The site for Super Colossal is now live. There are a few dead links in there, but it is mostly complete. So head on over and have a look around! Gravestmor will stay up for about a month and then I will likely redirect traffic over to SC.
If you are a subscriber, the new RSS feed may be found here.
We are, I hope all familiar with The Pritzker Prize. It is architecture’s richest prize and I guess as result, considered its most prestigious. It is awarded each year by the Hyatt Foundation to an architect with a substantial body of consistently high quality work that upholds the highest values of design.
As such it seems a little strange that the official website so utterly, terribly, eye-puncturingly, horrifically designed? Don’t believe me? Let us have a look:
Click - Enter - to enter. Before you do though, note that the site was last updated in April 2006. Not as you may imagine, in say, 1997.
Awesome. Frames. So retro.
In order for you to gain a full appreciation of the site I have taken the liberty to point out a few of the more subtle features:
A quick look at the source code reveals that the site was made in Microsoft Frontpage, which begs the question - With a prize for US$100,000.00 given out each year why not spend a couple of bucks to get someone to design something that even remotely does justice to the work of the architects being awarded?
So my question is, who is going to tell the blind/vision-impaired about this?
Tactile indicators are the second scourge delivered on the world’s cities by the litigious handicapped - the first of course being 1:14 ramp gradients. So it is wonderful to see this sign warning of the dangers of these things in a medium unable to be read by those that make use of the indicators.
It is difficult to camouflage a battleship. I know I am preaching to the converted here; this is a realisation we have all arrived at on our own.However during WWI, faced with changing weather, various climatic conditions and the insistence of the Germans in sinking their boats, the British Navy had a crack at it. Norman Wilkinson, developed a series of patterns, based on cubism that did not try to hide the ship so much as disrupt the viewing of it.
These boats were the Dazzle Ships. The theory was that U-Boat Captains, staring through their periscopes, would have difficulty judging not only the distance to the enemy target but also which direction it was moving. Thus making aiming a torpedo troublesome.
The Clover. Sketch above, reality below.
Perspective deployed as an evasive tactic.
[update] Rob provides some notes on the world of the Camofleur, an afficianodo of Camoflage.
As mentioned the other day, Johnson Pilton Walker have been awarded the commision for the new National Portrait Gallery in the ACT.
There is not a great deal of information on the actual building on the website - a perspective or two, a video that won’t load, an illegible plan. However, with JPW at the helm, I am sure that there is nothing to worry about - they have been entrusted with the Opera House renovations after all and produce arguably Sydney’s finest commercial buildings.
However what the official release does have though is lots of words (uncredited so I am not sure if they belong to the architects, the client, the PR department, monkeys). They are words like these:
“It is expressive of the diversity, creativity and openness of the Australian character.”
“The design reinforces our national identity, and encourages us reflect on what it means to be Australian.”
“The public spaces are planned on a single level with no apparent hierarchy and thus reflects the egalitarian character of Australians.”
What a you beaut bonza gallery this is gonna be! Throw another Portrait of Dame Edna on the barbie!
Architecture as jingoistic propaganda.
You only have to look at the eradication of collective bargaining and the newly introduced sedition laws (trust us! we’re only going after the baddies!) to know that Australia is not a country that votes for openness, a fair go and civil liberties. It is a nation that votes to close its borders and to protect mortgage repayments.
Again at the press conference, the gallery’s director, Andrew Sayers laid the nationalism on thick, saying that
“as a functional woolshed shows its bones, so will this building reveal its structure in a very elegant way.”
Fucking woolsheds. The woolshed has to be the most abused reference in Australian architecure. How is this building like a woolshed? Because it has large open spaces? Dude, its a gallery. Large open space and natural light are nothing in this department. Because it has an exposed structure? Please.
This is a general alert (RELAX. I’m holding things at a demure Elevated, Yellow) for all those that have visited Ronchamp in the fifty or so years preceding September 11 2005. For, before then ye faithful sketching hordes, Ronchamp ’twas not a consecrated church, which I guess until now made it just a humble shed.
The word is, that it was blessed in 1955 at its inaugruation, however it was not formally consecrated. Consecration involves the devotion of relics - Corb himself could have filled this role - the recitation of the litany, some incense burning, some candle lighting and the anointing of the walls and the altar. Without consecration, mass can only be carried out in a building with express written permission from the local bishop. It is unclear whether Ronchamp was given this dispensation, however consecration was carried out in September this year so if you have been there since the 12th you should be dandy.
I for one am not dandy. I visited earlierthis year and while I wouldn’t be so crass as to demand my 1 euro donation for the candle I lit refunded, it would be nice to know if the Chapel of Notre Dame du etc had some kind of scheme in place whereby previous prayers, solemn thanks, grateful silence and general goodwill to all peoples could be reimbursed.
Sydney has taken the next step to becoming a fully fledged theme park with the announcement of the Skywalk. The nonsense began a couple of years ago when the Bridge Climb began filling the top of the harbour bridge with a relentless march of teeny little grey clad tourists. Sydney went crazy for it - you have to book, like, months in advance - and it is costs $245.00 AUD…
You: Did you say two hundred and forty five dollars?
Me: Heck yes I did. But slow down, that’s Australian Dollars. It’s about one eighty three in the US.
You: Well, that is still rather dear…
Climbing the Harbour Bridge had previously been the domain of drunken teenagers and schoolkids trying to rescue their footy at lunchtime but with the privatisation of our skyline, anyone and everyone is up there grinning for the cameras.
I am less convinced by this NKOTB however. From what I understand, it is a small platform perched out from the side of Sydney (nee Centrepoint) Tower. The thing is, you can already, go up Centrepoint, have a look at the view and eat at a revolving restaurant. That is what it was built for 24 years ago. How standing outside in the wind is any more desirable I wouldn’t have a clue. Perhaps it is a fetish thing; the lure of getting to wear grey jumpsuits and a harness.
I am keen to see where Sydneyland will head from here. Getting thrills from being outside and vertically separated from the pavement by many, many metres is well covered now and probably doesn’t need any further examination. So what other themepark rides can Sydney mine to expand its repertoire?
I have always thought the lamest themepark ride is that one where you sit in a log and fall not very far down a hill into some water. The downhill bit is so short and they take your photo halfway down the hill bit, arms raised,eyes and mouth exclaiming “Oh My Gosh, I Never Would Have Thought I Would Be Falling Down Such A Small Hill In A Log!”
The Sydney Opera House would be perfect for the Lameass Log Ride. It isn’t very high off the ground and you could land right in the harbour, finishing off with a short ride along the harbour maybe incorporating an attack by an animatronic crocodile. You could easily charge upwards of $450 bucks for that kind of gig.
Additionally, the thought of a Sydney Harbour Pirate Ship - the full loop variety - is a temptation that I am sure has whet the appetite of many an entrepreneur and i suspect the only thing holding them back thus far is a desire to maintain some kind of historical accuracy in Sydneyland. I respect that. However, if this is all that is holding the endevour (eh? eh?) back, then I am sure that Sydneysiders and our thrill seeking visitors from afar would find a loop-de-loop Convict Ship a more than suitable alternative. A little bit of lateral thinking, entreprenuers! That’s all we’re asking.
NSW State Government has unvieled the evacuation plan for Sydney.
So if you see me in the grip of terror during business hours, chances are I will be headed generally towards the right.
I have always been pretty wary of the hype surrounding Berrima. It has been the darling of the arts press for some time due to its fostering of contemporary art and architecture and it would be an understatement to say that I was just a little bit cynical. What do I care if Sting opened the Berrima Kursaal? I mean really, Sting? Give me a break.
The rot set in in Berrima when the Southern Highlands began attracting the rock star artists of the early eighties and it became Australia’s vanguard of contemporary art. The knowing architects followed and before you know it, Sting is there, standing in front of a Damien Hirst preserved cow slice, in a Driz-a-Bone, eating a scone. You can understand my apprehension.
But I spent some time there over the weekend, and I am prepared to take everything back. Berrima has really reached maturity - gone are the galvanised steel blade wall hairdressing salons; in their place a series of quite, considered buildings that are more concerned with with surface and new structural technologies than giant aquariums in nightclubs.
I guess I have to admit that the change probably did begin with the Berrima Kursaal, nicknamed the “Flying Fig” by locals due to its pink, alien interior. It gave the Berrima Collective (BC) an appropriate space to stage their performance weaving and it introduced a new construction methodology into the Australian workforce.
Then of course, there is the understandable hype surrounding Ito’s new Tods store currently under construction. While it is obviously a progression of the Tokyo flagship model it is nonetheless good to see some cutting edge gear going on in the Southern Highlands. Similarly, FOA’s winning scheme for Berrima Town Hall looks like it will generate some excitement with its jaw-to-the-floor luminescant facade. Whether or not the project goes ahead is another story entirely…
This anonymous plea for help arrived in my inbox the other day:
Dear Marcus
I hate patch fittings.
I hate them so much.
Is there anything Gravestmor can do about this?Yours sincerely
Matthew BennettAnonymous
Gravestmor shares your disgust for those shiny stainless steel glass clasps and in particular the fucking spider variety. Damn I can’t stand those spider fittings.
Here is a bit of advice if you are thinking of putting in a giant glass wall in your building:
IF YOU CANNOT AFFORD A BIG ENOUGH BIT OF GLASS - OR - IF YOUR ENGINEERS ARE TOO CRAP :
THEN
DO NOT DESIGN A GIANT GLASS WALL.
It is as simple as that. Giant glass walls, while although potentially very clear, do not stand up on their own, they need support and unless you are Harry Seidler and can order in a whole lot of 10.8m high bits of glass then just give it a rest.
So to answer our reader’s query:
“is there anything Gravestmor can do about this?”
Of course there is. There always is, but I will not pretend that it is going to be easy - getting rid of all the patch fittings will certainly take a long time and will require a great deal of commitment on the behalf of all involved - the frameless shower screens alone will employ the world’s supply of unemployed German architecture graduates for at least seven months. That said, people are passionate about this gear, I was on the phone to Alberto Campo Baeza only last thursday and he sounded like he was about to explode with rage over the whole issue.
Unbridled rage will not get us anywhere though; we need a gameplan to tackle this beast and so I propose a four pronged attack; one prong per Ridiculous Stainless Steel Stud Thing.
First Prong
Raise the public’s awareness. Bob Geldof has been contacted. He is talking to Bono. The wheels are in motion. So rest easy, this prong is under control.
Second Prong
Deployment of the Pompilidae Fitting - natural predator of the Spider Fitting. The Pompilidae Fitting plants its larvae into the spider fitting which later hatches and eats it from the inside out. Nasty but necessary.
Penultimate Prong
This is where the Masses of Unemployed German Architecture Graduates come in. They will spiral out from Germany in an anti-clockwise fashion, removing rectangular patch fittings from glass shower screens without prejudice. Within a month, most of Europe will safe and within seven we should be all clear.
Fourth Prong
Melt all salvaged patch fittings down to make one colossal patch fitting sculpture to be placed at an undisclosed - for safety reasons - location. This will serve as a constant reminder of mankind’s deviation from sensible glass fixing methods at the turn of the century.
Aftermath
Accept awards/garlands for ridding the world of such a heinous tectonic.
Today’s issue of Domain in the Sydney Morning Herald had a cover story about owner-builders. It was essentially about how you can save money by not hiring a professional to do the job but to do it yourself. Just as it is cheaper for me to rewire my entire apartment than it is to hire an electrician. Cheaper and only fourteen thousand times more dangerous.
In a box at the end of the article they had another little handy hint for the folks at home, which essentially read: you don’t need an architect, all you need is the Building Code of Australia. I am not sure if they have had a flick through the BCA, but it is a fairly impenetrable document for architects and builders to use let alone Mary-Jo and Steve who want to design their new dream home. It is also a document full of fire ratings and ramp gradients with absolutely no design related content.
Anyway, here is what the Sydney Morning Herald would have you do:
Having drawn up some plans that comply with the Building Code of Australia, you then have the options of either submitting those directly to council, or taking them to a professional draftsperson.
Andrew Owens of interior and architecture consultancy Futurespace also suggests that where the site is particularly challenging or where an owner-builder feels that they’re not coming up with the best solution, they could approach an architect about developing a concept for the job for a set fee.
“You can say, ‘Look I’ll give you some money and I want you to come up with the scheme, but then Joe over here, who is a draftsperson, he can draw it up for me. And I’ll build it. But help me sort out the problems.’”
This is precisely the kind of crap the RAIA should be speaking out against.
Every year thousands of young aspiring architects travel through Spain and as sure as the diagonal meets the sea (finally) they wind up in Barcelona. They get lost in the Gothic Quarter, they marvel at Cerda’s grid, they navigate the city efficiently and easily. Then the rest of us hear about it for The-Rest-Of-Our-Goddamn-Lives.
If you, your design tutor or someone close to you has studied in Barcelona and you are sick of hearing about it then fret not! Help is here in the form of the Gravestmor Twelve Step Program. Just take your cult member aside, sit them down and explain, in a quiet soothing tone, with a lisp if needs be and inform them that they have a problem. Follow the steps below to purge the unholey urbanity from their soul.
The Gravestmor Twelve Step Program to a Barcelona Free Life:
Upon successfully following these steps they should be free of the harmful effects of Barcelona and ready to live in and enjoy the rich cornucopia of urbanised bits of land around the globe.
A while back, in the begining, I mentioned that we had t-shirts. I was referring to an endeavour by Jeremy and myself to gain unwordly riches through the screenprinting of wearable fashion items. We called this endeavour and we continue to call this endeavour - functional jones. Back then I even went so far as to say that they would be on sale some day time in July. It is now March a year later. However this time I can gaurantee that we will be selling our t-shirts this sunday {06.03.05} at the Bondi Markets.
All of our t-shirts are handprinted and due to our slap-dash approach to quality control, each one is different. We have t-shirts with bees on them, t-shirts with roses and bees, some with a seagull and one or two with the guy from excite-a-bike.
Of particular interest to readers of this site would be this one:
Dedicated to Our Harry and quoting Bruce Springsteen, the front says “NO RETREAT BABY, NO SURRENDER”. The back depicts a subtle metaphor for Harry’s tireless and unflinching dedication to getting kickass buildings built.
Also fun for architects is a t-shirt based on some previous gravestmor propaganda - the KO! t.
We will be there all day, so you should drop by, keep us company, buy our gear.
Gravestmor sends its congratulations to Durback Block for winning the Robin Boyd award for their Spry House. The Robin Boyd award is the National Award for a residential award given out by the RAIA each year and considering that the house was passed up by the state panel, the national award is a deserved victory for the practice.
To celebrate, Gravestmor is pleased to announce its first ever commemorative scent - L’Eau De Neil. Distinguished with a hint of chickory, this refined and fruity fragrance will have suitors and clients alike lining up to take your order. The bottle, in frosted glass, consists of two parts - trumpets if you will - that gesture to the both the body’s wrist and its neck making perfume application in today’s bustling world a breeze.
Enjoy.
Resplendent in Indeterminancy, shrouded in the Denial Of Visual Expectation, we here at Gravestmor Realty are pleased to announce that we have yet more space to let. This House, the tenth in a series feature all of the el-shifts and decompositional geometric transformations that would be expected from groovy New York architect, Peter Eisenman. Arranged around an axial void, a number of unspecified spaces, solarium, bar and maids quarters, comprise the living areas of the house.
Made manifest in axonometric form only this house is a once in a lifetime opportunity to escape the banality of your orthographic existence.
Today’s mission for Gravestmor has been to update The Wikipedia with up to date information on all bowtie wearing architects. For those unfamiliar with The Wikipedia, it is a free online encyclopedia. Running under much the same ethos as the Linux operating system it is free to use, free to write for and free to edit. Although it does not have the shine of Mr Britannica I must admit I am a little surprised at the amount of information that has been gathered so far. The breadth of information available coupled with the fact that it costs US $59.95 less than the Britannica, amounting to a reduction of approximately infinity% makes the Wikipedia hard to ignore.
Of course it cannot cover absolutely everything that is out there in the big scary world and this is where Gravestmor steps in. After resisting the initial temptation to run amok on the site, posting craziness at every corner, it became clear that the whole story was not being told. A quick search for bowties turned up no references to architecture nor architects. You can rest easy however as this has since been amended.
With the base information suitably amended the list of architectswas scoured to make sure that main culprits got their due. Bowtie amendments have been made to Peter Eisenman, Walter Gropius, Le Corbusier and of course Harry Seidler. Any suggestions of architects that should rate a bowtie mention are welcome in the comments section below. Or. If you are game, Gravestmor recommends, you dear readers, get out there and make amendments to the Wikipedia yourselves.
Together we can set the record straight.
Presenting to you, Dear Reader, The Twin Fists of Formalist Fury, The Double Suckerpunch of Cruel, Cruel Modernism.
You will note that this poster implies that Gravestmor is updated almost daily. If you are a regular reader of this site, then you will know this to be a fallacy. However it is my intention that updates become more frequent and so now if I slacken off I know I will have the The Twin Fists of Formalist Fury, The Double Suckerpunch of Cruel Cruel Modernism to answer to. You can be assured that the fists are harsh task-masters but understand this also; they have a soft side beneath the bravado and they will take good care of this site and its readers.
Tomorrow night Peter Zumthor is talking at Angel Place in Sydney. I am hoping that he is as enigmatic as he is tall. I don’t know if he is tall. I have a feeling that he should be tall. I will let you know.
We here at the gravestmor Real Estate Division have a room for lease in this exciting property. Built in 1930 this three bedroom house has an old world style that will charm even the most jaded of style nazi. With district views to the Spilberk Castle, the stunning outlook is complimented by glass walls, reminiscent of Prada LA, that disapear into the floor providing for an unique hybrid experience of both the inside and the outside.
The minor annoyance of furnishing the semi-circular dining ‘room’ is more than offset by the delightful play of line and arc freed {finally…} from the governance of structure, column.
A minimum of excessive decoration means that this house is easy to dust and clean.
Rooftop parking is available upon request.
It has struck me that there is not a great deal of architectural propaganda out there. Everything else has its fair share of propapaganda out there; the right calling it marketing, the left, culture jamming. Architecture hasn’t faired so well. To turn this around, Gravestmor will be producing an irregular series of poster-like things that will serve the cause of biased, unfounded statements about architecture. A link to the right will list all the posts containing this propaganda.
The first of these posters, below, I strongly believe will convince cities around the globe to take Sydney’s lead in protecting their skylines from being devastated by unwanted towers through investing in a few Seidler originals.
Download an A4 version of the above.
