I’m not sure if it was the latest Criminal Mastermind’s Lair (CML) in Daniel Craig’s final outing as James Bond that reminded me that while not all CML’s are Brutalist architecture, Brutalism has dominated the genre.

More than 60 years ago, in a land far, far away, design nearly won the day… — In 1958, before the Civil Rights Act of 1964, before bussing to integrate schools, before the Voting Rights Act of 1965, but just a few years after Rosa Parks and Brown v. Board of Education, there was an Expo (World’s Fair) in Brussels the US participated in with a major…

Fast food never had it so good. — As I’ve often claimed, designing a gas station (a prototype, say, for a national brand rollout) would have more impact on more people than any museum or city hall or library ever could. If the success of architecture is measured by the number of people’s lives improved (and why not)…

I learned a new word today; Apophenia. I’m almost (but not) embarrassed to reveal that I learned it from TV. Well, from whatever we call TV now (Netflix, actually), from a show called ‘The Queen’s Gambit’. It’s a show about brilliance/addiction/youth/family, among other things (including, mostly, chess) written and directed…

There are only one or two circumstances in which an architecture student can, in my view, legitimately be asked to work in a for-profit professional office without monetary compensation: when a visa specifically prohibits payment, and (in my opinion) when an architect is working on an unpaid competition and couldn’t…

Every few years a design critic writes about the questionable ethical parameters in which architects, desperate to build at any cost (including any moral cost), freely operate. Back in 2015 it was the New York Times article by Michael Kimmelman, about the American Institute of Architects’s (AIA) rejection of an…

Successful college dropouts, especially those from legendary institutions like Harvard or Stanford, are part of the origin story for Silicon Valley giants; Gates, Zuckerberg, Jobs, Dell, Brin, Page, Ellison all dropped out before starting the companies that made them extraordinarily wealthy and changed the world. …

Simulacra, Analog & Digital — “There are two ways of spreading light; to be the candle or the mirror that reflects it.” — Edith Wharton “Those who are able to see beyond the shadows and lies of their culture will never be understood, let alone believed by the masses.” — Plato So which is it…

I’m surprised how jolted I was by Charlie Watts death. Yes, he was the oldest, but (unrealistically) seemed like the least likely to die. We’re all shocked that Keith isn’t already dead (he credits that to using only pharmaceutical, never street, cocaine and heroin); Mick would be like John Lennon…