Valle de Egüés is a municipality located in the metropolitan area of Pamplona, north Spain, composed by several small towns. The capital of this valley is Sarriguren, a eco-friendly urban area settled in 1998. This eco-city is a pilot initiative of bioclimatic architecture and urbanism. In 2000, it was classified as "Good Practice" by the United Nations Centre for Human … [Read more...]
Life as architectural performance
Architecture atlas. The Eames: choreographing domestic life The designer couple Ray y Charles Eames lived in Pacific Palisades, Los Angeles, in a small, sunny home made of steel and glass and surrounded by trees. The iconic example of Modern domestic architecture, today considered a landmark of Los Angeles, began in the early 1940s. At that time, the couple of designers had … [Read more...]
Swimming pools. A private splash
A few weeks ago we wrote about Art Deco swimming pools, built in the 30s and 40s, now we write about modern and postmodern pools that took the good feeling of going swimming to the garden of single-family houses. Photograph of a swimming pool in Beverly Hills taken by Joe Scherschel for LIFE magazine in 1960. In 1960, LIFE magazine sent Joe Scherschel to photograph … [Read more...]
Do you want to swim or not? Seven Art Deco swimming pools
Nightswimming, remembering that night September's coming soon I'm pining for the moon The lyrics of the 1992 song Nightswimming, by the American music band REM, say that swimming is better on a quiet night. They evoke an unforgettable bath once the sun has set. They make us imagine the sensation of going into the water, the image of the clothes forgotten close to … [Read more...]
Abandoned landscape fragments as regeneration spaces
The view through the window shows the typical set of any city. On the right, a few collective housing towers have a paved community area on the ground floor. On the left, a recent building intended for hospital use, with a well resolved curtain wall facade. In the background, a 248 m high skyscraper. In the middle of this typically contemporary collage, there is … [Read more...]
Stories of the staircase: a journey through stairways’ role in architecture
Staircases are one of the richest architectural elements in terms of formal possibilities, one of the most complex to solve geometrically, and one of the most demanding at the functional level. In the architecture of AGi architects, staircases usually acquire an important role, as they are an opportunity to define a special transit between floors. The staircase is thought as a … [Read more...]
Power and the city. Modern architecture of the 70s in Kuwait and Madrid
The 70s were a decade of political and economic reconfiguration both in Kuwait and in Spain. Architecture gave shape to these processes, through buildings that reflected the aspirations of public and private institutions. In 1961, President Sheikh Abdullah Al-Salem signed the agreement that ended the British protectorate over the region of Kuwait. The Sheikh became the father … [Read more...]
Treatments of light: from latticework to Japanese shōji
The relationship between the architectural interior and the exterior has always been a key aspect when thinking about domesticity. Geographic reasons, which mainly have to do with climate, and cultural ones, linked to society and tradition, define the architectural limit between inside and outside. In the West, the opening of large windows was accepted and celebrated as soon … [Read more...]
The Galician Castros: origins of the circular house in Galicia
Landscape and heritage 1964. Modernism in architecture was beginning to be criticized by the younger architects. However, the belief in modernity remained alive. The architect Bernard Rudofsky was preparing an exhibition at the New York’s MoMA. Architecture without Architects changed perceptions about "vernacular" architecture, or at least drew attention to it. … [Read more...]
Translating between garden and paradise, an architecture atlas
Garden or paradise? Few architectures are so utopian, and at the same time so real, as the garden is. Perhaps the etymology of the word can help us to know the reason why. Garden comes from Old French jart, whose meaning was 'orchard', which came from Old Low Franconian garda, 'enclosure', space that is delimited by a fence. It turns out that, if we trace the origin of the … [Read more...]