In New York City with a gondola

that might be the new landscape of New York City if the prophecy of the scientists will come true and the global warming will eventually melt most of the polar ice. friends in NY - prepare your air mattresses...
source: earthfirst

Panic in Detroit!

Jeffrey Eugenides - Middlesex, a very good book that i usually read only during yom-kippur (because you need a lot of time and concentration) which is in a part, a saga of an immigrant greek family in Detroit with many references to historic events of the city. Madonna, also native of Detroit, just finished her worldwide tour, the crisis of the car industry and so on...
so, Detroit: at the beginning of the 20th Century, the city of Detroit developed rapidly thanks to the automobile industry, a home to the 'Big Three' companies, General Motors, Ford and Chrysler. until the 50’s, its population rose to almost 2 million people and Detroit was the 4th most important city in the US. segregation and de-industrialization caused violent inter-racial riots in the late 60's (some say that the song of Bowie 'Panic in Detroit' is based on Iggy Pops's descriptions of revolutionaries he had known at that time). the following white middle-class exodus from the city together with the oil crises of 1973 (yom kippur war), that impacted the American auto industry, marked the beginning of the decline. firms and factories began to close or move to lower-wage states. slowly, but inexorably downtown high-rise buildings, theaters and historic monuments emptied. Since the 50’s, “Motor City” lost more than half of its population. source: alex|3d

Erich Mendelsohn

few days ago i went to see Die Nibelungen at the Schaubuehne in Berlin (lower pic). from my point of view, the production was a bit too abstract to describe a germanic heroic saga but the theater building, originally built as Woga-Komplex and Universum-Kino(1925-1931) by Erich Mendelsohn, was also worth a visit. Erich Mendelsohn (1887 - 1953) was a german architect , known for his expressionist architecture in the 1920s, as well as for developing a dynamic functionalism in his projects for department stores and cinemas. he was studying architecture at TU in Berlin and graduated in Munich. in 1912 he opened his own firm in Munich but after the first world war he moved to Berlin. in 1924 he founded together with Ludwig Mies van der Rohe ad Walter Gropius the progressive architectural group known as Der Ring (strange, Die Nibelungen have also something to do with a ring...). During the Weimar republic, Mendelsohn was very successful both in his work and financially. when the nazi party came to power in Germany in 1933, Mendelsohn moved to England and worked at the same time in Palestine. in 1935 he opened a bureau in Jerusalem, where he greatly influenced the local Jerusalem International Style. in 1941 Mendelsohn moved to the US. some of his famous buildings: Einsteinturm, Mossehaus, Schocken department store - Germany. Weizmann hause (upper pic.), Schocken library, Hadassah Mt. Scopus, Anglo-Palestine bank - in Israel

Levittown

another term that i found in Learning from Las Vegas. Levittown was the first modern American suburb and is widely considered as the archetype for postwar suburbs throughout the US. it is also used as an offensive term to describe suburban areas that lack the culture and vitality of an urban area. Levittown gets its name from its builder, the firm of Levitt & Sons, Inc. founded by William Levitt, which built a district in New York as a planned community between 1947 and 1951. the firm built also other similar communities in Pennsylvania, new Jersey and Puerto Rico. they built them with an eye towards speed, efficiency, and cost-effective construction which led to a production rate of 30 houses a day. the firm had learned the techniques of rapid construction using standardized parts, tightly controlled suppliers of goods and services, and a workforce with highly specialized skills. they took the mass-production assembly line and converted it so that workers moved from site to site doing their specific targeted tasks.
source tessellar.

Mio fratello è figlio unico

My Brother is an only Child is an Italian drama film (2007) directed by Danielle Luchetti. it is based on the novel of Antonio Pennacchi Il fasciocomunista who then disassociated himself from the film, claiming that his real intentions were modified. the film tries to describe the political tension between Communists and Fascists in Italy during the late 60's from a working class family point of view. very good parts of Elio Germano and Angela Finocchiaro
the title comes from a song by Rino Gaetano.

I need an explanation

the new central bus station in Jerusalem was opened in 2001 and it is the main bus depot in the city and one of the busiest in the country. its heavy monolithic flat facade expresses nothing that has to do with movement, dynamism, transparency or invitation to begin your journey. even the blue reflecting glass from the 80's can't help. and what is it this watch? and the cheep 'Bazaar' inside? shocking...

Angelo Mangiarotti

is an important Italian architect (1922) and industrial designer. he graduated in 1948 at the faculty of Architecture of Politecnico di Milano. in 1953 he moved to Chicago where he worked as a professor. during his stay in America he met Frank Lloyd Write, Walter Grupius, Mies van der Rohe and Konard Wachsman (all the masters) who shaped his personal and professional growth.
two years later Mangiarotti went back to Italy and opened in Milan his architectural firm (with Bruno Morassutti until 1960). In 1989 he opened in Tokyo the Mangiarotti & Associates Office. from 1986 to 1992 he was the art director of Colle Cristalleria. he was teaching in many Italian and foreign universities, in Venice, Hawaii, Losanna, Palermo, Florence and Milano. his career has been rewarded with many prizes both in the field of design and architecture. he is definitely a very creative architect and designer. however, i personally like more his 'Giogali' lamps designed for Vistosi, less the design of the stations 'Porta Venezia' and 'La Repubblica' in Milan.

Slinkachu

is an artist who works and lives in the UK, that installs tiny figurines around the city and takes the street art into a new scale, discovering an unexpected city landscapes. Slinkachu modifies and paints figurines made for model trains installing them in streets and parks, where he photographs the scene and leaves the characters behind. his work is both street art installations and photography.

Bonjour Tristesse

is probably the most poetic name associated with a building. following a competition in 1980, the architect Alvaro Siza has received his first commission abroad for a building in Kreuzberg, Berlin. the building of mixed use - commercial on the street level and 6 residential floors above, was designed with the goal of restoring an urban block, inhabited mainly by immigrants, on the corner between Schlesischestrasse and Falchensteinstrasse. it has a facade that combines a respect to the alignments of the existing buildings and a curved wall surfaces. the angle of the block is marked by sharp canopy and a pillar and the floor plans are inspired by the expressionist architecture in Berlin, in particular of Scharoun and Mendelsohn.
the graffiti 'Bonjour Tristesse', the name of a novel written by Segan (1954), was added later on top of the curved angle and it is still there.
the source and other information: Berlino - Un secolo di Architettura moderna

Helmut Newton

Helmut Newton (1920 - 2004) was a German-Australian fashion photographer noted for his nude studies of women. he established a particular style marked by erotic stylized scenes, often with sado-maso and fetishistic elements (high-hills shoes are a must). his success increased notably with his 1980 'Big Nudes' series, which marked the top of his erotic-urban style. the subjects in the series represent perfectly the strong career women of the 80's, serious look in a stiff position that will make even a playboy girl to look like corporate manager.

permanent exhibition at Helmut Newton foundation Berlin

Europe 2020...

assuming that in the next 10 years, the European Union administration will become powerful enough to reduce the importance of the historic national countries within it, few regions with strong cultural identity and economic power will claim, according to ComingAnarchy, their own Independence.

Broadacre City Vs. La Ville Radieuse

two urban development concept, one proposed by Frank Lloyd Wright - Broadacre City and the other by Le Corbusier - La Ville Radieuse. Both were designed and presented in the beginning of the 30's of the last century.

The first, Broadacre City, was the "antithesis"of a city. it was both a planning statement and a sociopolitical scheme by which each family would have be given a one acre plot of land (4,000 m²). there were few high-rise building for offices and apartments, but the dwellers in this structure typology were expected to be just a small minority. although there is a train station in Broadacre City, the most important transport is done by private cars. Broadacre City is a platform, it has no clear vision and therefore it offers a natural, organic and flexible development.

the second, La Ville Radieuse, is a mega-structure consists on pre-fabricated apartment houses - les unites. each structure is fifty meters high and it could accommodate, according Le Corbusier, 2,700 inhabitants with 14 m² per person. the buildings would be placed upon pillars, five meters above the ground floor which is considered as a continuous open public space. the apartments were available to everyone based on the size and needs of each particular family. every transportation system: pedestrian, cars, subway and trucks is separated and has its own level. La Ville Radieuse is an instant city. it has a totalitarian design with no space for individual expression or flexibility.