:
The Evolution of Eco-Tourism?

AlertMap: Real-time Disaster Events

2006-09-28T12:04:00.000-05:00

"The Havaria Emergency and Disaster Information Services in Budapest Hungary, uses Google Maps to offer a real-time interactive display of the world's ongoing disasters, with clickable descriptions, coordinates, damage levels." - Bryon Finoki via Archinect via Smart Mobs via information aesthetics

Everything from forest fires on the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region to a chemical spill that happened yesterday in Massachusetts. Also covering: biological hazards, epidemic hazards, earthquakes, tropical storm systems, tornados, hails, airplane accidents & incidents, & active vulcanoes.

Link to AlertMap here.

Friday Photography | Libraries

2006-09-01T12:46:00.000-05:00

And now for something completely different.

These beautiful shots of libraries from all over the world are by Candida Hofer, a German born photographer. The images you see below are actually just scans from her book, aptly titled Libraries, taken by JMorrison over at thenonist.com.

To see more images like those above, click here.

To read a bit more about the book and possibly purchase a copy for yourself, click here.

And to see more of the photographer's work, click here.

Happy Friday!

LAO America Update | CAMPAIGN FOR CARPET

2006-08-23T18:02:00.000-05:00

About a month ago we held a charrette to help a local non-profit, Lao America, look into renovation possibilities. (Read more about that charrette here.) While investigating their community center for immediate areas of improvement it became clear that the children's library and play area could desperately use carpeting.

To help them get started we are asking architects and designers who might have access to outdated carpet tile samples to donate them to the cause. Too often architecture firms end up throwing out valuable material samples that might be able to find a second life being put to good use.

If you think you might be able to help, please click on the image below for more details.

If not, just keep re-use in mind next time you're cleaning out the sample room :)

Tsunami Recovery in Thailand | Part 10: FRUSTRATION OVER AID

2006-08-23T17:33:00.000-05:00

(Part 10 of a 12 part series)

Five weeks after the Tsunami hit, Sishir Chang went to Thailand to see how the people there were recovering and to see how those concerned could help. The following is the tenth installment of his experiences in the aftermath of one of the world's most devastating natural disasters. Originally published in the Southasian, the article is being republished here, with previously unpublished photographs, with the author's permission.
___

Part 10: FRUSTRATION OVER AID

Italian volunteers from the organization New Acropolis

One of the most frequent complaints I heard about was the slow and frustrating pace of aid. There’s been such a huge outpouring of aid yet many average Thais don’t feel that much of that has gotten down to them. Many people coming out to help also feel frustrated by the bureaucracy and pace of aid. All of the aid workers that I’d spoken to had bypassed the major relief agencies and governments to come and deliver aid or volunteer themselves.

At Khao Lak one resort had set up its own tsunami volunteer aid center staffed by people who had showed up on their own to help. According to the aid center’s spokesperson Sophie Konnaris, all of them are volunteers who have come on their own money and time with very few having training or experience in dealing with disasters. In other cases individual towns in western countries have raised money to send volunteers. Duane Reid and George Thomson, volunteer paramedics, were sponsored by their hometown of Emerald, Queensland in Australia to come and help. While the town of Inverell in New South Wales, Australia had adopted the village of Bang Niang. There Rosemay Breen and Anna Thivakon brought with them aid and resources to help rebuild the village that had been wiped out by the tsunami. In a true example of ad hoc aid they enlisted a group of Italians from the organization Nuovo Akropoli (New Acropolis) who had showed up on their own accord at one of the refugee camps to see where they could help out. There they met Rosemary and Anna who quickly put them to work on rebuilding houses in Bang Niang.

A Khao Lak resort turned impromptu aid center

Frequent visitors and tourists to Phuket have also been bringing aid apart from official channels. I met the Grimm family in Kamala where the mixed Australian and German family had been having reunions for years. They had planned this year’s reunion well in advance of the tsunami but had had some trepidation about whether to come after the tsunami. As one member of the family put it, “Some of our friends thought it was disgusting to see people sunbathing where people had died.” After emailing people they knew in Thailand who told them to come they went ahead. For them this trip has turned into more of an aid mission than a vacation because they brought with them funds they had raised at home to distribute to people they knew in Kamala. Many of these funds were raised from people who lived in their home countries but who they had met in Kamala. On the day I met them they were there to see if the locals they knew had survived the tsunami. Unfortunately the resort they usually stayed at had been damaged by the tsunami and they had to stay at another beach.

Rebuilding the temple in Kamala

Other examples of ad hoc aid coming to the region was in the rebuilding of the temple and school in Kamala by the Grand Lodge of Western Australia and the Thai Rotary Club. Also in Kamala the Thai Rotary Club is helping fishermen get new boats. Sia, a Kamala resident, had owned four houses and a restaurant and laundry business with her family, which had been destroyed along with her sister and niece killed. She has since started reconstruction with aid donated by old customers from Europe. While I ate lunch in her makeshift restaurant she proudly showed off the construction work being done and pictures of the German who donated the money to buy the concrete. According to Sia it doesn’t do much good to give money to the Thai government or major aid groups but its better to bring it directly to the people.

AFHMN Project | LAO America Community Center

2006-08-18T12:40:00.001-05:00

The LAO America Facility.

The Lao Advancement Organization of America (LAO America) is a non profit organization based in Minneapolis, Minnesota whose core mission is to give local Lao families the tools they need to succeed in their new homeland. They have been helping the Laotian community foster education, employment, and economic opportunities since 1988.

After years of serving the community, they decided it was time to take a step back and re-evaluate their facility. They got in touch with AFHMN, and after a few initial visits to the building, we held a charrette. The goal of the charrette was to break up the rather daunting task of building renovation into managable chunks of information for LAO America to digest and take action on.

Charrette participants hard at work in the main hall.

On the morning of Saturday, July 22, members of Architecture for Humanity Minnesota and local designers, builders, and students interested in helping met at the LAO Cultural Center for a design charrette focused on improvements to the group's existing building and site. Participants divided into four groups to focus on specific design issues: site, exterior building, interior building, and sustainability. After a morning of working and discussion with several LAO America community members, everyone shared a meal of traditional Laotian food, and the four teams presented their drawings and ideas.

A site plan, one of many drawings produced for LAO America.

Todd Melby of KFAI Radio spent the morning with us, documenting the charrette process. You can hear the show as part of of the podcast "Building Minnesota" here.

We'd like to thank everybody who came to volunteer at the charrette, including LAO America for inviting us, and Todd Melby for taking some time to help more people see, or rather... hear, AFHMN in action.

LAO America project updates to come as they happen.

Teddy Cruz & Trans-Border Urbanism

2006-07-21T16:24:00.000-05:00

Don't miss Teddy Cruz, who we wrote about back in March, talking about his observations on trans-border urbanism on Architecture Radio.

"Inspired by his studio's location at the border between San Diego, California and Tijuana, Mexico, Cruz's work explores the uniqueness of this bicultural territory. Cruz's work integrates research, theory, and design production to create architecture, interiors, furniture, installations, public art, and landscape interventions. Over the past decade, Cruz has demonstrated a commitment to finding architectural and urban planning solutions for global political and social problems that proliferate in international border zones. Taking his theoretical frame of reference as a starting point, Cruz has pursued investigations that stimulate an unconventional practice addressing the future of "divided" cities and the larger phenomenon of border zones." [Architecture Radio]

Teddy talks about the issues of trans-border urbanism with clarity, insight, and humor. This lecture is a great primer for anyone interested in the subject.

More Information:
Teddy Cruz on Architecture Radio
Border Postcard: Chronicles from the Edge by Teddy Cruz
Cruz Finding New Solutions for Border Living, Architectural Record
Urban Acupuncture, Residential Architect

Related Posts:
Growing Securtiy, or ... Park as Wall
Friday Photography Border Film Project
Friday Photography Sprawl
Shantytowns as New Sub/ Urban Ideal

Friday Photography | Shanghai's Shikumen

2006-07-21T15:12:00.000-05:00

Ted Kane has an interesting gallery at Polar Inertia documenting a soon to be extinct urban housing typology, the Shikumen.

You could think of each Shikumen development like a large city block, the streets around it support pedestrian, bicycle, and auto circulation. From this vantage point, the structure presents itself as a solid mass with openings facing the street usually programmed for commerce. [img: Ted Kane]

"Sometimes referred to as a Lilong development, the Shikumen is a uniquely Shanghai typology that formed during a period of rapid urbanization and increased westernization, resulting in a hybrid of the British row house with the Chinese traditional courtyard house." [Polar Inertia]

Narrow pedestrian alleys, like the one above, organize the solid mass into smaller "blocks". [img: Ted Kane]

The Shikumen are falling victim to raised property values and the Chinese government's desire to stimulate economic growth. Residents are being bought out and relocated into monolithic residential towers similar to ones featured on BLYGAD a couple of weeks ago. Demolished Shikumen are being replaced with western style high-rise commercial developments and condominium towers.

Each alley is lined with residences, much like the British Row House. The name Shikumen is derived by the stone gate entries seen above. Each stone gate leads to a residential courtyard and then to a corresponding residence. [img: Ted Kane]

Compare Ted's photograph above of a delapidated, soon to be demolished, Shikumen pedestrian lane to the similar shot below of a recently renovated Shikumen development.

[img: Wikipedia]

More information:
Lilong Housing, A Traditional Settlement Form, an architectural thesis by Qian Guan
Shikumen, Wikipedia Article
Shanghai, Wikipedia Article (extended information on Shikumen about halfway down)

Related Posts:
Friday Photography 100 x 100
Friday Photography China

Slum Dwellers International: Urbanism From the People Up

2006-06-28T16:26:00.000-05:00

I was ecstatic to find this heartening photo story of the creation, from the ground up, of a replacement village for slums in Lilongwe, the capital city of Malawi. The community was organized through an international super group of federations called Slum Dwellers International.

Selected photo's and their captions:

Preparatory meetings

We are all Architects on the ground

We will smile like this for our real houses

Celebrations during the Ground Breaking Ceremony

The first brick

Adobe Everywhere

Look at our first house coming up

A hub of employment creation

Women power

Home Finally

In the lounge

Future architects

See the whole photo story here.

SDI has built a combined total of 80,000 new homes in countries like South Africa, India, Thailand, Cambodia, & the Philippines.

They do so without help from the United Nations, the IMF, or the World Bank. They do so by empowering people. This is urbanism from the people up. It can be done.

More information about Slum Dwellers International:
Slum Dwellers International (SDI) is a loose network of people's organisations from an increasing number of countries in the [Global] South. The network is made up of Federations of community organisations and other grassroots initiatives that are in the process of developing Federations. Linked to this network is a group of professionals who are committed to supporting Federations of the urban poor.

The SDI affiliates in twenty-three countries have come together to give a voice to the poor in an arena of decision-making that has, in recent years, been confined to global organisations that champion neo-liberal theories of development.

As a counterpoint to these agencies, social movements (such as the women's and environmental movements) have emerged. They see themselves as opponents of centralised state power, backed by these global agencies - the United Nations, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank.

Then there has been a plethora (now diminishing) of organisations in civil society who have mobilised poor individuals, mainly through micro-finance, to help poor people improve their individual standards of living as a means of adapting to the reality created by the alliance of power between multi-laterals and national governments.

SDI affiliates are attempting to pioneer an alternative route to the two that are mentioned above.

Growing Security, or... Park as Wall

2006-06-12T12:32:00.000-05:00

I'm a little late to this one, but it's too interesting to not post:

Mexico to grow 'green wall' along U.S. border - MSNBC

"MEXICO CITY - Mexico is creating an environmental reserve about 30 feet wide and 600 miles long on the Texas border, a “green wall” to protect the Rio Grande from the roads and staging areas that smugglers use to ferry drugs and migrants across the frontier.

Much of this border zone is remote and inhospitable — generally too rough to hike through unless you’re a black bear or a pronghorn sheep, species that have flourished in the area’s deserts and mountains..."

Related Posts:
Friday Photography Border Film Project
Border Stability: One Home at a Time

Tsunami Recovery in Thailand | Part 9: TSUNAMI TOURISM

2006-06-12T11:57:00.000-05:00

(Part 9 of a 12 part series)

Five weeks after the Tsunami hit, Sishir Chang went to Thailand to see how the people there were recovering and to see how those concerned could help. The following is the ninth installment of his experiences in the aftermath of one of the world's most devastating natural disasters. Originally published in the Southasian, the article is being republished here, with previously unpublished photographs, with the author's permission.
___

Part 7: TSUNAMI TOURISM

With so much attention being paid to the tsunami many of the Thais sought to capitalize on it. At many souvenir stalls there were tsunami VCD’s and DVD’s for sale while T-shirt shops sold tsunami t-shirts featuring the Hokusai woodblock print of The Wave. At some places they offered to sell pictures from the tsunami such as of a man running away from a wave breaking through the tops of palm trees, a car on top of a building and piles of debris and bodies washing up along a beach. On the ride in from the airport my driver even offered me a tsunami day package to go see the worst hit place by the tsunami. He even added that lunch and shopping stops would be included.

While it seems crass to commercially take advantage of the tsunami, the residents of Phuket are suffering very much economically because of it. Several Thais that I spoke to said they’re getting very little aid from the government or from major relief agencies. Maem a cabana vendor in Patong was typical, her business had been wiped out in the tsunami and since then she had only received 2,000 Baht (around $50) from the government and nothing from aid organizations. The most aid she had received was 200 Euros from a German for saving his life. Vhola Nathku, an Indian tailor, was rebuilding his store with insurance money but had received nothing from the government, both Thai and Indian. He also said that practically all of the reconstruction being done in Patong was from insurance. A few other Indian tailors I spoke to couldn’t even count on insurance and they called themselves “tsunami refugees” since they had no livelihood after their shop was destroyed and were left hoping to find some other work. The desperation brought on by the tsunami had caused some businesses to include a direct appeal to aid to potential customers like a sign at a massage parlor that said, “Massage; Please to subsidize victim tsunami to pay off debts.”

Friday Photography | 100 x 100

2006-05-19T12:34:00.000-05:00

Michael Wolf does it again: 100 x100. (Thanks for the heads up Chris.)

100 rooms, each room at 100 sqaure feet.
"Photographs of residents in their flats in hong kong's oldest public housing estate."

Exterior pictures of Hong Kong's public housing estates (from the Hong Kong Housing Authority):

Previously on BLYGAD: Michael Wolf - Architecture of Density

John Dwyer's Clean Hub

2006-05-16T15:07:00.000-05:00

Beating us to the punch, Bryan Finoki recently profiled the Clean Hub on Subtopia. The Clean Hub, designed by AFH|MN member John Dwyer, is a self-contained and self-reliant system designed to bring clean water and sanitation to remote locations, disaster relief efforts, refugee camps, and slums.

Tsunami Recovery in Thailand | Part 8: THE RESILIENCE OF SURVIVORS

2006-05-16T12:23:00.000-05:00

(Part 8 of a 12 part series)

Five weeks after the Tsunami hit, Sishir Chang went to Thailand to see how the people there were recovering and to see how those concerned could help. The following is the eighth installment of his experiences in the aftermath of one of the world'’s most devastating natural disasters. Originally published in the Southasian, the article is being republished here, with previously unpublished photographs, with the author's permission.
______

Part 8: THE RESILIENCE OF SURVIVORS

The resilience of those who have survived the tsunami is often astounding. Many of the foreigners who have survived and remain in Phuket are elderly and have chosen to stay because of their love of the place. Marius Poatalle a 75-year-old survivor from Monaco said that he had been washed out of the second floor of his hotel. “I pray to God, Allah, Buddha, anyone!” he said. Even after that experience he still hung out on the beach at Patong showing off the scars he got from the tsunami and haranguing people about French colonial policies in broken English. Another elderly survivor from Australian I met in a Patong nightclub had broken his hip in the tsunami yet in his words the worst thing that happened was that he “couldn’t enjoy all of the lovely Thai ladies.”

The Thais are more circumspect about surviving tsunami. Many of them feel privileged that they’ve survived. According to Maem, a cabana vendor in Patong, “My customers die but I live.” Outwardly its difficult to see if they are suffering from depression or post traumatic stress but I did hear from aid workers and a monk that there are many who are suffering but don’t show it. Aid workers say that in the refugee camps many children have nightmares about being swallowed up by waves. Duane Reid a volunteer paramedic from Australia, said that he’d seen Thais staring fixedly at the sea. Even so he stated that the Thais have dealt with the aftermath far better than he expected, “In Australia after a major disaster people are depressed but here the Thais still seem friendly and upbeat.” He added, “These people have been to hell and back its just amazing what they’ve done.”

The Flophouse: Making an Old Idea New Again

2006-05-06T11:58:00.000-05:00

[image: Harvey Wang]

Last Sunday the New York Times put out an article by Janny Scott titled Making a Flophouse a Home, And a Decent One at That. The article is all about the Andrews House, one of the last remaining Flophouses in New York City. In 1997, Common Ground interviewed aproximately 100 homeless people, all of whom shared a disinterest in the type of housing (with built in social services and support programs) that CG was currently offering.

"Many said they wanted something small, private, safe, cheap; they wanted just enough space for themselves and their belongings. They had a little money, though not enough for an apartment. They could pay. And they wanted anonymity."

CG realized that they didn't need a new housing type, the results of the survey described a housing type that already existed in the form of the Flophouse. As usual, Wikipedia offers us a great definition of the word:

Flophouse: ... A place that offers very cheap lodging, generally by providing only minimal services. Occupants of flophouses generally share bathroom facilities and reside in very cramped quarters. The people who make use of these places are often transients, although some people will stay in flophouses for long periods of time, years or decades. Some people who live in flophouses may be just a step above homelessness. In the late 20th century, typical cost might be about US$6 per night. A typical flophouse might advertise its services with a sign such as "Hotel for Men; Transients Welcome".

Quarters in flophouses are very small, and may resemble office cubicles more than a regular room in a hotel or apartment building. A cubicle might only have wire mesh for a ceiling.

The last sentence there is of particular interest. CG was faced with the challenge of redesigning the Andrews House, a double loaded corridor style building only 17 feet wide, into something that provided viable spaces to live.

[aproximate floor plan of the Andrews House]

As it existed, The Andrews House was only a “home” in name. What vitality and integrity the structure retained came only from it's residents. The living cubicles, cramped and lacking sunlight, became a place for the men living there to keep and proudly display their worldly possessions. It was a place to take respite from the outside world, even if just by watching TV on the small bed, but as it was, the building was in desperate need of a makeover.

[image: inside the Andrews House, James Estrin]

[image: a corridor splits the 17' wide building]

[image: inside the cubicles, years of possessions]

In admirable fashion, Common Ground opened up this monumental challenge to the design community with a competition. The winning entries all met the challenge to varying degrees of success and the Andrews House is currently under construction, set to open in the spring of 2007. You can see from the images below that many of the winning designs addressed at least two of the major design concerns: how to bring light into the cubicles and how to maximize the space efficiency of the tight quarters.

[image: "Kit of Parts" by LifeForm]

[image: "The Ordering of Things" by Katherine Chang & Aaron Gabriel]

[image: "Soft House" by Forsythe + MacAllen Design]

[image: "Cacoon" by Daniela Fabricius]

Further Information:
NYT video with a more in depth look into Common Ground and The Andrews House.
Flophouse: Life on the Bowery by David Isay & Stacey Abramson, with Photographs by Harvey Wang.

Friday Photography | Recreation Vehicle Homesteading

2006-05-05T15:49:00.000-05:00

Recreational Vehicle: ... an enclosed piece of equipment dually used as both a vehicle and temporary travel home. (Wikipedia)

Homesteading: ... Currently the term homesteading applies to anyone who is a part of the back to the land movement and who chooses to live a sustainable, self-sufficient lifestyle. (Wikipedia)

[image: Mac Kane]

[image: Mac Kane]

[image: Mac Kane]

For more in the way of Long Term Visitor Areas (i.e., nodal points for the creation of instant cities), off-grid living, nomadic lifestyles, and freedom from property taxes, see Mac Kane's online exhibition Border Camping at Polar Inertia.

Tsunami Recovery in Thailand | Part 7: SEX, DRUGS & TSUNAMI RELIEF

2006-05-04T08:42:00.000-05:00

(Part 7 of a 12 part series)

Five weeks after the Tsunami hit, Sishir Chang went to Thailand to see how the people there were recovering and to see how those concerned could help. The following is the seventh installment of his experiences in the aftermath of one of the world's most devastating natural disasters. Originally published in the Southasian, the article is being republished here, with previously unpublished photographs, with the author's permission.
___

Part 7: SEX, DRUGS, & TSUNAMI RELIEF

Thailand is known for its beauty and culture but the country also has a seamy reputation. For decades it’s been a major stop for sex tours and a place for unabashed hedonism. Even with the tsunami that was still true and judging from the majority of tourists still coming to Patong the pursuit of pleasures of the flesh was alive and well. A ubiquitous site in Patong was fat middle-aged European men with small delicate Thai women. You would see them walking on the beach, shopping in town, eating in restaurants and drinking in bars. Foreign men without women would often be in the process of finding women and scantily clad Thai women would be in the process of finding foreign men. Some of the time the interaction would be a straight up exchange of money for sex which some men were fairly brazen about but in many cases these foreign lonely hearts would get a temporary Thai girlfriend to spend time with. They would take them out at night and to the beach while paying for their meals, buy them gifts and give them money. In turn the women would keep them company both sexually and emotionally for all purposes like any other happy couple on vacation. The Patong scene catered to more than just heterosexual men but there were also many slight Thai men accompanying foreign men along with others who catered to heterosexual women. According to a female visitor from Ireland a Thai women had even offered her services to her.

With tourism down there was an over abundance of Thai women, and men, looking for foreigners. In many of the bars it was common to see several skimpily clad Thai women sitting around looking for men. Anytime an unaccompanied foreign male would enter the bar these women would aggressively pounce on him and vie for his attention. To some this was a boon as Warrick an Englishman in his forties and a frequent visitor to Patong enthusiastically confided in me, “There are so many girls out there you can pick the best.” Also following the law of supply and demand he mentioned that now was a great time to get women because prices were down, “for about $50 you can get a girl for all night.”

Prostitution is technically illegal in Thailand but is tolerated and there seems to be no shame among the Thais about it. Thai culture has historically been accepting of having mistresses. At the same time the appetite for sex and companionship continues to draw many men to Phuket in spite of the tsunami. With tourism down overall it’s very likely that without these men there might not be any tourism at all.

Tsunami relief also came from indulgences besides sex. A few bars advertised reduced priced or special drinks because of the tsunami and even drug dealers chipped in to help. While I was there a local drug dealer of a type of mephamphetamine called “Ya-Ba” was arrested. His angle for getting customers was that he pledged to donate a third of his profits to tsunami relief. This proved so successful that he quit his regular job to deal full time. He also stuck to his pledge and by the time of his arrest he had donated about 13,000 Baht ($325) to the Army’s tsunami relief fund.

Tsunami Recovery in Thailand | Part 6: COME TO PHUKET

2006-05-02T09:05:00.000-05:00

(Part 6 of a 12 part series)

Five weeks after the Tsunami hit, Sishir Chang went to Thailand to see how the people there were recovering and to see how those concerned could help. The following is the sixth installment of his experiences in the aftermath of one of the world's most devastating natural disasters. Originally published in the Southasian, the article is being republished here, with previously unpublished photographs, with the author's permission.
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Part 6: COME TO PHUKET

EMPTY BEACHES

Even with the scale of the tsunami Phuket still remains beautiful. Unfortunately for the Thais the place is far below its tourist capacity and I had heard that many tourists are staying away out of fear, uncertainty and even guilt. In Patong I was told by everyone that I talked to that the number of visitors was very down. November to May is supposed to be their high season when many businesses earn enough money to make it through the rest of the year. The beach at Patong was only about half full while some other beaches, even those untouched by the tsunami, had even less. At night many of the bars and restaurants were nearly empty, often to the consternation of the Thai women who worked them as hostesses or to troll for lonely foreigners.

Tourism is the backbone of Phuket’s economy and without it recovery will be very difficult, if not impossible. In the town of Kamala I spoke to Tan, a shopkeeper who had lost three of his stores and was in the process of rebuilding one of them. The store he said was being paid for from his own savings and a bank loan and whether he could rebuild his other stores would depend on how well the next few seasons went. The Thais and frequent visitors all wanted to let people know that tourists should return to Phuket. Some visitors who had been to Phuket before and enjoyed it were upset by what they felt was overblown and sometimes wrong coverage by the media regarding the extent of damage.

REBUILDING AN ECONOMY, ONE ATTRACTION AT A TIME

Marty Testa, a visitor from Ohio, even tried to call a radio station back home to tell them that they were exaggerating the extent of damage to Phuket. Debbie Cliff and Celia Frodham frequent visitors to Phuket from England said that Phuket had gotten a lot of bad publicity and that its time it got some good publicity. At first many of their friends had told them not to go to Phuket but they went ahead anyway and have not regretted their decision. Even though I was speaking to them on the ruins of a seawall where once a seafood restaurant that they frequented stood they said, “you can still do everything as before.”

The Evolution of Eco-Tourism?

2006-05-01T21:37:00.000-05:00

THE BUFFALO RIDGE WIND TOWERS

Western Minnesota is a wind power hotspot and in the past 6 years wind farms have begun to pop up all over the landscape to take advantage. In an encouraging sign of the marketability of alternative forms of energy, the town of Hendricks has begun to promote the high concentration of windmills in the area as one incentive for green-minded families to move from the city to a more rural location, as in this excerpt from the city's home page:

"The residents of Hendricks have focused on creating a town which is a perfect place for children. Our school district is one of the best in the nation. Our weather is temperate and provides for four seasons of fun. We are well grounded in our past, as we continue to worship in a prairie church which is now on the National Register of Historic Places. We look to better our tomorrow through efforts such as our wind farms and organic farming. We believe you will find the Hendricks Minnesota quality of life second to none."

SPEND A NIGHT AT THE MIDWEST CENTER FOR WIND ENERGY

If you like the steps Hendricks is taking towards a more sustainable planet, but still aren't sold on the whole package, you might want to consider a night or two "atop a bluff within the world's largest wind farm" at the Midwest Center for Wind Energy. 75 to 100 dollars will get you a night of lodging on the cutting edge of alternative power in the US, not to mention a continental breakfast. Fellow guests to this wind power epicenter include some of the world's top aeronautical scientists and technicians.

With the ever-unstable cost of crude oil consistently rising, it is more important then ever to show support for alternative means of power. Even if you can't make it to Hendricks, MN there is at least one simple way you can show your support: The 3.3 million Xcel Energy customers in the US now have the option to buy blocks of wind power that will supplement the traditional forms of energy they usually consume. After signing up, a portion of your energy (proportional to how many blocks you buy) will come from local wind generation. (Thanks to Jess at Greenlight for the tip.)

THE CHANGING MIDWESTERN LANDSCAPE

This is a great way to single handedly increase the use of a clean & renewable energy source and make a strong statement in support of a new type of sustainable fuel economy.

Via Inhabitat: Post-Slum Payatas

2006-04-26T08:57:00.000-05:00

Writing for Inhabitat, Bryan Finoki takes an in-depth look at poverty, slums, dump-site economies and an organization in the Philippines, Gawad Kalinga, that is using disaster relief as a catalyst for changing the socio-economic infastructure that creates such situations in the first place.

Excerpt:
It's good to see organizations that not only deal with the conditions of poverty, but the perceptions (self-perception included) of it, too. Moleto says, "Poverty is not just an absence of money. [...] You just can'’t take away the slums; you also have to take away the slum mentality of the people who live there." And, perhaps the way slums are perceived in general. While this type of poverty can be dehumanizing, I am sure he would agree that for the people who salvage a livelihood for themselves there, the slums are actually a great source of pride and strength, if, at the very minimum, as a means of survival. Indeed, some of the greatest triumphs of human spirit and entrepreneurialism can be found deep within the urban networks of rampant global poverty. Nevertheless, this type of community building just goes to show, if we can continue to bring needed resources together, often times these vibrant and thriving communities will assemble themselves with far greater capacity and ingenuity than perhaps anyone else could provide for them. Isn't that the true source of human pride?

Read the whole post here and more at Bryan's own blog, Subtopia, here.

Tsunami Recovery in Thailand | Part 5: TWO TALES OF SURVIVAL

2006-04-22T22:50:00.000-05:00

(Part 5 of a 12 part series)

Five weeks after the Tsunami hit, Sishir Chang went to Thailand to see how the people there were recovering and to see how those concerned could help. The following is the fifth installment of his experiences in the aftermath of one of the world's most devastating natural disasters. Originally published in the Southasian, the article is being republished here, with previously unpublished photographs, with the author's permission.
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Part 5: TWO TALES OF SURVIVAL

1. The Monk’s Tale

ABBOT POON SAWATT, IMAGE FROM SISHIR CHANG

Abbot Poon Sawatt presides over Wat Kamala, the small Buddhist temple that serves the village of Kamala. On the morning of December 26th at 9:50AM he was on the second floor of the monks’ residence readying a talk he was going to give that morning. As he looked out over the bay he noticed the water was very dark and rushing onto land. Soon the temple and its grounds were under about a meter (3 feet) of water but in about 2 minutes the water subsided leaving many fish trapped on land. The locals began to collect the fish but as they did so the water came back this time higher and higher. Soon the pictures of the life of the Buddha that decorated the second story of the temple were no longer visible and boats were being dragged inland. The building the Abbot was in broke and he found himself suddenly being tumbled underwater.

As he tumbled he heard a roaring sound that filled his ears. Eventually he managed to grab onto a tree and pull himself up above the water. As he pulled himself up he had to fend off debris with his free hand and saw a bus being pushed by the water. He suddenly noticed a tin roof coming towards him and dove back under to avoid getting his head cut off by the roof. As he did so more water struck and pushed him inland further. After awhile the water dumped him onto a pile of sand almost 700 meters (2,100 feet) away from the temple. He had survived but lost all of his clothes and grabbed a shirt to tie around him to go to the hospital. Even though he and another monk had lived three monks in the same building had died. 63 others, including 22 foreigners, had also lost their lives in Kamala. A school near the temple had been devastated but fortunately wasn’t in session at the time.

2. “Water Go Home!”

PETER & GERTI, IMAGE FROM SISHIR CHANG

Peter and Gerti Trausdorf are Austrians in their 60’s who spend winters in Phuket. At around 10:00 AM on December 26th they had just gotten to the beach and Peter had just ordered his breakfast of Johk (Thai rice porridge) as he was settling down one of the cabana workers told him that the water had disappeared. He looked up and noticed that the water had gone out of Patong Bay about 600 meters (1,800 feet) or more. Several fish were stranded on the bottom of the suddenly dry bay. Peter thought no more of it as his food arrived. Just as he started to take his first bite Gerti started screaming “The water is coming back!” Peter looked up to see a wall of water rapidly approaching the beach. He jumped up onto a low sea wall and grabbed onto a railing as the water rose up to one and a half meters (5 feet) around him. As he clung on he realized that he couldn’t see his wife. Unknown to him Gerti was trapped on the beach underneath beach umbrellas that had been displaced by the wave. Just as suddenly the water receded and Gerti managed to get clear of the umbrellas.

Peter grabbed his wife and pulled her up just in time as the next wave hit. This one was much larger and as the water rose it lifted Peter and Gerti up above the level of the railing. As Peter was lifted up about a meter (3 feet) above the railing he hung on with one hand and with the other to his wife while around him beach umbrellas, motorbikes and even cars were being thrown about. Fortunately none of them hit them. As the wave lifted them higher and higher he started to shout, “Water go home!” As he shouted the water did start receding but as it did it brought debris out with it. Peter and Gerti found themselves having to fend off debris as it came hurtling at them. A tree struck Peter in the leg just below the knee and gashed him badly. As the water rushed past the tree broke and was swept out. Finally the water dropped back down to normal and Peter noticed his leg badly bleeding.

He and Gerti realized they needed to get to a hospital and started to make their way up the ruined streets. As they did Gerti fell into a sinkhole but managed to hang onto Peter who pulled her out. Stopping at a store Peter got some rice whiskey and washed out his wound. As they made their way down the main street of Patong, a block away and running parallel to the beach, the next wave hit. This one was even larger and Peter and Gerti rapidly scrambled up the steps of a bank to get away. Once the water receded again they ran into a police officer who seeing how badly Peter was bleeding commandeered a truck to take him through the flooded streets to the hospital in central Patong.

At the hospital wounded and dead were streaming in. A nurse stitched Peter up quickly while medical personal set up a triage system to deal with the most injured. As the staff dealt with those wounded more severally than Peter he got some dressings and disinfectant and bandaged up his wound. At that point he felt well enough to go back to his hotel and refused an offer to be flown to the international hospital in Phuket. Even though he felt well enough to go the hospital staff wouldn’t let him leave the hospital because for the next several hours rumors of another tsunami would come in each hour and the staff would frantically herd people up to the second floor of the hospital. By 5 PM it was obvious that another tsunami wasn’t going to hit and they left the hospital. In the water they had lost all of their keys, money and anything else they had on the beach. Peter was forced to break into his hotel room with a piece of metal debris.

Even though they endured the worst of the tsunami Peter and Gerti have decided to remain in Phuket and to come back next year. Their son has asked them to come back to Austria but they figure that the tsunami is a small price to pay to get away from the cold and the snow of Austrian winter. Anyway as Peter said with a smile, “Now I know when a tsunami is coming. When the water disappears I know to run. Sometimes when I’m sleeping on the beach I wake up to see if the water is still there. If it is I know everything is all right and go back to sleep.”