Fontevraud Abbey is a religious building hosting a cultural centre and situated in the Loire Valley (France), an Unesco World Heritage Site. Today the Fontevraud Abbey invite young artists ( here dancer & motion designers ) to reappropriate this historical place through their discipline.
[Source: Welcome to Fontevraud]
James Gulliver Hancock, an illustrator originally from Australia currently based in Brooklyn, New York is attempting to draw all the buildings in New York. Love his early work.
[An] holistic approach to illuminating cities has come to be known as a lighting master plan. While few cities outside Europe have a plan currently in place, the steps involved in creating one help officials evaluate how the layers of lighting – street-level, marquees and directional signage, and monuments or cultural landmarks – should work together and be energy efficient.
An interesting look at how lighting is stepping out from the shadows of historic preservation and being used by urban planners to help improve a city’s character and livability.
Anyone remotely interested in modern architecture must have heard of Le Corbusier’s chapel of Notre Dame du Haut (1954) in Ronchamp (France). It is one of Le Corbusier’s iconic buildings and is currently in the eye of a storm (in a teacup?) with regards to replacement of its visitor’s center to be designed by Renzo Piano.
DNA India points us to tiny hamlets within the suburbs of densely populated Mumbai, India. Mumbai was a cluster of seven islands with several villages not more than 70 years ago (my ancestors hail from one of them). I’m glad to see some remnants of those humble roots but these will not last long.
Christopher Hitchens makes an argument for preserving that quirky sense of place and cultural hotspots that make a city what it is. As he mentions, London, Paris, and San Francisco have recognized the need for its Bohemia and it is time for Manhattan to wake up and smell the coffee.
The challenge for all cities with a rich architectural legacy is to find a balance between preserving the historical identity without becoming a slave to it.
The Super Spatial Blog writes on Venice calling it a city that was destroyed by its own beauty by turning in to essentially “a theme park for hordes of visitors.”
This classic piece of American architecture never gets old.
Admittedly, it is the people that make a city but nevertheless, ghost towns can be hauntingly beautiful too.
What cities come readily to mind when you think of skyscrapers? New York? Tokyo? Shanghai? Well, how about Shibam located in the deserts of Yemen.
This city was host to more than 500 mud-brick ‘skyscrapers’ built more than 500 years ago. Click through for a fly-by of the city.