It’s official: US investor Hines will go ahead with a Frank Gehry design and build Germany’s tallest residential tower smack in the middle of Alexanderplatz. At the same time, an old master plan is to be revived. What to make of all this?
Gehry’s tower will rise to the right of the Saturn electronics store, across the street from the GDR-era “Haus des Reisens” (with the Sharp advertisement on its top) – here is a rendering
I am planning to pitch a piece on the 1964 Tokyo Olympics and the urban transformation the Games brought about. Besides some of Manuel’s photos, I want to use a slide I bought on ebay the other day (see below). We look up north across the newly-built expressway connecting Haneda airport with the city centre. The monorail track is to the right. More info here. Article abstract after the jump (comments more than welcome!).
Back from Argentina I have quite a few architectural shots I don’t necessarily want to cast a post around. Herewith a few unsorted impressions of some buildings that caught my eye while exploring Buenos Aires.
Puerto Madero is Buenos Aires’s ambitious waterfront urban regeneration project in the old port area, along the riverbank of the Rio de la Plata. While construction is ongoing, the area has already become one of the city’s richest. Herewith some photos taken during a recent stroll.
Inaugurated in 1971, Torre Dorrego is a Brutalist residential building. It towers above Buenos Aires’ Palermo neighbourhood. Its unique shape gives it a certain lightness. The many antennas on the roof emphasise its vertical shape.
The Museo Xul Solar is devoted to the artist’s extensive work spanning several decades and various media. The building is an architectural masterpiece that connects various old structures, including Solar’s flat at the top, with cast concrete staircases, mezzanine floors and open spaces.
With Testa, Argentina lost one of its most famous architects last year. Two of his landmark buildings are among the more successful examples of Brutalism globally. I visited the Banco de Londres and the Biblioteca Nacional while in Buenos Aires last week.
Banco de Londres (1959-1966)
We checked out two modern art museums in San Telmo, Buenos Aires the other day. The Museo de Arte Contemporaneo de Buenos Aires (MACBA) and the neighbouring Museo de Arte Moderno de Buenos Aires (MAMBA) were, while almost completely empty, really worth the visit.
Super-slender residential skyscrapers are taking to the skies south of Central Park. They are an increasingly brazen display of economic inequalities and a seizing of one of the world’s most distinctive skylines by the super-rich.
Midtown zoning plans on display at the Skyscraper Museum, New York
Japan is any rail buff’s heaven. The punctuality and efficiency of the trains is one thing, the sheer scale of the network another: 82 out of the world’s 100 busiest train stations are in Japan. The role private rail lines played in the post-war urbanisation of Tokyo is explored in the post below, using Tokyu’s Den-en-toshi Line as an example.
Den-en-toshi Line signage. Thanks to kawawa for taking the shot!
