The rate at which the seas are rising. Best estimate: .13" per year (per National Geographic and NOAA, both possibly referencing the same source material). There is some debate on whether the rate of climate change and sea level rise will increase or level off as the effects of both act on one another (is... Continue Reading →
15. Victor Hugo
What Victor Hugo really meant by ‘this will kill that' "By 1832, the year he published his novel, Hugo believed architecture had reached an impasse: architects had nothing new to say. This artistic bankruptcy was revealed in the profusion of movements that toyed with earlier styles: neo-classicism, neo-Byzantine, neo-this, neo-that. Architecture was dead, but architects... Continue Reading →
14. Brick
How to lay bricks Two pieces of advice from teachers in undergrad architecture schools: If you want to work out your forearms, apprentice with a brick mason over the summer If you want a lucrative profession skip architecture and become a mason specializing in butter joints - the thin mortar joints that most pre-modern architecture... Continue Reading →
13. More Glass
And [a history] of its [glass] meaning Glass as building material has always meant connection to the outside world, often at a cost of warmth (or dryness). Two papers/essays discussed in past architectural theory classes covered some of the evolving meaning of glass and of windows in the 20th century. Type and its Transformation by... Continue Reading →
12. Glass, a History
The history of its [glass] production and use Wikipedia is remarkably details on this topic. I have little to add except to say that windows hold symbolic value, which is why people buy windows with useless pieces of fake frame pretending to divide one pane of glass into six. It seems like glass always looked... Continue Reading →
11. Glass
The insulating properties of glass This experiment of writing a post a day for Michael Sorkin's laundry list of prerequisites for architects has turned into "how effective is google at answering a particular question". I can share links explaining how window insulation is measured (on a zero to one scale called u-value aka thermal transmittance).... Continue Reading →
10. Azaleas
The flowering season for azaleas Number 10 of 250 things an architect should know, according to architect Michael Sorkin. The Azalea Society of America has a chart showing bloom times which vary based on weather, species:
9. Rent Subsidy in DC
[How many people receive rent subisidy] in your city (including the rich)? [A semantic issue: if you rent out a house and the landlord gets tax breaks on their mortgage interest rate is not everyone getting a tertiary/'trickle down' subsidy, assuming that the cost of financing home ownership gets passed on to tenant?] I currently... Continue Reading →
8. Rent Subsidy
The number of people with rent subsidies in New York City The Museum of the City of New York had a show over the winter focusing on affordable housing in the city. The show was a rich look at various types of affordable housing projects undertaken in the last 100 or so years. (Coverage of... Continue Reading →
7. Hatshepsut’s Temple
Everything possible about Hatshepsut’s temple (try not to see it as ‘modernist’ avant la lettre). Queen Hatshepsut made the news this week with reports that her impact had been covered up by her successor (stepson); she was a far more prolific builder than previously thought. Sorkin here implores a reading of her namesake temple that... Continue Reading →
Adam Achrati 