THE ARCH ITECT SN EWSPAPER 06_i2.i2.2007 CALIFORNIA ARCHITECTURE AND DESIGN WWW.ARCHPAPER.COM $3.95 GREENING GRACEFULLY CO I— 08 LU WHY IN GRAND THEATER IS FIRST BUILDING o o COMPLETED AT L.A. LIVE RAPIDS 26 NOKIA MIKE DAVIS ON FIRE 05 EAVESDROP 11 AT DEADLINE CALLING 21 DIARY 22 REVIEWS PORTZAMPARC TO DESIGN ACADEMY'S FILM MUSEUM 24 MARKETPLACE No matter where you were in Los Angeles on the night of October 18, it was difficult to miss the opening of the Nokia Theatre. Not only did the building glow brighter TWO OF THREE BY MORPHOSIS than every other building in downtown, AT LA DOWNTOWN DEVELOPMENT LEADING MAN but dozens of lights spun deliriously into On November 8 the Academy of Motion Center for Motion Picture Study, south of the sky, putting any klieg-lit premiere in Picture Arts and Sciences announced Sunset Boulevard. Designs have not yet been Hollywood to shame. The sleek building HEARST its selection of Paris-based Christian de developed, but Bruce Davis, the Academy's is the first completed building at L.A. Live, Portzamparc to design its new movie muse• Executive Director, said that the museum the massive residential and entertainment um in Hollywood. will sit on an 8-acre campus that will likely corridor taking shape in the blocks adja• The museum, described by the Academy be divided among different buildings. cent to the Staples Center, in the South CASTLES as "a place for watching and learning about Davis said the Academy, which hosts the Park neighborhood. On November 6, Los Angeles City Council film and filmmaking, for exploring film's Academy Awards and has a membership When completed in 2010, the 4-million- upheld the Environmental Impact Report relationship with the greater world, and for of about 6,500 filmmakers, began thinking square-foot L.A. Live will also include the (EIR) for the redevelopment of the 1913 listening to stories told by filmmakers," will about the museum five years ago, and that 2,400-seat Club Nokia venue, corporate Herald Examiner building on the southern be located just north of its existing Pickford it began the search for continued on page 3 office space for continued on page 6 end of downtown. continued on page 5 Officials from the MIT SUES GEHRY BUT ARCHITECTS HAVE lUILDING: MURALS GET A NEW LOOK IN LA HEARD IT ALL BEFORE Massachusetts Institute of Technology went to Boston's Suffolk County Courthouse on October 31 to file a lawsuit against architect Frank Gehry and contractor Skanska. The claim: Gehry's design— for which he was paid $15 million—of the Ray and Maria Stata Center was defective •2 'fill and caused the university considerable damage. mm ifi iiAtiiH The building, which opened in the spring of 2004, featured Gehry's characteris• SHOCKED,SHOCKED tic flourishes and unconven• tional angles, and was meant ABOUT LEAKS to support continued on page 6 April Greiman's muralir;^Jtor6atown • -> Elegance is expressed in the purest forms. USM recently achieves the GREENGUARD Certilication - more information at www.usm.com. Visit our showroom or request detailed information. USA: USM U.Schaerer Sons Inc.. 28-30 Greene St., New York, NY 10013. Phone 212-371-1230, [email protected] International: USM U. Scharer Sohne AG, 3110 Munsingen/Switzerland, Phone +41 31 720 72 72, [email protected] Showrooms: New York 28-30 Greene Street, Berlin Franzosische Strasse 48, Bern Gerechtigkeitsgasse 52 Hamburg Neuer Wall 73 -75, Milan Via S. Radegonda 11, Paris 23 Rue de Bourgogne USM www.usm.com Modular Furniture CO ro 3 o LU THE ARCHITECT'S NEWSPAPER DECEMBER 12. 2007 LEADING MAN continued from front page Diana Darling It seems that every green building these days claims to be a first: a new architect two years ago. The O I— The first multi-family, mixed-use, south-facing LEED Silver Academy's original list of candidates included William Menking M skyscraper; the first LEED-rated cafeteria in the northern two- 154 architects, a number they whittled down EXECUTIVE EDITOR to 32, and then to five finalists. Julie V. lovine LU thirds of California; the first green bathroom in the country that CALIFORNIA EDITOR While some Los Angeles architects have is not an outhouse. grumbled that a local architect should have Sam Lubell And while it is of course admirable for a building to aspire won the commission, Davis said the choice Martin Perrin to being green, this unending barrage of firsts has gotten out of came down to a combination of aesthetics, NEW VORK EDITOR control. Obviously LEED and other green rating measurements practicality, and Portzamparc's alluring Anne Guiney intangibles. "We certainly had no prejudice have become much more than tools to measure sustainability. Alan G. Brake against local people," he said. "He seduced Aaron Seward They have become tools for marketing. those of us who went to Paris and then he Granted, the marketing is necessary for most buildings to came here and re-seduced the committee. Matt Chaban secure funding, tenants, and recognition. The problem comes You can tell you're dealing with a visionary; Lisa Delgado a sort of poet of architecture. He has a very DESIGN AND PRODUCTION when the hyping of a building's green credentials begins to unusual and artistic approach to his craft." Dustin Koda overshadow the importance of overall design quality. Already WEST COAST SALES AND MARKETINO DIRECTOR Portzamparc, 1994 winner of the Pritzker Frank Dantona otherwise unremarkable buildings are getting praise thanks to Prize, is best known for his design of the ASSISTANT MARKETINO MANAGER the United States Green Building Council's (USGBC) stamp of French Embassy in Berlin (2003), his LVMH Andrew Griffin approval. Too often the standards of design seem to lag behind. Tower in New York (1999), and his Cite de la EDITORIAL/MARKETING ASSISTANT Musique in Paris (1995). Audrey Jaynes Aesthetics, occupant experience, programmatic innovation, all The Academy, which plans to raise EDITORIAL INTERN Rodney DeaVault come second to the all-important green checklists. And, as one $300 million to build the museum, is in final architect recently told me, this stampede for ratings, which negotiations to secure the last parcel of land he called a "point hunt," is not always in the best interest of the it needs for the site. particular building. "We can design something that's important Davis said that he hopes to have renderings of the new museum by this summer. For for the quality of the building and the occupants, but that doesn't now, he says, the museum will not focus CONTRIBUTORS always get any LEED credit. But if we put in a bike rack we get on artifacts, but on how movies are made GREG GOLDIN / GUNNAR HAND / AMARA HOLSTEIN/ JULIE KIM / ALLISON MILIONIS/ JOHN PASTIER/ three points," the same architect complained. and the impact of cinema. It has named LAURI PUCHALL/CRAIG SCOTT / ALISSA WALKER/ Maryland-based Gallagher & Associates to I think you may well want to question the sincerity of a com• design the museum's exhibition spaces. EDITORIAL ADVISORY BOARD pany that so aggressively uses green as a tool for obtaining higher SAM LUBELL FRANCES ANDERTON / STEVE CASTELLANOS / ERIN CULLERTON/TEDDY CRUZ/MIKE DAVIS/ profits and getting more exposure. Sure, it's a good problem to NEIL DENARI/BETTI SUE HERTZ/BROOKE HODGE/ CRAIG HODGETTS/WALTER HOOD/DAVID MECKEL/ have. At least the buildings are green. But you wonder, for KIMBERLI MEYER / JOHN PARMAN / instance, about the amount of trees they've cut down to print the ROGER SHERMAN/WILLIAM STOUT/ WARREN TECHENTIN/HENRY URBACH press releases letting everyone know how sustainable they are. Just because a building is green doesn't mean it's ft^ee fi-om sin. GENERAL INFORMATION: INF0(5)ARCHPAPER.C0M EDITORIAL: EDITOR^iARCHPAPER.COM New green condos are kicking out existing populations with ADVERTISING: DDARLING®ARCHPAPER.COM their high price tags. A new green BP gas station in Los Angeles WEST COAST ADV: FMDMEDIA(!>SPACESALES.COM SUBSCRIPTION: SUBSCRIBE(?iARCHPAPER.COM serves good old-fashioned unleaded, instead of bio-diesel. And REPRINTS: [email protected] then there's the biggest question of all: How green can a building VOLUME 01, ISSUE 06 OCCCMBER 12. 2007. THE ARCHITECT'S NEWSPAPER'S be if it's built from scratch? The greenest building employs the CALIFORNIA EDITION (ISSN 1952-80811 IS PUBLISHED SIX TIMES A YEAR (FEBRUARY, MAY. JULY, AUGUST, OCTOBER, DECEMBER) BY THE existing building fabric, rather than exploiting new materials ARCHITECT'S NEWSPAPER. LLC, 21 MURRAY ST, 5TH FU NEW YORK. NY 10007. SEND ADDRESS CHANCE TO: 21 MURRAY ST., STH FL., NEW YORK, NY 10007. FOR SUBSCRIBER SERVICE: CALL 2l2-»6e-0«30. FAX 2I2-9M-0633. and resources, no matter how green they are. S3.95 A COPY. S2S.0O ONE YEAR, INTERNATIONAL SAO.OO ONE YEAR. INSTITUTIONAL SSO.OO ONE YEAR. ENTIRE CONTENTS COPYRIGHT 2006 BY THE ARCHITECrS NEWSPAPER, LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. In the end green building shouldn't be a marketing coup. PLEASE NOTIFY US IF YOU ARE RECEIVING DUPLICATE COPIES. THE VIEWS WWW. OF OUR REVIEWERS AND COLUMNISTS DO NOT NECESSARILY REFLECT It shouldn't even be a big deal. Everybody should build green. It THOSE OF THE STAFF OR ADVISORS OF THE ARCHITECT'S NEWSPAPER. FOR REPRINTS. E-PRIHTS AND RELATED ITEMS CONTACT should be the starting point for every project, not the crowning PARS INTERNATIONAL TEL 212-22I-9595: FAX 212-221-9191; WWW.MACREPRINTS.COM/aUICK0U0TEJkSP. achievement. ARCHPAPER. COM MORE UPGRADES NEEDED as the unique proposition that they no Sacramento—the Coalition for Adequate CORRECTIONS Regarding "Smart Thinking" {CAN doubt are.