I have written about Le Corbusier’s Cité Radieuse in Marseille many times before on the blog. It is one of the most influential multi-unit buildings of the 20th century. For better and for worse, it inspired a generation of architects. But up until this afternoon, I had yet to actually see it in person. Now that I have, here are 3 takeaways.
The corridors throughout the building were thought of as “streets” in a vertical village. Because of this, each street had a mailbox and each front door came equipped with an elaborate delivery system. The large curvy thing pictured above was for general deliveries (mostly food I’m guessing). And the smaller door below was for ice block deliveries (i.e. refrigeration). In both cases, these doors could be accessed from inside the kitchen.
The two “streets” in the middle of the building were dedicated to commercial uses. And by being in the middle of the building, they were equidistant from residents living either above or below. I was told that when the building first opened in the 1950s, these streets were actually quite successful — filled with everything from bakeries to grocery stores. So you can imagine people running deliveries up and down to the other streets. But that quickly fell off as the retailing landscape developed in Marseille and in France. Today, this portion of the building houses mostly offices, art galleries, and specialty boutiques. Though there remains a widely-used 21-room hotel (pictured above).
To fully appreciate what the Cité Radieuse meant for housing in France, you kind of have to imagine what the rest of its stock was like at that time. The introduction of duplex and dual aspect units with modern kitchens and bathrooms and with views of the sea, represented meaningful progress at the time. But it is interesting to see how much ceiling heights have changed over the years. They’re really low here — well under 8 feet. And that is probably its greatest Achilles’ heel today.
If ever you happen to find yourself in Marseille, I would encourage a visit to the Cité Radieuse. Many of the things we do today started in this building. And there are some other ideas here that might also be worth bringing back.
https://twitter.com/CyberBrokers_/status/1572224061119533056?s=20&t=qZlgoHSqui9npg4jr1fzLg
One of the most interesting things about NFTs is that some, but not all, come with very permissive licensing. What this could mean is that, as a holder, you are free to do whatever you would like with your NFTs, including creating businesses on top of them or using them for other commercial purposes. This is fascinating to me and I like NFT projects that adopt this open approach.
In the past, we have talked about Bored Ape Yacht Club owners creating things like restaurants on top of their NFTs. But here is another more recent example: An NFT from the CyberBrokers collection has just been signed to a Web3 record label called Player Zero. This is the company's first "Animated Virtual Artist", and her inaugural album is available for streaming here, as well as from places like Spotify.
This might sound kind of crazy if you aren't following the crypto space. But is it really? We already have virtual influencers with millions of followers, so why can't we have virtual pop stars being signed to digital record labels?
I don't know what this will ultimately mean for the holder of the above NFT, but imagine a world where the owner automatically receives X% of all the proceeds produced by the virtual artist. Now all of a sudden you have a cash flow stream that can be evaluated using traditional finance methods and an asset that can be valued and traded.
Full disclosure: I own multiple CyberBrokers.
Okay, so this is creepy, but perhaps not all that shocking:
https://twitter.com/driesdepoorter/status/1569285878089908231?s=20&t=oF9GL9lTNJ8TMFY10T9zhw
What artist Dries Depoorter has done is the following:
He recorded videos from open cameras located in cities around the world (the one in the embedded tweet above is from Temple Bar in Dublin)
He scraped all Instagram photos tagged with the same general location
And then he used AI software to help compare the Instagram photos against behind-the-scenes footage of the photos actually being taken
I don't have a problem with people posing and making numerous attempts to capture the right photo. You should see me before every meal and when I go to the gym. I think the creepy part is that many, or perhaps most, probably don't realize just how ubiquitous video surveillance is within our cities. But the reality is that there are cameras everywhere.
I guess I'll never be able to run for Prime Minister.
I have written about Le Corbusier’s Cité Radieuse in Marseille many times before on the blog. It is one of the most influential multi-unit buildings of the 20th century. For better and for worse, it inspired a generation of architects. But up until this afternoon, I had yet to actually see it in person. Now that I have, here are 3 takeaways.
The corridors throughout the building were thought of as “streets” in a vertical village. Because of this, each street had a mailbox and each front door came equipped with an elaborate delivery system. The large curvy thing pictured above was for general deliveries (mostly food I’m guessing). And the smaller door below was for ice block deliveries (i.e. refrigeration). In both cases, these doors could be accessed from inside the kitchen.
The two “streets” in the middle of the building were dedicated to commercial uses. And by being in the middle of the building, they were equidistant from residents living either above or below. I was told that when the building first opened in the 1950s, these streets were actually quite successful — filled with everything from bakeries to grocery stores. So you can imagine people running deliveries up and down to the other streets. But that quickly fell off as the retailing landscape developed in Marseille and in France. Today, this portion of the building houses mostly offices, art galleries, and specialty boutiques. Though there remains a widely-used 21-room hotel (pictured above).
To fully appreciate what the Cité Radieuse meant for housing in France, you kind of have to imagine what the rest of its stock was like at that time. The introduction of duplex and dual aspect units with modern kitchens and bathrooms and with views of the sea, represented meaningful progress at the time. But it is interesting to see how much ceiling heights have changed over the years. They’re really low here — well under 8 feet. And that is probably its greatest Achilles’ heel today.
If ever you happen to find yourself in Marseille, I would encourage a visit to the Cité Radieuse. Many of the things we do today started in this building. And there are some other ideas here that might also be worth bringing back.
https://twitter.com/CyberBrokers_/status/1572224061119533056?s=20&t=qZlgoHSqui9npg4jr1fzLg
One of the most interesting things about NFTs is that some, but not all, come with very permissive licensing. What this could mean is that, as a holder, you are free to do whatever you would like with your NFTs, including creating businesses on top of them or using them for other commercial purposes. This is fascinating to me and I like NFT projects that adopt this open approach.
In the past, we have talked about Bored Ape Yacht Club owners creating things like restaurants on top of their NFTs. But here is another more recent example: An NFT from the CyberBrokers collection has just been signed to a Web3 record label called Player Zero. This is the company's first "Animated Virtual Artist", and her inaugural album is available for streaming here, as well as from places like Spotify.
This might sound kind of crazy if you aren't following the crypto space. But is it really? We already have virtual influencers with millions of followers, so why can't we have virtual pop stars being signed to digital record labels?
I don't know what this will ultimately mean for the holder of the above NFT, but imagine a world where the owner automatically receives X% of all the proceeds produced by the virtual artist. Now all of a sudden you have a cash flow stream that can be evaluated using traditional finance methods and an asset that can be valued and traded.
Full disclosure: I own multiple CyberBrokers.
Okay, so this is creepy, but perhaps not all that shocking:
https://twitter.com/driesdepoorter/status/1569285878089908231?s=20&t=oF9GL9lTNJ8TMFY10T9zhw
What artist Dries Depoorter has done is the following:
He recorded videos from open cameras located in cities around the world (the one in the embedded tweet above is from Temple Bar in Dublin)
He scraped all Instagram photos tagged with the same general location
And then he used AI software to help compare the Instagram photos against behind-the-scenes footage of the photos actually being taken
I don't have a problem with people posing and making numerous attempts to capture the right photo. You should see me before every meal and when I go to the gym. I think the creepy part is that many, or perhaps most, probably don't realize just how ubiquitous video surveillance is within our cities. But the reality is that there are cameras everywhere.
I guess I'll never be able to run for Prime Minister.
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