The business of architecture
Safari Roof House What was it? A national lecture tour held last week for the Australian Institute of Architects by Malaysian architect, Kevin Low, and hosted in Melbourne by the ever-entertaining Stuart Harrison. Small Projects is also the name of Low's studio, which has an almost exclusive focus on buildings of residential scale or smaller.... Continue Reading →
The Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre What was it? The Australian Institute of Architects' national architecture conference, held two weekends ago at NH Architecture's polished Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre. Creatively directed by Sandra Kaji-O'Grady and John de Manincor, it explored the subject of material, asking questions like: is fog an architectural material? What would a... Continue Reading →
This is the 9th instalment in a series of 10 articles where we attempt to categorise chronologically and thematically the list of things you will need to start your architecture practice, and furnish it with the glimpses of insight we've accrued during the first three years of our architecture practice, Mihaly Slocombe. 9. Community When:... Continue Reading →
This is the 4th instalment in a series of 10 articles where we attempt to categorise chronologically and thematically the list of things you will need to start your architecture practice, and furnish it with the glimpses of insight we've accrued during the first three years of our architecture practice, Mihaly Slocombe. 4. The law When: Immediately Importance: Critical... Continue Reading →
What follows is a presentation we made this morning to the Australian Institute of Architect's Small Practice Forum, providing an introduction to cloud computing and argument for its benefits to small architecture practice. All characters appearing in this presentation are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental. An overview of... Continue Reading →
What are they? As part of the annual Australian Institute of Architects awards, architects gather in each state and territory for a weekend to present their projects to category juries. Categories include residential new, residential renovation and residential multiple, public, heritage, small project, public new and public renovation, interior, commercial and urban design. Entrants have 7 minutes... Continue Reading →
Not a great application letter It is a sign of the ongoing scarcity faced by the construction industry that architecture graduates are anecdotally having a lot of trouble finding work. The federal government's stimulus package has long since dried up and the big end of town is once again executing layoffs left and right. Though... Continue Reading →
Palace of the Soviets by Boras Iofan (1932) What is it? Michael Gurr wrote an opinion article in The Age recently condemning the Footscray Station Precinct development by SJB and McBride Charles Ryan as Stalinist. "If the communist bloc still existed, Footscray's apartment buildings are what their security headquarters would look like. These buildings are big,... Continue Reading →
We have observed with growing disquiet over recent years that architecture is fast becoming the invisible profession. Be it in the papers, on talkback radio or coming directly from parliament, rarely are the opinions of architects publicly sought on issues that affect the built environment. Over and over again, builders, planners, real estate agents, plumbers and... Continue Reading →
What's on Your Desk? - November Process We attended Process at Loop earlier this month, a session of the Australian Institute of Architects' long running young architects' talks entitled, What's on Your Desk? Presenting current projects and a few miscellaneous ideas were our friend and colleague, Steve Rose, together with Jack May and Andy Yu. Killing... Continue Reading →