One more time, we are blown away by the response this event got. The first two hundred seats were gone almost before we posted the event. We found a second venue that was twice as big and it sold out even faster, and we had a waiting list of 1,000 people who just wanted to hear people talk about design. Our partner, MODA, coordinated this recording with Switchyards. If you weren't there, its a great listen. If you, were, kick back and just groove on the good ideas again. Thanks To MODA who did most of the heavy lifting. Thanks to our Moderator - Thomas Wheatley Thanks to the Panel, Tim Keane, Ryan Gravel, Lisa Gordon, Jim Irwin, and Greg Burbidge. Thanks to all the volunteers and staff at all the organizations. Fantastic.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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 TheNew 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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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).
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.
