Brandon Donnelly

Daily insights for city builders, delivered every morning at 6 AM ET. I’m Brandon Donnelly — a Toronto-based real estate developer and founder of Globizen. I’ve been writing here since 2013.

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Tag: rem koolhaas

  • Austrian House by Rem Koolhaas

    I definitely wouldn’t call a 40-foot wide lot minuscule. But I guess when it’s located on the side of a mountain in Zell am See, Austria; you have a required 13-foot setback on both sides; and your architect is one of the world’s leading practitioners, it starts to feel a bit smaller. This is the recently completed Austrian House, designed by Rem Koolhaas:

    I’m always drawn to houses like these because they demand creativity. You can’t just repeat what was done on that other 40-foot wide lot, because then you might conclude that the lot is unbuildable. And it’s not. You just have to solve the puzzle. Then you’ve unlocked something that that many, or perhaps most, thought wasn’t possible. And that’s truly exciting to me.

    For more on the Austrian House, check out Architectural Digest.

    Photography by Pernille Loof and Thomas Loof

  • New Taipei Performing Arts Center by OMA

    The new OMA-designed Taipei Performing Arts Center opened up last Sunday and so you’ll now find lots of articles, photos, and drone videos circulating around online. The two partners-in-charge, Rem Koolhaas and David Gianotten, were also on this Monocle on Design episode talking about the genesis of the project and how they worked to optimize the various theater spaces.

    My favorite part of the whole story is how they actually won the design competition. The site is located next to Taipei’s renowned Shilin Night Market. And I can attest to this fame because I spent a summer living in Taipei while I was in university. This night market was the thing I was immediately told I needed to visit as soon as I stepped off the plane. And they weren’t wrong. I spent many a nights with those stinky tofu dishes that smell like feet but actually taste pretty good.

    But for whatever reason, the competition brief stipulated that the night market was to be torn down in order to make way for this new performing arts center. And since it was in the brief, almost everyone took it as a non-negotiable given. The only firm that didn’t — out of 140 bidders — was OMA. They questioned why the city couldn’t have both: a new performing arts center and their wildly successful night market.

    So that’s how OMA — at least partially — won the competition. And I’m certain that Taipei is better for it.

  • 50U

    There is a new book out right now about the United Arab Emirates called 50U. It has been fifty years since the confederation of the seven Gulf states was officially declared (December 2, 1971), and so the book is a celebration of that. The format is 50 portraits of people, places, and plants (yes, plants) that tell the story of the UAE.

    Included in the book is an excerpt of a 2009 talk by architect Rem Koolhaas (of OMA) about his reading of Dubai. ArchDaily published an abridged version over here and I thought it was an interesting read. Few people think about cities as deeply as Koolhaas does, and few can express their thoughts in such a rational and Dutch-like way. Here’s a snippet of the talk:

    I came here first in 2004. We were asked to do a major building on the site which is marked by the flag. Then, two years ago it was the exact moment… I became increasingly nervous about the mission of architecture and the uses of architecture. And I really became almost desperate… that the incredible pressure of the market economy was forcing architecture itself into increasingly extravagant conditions. Seemingly, Dubai seemed to be the epicenter of that extravagance. So, I came with deeply ambivalent feelings. It seemed as if the idea of the city and the metropolis itself had been almost turned into a caricature, not a coherent entity but maybe a patchwork of theme parks. And those themes would become the bogus and increasingly bizarre characters that were perhaps partly mythical and partly real.

    I’ve only been to Dubai once. It was back in 2008 or 2009. And to be honest, it wasn’t my favorite city; I think primarily because I enjoy walking cities and Dubai is largely the opposite of that. It felt like a patchwork of theme parks that you had to drive around to — ideally in an exotic car while being as flashy as possible.

    Now if these theme parks were within walking distance (and the drinks were good), that would be an entirely different story.

  • OMA New York has just published its first book

    OMA NY — the New York office of OMA — has just published its first monograph. It’s called OMA NY: Search Term. For those of you who may be unfamiliar, Office for Metropolitan Architecture (OMA) is an architecture firm that was founded by Rem Koolhaas in Rotterdam in 1975.

    The firm is considered to be one of the most influential in the world because of their projects, the writing and thinking of Rem Koolhaas, and because of how many notable architects developed their craft under his tutelage.

    When I was in architecture school, OMA was a firm that people wanted to work at and I had friends who did. You weren’t paid very much from what I remember, but people put up with that because you wanted OMA on your resume and you wanted to learn things from Rem (apparently he’s a big fan of Raisin Bran in the morning).

    The New York office of OMA is run by Shohei Shigematsu and Jason Long who are both partners. The practice started out as an American outpost, but it has become more independent over the years and, from what I can gather, it now prides itself on having its own attitudes and views on architecture and urbanism.

    This monograph is about that. Twenty radical projects from the firm’s new guard. It also includes interviews from people like Virgil Abloh (Off-White). I don’t have a copy yet, but if you’re an architecture and urbanism person, you probably want this one on your bookshelf.

    Image: Rizzoli

  • Ray: Architecturally-inspired homes at the intersection of art, culture, and community

    Back in 2008, Dasha Zhukova and Roman Abramovich hired starchitect Rem Koolhaas and founded a new contemporary art museum in Moscow called the Garage Museum. Supposedly this was the first philanthropic institution in Russia dedicated solely to contemporary art. (Here’s a short video in case you’re curious what it looks like.) After it opened, the founders apparently had a realization about the way people like to consume art. Yes, people like to look at art and ponder deep things. But it turns out that people also like just being around art and other art-like things. People started coming to the Garage Museum not only to view the various exhibitions, but also to just hang out.

    This insight is now being used to inform a new real estate development company, also by Dasha, called Ray. The mission of the company is to create “architecturally-inspired homes at the intersection of art, culture, and community.” Their first two projects are in Harlem and Fishtown, Philadelphia, but apparently they have something cooking in Miami as well. What Ray hopes to do is integrate art and culture in a more meaningful way through cultural programming, exhibitions in their buildings, artist studio spaces, and other creative ideas.

    There’s also an affordable housing angle. According to the WSJ, Ray’s Harlem project is a joint venture with L+M Development Partners. I don’t know any of the specifics of this deal, but I know L+M, because one of their founding partners, Ron Moelis, was a professor of mine in graduate school. L+M is focused on affordable and mixed-income housing and uses tools like the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC) to make these sorts of projects financially feasible. They aren’t, otherwise. I learned all about them in school and I always found it to be a great way to get the private sector building affordable housing.

    “Art and culture, community, and accessible pricing.”

  • This is not an art show

    Later this month a new exhibition will open at the Guggenheim Museum called Countryside, The Future. Produced by architect Rem Koolhaas and Samir Bantal (Director of AMO), the focus of the exhibition is on non-urban areas — or, the 98% of the earth’s surface not occupied by cities. The 21st century is being called an urban century. But the argument here is that “the countryside is now the site where the most radical, modern components of our civilisation are taking place.” If you’re going to be in New York, this one should be worth checking out. It’s on my list. Here is a teaser video that was just released by the Guggenheim:

  • OMA’s first ground-up project in Manhattan finishes construction

    121 East 22nd — which is OMA’s first ground-up project in Manhattan — recently finished up construction at the corner of E 23rd St and Lexington Ave (the site continues through to E 22nd St, where there is basically a 2nd building). I wrote about the project over two years ago, here.

    Below is a photo by Laurian Ghinitoiu, via Dezeen, of it completed:

    The defining feature is its “prismatic corner”, which, I understand from this interview with David Von Spreckelsen (President of Toll Brothers City Living), was largely an outcome of the site’s restrictive zoning. There was a requirement to have constant street walls. That minimized what could be done architecturally on the project’s main elevations.

    The solution is two contextual street walls — the punched windows are designed to match the rhythm of their adjoining buildings — coming together and creating dramatic visual interest only at the point where they intersect. Below is a rolled out elevation from OMA. Note the gradient created by the windows as they converge toward the corner (center in the drawing below).

    The other interesting thing about this project is that it reminded me just how different the built form of Manhattan can be compared to Toronto. In the case of 121 East 22nd, the streetwalls rise 150 feet without any stepbacks. There is then a 10 foot stepback before the building rises another 60 feet — similarly without any additional breaks.

    I love the grandeur.

  • Starchitecture is dead — how OMA thinks about preservation

    I somehow stumbled upon this transcript from Columbia University’s Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation (GSAPP), covering a talk that architect Rem Koolhaas did at the school back in, I think, 2014. 

    The title: “Preservation is overtaking us.” It’s all about how his firm OMA thinks about and approaches preservation. 

    The overarching theme is that preservation, for them, has become a kind of refuge from the market forces – which they call the “The ¥€$ Regime” – that currently drive architecture and demand constant novelty. It is refuge from “starchitecture.”

    Here is an excerpt:

    At some point, I don’t know who was responsible, the word, “starchitect” was invented. And we all know what it is: a term of derision. And at some point, it becomes very hard to avoid. I would say that preservation is, for us, a type of refuge from this term. What we are hoping to do is propose a number of strategies in which we are working to undo, or escape, from this label.

    And here is a summary of “OMA’s Preservation Manifesto” taken from the GSAPP transcript:

    1. Starchitecture is dead
    2. New forms are no longer relevant
    3. Preservation is architecture’s saving retreat
    4. Preservation creates relevance without new forms
    5. Preservation is architecture’s formless substitution

    It’s a substantial read, but a fascinating one. In case you don’t get to it (understandable), I would like to leave you with this final excerpt:

    What we started to do was look at preservation in general and look a little bit at the history of preservation. Now, the first law of preservation ever defined was in 1790, just a few years after the French Revolution. That is already an interesting idea, that at the moment in France when the past was basically being prepared for the rubbish dump, the issue of preserving monuments was raised for the first time. Another equally important moment was in 1877, when, in Victorian England, in the most intense moment of civilization, there was the second preservation proposition. If you look at inventions that were taking place between these two moments—cement, the spinning frame, the stethoscope, anesthesia, photography, blueprints, etc.—you suddenly realize that preservation is not the enemy of modernity but actually one of its inventions. That makes perfect sense because clearly the whole idea of modernization raises, whether latently or overtly, the issue of what to keep.

    I like the notion that preservation is one of the inventions of modernity, rather than an enemy of it.

    Photo by Reginar on Unsplash

  • REM

    image

    “A building has at least two lives – the one imagined by its maker and the life it lives afterward – and they are never the same.” -Rem Koolhaas

    Tonight I went with a developer friend to see the documentary REM at the Hot Docs Cinema on Bloor Street. It’s a documentary about the Dutch architect Rem Koolhaas, directed by his son Tomas Koolhaas. Trailer here.

    The film is essentially 75 minutes of introspection on the part of Rem. It’s him ruminating over a continuous piece by the American composer Murray Hidary. At times it was hard to hear what Rem was actually saying.

    If you’re looking to learn the specifics of his designs and process, then this movie is not for you. Though there’s lots of footage of his buildings. It also does not make clear just how much influence he has had professionally. I mean, everyone from Bjarke Ingels to Jeanne Gang once worked at his firm.

    The film is really about getting inside the mind of Rem as he travels the world. What struck me is Rem’s profound curiosity for seemingly everything. He really is obsessed with analyzing, documenting, and reporting. He refers to it as a compulsion.

    I also like the idea put forward that architecture represents a particular moment in time. If you’re precise about things, you may be right the moment the building is complete.

    But from that point onward, everything begins to change around it and you will be wrong. That’s what the quote at the top of this post is getting at.

    So I enjoyed it – but probably because I’m an architecture geek and Rem is arguably the most influential living architect today. But I’m not going to tell you that this film is a must-see.

    P.S. Who knew, Rem Koolhaas flies economy.

    Photo by Pavan Trikutam on Unsplash

  • 121 E 22nd

    My friends in New York tell me that if you want to sell a luxury residential building, you need a name brand architect. People care about architecture and it’s part of the buying process: “Oh, it’s a Herzog building.”

    To that end, Toll Brothers City Living just released the following video for their 121 E 22nd project in New York. If you can’t see it below, click here. What’s notable, is that it is OMA’s first full building in New York. So the story is: star architect + first building in the city.

    [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dSQq8W8od9g?rel=0&w=560&h=315]

    But there’s more. It’s almost unbelievable that, until now, OMA hadn’t designed and constructed a full building in New York. I reread this Dezeen article 5 times just to make sure I wasn’t missing something.

    So much of Rem Koolhaas’ career (founding partner of OMA) is centered around New York City. In 1978, he published Delirious New York, where he both dissected and celebrated the city’s “culture of congestion.” Oysters at the downtown athletic club, anyone?

    This book was so influential that I bet you’d be hard pressed to find an architect that doesn’t have it in their collection. I have his approximation of New York hanging on my wall. So this was clearly overdue. Kudos Toll Brothers City Living.

    Note: OMA’s New York office is led by Shohei Shigematsu.