Concrete
Editor: William Hall
Essay by Leonard Kohen
240 pages, Hardback, 290 x 250mm, English
Forms of Practice: German-Swiss Architecture 1980-2000
Ed.: Irina Davidovici
281 pages, softcover, 17 x 24 cm
English
How to Make a Japanese House
Edited by Cathelijne Nuijsink
Designed by Sander Boon
Paperback, 328 pages, 16 x 24 cm
NAi Publishers, 2012
This book contains a far richer mix than its coffee-table looks suggest: an intelligently-themed, eclectic selection of projects, both familiar and obscure. The projects are presented through archive and contemporary images with short, enlightening captions, all contextualized in a thoughtful essay by Leonard Koren that grounds a personal, physical experience of concrete. (RW)
Whilst the German-Swiss architecture phenomenon is not a new subject, this rigorously-researched and intelligent tome provides a fresh step back, divining the magic ingredients that have made it such an influential trend — traced through Swiss-ness, the ETH Zurich, and a detailed analysis of seminal projects. (RW)
No, this is not a construction manual. It's a selection of 21 radical, single-family houses in Japan, accompanied by 21 entertaining and informative interviews with their architects (including Sou Fujimoto, Kengo Kuma, and Kazuyo Sejima), illuminating their concepts in a way that makes you want to read the next interview. And the next. (FH)
Edge City: Driving the Periphery of São Paulo
Editor: Justin McGuirk
Available for Kindle and iPad
Strelka Press, 2012
Sweet and Salt: Water and the Dutch
Tracy Metz, Maartje Van Den Heuvel
296 pages, Softcover, 23 x 28 x 2.3 cm
NAi Publishers, 2012
Why We Build
Rowan Moore
416 pages, Hardcover, 23.4 x 15.3 cm
English
Picador, 2012
A well-written travelogue can provide an intimate understanding of place. Justin McGuirk’s new story of a day-long road trip around São Paulo’s perimeter is a perfect encapsulation of the “unstoppable” city. Taking us on a tour of various social housing typologies — the self-built shack to the modernist block — McGuirk combines keen observations and personal anecdotes with dense historical and socio-cultural information. (EW)
The Dutch are masters of managing the relationship between land and water. The constructed nature of the Netherlands has defined the country for centuries, in everything from economic to social terms. Tracy Metz and Maartje Van Den Heuvel's new book traces the country’s history into the present, taking an interdisciplinary approach to this pressing issue that will eventually affect us all. (JB)
Money. Power. Respect. In his bluntly titled book, Why We Build, Rowan Moore chronicles the money and power — along with sex and other base human motivations — behind a diverse range of architecture projects throughout the history. Personal yet global, he takes us from the Parthenon to the World Trade Center, from Adolf Loos to Lina Bo Bardi, in an entertaining, enlightening, and accessible book for everyone. (JB)
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