Sam Jacob, Sean Griffiths, and Charles Holland 04 Nick Johnson
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Constructs Yale Architecture Fall 2007 Constructs Fall 2007 Table of Contents 02 FAT: Sam Jacob, Sean Griffiths, and Charles Holland 04 Nick Johnson 05 REX: Joshua Prince-Ramus and Ezra Ella 06 Developing the UAE: Keller Easterling and Ali Rahim 08 UN Studio: Evolution of Space 09 The Market of Effects 10 Delayed Gratification 12 Common Ground, Yale’s New Partner 13 In the Field: The New Chicago Architecture, The Rotterdam Biennale 16 Book Reviews: Frederick Horowitz and Brenda Danilowitz’s Josef Albers: To Open Eyes; Nathan Glazer’s From a Cause to a Style; Carter Wiseman’s Louis I. Kahn: Beyond Time and Style; Ray Ryan’s Gritty Brits; Diana Balmori and Gaboury Benoit’s Land and Natural Development (LAND) Code. 18 Yale Fall Events Symposium: “Constructing the Ineffable: Contemporary Sacred Architecture” Exhibitions: A Field Guide to Sprawl, and Ecology. Design. Synergy. 19 Books from the School of Architecture 20 Spring 2007 Lectures 22 Advanced Studios, a snapshot 23 Colin St. John Wilson: A Eulogy and A Reminiscence 24 Faculty News Hope House Kolkata, Fabrication on Display, Kevin Roche Archives to Yale 26 Alumni News New Architectural Centers 02 CONSTRUCTS YALE ARCHITECTURE FALL 2007 INTERVIEW: REX Joshua Prince- Nina Rappaport for Ramus and Erez Ella Constructs. Ramus of the firm REX, in and Ella will be giving New York, are teach- a lecture, “It’s Not REX ing as the Saarinen All About You,” on Visiting Professors Monday, October 29, in the fall. They at the school. discussed their new firm and work with Nina Rappaport Where do you see constraints: “We need a stage 90 feet by 40 your architectural practice going now that feet, a proscenium wall of this thickness, REX has been established independently concrete walls around the auditorium, acous- from OMA New York for the past year? tics determined by these panels, these lights, Joshua Prince-Ramus Yes, it was doors that work like this.” We responded, about a year ago that we changed the name. “This is already a solution to a situation. NR That is how you put it, “changed What are the first principles? Let’s say that the name”? I am a magician. What do I actually need to JP-R Well, we purchased Rem’s perform?” They then started discussing the half. The New York office was always an underlying criteria: required noise levels, a anomalous condition within OMA, and that person entering without noise or light infiltra- is why we separated. Its uniqueness started tion, etc. We tried to think about solutions out because of legal requirements: architec- that met these requirements but did not tural entities in the U.S. have to be free and necessarily conform to, and often exceeded, clear of other firms. So we had to create an the conventional approaches. That is how we REX, development proposal for Governors Island, New York, 2007. independent entity that was owned half by work from first-principle requirements. We Rem and half by me. In time, what bound are saying: there is no universal solution—we New York to Rotterdam was my relationship will find the specific solution for your set of to Rem, not a larger relationship with the issues. Sometimes the client doesn’t know other partners and a need to coordinate what the problem is or doesn’t recognize it, business decisions. We would give and so it must be a process—a mutual education. receive input to and from Rotterdam but were NR Often it is said that architects act gradually becoming more and more autono- as psychotherapists, especially on residential mous; people were hiring us because of our projects. When you’re working with a client, own work. At one point we had a meeting to do you have a standard process to get to a rethink our relationship. I don’t think any of client’s real needs, whether it is looking at a the partners expected the New York office museum and understanding the collections to separate, but we decided that it would be or working with your new residential client on best for both sides. The projects that the New the Lower East Side to organize a space for York office had developed—Museum Plaza, his specific life style. in Louisville and the Wyly Theatre, in Dallas— EE This is our first residential stayed with us, but the Cornell School of project in New York, and it has an interesting Architecture and the New Jersey towers problem in that the client said, “Right now continue, with Rem. I am a student, so I want a house that will NR The press was so nice about accommodate me now. When I become a it being a friendly divorce, but is that really CEO of a high-tech company or when I have true? It is rare today that a young architect a family, I don’t want to have to move.” We leaves a firm and gets the going-away were asked to design a layout that would present of projects to start his own company. allow him to alter the functions of the spaces Erez Ella It was amicable; we’re as his life changes. While we are not quite lucky that we had a peaceful separation and psychotherapists, it is too intimate a process that Rem has been so supportive. Instead of to think with him about where he is going REX, rendering of Wyly Theatre, Dallas, Texas, 2007. being one company that confusingly acts as to sleep and how much time he is going to two, it is better to be two separate compa- spend in each space. nies that can collaborate. Rem had never NR What are the ways that program met some of our clients. It was a process that then directs the office as you evaluate the evolved naturally. But everyone does ask us basic principles? the same question. JP-R If you dig deeply enough into NR You have criticized the star- a core problem, you will unearth its uncon- architect phenomenon, insisting that you ventional aspects. Cost efficiency can also are collaborators. FAT, a British firm, which generate discovery. Going back to basics is also teaching at Yale this semester, wrote leads us to the unexpected; sometimes the about how to become famous and thus made result is an unusual form. its own fame. I find it interesting that as you NR Are you also interested in creat- are talking about authorship you are in the ing new typologies such as the way in which limelight. Did you think about it that way? you elevated the art center in the Museum JP-R It is not that we are against Plaza to invent a new way of using space and fame. It is that we are for accurate attribu- a new program? tion. If there is a project that is really done by JP-R If every time we engage a one person, fine, but that person should get project we could invent a new typology, we proper credit. We are obsessed with correct would be really happy. Sometimes we are crediting. An incredibly complex building not sure that we can step out of our own that involved many people should have the experiences—like the library typology we names on it of everyone who was instrumen- developed for the Seattle Central Library— tal, not of one lone person. and come up with a new idea. Now that we NR Such as the Seattle Central are starting to design the library in Oslo, we Library? cannot simply regurgitate our previous ideas, JP-R Seattle Central is a great even though we had huge conviction in what example of a project that would not have we were doing at the time. The book spiral become what it is if our partner, LMN, had was the appropriate solution to a specific not felt a sense of ownership and a confi- problem. This situation and problem requires dence that they would receive appropriate a new, tailored solution. recognition. But people still don’t properly EE It is easier to ignore the world’s credit the building to OMA/LMN. It simply observations than your own. Now we need to wouldn’t be the same project without LMN. fight what is in ourselves. They were just as passionate and committed NR So you have to wipe out your to it as we were. But if our profession and the internal hard drive. Do you also think about media continue not to credit properly, then the way people would experience a new the quality of work is going to decrease. Who kind of space and new technologies and the would want to give his soul to a project the potential for that experience? next time if he learned the last time that only JP-R That is really what we are one, famous person would get all the credit? obsessed with. We don’t talk about “Wow, It was amazing how invested and committed this is a great space,” as so many architects LMN were; it would be great if they received do. We are more concerned with the person fame for the Seattle Library too. functioning in that space, how they move NR You often use the concept of across it and operate within it. first principles, which is something that NR What is your approach to the engineers discuss in terms of the basic Governors Island park competition that you principles of Newtonian physics. What do were selected to compete in against four you mean by it in terms of architectural other architectural teams? design, and how does it make for specific EE Our theme with landscape projects rather than generic ones? architect Michel Desvigne was that this is not EE When we started the design a landscape proposal; this is a development of the Wyly Theatre, we sat with theater strategy.