#028 - Tony Rizzuto - First You Must Observe

Dr. Tony Rizzuto never had any intention of becoming an academic. He grew up wanting to be a practicing architect, but his professors noticed "he talked a lot" in class, and evidently liking what they heard, encouraged him to become a teacher.

As Chair of Kennesaw State University's Department of Architecture, Tony has an unique ability to connect architectural history and theory to the challenges of modern architectural practice in a way that helps students understand the value of architecture education.

One of the challenges of training architects that Tony and the rest of the faculty face is making students awareness of architecture. It's not  that students have no experience with buildings, but that they have so much experience and have thought so very little about them.

That's why Kennesaw State students begin their education by simply observing and recording public spaces: how people move and react to space, how spaces change over time, the latent potential of space, and the physical characteristics of spaces.

For anyone interested in impacting and changing the buildings, neighborhoods, cities, and communities we live in, a good place to start is simply observing how people and spaces actually interact. 

Lots of names, lots of links this time. Peruse and I think it will be worth your wild. You'll learn a little about high theory, and a little about all the work it takes to become an architect. 

LINKS

Architecture Schools

Kennesaw State Department of Architecture

University of Florida School of Architecture

University of Illinois at Chicago School of Architecture

Georgia Institute of Technology School of  Architecture

Becoming an Architect

National Architectural Accrediting Board (NAAB)

Intern Development Program (IDP)

Architecture Registration Examinations (ARE)

Georgia State Board of Architects

People to Know

Minoru Yamaski

Stanley Tigerman

Peter Eisenman

Catherine Ingraham

Jeffery Kipnis

Robert Somol and Sarah Whiting

Bruce Graham
Betty Dowling
Le Corbusier (Corbu or just Corb)
Aldo Van Eyck
Alison and Peter Smithson
Ernst May
J.J.P. Oud

Ideas and Groups
Congres International d'Architecture Moderne (CIAM)
Team X
De Stijl
Constructivism
Expressionism
Neue Sachlichkeit (New Objectivity)
Brutalism

Buildings

World Trade Center Towers

Citycorp Building
Rockefeller Center
Atlanta-Fulton Central Library
Farnsworth House

Architecture Firms

Skidmore, Owings, & Merrill (SOM)

Cooper Carry 

Dr. Tony Rizzuto is Chair and Associate Professor of the Department of Architecture at KSU. He has taught architecture and urbanism for over 20 years, written numerous articles on architecture and organized international symposia on the Bauhaus and Le Corbusier. He is currently a member of the KSU Livable Communities Initiative and a member of the Board of Directors of the Midtown Alliance, where he also serves on the Sidewalk Activation and Public Art Committee and the Midtown Comprehensive Transportation Plan Steering Committee. In 2015, he was the Competition Manager for the Atlanta Bridgescape Competition a joint venture between the Midtown Alliance, Central Atlanta Progress, ADID and the Atlanta Design Center. For the past ten years Dr. Rizzuto has served on the City of Atlanta’s Development Review Committee for SPI-16 & 17 and Chaired the Midtown Neighbor’s Association Land Use Committee. He is also the Georgia Regional Coordinator for Future City, a national STEM competition for middle school students.

Before turning to academia, Dr. Rizzuto was Principal of the design firm Metastasis and had previously worked for Cooper Carry & Associates in Atlanta. He earned a B.S.ARCH from the University of Florida, an M.ARCH from the University of Illinois Chicago and a Ph.D. in architectural history and theory from Georgia Tech.

New Lego House (Cir Sept 2015) by my Nephew Owen.

#26 - Ryan Gravel - A Thousand Ways To Build a City

Ryan Gravel is known mostly for one idea he had in grad school. A one of a kind idea that somehow captured the attention of a city that typically doesn't embrace bold, homegrown ideas. Atlanta prefers well tested ideas, especially if they are imported from some recognized center of international thinkiness. But Ryan Gravel has more ideas than just the Atlanta Beltline, and his new practice Sixpitch, "casts a wide net" to incorporate abroad range of tools and modes of operation in order to bring those ideas to life in as many places as possible.

Ryan sat down with Nathan Koskovich, AIA talk about how cities become what they are. How we impact them and how they in turn impact us.

Ryan Gravel, AICP, LEED AP, is an urban planner, designer, and author working on site design, infrastructure, concept development, and public policy as the founding principal at Sixpitch. His master’s thesis in 1999 was the original vision for the Atlanta Beltline, a 22-mile transit greenway that after fifteen years of work and collaboration is changing both the physical form of his city and the decisions people make about living there. Alongside other projects at Sixpitch and research on similar “catalyst infrastructure” projects around the world, Ryan’s forthcoming book, “Where We Want to Live,” (St Martin’s Press; March, 2016), investigates this cultural side of infrastructure, describing how its intimate relationship with our way of life can illuminate a brighter path forward for cities.

The Links

Six Pitch

Atlanta Beltine

#25 - Negro Building with Richard Dagenhart - Space for Citizenship

Most people don't know what the Negro Building was or the huge role it played in the shaping African American Culture, Atlanta, and America. It is in many ways the seed from which the Civil Rights movement flowered three quarters of century later. Its an excellent example of how space can be designed with a latent power which citizens can harness in order to advocate for their rights. Richard Dagenhart, along with Mable Wilson, Annabelle Jean-Laurent, and other's want to change that through the Negro Building Remembrance Competition.

ADC is very proud and honored to be a sponsor along with the Georgia Tech School of Architecture, The National Association of Minority Architects, and the Center for Civil and Human Rights. Richard Dagenhart explains more about the competition and the history of the Negro Building in this installment of Shoptalk. 

If your interested in getting involved the competition committee is still looking for support. Oh, and submit your ideas!

Also, Sorry for the sound quality. The acoustics in the "New" architecture building are terrible, and they would not stop blowing leaves.

Where it all happened

LINKS

Negro Building Remembrance Competition 

People

Mable O. Wilson

Annabelle Jean-Laurent

Richard Dagenhart

Booker T. Washington

Henry W. Grady

J.W.E. Bowen

Movements and Events

New South Movement

Cotton States and International Exposition 

New Negro Movement

Words

Booker T. Washington "Atlanta Compromise" Opening Address of 1895 Cotton States Exposition

J.W.E. Bowen's "Appeal to the King" Cotton States Exposition Negro Day Address

#23 - Ellen Dunham-Jones - Why Urban Design Trumps Architecture

Nathan Koskovich speaks with Georgia Tech Urban Design Professor Ellen Dunham-Jones about why she, like so many architects, changed her focus towards urban design, and her work as a professor, theorist, and author. 

The lesson? In order to build meaningful buildings, buildings that fulfill the promise of design helping to create a better world, buildings must be placed in a meaningful context. 

Ellen Dunham-Jones is an award-winning architect, professor and Coordinator of the MS in Urban Design at the Georgia Institute of Technology. She serves on the Policy Subcommittee of the AIA Design and Health Leadership Group, is on the Board of Commons Planning, and is past Board Chair and Fellow of the Congress for the New Urbanism.  

A leading authority on suburban redevelopment, she lectures widely, conducts workshops with municipalities and consults on individual projects. She has published over 60 articles linking contemporary theory and practice.  She and co-author June Williamson wrote Retrofitting Suburbia; Urban Design Solutions for Redesigning Suburbs (Wiley & Sons, 2009, updated paperback edition in 2011, mandarin translation in 2013). The book’s documentation of successful retrofits of vacant big box stores, dead and thriving malls, and aging office parks into more sustainable places has received significant media attention in The New York Times, PBS, NPR, Harvard Business Review, Urban Land, Planning, Architectural Record and other venues. The book received the PROSE award from the American Association of Publishers as best architecture/urban planning book of 2009, was featured in Time Magazine’s March 23, 2009 cover story, “10 ideas changing the world right now” and is the subject of her 2010 TED talk and 2012 TED-NPR Radio Hour interview.

She continues to research short and long-term tactics for scaling up suburban retrofitting in the U.S. and abroad. She appeared in the 2011 documentary Urbanized, the 2012 PBS series “Designing Healthy Communities” and contributed chapters to the honorable Henry Cisneros’s 2012 book, Independent for Life, Homes and Neighborhoods for an Aging America and “Irrational Exuberance: Rem Koolhaas in the Nineties” to the 2013 book Architecture and Capitalism. She received undergraduate and graduate degrees in architecture from Princeton University and taught at UVA and MIT before joining Georgia Tech’s faculty to serve as Director of the Architecture Program from 2001-2009. 

First a video to set the stage

LINKS

Books

The Death and Life of Great American Cities (read this first!)

Triumph of the City (then read this)

Retrofitting Suburbia (now read this)

and this also if you're interested

Delirious New York

and this if you want a mental work out

The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction

Names to Know

Ellen Dunham-Jones
Jane Jacobs

Andres Duany
Peter Calthorp
Jacques Derrida
Michael Graves
Peter Eisenman
Kenneth Frampton

Rem Koolhaas

Groups

Congress of New Urbanism

Local Architects and Designers
TSW
SBCH

#023 - BIG NEWS - Georgia Archives Partnership - Jody Thompson and Jack Pyburn

Good news everybody!

Together the ADC, Georgia and Atlanta chapters of the American Institute of Architects (AIA) and Georgia Tech have initiated the Regional Archive Program. These groups have realized the pressing need to create an expanded archive of significant architecture and other design documents and objects in order to record the culture and history of architecture and related fields in Georgia. The archive will afford opportunity for research and for the organization of exhibits, lectures and other activities centered around the collection.

The Peachtree Way exhibit opens May 7th and runs through May 27th. This is the first fruit of a partnership  between ADC, the Georgia Tech Library, AIA Atlanta and AIA Georgia to promote Georgia's design heritage through expanding the efforts made to identify and preserve important archival documents. I encourage all of you to check out the great documents and amazing architecture on display at Georgia Tech's College of Architecture Stubbins Gallery. That's in the "old" architecture building above the auditorium for all of you Tech people out there.

We hope this excites you as much as it does us, and if it does, please reach out to us to volunteer or contribute. You can reach me at nathan@koskovicharchitecture.com.

Jody Thompson

Jody Lloyd Thompson is the head of Georgia Tech's Library Archives and Records Management department. She's held this position for 7 years and was the former Visual Materials Archivist. Thompson actively promotes the archives on the Georgia Tech campus, as well as in the city of Atlanta. She and the late Doug Allen were instrumental in transferring Georgia Tech's College of Architecture Heffernan Archives to the Library and bringing more awareness to its research value to faculty, students and the public.

In 2010, Thompson was the president of the Society of Georgia Archivists. She holds a BA and MA in History from Georgia Southern University.

Jack Pyburn, FAIA

Jack Pyburn, FAIA is a principal in the Historic Preservation Studio at Lord Aeck Sargent in Atlanta. Raised in north Louisiana, his professional journey started at Texas A&M. He got his first job in architecture from Mark Hampton, of the noted Sarasota School of architects, in Miami, Florida. Subsequently, he spent 10 years in St. Louis that included graduate school in Urban Design at Washington University and working with a young multidisciplinary firm, Team Four on urban and environmental issues throughout the Midwest. In 1980 he moved to Atlanta as a principal with EDAW and started his own firm in 1984. After 25 years of having his own historic preservation focused architectural firm he joined his practice with Lord Aeck Sargent in 2007. He is currently Secretary and a director of DOCOMOMO/us and a past chair of the AIA/Historic Resources Advisory Group.  

Links

Paul M. Heffernan House

Pringle and Smith

Jova, Daniels, Busby

Neil Reed

Philip Shutze

The Breman Museum

 

#022 - Doug Hooker - Atlanta Regional Commission; Seeing the Forest - 03-02-15

As the Executive Director of the Atlanta Regional Commission (ARC), Doug Hooker is uniquely positioned to gage the state of Metro Atlanta. His organization is charged with coordinating the planning and development of what can feel like innumerable municipalities. Each interconnect with its neighbors but only empowered to work within its own purview.

Its bewildering how many issues are deeply affected by planning and transit, and Doug has to understand all of them. Fortunately for the Atlanta Region, Doug has a unique talent for understanding and explaining complex issues. In this interview with Nathan Koskovich, AIA, he shares many of his thoughts on Atlanta, including how he came to be in the city at all.

Links

Atlanta Regional Commission

If you have the time, dig deep into the Atlanta Regional Commission's website. Not only will it give you more information on many of the missions ARC is charged with, but it also has an amazing amount of information on regional issues. 

The Wall at Peyton Road

The Peyton Road Wall Controversy was a major turning point as it represent a sharp shift from planning directed by segregationist ideas.

The Equality of Opportunity Project

As Doug mentions, physical access to opportunity is a key component of economic opportunity. See some of the stats here

Cities, Produce More Wealth and Use Fewer Resources

I should post this talk annually. Geoffrey West  breaks down the value cities bring to the world scientifically. The potential West has measured in cities Doug and others are trying to maximize here in Metro Atlanta and in other parts of the world.

Douglas Hooker is the executive director of the Atlanta Regional Commission (ARC). ARC is an agency which facilitates local governments in the Atlanta region implement innovative solutions for small and large challenges and opportunities. In his role he oversees programs and services that support community development, transportation development, water and natural resources, arts and culture, aging and health resources and workforce development, community research and analytics, and more. 

In his career he has worked for public sector and private sector organizations, among them: the City of Atlanta’s Department of Public Works (serving as the Commissioner who led the agency through the 1996 Olympic Games); Executive Director of the State Road & Tollway Authority (SRTA); Director of Finance and Administration with Bio-Lab, Inc., and Vice President for Business Development and Marketing with Atkins Engineering (formerly PBS&J). He began his career with Georgia Power where he worked as a design engineer, project manager, design section supervisor, and as a technology policy analyst. Through the different facets of his career he has had the privilege to work on important regional and local projects in the areas of energy, education, transportation, transit, and water.

Doug holds a Bachelor of Mechanical Engineering degree and a Master of Science (in Technology & Science Policy) degree from Georgia Tech, as well as a Masters of Business Administration from Emory University’s Goizueta Business School. He is married to Patrise Perkins-Hooker, a Georgia Tech and Emory alumna herself, who is the Vice President and General Counsel of the Atlanta Beltline. In his spare time,Doug composes music, plays in a community band, loves to read, and travels with his wife.

#021 - Thomas Wheatley - 2014 / 2015 Review - Preview - Watching Urbanism

Happy New Year! 

This month's addition of Shoptalk serves as an introduction to Thomas Wheatley, Creative Loafing's News Editor, and a review of 2014's development landmarks along with a look forward to developments to come in 2015. Thomas Wheatley is an Atlanta native and the news editor of Creative Loafing, Atlanta's alt-weekly. He started at CL in 2007 as a staff writer covering transportation, urban development, and the environment. He has also written for Flagpole and Next City. He lives with his wife and two cats in southwest Atlanta's Westview neighborhood. 

Nathan Koskovich, AIA is a licensed architect in the state of Georgia, host of Shoptalk and chair of the Architecture and Design Center.

Links

Creative Loafing

2014

Cultural Buildings

A whole set of new cultural institutions got new homes, or at least started work on a new home. Some, like the New Falcon Stadium, are more of the same, suburban models jammed into an urban context, and others, like the College Football Hall of Fame embrace the neighborhood and contribute to creating a more vibrant city.

New Atlanta Falcons Stadium

Sun Trust Field

National Center for Civil and Human Rights

Zuckerman Museum of Art

College Football Hall of Fame

Transit Infrastructure

Roads used to be the new transit. Then they were the only transit. Now they're the old transit and more and more alternative modes are developing in Atlanta.

GA-400/I-85 Flyover

Atlanta Street Car

Mixed Use Development

Atlanta continues to move awkwardly toward true urban developments. Some of the new developments which at least partially opened in 2014 succeed more (Ponce City Market) than others (Avalon).

Ponce City Market

Krog Street Market

Buckhead Atlanta

Avalon

2015

Mack Scogin and Merrill Elam Architects have two new exciting projects scheduled to break ground in 2015.

Alliance Buckhead

One Museum Place

Culture

Many of the City's best loved cultural institutions are growing and expanding. Below are some of the most exciting looking new digs.

Atlanta History Center Reopening

The Cafe at Linton's Atlanta Botanical Garden

Center for Puppetry Arts Renovation

Reynoldstown Stage

Infrastructure

Building out extra capacity and parallel transit systems as well as maintaining the existing networks are on the agenda for 2015

City of Atlanta Bond

West Side Trail

East Side Trail Extension

Development

The investment Midtown Atlanta made in planning years ago continues to pay dividends as mid and high rise developments continue to spring up in the area.

Midtown Atlanta

Events

The eyes of the design world don't often turn to Atlanta, but they will several times this year.

American Institute of Architects National Convention

Downtown / Midtown Bridgescape Competition

Potential

The Old Atlanta Constitution Building