February 27, 2006
Benjamin Franklin: 13 steps
1. Temperance: Eat not to dullness and drink not to elevation.
2. Silence: Speak not but what may benefit others or yourself. Avoid trifling conversation.
3. Order: Let all your things have their places. Let each part of your business have its time.
4. Resolution: Resolve to perform what you ought. Perform without fail what you resolve.
5. Frugality: Make no expense but to do good to others or yourself: i.e. Waste nothing.
6. Industry: Lose no time. Be always employed in something useful. Cut off all unnecessary actions.
7. Sincerity: Use no hurtful deceit. Think innocently and justly; and, if you speak, speak accordingly.
8. Justice: Wrong none, by doing injuries or omitting the benefits that are your duty.
9. Moderation: Avoid extremes. Forebear resenting injuries so much as you think they deserve.
10. Cleanliness: Tolerate no uncleanness in body, clothes or habitation.
11. Chastity: Rarely use venery but for health or offspring; Never to dullness, weakness, or the injury of your own or another's peace or reputation.
12. Tranquility: Be not disturbed at trifles, or at accidents common or unavoidable.
13. Humility: Imitate Jesus and Socrates.
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February 07, 2006
"The art of being happy lies in the power of extracting happiness from common things."
Henry Ward Beecher -
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December 20, 2005
OMA process
read Theoretical Anxiety and Design Strategies by Moneo
Koolhaas chapter
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November 26, 2005
size and scale
The size is nothing; what matters is the scale. --Barnett Newman, in Pierre Schneider. "Through the Louvre with Barnett Newman" (1969)
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October 19, 2005
Grants - archinect discussion
Archinect : Discussion Forum : Travelling Scholarships...
citizen
10/19/05 9:24
I've managed to score a couple of large grants (large for a grad student, puny for the real world). An application committee wants to hear, as Susan suggests, why you must pursue this inquiry, and why you can only accomplish this in Moscow, or Prague, or Iowa City. "I've always thought it would be interesting to study churches in France" probably won't cut it.
Second, the committee wants to hear what you will be doing from the day you land/arrive. "Week 1, I will locate and briefly visit the six structures I will document. Week 2, I will return and survey the first two in detail, preparing as-built plans and elevations..." will work better than the vague statement above .
Grant applications committees want to hear that the money will be well-spent by someone who knows 1) the purpose of their inquiry, and 2) the exact steps necessary to undertake it. Otherwise, let someone else who REALLY deserves the grant for legitimate research/ experience go for the grant. Don't muddy the pool.
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October 16, 2005
Charles Jencks Interview
An Interview With Charles Jencks, Author of THE ICONIC BUILDING
"Cosmogenesis" has a 150 year history as a word. It is picked up by Teilhard, de Chardin, Thomas Berry and Harvard physicists. It has come to mean the universe as a continuous, unfolding event (i.e. a genesis, by a cosmic process lasting 13.7 billion years). This is the shift in worldview that sees nature and culture as growing out of the narrative of the universe. In a global culture of conflict this narrative provides a possible direction and iconography that transcend national and sectarian interests.
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October 04, 2005
art and meaning
IU Research and Creative Activity Magazine
“Art makes meaning on multiple levels,” McDaniel says. “And the more complicated that layering process is, the better the art.”
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Art History: Semester Project Proposal
The iconography of Louis Sullivan as it relates to his motivation for creating art.
Louis H. Sullivan - Great Buildings Online
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October 03, 2005
value
Oscar Wilde quote about a cynic's knowing ''the price of everything and the value of nothing.''
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September 22, 2005
is architecture a rich kids profession?
Archinect : Discussion Forum : is architecture a rich kid's profession?
architects basically are taught to be socialists in school but we work for capitalists so there is always this guilt. it comes up often with the architects i know here and in europe, and we all sort of laugh at ourselves for being so naive.
jump
Total Entries: 4
Total Comments: 321
09/22/05 5:53
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September 19, 2005
choices - from archinect
Archinect : Schoolblog : Hello from Fall 2005 ( photos)
1) to become pure service provider and execute the clients less than lolfty design as if automaton
or
2) to challange, to inform, to educate, to expand, to lead in discovery...to reveal to the client the added value that an architect brings to the table
Posted by: Suture on Sep 14, 05 | 11:49 am
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September 18, 2005
utopian communities
Portraits of American Paradises, Mostly Lost - New York Times
September 18, 2005
Portraits of American Paradises, Mostly Lost
By PHILIP GEFTER
Skip to next paragraph SWEET EARTH: EXPERIMENTAL UTOPIAS IN AMERICA
Luhring Augustine Gallery
531 West 24th Street, Chelsea, (212) 206- 9100. Through Oct. 22.
THE "perfect society" may be a figment of the idealist's imagination, but from the early years of the republic, many Americans have tried to give those ideals a tangible form, organizing their lives and those of their neighbors in a variety of social experiments.
Between 1810 and 1850, at least 600 utopian communities were established across the continent, approximating both religious and secular visions of the perfect life. In the 1960's, social upheaval led to a new wave of alternative communities, or communes, some of which still survive today. And, more recently, in the 1990's, new ideas about urban planning have led to more practical experimentation with a utopian vision of suburban design.
For the last 12 years, Joel Sternfeld has been photographing the sites of utopian communities across the country - the land on which they once resided, buildings that still remain, or monuments erected to symbolize their ideals. This body of work, "Sweet Earth: Experimental Utopias in America," now on view at the Luhring Augustine Gallery in Chelsea, is an extension of his continuing chronicle of the American landscape, most notably his seminal series, "American Prospects," with crisp, color-saturated photographs taken in the 1970's and early 80's in which structures of modern life fit awkwardly into the natural landscape.
The chapel without walls in New Harmony, Ind., was designed in 1960 by Philip Johnson as an inverted rosebud to echo the founding ethos of the community, home to one of America's first secular utopian experiments. It was started in 1824 by Robert Owen, a British industrialist who believed that education, equality and communal life were vital to the formation of moral character. "Happiness," he held, "will be the only religion of man." Johnson intended the chapel to cast the shadow of a rose, the symbol of the New Harmony Community of Equals.
Seaside, Fla., was the brainchild of Robert Davis, a builder who wanted to develop the land he inherited along Florida's Gulf Coast in line with his childhood memories of beach-town life. The community, which was first opened in the 1980's,was designed as a small town with everything within walking distance, and vernacular architecture that recalls an ideal past that may never have existed.
The school bus is among the dwellings at The Farm, a commune established in the 1970's that at its peak had a population of 1,500 members. The motivating source was Stephen Gaskin, a professor at San Francisco State University whose lectures about cultural upheaval developed such a cult following that hundreds of students followed him on a speaking tour around the country. Eventually, many people in that caravan of buses and vans acquired land in rural Tennessee and set up The Farm.
In 1982, while Mr. Sternfeld was still working on "American Prospects," he visited a socialist thinker, Scott Nearing, then 99, in Maine. Looking through Mr. Sternfeld's images for that series, Mr. Nearing advised that they were too critical of America. "Picture an ideal world and photograph that," he told the photographer. Mr. Sternfeld evidently took his advice, capturing in this body of work if not an ideal world, at least the idea of it.
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August 29, 2005
hunter s
"Well, I got through today, but tomorrow might be different." This is a very weird and twisted world; you can't afford to get careless; don't fuck around. You want to keep your affairs in order at all times.
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Archinect : Discussion Forum : View All : inexpensive materials for loft
Coroplast - corrugated plastic sheets.
comes in many colors, but translucent is my favorite. wholesale
price is $8.00 for a 4' x 8' sheet i think. could make nice dividers..
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Archinect : Discussion Forum : View All : Hi, Gorgeous. Haven't I Seen You Somewhere?
Probably the same way that reenactment differs from reaction.
Rita Novel
Total Entries: 23
Total Comments: 742
08/28/05 12:22
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August 21, 2005
Paranoid Critical Method
Archinect : Discussion Forum : View All : Why do you think you're creative?
bRink
Total Entries: 11
Total Comments: 148
08/19/05 22:29
When I was in archischool, one of my colleagues was quite interested in Salvidor Dali's "Paranoid Critical Method", something that Rem Koolhaas also wrote about somewhere I recall... I'm not an expert on Dali or surrealism, but the basic premise of Dali's Paranoid Critical method was that in fact creativity could be induced methodically (by basically anybody) by intentionally creating a surreal juxtaposition: if you intentionally juxtapose two extraneous things (that is totally unrelated things chosen at random, be it two objects--- like a lobster and a telephone say, or two ideas that have nothing to do with one another, or two of anything, perhaps two concepts from unrelated disciplines), you can actually methodically produce something new that nobody could have thought up through logical means... In other words, create an idea that is totally illogical (like some of Dali's surreal creations), by having your mind be in two places at once, a kind of imaginative schizophrenia... What you end up with is a surreal juxtaposition, but it is something that nobody could have thought up through a logical method of thinking...
The interesting thing I think is when you bring that surreal idea and push it further, try to make it "real"... You might serendipitously discover something that you could not have come up with through rational means. Whether that thing is actually useful to you or not is chance... But the potential for it being completely "new" is much greater... So in a way, its an irrational method that can actually produce more innovative ideas than any rational method could ever hope to...
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practicing
liberty bell
Total Entries: 5
Total Comments: 698
08/20/05 12:45
http://www.archinect.com/forum/threads.php?id=23513_0_42_0_C
There's a story about a Westerner who went to a renowned Japanese calligraphy master to make a purchase. The master took the person's money and said “Come back in a year”.
A year later man came back, and the master said “It's not ready yet, come back in another year.”
This went on for a decade. The man eventually lost patience. He went to the calligraphist and demanded a drawing or his money back.
The master pulled out a piece of paper, dipped his brush in ink, and in one perfect motion drew the figure and handed the piece of paper to the man. The man saw the beauty and skill evident in the piece and said “That took five seconds to do, why did I have to wait so long, what on earth have you been doing for the last ten years?!”
The master walked to the door behind him and opened it, revealing thousands upon thousands of papers piled and stacked and scattered about, all with the man's figure on them, and replied “Practicing.”
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August 20, 2005
Design Within Reach - Case Study Day Bed
Material
Laminated maple plywood frame; nickel-plated brushed steel legs; high-density polyurethane foam core; 100% nylon crepe upholstery with Teflon coating
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August 19, 2005
ReadyMade: Feature - Slide Lamp
SLIDE LAMP
20min Clock icondifficulty_2 $45
Ingredients:
* Standard type A lampshade frame, at least 8.5" diameter
* 48-60 mounted slides
* 48-60 1.5" x 1.5" squares of heavy parchment white lumen paper
* 150-175 10mm 16-gauge silver-tone jump rings
* Table lamp with standard type A base
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August 17, 2005
Hospedaje RAX PO Backpacker Hostel in Coban – Guatemala – North America
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Lonely Planet | Thorn Tree Travel Forum
Tikal
Now, Guatemala is also full of culture and ruins. If you opt for this C.A. country, I would highly recomend Panajachel in Lake Atitlan. It is a bit of a hippie town, but the sourounding scenery is breathless. An added plus is that Guatemala is so small that you could visit most areas of the county in weekend trips or side trips. I will try to avoid Antigua and Quetzaltenango (sp?) though since both are too touristy. Panajachel, Guate will be a good choice if you love nature, mayan culture, and a less touristy option to learn Spanish.
cheers,
Fernando
PS: any question, just choot me an email at
darthmilmo at yahoo dot com
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August 12, 2005
phd thought - narciso's class
Post-colonialism has close ties to utopianism. Next semester I shall teach a proseminar on the utopianism of French Neo-classic architecture and beyond. The notion that classicism is atemporal because it is a product of the wisdom of nature and therefore the perfect architecture for the perfect society will be at the core of the proseminar. Investigation of how this idea, which is morally neutral, fed into utopias defined by the French Revolution, the Napoleonic Empire, the emerging early nineteenth-century Prussian nationalism, American republicanism and subsequent democracy, the notion to a return to first principles in early 20th-century Austria and Germany, and the Nazi and Soviet utopias will be topics of research.
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classes with narciso
600 Special Topics in Art History (Recent Topics: "Louis Sullivan";
467 Form and Content in American Architecture (1855-1900)
348 European Architecture: The 18th Century
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"It always starts out with me asking myself, 'Does the world really need another 40 feet of painting?' " Mr. Katz said, grinning. "And the answer is always no, but then I paint it anyway, just to see what it's going to look like."
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July 31, 2005
note from narciso
Do you think that thirty or forty years from now, when the rapture of
dancing in the street is a sweet and lovely memory of the two of you,
you will feel your chest swelling and bursting with tenderness for her
to the point that you will be willing, at your old age, to sacrifice
anything to see her smile? This, I think, is the final bliss of two
becoming one as the road approaches the end.
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July 19, 2005
LARE board MD
The Board - State Board of Examiners of Landscape Architects
State Board of Examiners of Landscape Architects
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July 13, 2005
Medium Format Contax 645
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DSC-F828
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July 07, 2005
phd titles from princeton
Miwon Kwon, (University of California, Los Angeles), Site Specificity and the Problematics of Public Art: Recent Transformations at the Intersection of Art and Architecture (1998)
Alick Mclean, (Syracuse University), Sacred Space and Public Policy: The Establishment, Decline and Revival of Prato's Piazza Della Pieve (1993)
Alexandra Midal, 1968-1972: Cells, Capsules and Units: Furniture as Architecture
Tamar Zinguer, Architecture in Play: An Exploration of the Interchange Between Architecture and Toys
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NY times article "bUild me a bargain"
SIDING: The exterior is clad in plywood and cement fiberboard panels stained green to blend with the surrounding foliage. The deck is untreated cedar.
CATWALK: A home for 2,000 books - a handful written by Ms. Upcher - was constructed with industrial steel brackets and construction-grade cedar planks.
BUDGET GOURMET: In the kitchen, a butcher block countertop and aluminum frame cabinets with particleboard shelves, also used in the guest bedroom, helped keep a lid on costs.
ECONOMY CLASS: Caroline Upcher wanted a simple house in the Hamptons. For $190 a square foot, her architects devised a two-story cube clad in tinted fiberboard and rough plywood. No need for a garage: Ms. Upcher prefers to bike.
Walls are made of sheets of oukume plywood and cedar floorboards split down the middle and upended. The floors are made of the same fiberboard used for outdoor signs.
HEAT: A bluestone mantel hangs over a prefab fireplace on the same brackets used for the bookshelves. The floor is fiberboard, the kind typically used for outdoor signs.
LIGHTS: Inexpensive industrial fixtures were hung from hollow steel columns and brackets with wiring hidden inside.
no-frills industrial shelving system using planks of construction-grade cedar and steel brackets bolted into predrilled holes in vertical columns, a system used in big-box stores like Home Depot. Versions of the sturdy steel brackets were used throughout the house to support a narrow catwalk off the upstairs study, a bluestone fireplace mantel, kitchen cabinets and light fixtures.
In fact, the shelf system holds up the roof, and the entire second floor. Although the system is inexpensive - the entire structure cost $7,000 - it is sturdier than any wooden post and beam construction,
For about the same cost as ordinary wallboard, Mr. Masi covered the walls of the living-dining area in sheets of oukume plywood finished in a clear oil-base sealant. "It has a lot more character than drywall, and it softens the industrial aesthetic," he said.
The floors throughout the house are made of $40 sheets (4 feet by 8 feet) of fiberboard made with waterproof glue, a material typically used to make outdoor signs. "We laid it down in a day," said Mr. Masi. "It gets abused because it's not a real floor material." With its scratches and stains, the floor is the one disappointment, Ms. Upcher said. "But I wasn't going to change it," she said. "I just look up."
Some of the biggest savings came in the kitchen, where Mr. Masi selected stainless steel cabinets, some with frosted glass fronts. He used the same steel cabinets as bathroom vanities and even turned a steel pantry unit into an armoire in Ms. Upcher's guest bedroom.
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other phd thought
compare contrast china's infrastructure movement with the US's and china's probably course correction (as ours is/has been going through)
Planning History and Theory
Urban Spatial Theory
Economic Development
Physical Planning
Transportation
Housing
Community Development
Comparative Planning
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| Comments (0)phd thought
what about developing countries who are skipping large infrastructure projects in favor of individual applications (cell phones instead of land lines, personal water filtration instead of city water, etc) and its effect on built environment patterns
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July 04, 2005
Web Standards in proposals
In order to anticipate future browser compatibility we require conformance to the following W3C standards:
HTML
Validate to either the W3C's XHTML 1.0 transitional or strict doctype
http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/
CSS
Validate to the W3C's CSS 2.1 or 1.0
http://www.w3.org/TR/CSS21/
http://www.w3.org/TR/CSS1
Javascript
Javascript will never use browser detect but instead object detection to test for browser support of properties, arrays and methods
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notes on photographing smoke
Firstly I should point out that the smoke is everyday grey. I have found joss sticks to be the best source of smoke. The smoke is side or back lit and photographed against a black background.
If I want the final picture to have a white background then the whole image is inverted, black becoms white, white becomes black, and grey's stay much the same. The colouring is done in Photoshop by selecting parts of the image with a highly feathered selection and adjusting the colour with hue/saturation or one of the other colour adjustment tools.
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CMS information from Archinect member
>How are you building your CMS ? Are you building a database system with PHP/SQL ?
>
>Ive done a number of striaight html sites but am interested in learning how to set up a simple, useable CMS.
>
>Any thoughts would be most appreciated.
>
>-andrew
>
>
Oh, and as a recommendation for a simple solution, Mambo
(www.mamboserver.com) is relatively easy to set-up and manage, and you
can integrate some of the templating functions into Dreamweaver.
What kind of site do you want? Is it a blog, a marketing site? Do you
need image galleries? User authentication? All of these questions will
help you select a CMS.
Rodrigo
andrew,
this is in response to the archinect thread, right?
I am using typo3 (http://www.typo3.org/). It's an open osurce PHP-based
cms. Very powerful and extensible, but with a rather steep learning
curve. It does ,however, have a very helpful and active community, and a
number of tutorials on templating and other topics. The newsgroups are
very active anf friendly as well.
There are easier to use systems, but in my opinion, they aren't as
configurable and don't have very good control over users.
I used it for a rather large site, belonging to one of the largest IT
firms in Chile (where I live), and they were convinced it is a robust,
scalable system. You can check out the site here: http://www.sonda.com/.
(I only did the programming / development, not the graphic design, which
I'm not too fond of).
You should take a look at http://www.opensourcecms.com/, which lets you
try out a large of number of CMS solutoins without having to install
them first, and has good forums, etc.
Let me know if you need any help or suggestions, and show me your work!
Cheers,
rodrigo
{signal}
>How are you building your CMS ? Are you building a database system with PHP/SQL ?
>
>Ive done a number of striaight html sites but am interested in learning how to set up a simple, useable CMS.
>
>Any thoughts would be most appreciated.
>
>-andrew
>
>
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PHP MYSQL Book
PHP + MYSQL Web Development
By Luke Welling & Laura Thompson
$49.95
amazon link
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