Any kid with an architectural bent—and many a grown designer—has dreamed up elaborate and maybe-crazy buildings, made from materials that don’t exist with anti-gravity properties that make soaring heights a cinch. And while it’s not to say that some pretty extraordinary (La Sagrada Familia) and experimental (Fonthill) buildings don’t get built, vast cities of the never built remain in our collective unconscious.

Dreams aside, there are plenty of examples of interesting buildings that got to the sketch or model stage from some well-known architects, but were never constructed (see some dramatically interesting examples from the City of Angels in this month’s story, “Dreams Unfulfilled.”)

Seeing what they didn’t build can give us (almost) as much insight into these architects’ work and method as those that were. Read more…

Turning ten next year, the McCormick Tribune Campus Center at the Illinois Institute of Technology, designed by OMA’s Rem Koolhaas in 2003, is a widely lauded building. Waxing poetic about the way the structure incorporates the train tracks that run above it, while protecting the building’s occupants from any noise or vibrations associated trains, is just one positive reaction to the well-known design.

But for me, this campus center at IIT works because it provides students and faculty with choices of where to work and hang out. Their options range from sundrenched tables to underground computer stations. Like any student center, this too contains spaces where the kids can eat, drink coffee, meet with others, and shop during their breaks. But it’s the sense of control they get that I find rewarding.

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It’s only the ninth of March and already we’re having trouble keeping up with all this month’s design news. If you’re like us (harried, easily distracted, constantly hungry, etc.), then read on for a quick, painless recap of the month’s biggest design news, so far.

President Obama Appoints Edward Tufte to the Recovery Independent Advisory Panel

In his new role, the information-design guru (and vocal PowerPoint critic) will help track and explain the $787 billion in federal stimulus funds. “I’m doing this because I like accountability and transparency, and I believe in public service,” Tufte wrote on his Web site. “And it is the complete opposite of everything else I do.”
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MIT’s New Media Lab Building Opens

Fumohiko Maki’s design draws on Piet Mondrian, George Seurat, and Japanese paper lanterns for a 163,000-square-foot exercise in transparency.

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Images: © OMA/Ole Scheeren 2009

Bangkok might not be the first Asian capital one thinks of when talk turns to high-quality international architecture (it might not be the second or third one, either), but that could just make it ideal for a project like MahaNakhon, OMA’s dazzling 77-story skyscraper slated to begin construction this fall. The MahaNakhon project is headed by OMA’s Ole Scheeren (Scheeren was also the lead architect on Beijing’s CCTV headquarters), and its look and sheer size are clearly intended to make a statement about new design and development possibilities in Thailand. The building will feature seven floors of retail (including cafes and restaurants), residential units (200, managed by the Ritz-Carlton), a hotel (the Bangkok Edition, a collaboration between Marriott International and Ian Schrager), and, of course, a Sky Bar. A public plaza and outdoor atrium at the foot of the building will connect MahaNakhon with the Cube, a seven-story leisure-and-dining complex, also designed by OMA.

In renderings, the skyscraper looks like it’s been eaten away from the outside; irregularly stacked terraces form a sort of pixilated helix, carved into the otherwise unbroken façade of the building. The idea, according to the designers, is to expose the insides of the building to the city around it—to reduce the skyscraper’s natural insularity and promote some type of integration between the tower and its surroundings. OMA has a history of carefully considering urban settings in their designs and, socially, the emphasis here on public space and connections to mass transit hubs is laudable. Typologically, OMA’s skyscraper doesn’t exactly blend in, but, then again, maybe that’s the point.

More images of MahaNakhon (Thai for “great metropolis”) after the jump. Read more…

The architecture world’s eyes are trained this morning on Beijing, where a hotel tower in Rem Koolhaas’s massive Central China Television (CCTV) complex went up in flames, the New York Times reports. The 40-story Mandarin Oriental Hotel, scheduled for completion this year, might have caught fire during the citywide fireworks displays celebrating the lunar new year. Videos from bystanders are already being posted on YouTube (like the one shown here), but there’s no word yet on injuries or the full extent of the damage. Early reports suggest that the main building, China Central Television’s monumental headquarters, unveiled last summer as an Olympics showpiece, is so far unscathed.