John Hill’s Notable Books of 2011
Nonfiction, Architecture
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This encyclopedia of alternatives to traditional architectural practice is a valuable reference at a time when many architects are still out of a job and are disenfranchised by the profession. It also illustrates the great diversity of architectural production that exists outside of the “individual hero” mold. Collaboration and empowerment are key instead of authorship and formal novelty.
Ford, an architect and educator at the University of Virginia (and the author of The Details of Modern Architecture), continues his exploration of details in architecture by defining five different types found in contemporary architecture and buildings from last century. Theoretically he grounds each type of detail into a larger context, ultimately arguing for autonomous details that work on their own terms.
This beautifully produced monograph on Chicago-based Studio Gang Architects redefines the genre with its thorough illustration of process. It reveals the imagination and working methods of Jeanne Gang and her team through an archival presentation of a half-dozen projects. A sequel with more projects is much anticipated.
This book collects over 150 design proposals in response to the Institute for Urban Design’s By the City/For the City competition. While not all of the proposals are necessarily worthy of publication, the book is notable as an exploration of how crowd sourcing can be used to define problems and develop appropriate design solutions toward the betterment of the public realm.
This collection of Pamphlet Architecture’s second decade is notable on a personal level. These issues coincide with my undergraduate architectural education, and were therefore important in shaping how I thought about architecture. Those by Lebbeus Woods and Kaplan and Krueger hold up especially well all these years later. This collection also replaces issues that I have misplaced over the years.
This collection of a dozen urban design projects by Morphosis is elegantly designed and illustrated, a visual feast. But it is also theoretically intriguing, in the way Mayne uses the computer for exploring the evolution of urban form.
Finnish architect, educator, and writer Juhani Pallasmaa wraps up his trilogy of books on the senses in architecture—Eyes of the Skin and The Thinking Hand are the first two—by focusing on images at a time when they saturate our mediated lives. He skillfully argues for reconsidering image based on experience rather than image based on novelty.
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Announcements
Design Books to Win, December 18, 2014: Winners of Five Books by Pentagram Designers Announced
The winners of five books designed by Pentagram have been announced. The three winners are Joy Weeeng, Tyler Wilson, and Tim Zissou — congratulations!
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Our new giveaways begin again in 2015.
New Book Release, December 31, 2014: What If...?: The Architecture and Design of David Rockwell
Widely admired for his sophistication, creativity and exuberance, David Rockwell is one of the leading architects, interiors architects, and set designers working today. For over 30 years, he has explored his desire to imagine new worlds, to tell stories and to engage with others. This interest is rooted in his sense of play and possibility—an endless curiosity that continually drives him to ask, “What if?”
Edited by Chee Pearlman; texts by David Rockwell, et al.
Published by Metropolis Books
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New Book Release, February 3, 2015: The Modern Architecture Symposia, 1962–1966: A Critical Edition
In a series of three symposia at Columbia University in the 1960s, leading scholars and critics gathered to re-examine the architecture of the 1910s, 1920s, and 1930s and assess its scope and significance anew. Chaired by Henry-Russell Hitchcock with the support of Philip Johnson, the Modern Architecture Symposia marked a pivotal moment in the reappraisal of early modern architecture and its historiography during the late modern period.
Edited by Rosemarie Haag Bletter and Joan Ockman, with Nancy Ecklund Later
Published by The Temple Hoyne Buell Center for the Study of American Architecture; distributed by Yale University Press
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New Book Release, February 9, 2015: Reproducing Scholten & Baijings
The first book on the work of the Amsterdam-based studio Scholten & Baijings, which has become renowned for its sensitive and subtle yet functional products—from ceramics and silverware to textiles and even a concept car.
By Louise Schouwenberg
Published by Phaidon Press
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New Book Release, February 17, 2014: B is for Bauhaus, Y is for YouTube: Designing the Modern World from A to Z
A tool kit, done in A–Z form, for understanding the world around us through the way we design and use things. Covering subjects that range from authenticity to Grand Theft Auto to Dieter Rams, Deyan Sudjic’s latest book has been called “a master class in musing on modern design.”
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By Deyan Sudjic
Published by Rizzoli
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New Book Release, September 16, 2014: Designing Here/Now
An ambitious global compendium of the most thoughtful and innovative design objects (over 500) invented or produced in the past five years, compiled by experts at the online industrial design magazine Core 77.
Edited by Allan Chochinov and Eric Ludlum
Published by Thames & Hudson
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