SPURA is one of the many adopted acronyms used to describe New York City’s division of neighborhoods. But unlike SOHO, NOHO, or Tribeca, SPURA is actually the name of a development site in Lower Manhattan, the Seward Park Urban Renewal Area, to be exact. The history of the site is a story of politics, economics and social pressures. After fifty years of debates between community leaders, activists and designers, the City Planning Commission has given a proposed development plan the green light. That means that following a land-use review process called ULURP, a city council vote and the Mayor Bloomberg’s final approval, the site may finally transition from a street level parking lot into a mixed-use development full of retail stores, offices, community facilities, a new Essex Street market, a hotel, a park and 900 apartments that will occupy 1.65-million-square-feet.

Join us after the break to read more on the development and to see other alternative creative proposals that this site has inspired over the years.

The life of a city-funded project is a tumultuous one. After winning a design competition early this year and receiving public support to move forward, Diller, Scofidio + Renfro’s “Granite Web” design for the redevelopment of the nineteenth-century Terrace Gardens in Aberdeen, Scotland was recently rejected by the city council in a 22-20 vote. The project promised to bring a revived pulse to the heart of the city centre with a public space that would bring a year-round civic garden onto the “unattractive” Denburn dual carriageway and railway line.

More after the break.

By invitation of Director David Chipperfield, MVRDV and The Why Factory will participate in the 2012 Venice Biennale. The main contribution consists of the collaborative project ‘Freeland’ forming part of the single exhibition in the Central Pavilion at the Giardini. Further contribution is made by Winy Maas and The Why Factory with ‘Porous City’ to the EU CITY Program, initiated by the European Forum for Architectural Policies (EFAP) representing Europe for the first time at the Venice Architecture Biennale.

More details on the two exhibitions after the break.

The Danish Pavilion for the 2012 Venice Biennale will feature a collaboration between Greenlandic and Danish Architects called “Possible Greenland”. The exhibition will address the current development of the Arctic Region as Greenland undergoes a shift towards political independence and business development in the midst of dramatic climate changes. “Possible Greenland” attempts to look optimistically at the climate changes that are causing ice melts throughout Greenland. The shifting planes result in the exposure of vast mineral resources that can kickstart new industries and allow new urban cultures to emerge. The team of architects that designed “Possible Greenland” were led by internationally renowned Professor in geology at the University of Copenhagen, Minik Rosing and the young Danish architect firm NORD Architects of Copenhagen.

Explore the possibilities with us after the break.

Representing Brazil at the 2012 Venice Biennale will be StudioMK27 and Lúcio Costa‘s 1964 installation “Riposatevi”. The exhibit takes an intimate look at the lives of multi-generational households in modern Brazilian architecture. Curated by Lauro Cavalcanti, the Brazilian pavilion will investigate the intersections between traditional and contemporary artistic tendencies and will feature the movie installation, “Peep”, by Lea Van Steen and Marcio Kogan, with photography by Cleisson Vidal. The event will take place between August 29th and November 25th in the Giardini and Arsenale buildings in Venice.

More after the break. 

The Poland Pavilion at the 2012 Venice Biennale will feature a design exploration into the interaction between sound and architecture in creating our environment. The project, by Katarzyna Krakowiak, is a sound sculpture that presents architecture as a primary system of listening. The sculpture collaborates with neighboring pavilions and echos the sounds that reach the Polish Pavilion, highlighting its acoustic qualities. The exhibit will be on view from August 29th through November 29th.

More on the exhibit after the break.

“Open City: London, 1500-1700″, an exhibit running at the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, DC, explores the two hundred year period in which London was transformed from a medieval capital to an early modern metropolis. During this period the city suffered a series of traumatic events including plagues, religious disputes, civil wars, the Great Fire, political instability and economic upheaval. This exhibit allows the audience to witness that despite these drawbacks in its history, London came out on top as the capital of a global empire. Looking at the city as places of gathering: churches, theaters and markets, “Open City” explores ways in which citizens dealt with the changes in their political, economic and social systems. The exhibit is curated by Kathleen Lynch and will be running through September 30th.

More after the break.

The relationship between social dynamics and architecture has always been intimate. It is a constant dialogue between social norms and politics, stylistic trends and aesthetic choices, individual preferences and the collective good. The Modernist Period was a time when architecture took on the challenge of many social problems. In all the arts – architecture, design, music and film – the period was highly politicized and the choices often gave way to a utilitarian ideal that was a hybrid of efficiency, simplicity and comfort. Jake Gorst’s new film Modern Tide: Midcentury Architecture on Long Island, supported by Design Onscreen, is a message of preservation that takes us through the history of the modernist housing boom that took place on Long Island, NY in the period between the Great Depression and the 1970s.

On August 14th, Cook+Fox Architects hosted a private film screening at their office on 641 Ave of the Americas, presenting the treasures along the island’s shore that have fallen between the cracks of history. The film looks at works from Albert Frey, Wallace Harrison, Frank Lloyd Wright, Marcel Breuer, Philip Johnson, Charles Gwathmey, Barbara and Julian Neski and many others.

Follow us after the break to catch up on the history of the development of these houses on Long Island.

“Erupting Stability: Tornado Proof Suburb” is a project being developed by Ted Givens, AIA, of 10 Design in Hong Kong. He and his team are researching ways to apply kinetic design to architecture in order to provide safe options for shelter in climatically unsafe environments. The goal is to break free from static ways of building and create a method of using technology that learns from and responds to the environment in a dynamic way. ”Erupting Stability” assesses the forces of tornadoes and high velocity winds, specifically, by the way that he and his team are thinking about architecture opens up a range of possibilities for applications in any disaster scenario.

Join us after the break for more on the project and a video that demonstrates how it works.

For Taiwan’s seventh year at the Venice Biennale, the Taiwanese team will present Architect/Geographer – Le Foyer de Taiwan. The exhibition will embody the main theme of the 2012 Venice Architecture Biennale which is “Common Ground”. The aspects of Taiwanese culture and architecture will be presented through the perspective of a geographer as mapping that can uncover a new understanding of Taiwan through international eyes. The team is supervised by the Ministry of Culture, organized by the National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts, and curated by Ke-Fung Liou. The exhibit will be displayed at Palazzo delle Prigioni.

Follow us after the break for more on the exhibit.

At a time when sustainability is high on the agenda and construction costs continue to soar, many Cambridge residents are questioning a proposal to demolish a sound and respected school building to replace it with a new school one that will strive to be a “green facility”. The Martin Luther King Elementary School (1968-1971) was designed by Catalan architect Josep Lluis Sert (Sert, Jackson and Associate). As it stands today, the school compliments the many other buildings in Cambridge that Sert worked on while also teaching at Harvard University, including the Peabody Terrace Graduate Housing complex just across the street.

Read on to find out what the community is doing to save the building from demolition and why it can prove to be a more sustainable option for the city.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Energy Star program has launched the 2012 National Building Competition: Battle of the Buildings. This year, 3,200 buildings across the country will be competing to improve energy efficiency, lower utility costs and protect health and the environment. With that kind of challenge, every participant wins. Last year, 245 participants saved a combined $5.2 million on their utility bills and prevented nearly 30,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide. The competition is open to commercial buildings, which are responsible for approximately 20% of the nation’s energy use and greenhouse gas emissions at a cost of more than $100 billion annually in energy bills.

A winner will be announced in April 2013.  In the meantime, follow us after the break for more on the potential behind this competition.

Now through November 5th, the Museum of Modern Art will be running Century of the Child: Growing by Design, 1900-2000, a new exhibit that surveys modern design and innovation through the exploration of childhood development and well-being. Prior to the 20th century, childhood was not considered a time of development for the human brain. As Ken Johnson points out in his reviewof the exhibit, “children were considered small adults to be put to work as soon as possible”. The 20th century changed all that and modern psychology bore a great deal of influence on investigations into childhood and development. Modernist design followed, creating a whole new set of tools that children could interact with, learn from, and be entertained by. The exhibit has an assortment of furniture, toys, books, games and posters all designed for the child.Read on for more after the break.

In an article published by The Wall Street Journal called For Creative Cities, the Sky Has Its Limit, Richard Florida discusses the development of urban environments and their relative successes. As human migrations are trending towards big cities, the design and appropriation of space within these cities is increasingly important. Florida cites that trends indicate that by 2050 cities will make up 70% of the global population. With so many people, elevate density within cities will be unavoidable, but what Florida emphasizes is that it isn’t just density that makes a vibrant and thriving city. Citing Shanghai and New York City as examples of dense urban environments, Florida explains the differences in their relative architectural and urban developments and the prosperity that follows. The fundamental difference? The prevalence of mixed-use neighborhoods in New York City that overpower the innovation of strictly financial districts of either New York or Shanghai.

Let’s look at these examples after the break.

The AZA 2012 Biennial Festival in Cape Town, South Africa will feature six international architects to join South African architects in a conversation about architectural practice and its role in the context of the city. The participating speakers include David Adjaye, founder of Adjaye Associates, Yoshiharu Tsukamoto and Momoyo Kajima of Atelier Bow-Wow, Tatiana Bilbao, Teddy Cruz of Estudio Teddy Cruz, Rahul Mehrotra, founder of RMA Architects and Kibwe Tavares co-founder of Factory Fifteen, in addition to others. This is the second Architecture ZA event, a premier urban culture festival that brings together cutting-edge thinkers and multi-disciplinary practitioners from around the world. It will be held on September 13-16, 2012 and will include various events, talks, film screenings, conferences and tours.

Read on for more about the speakers invited to AZA 2012.

This year’s winners for the Sustainable Home: Habitat for Humanity Student Design Competition have been announced. The Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture chose five winners, one from each region and an additional prize for the best use of vinyl building materials. The competition asked young professionals to consider building strategies that would advance solutions to poverty with affordable housing that is simple, decent and healthy.

Follow us after the break to view the winning projects.

Over 60 prominent architects, including Frank Gehry and Jeanne Gang, signed a letter asking Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel to grant Bertrand Goldberg‘s Prentice Women’s Hospital landmark status and make it a permanent part of Chicago’s built environment. ”A building this significant”, the letter read, it “should be preserved and reused.” Goldberg’s architectural work has been iconic to Chicago’s city-scape. Building such as Marina City, River City, Wright College and Astor Tower have all made a tremendous impact on the personality of the city.

More on the state of the building after the break.

Anupama Kundoo‘s Wall House, originally built in Auroville, India in 2000, will be partially reconstructed at a 1:1 scale at the Venice Biennale this year for the theme of “Common Ground” by director David Chipperfield. This portion of the exhibition is supported by the University of Queensland, whose students and staff will assist with the construction of the replica alongside Indian craftspeople and Italian builders. The house has been described as a testing ground for spatial and technological innovation. In its debut at the Venice Biennale, it will afford Kundoo the opportunity to further explore these experiments.

Follow us after the break to see the innovations behind this widely acknowledged piece of architecture.