British architect Gavin Brodins trademark is designing luxury with ease, where he connects lifestyle with architecture and interiorsall with an insane amount of attention to detail, and a clever use of natural materials.

Mr. Brodin is the founder of Brodin Design Build, a luxury residential and commercial property developer based in Los Angeles. Most recently, he and his team have completed the penthouses at the Four Seasons Private Residences Nashville, which are glass units on the top floors of the new development. (The top, 40th-floor residence breaks a Nashville record, on the market for $25 million.)

Some of his most notable works include private yachts, jets, urban apartments, and designing for celebrity clientele that include Rod Stewart, Sylvester Stallone and Kate Beckinsale.

More: There Are Merits to Collaborative Rather Than Ego-Driven Architecture, Industry Veteran Says

Among his most ambitious portfolio projects are the $15 million Spelling Manor in Beverly Hills and the historic Palace Green mansion with 55 rooms on Kensington Palace Gardens in London, which he calls one of my most memorable projects to date.

Mansion Global caught up with Brodin, 50, about the power of lighting designers and the dangers of Pinterest.

Mansion Global: What was your approach for thepenthouses at the Four Seasons in Nashville?

Gavin Brodin: As a designer, Im always looking for projects that inspire and challenge me. This project allowed my team and I to tap into the traditional aesthetic of the Four Seasons, but with a modern, sleek design that would fit with the glass-encased penthouses they have on the Nashville skyline.

More: The Future of Furniture is Curvy, Says Furnishings and Home Staging CEO

MG: Where do you feel luxury design is headed?

BG: We feel things are going toward lighter tones, simple designs, and natural materials that would stand the test of time, to keep it classic without overdoing the design. The Four Seasons is classic, but its more of an open, modern penthouse feel. People are not going for modern drywall boxes. A lot of people are asking for a similar design aesthetic, which is classic with modern elements. They bring in the color with the artwork, pillows, throws and flowers, but they keep the bones of the home very clean and transitional in its tones and style.

MG: What has been the biggest change in luxury design, in your eyes?

GB: Design has changed over the past few years. Before, we would meet a client and show the boards and samples. Now, everyone has a Pinterest board, its unbelievable how involved clients get showing you what they want. Ive done this for almost 30 years, Ive never seen anything like it.

MG: Is it overwhelming? You must add your own personal design trademark?

GB: Yes. They say: Id like this for the dining room, but this for the bedroom, completely different styles, but we add a flow throughout the house. We give it our vibe throughout the house, and they love the outcome.

More: Buyers Flocked to Florida for a New Lifestyle Amid Pandemic, Says Brokerage Owner

MG: Are people changing their design plans/layouts because of the pandemic?

GB: Somewhat, yes. They are trying to have multipurpose rooms. They want to maximize rooms, declutter and use every inch of every drawer, well-thought out. If youre in a room, you can conceal power and USB cables in the leg supports of tables for work from home desks. People want good design, but everything seamlessly hides away. Thats what were seeing now. People want everything away from their kids, they dont want cords on the tabletops. Organization is a massive priority.

MG: Whats your personal definition of luxury?

GB: For me, luxury goes far beyond high-quality craftsmanship. Its really focused on the high level of detail of how the function of the home is tailored to the client. The amount of detail that goes into every area is part of luxury design. Its a thought process, a use of the house. True luxury is considering how they live and move within a home, with flow and ease. That is true luxury for our clientele.

MG: Have you seen people asking for larger homes since the pandemic?

GB: No, its smaller homes with bigger outside space. People have gone less. We used to have clients coming in asking for 30,000 square feet and above, now theyre asking for 15,000 square feet. That was surprising. They were looking for smaller homes, bigger outdoor living, especially in California.

MG: Are you working in areas you havent worked before as luxury buyers moved over the past year and a half?

GB: We have an ongoing clientele. We do their homes every time they move. A lot of people moved to Nashville and Austin [in Texas] when the pandemic hit, which was super random.

MG: Who has been influential in shaping your design philosophy?

GB: The Canadian designer Ferris Rafauli, who is really into detail. Ive done a lot of lofts, we dont have a typical design aesthetic, we go from traditional to super raw.

More: Off-Plan Condo Buyers Are Demanding a More Bespoke Experience, Designer Says

MG: Whats luxurious about your own home?

GB: I just bought 5 acres of land on Mulholland Drive during the pandemic; I wanted this amazing piece of land. Im going through my own designs right now of what I want. Its going to be the no separation of indoor and outdoor. I like that natural raw look, a home right by a natural rock by the hillside. There are tons of bobcats and deer in the area. Im donating half my land back to Santa Monica Conservancy so the animals can walk around freely.

MG: Whats the secret finishing touch of designing a fantastic home?

GB: Working with a good lighting designer is so beyond key, I cant even tell you. Most people dont understand the importance of a lighting designer. Its the way they cast shadows. Most lighting designers get hired after the house has been built. It doesnt make sense. They need to know every finish, every wall, where every coffee table is going to go, where mirrors and reflections are. Lighting design is built around that. It makes a huge difference.

Click to Read More Luxury Real Estate Professionals Share Their Insights

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Good Lighting Design Makes All the Difference, Says L.A.-Based Architect - Mansion Global

For historic architecture in Los Angeles, death can come in one of various ways: fire, earthquake or slow decay ... followed by redevelopment schemes that involve bland luxury condos. But none is quite as ignoble as being razed to make way for a parking lot.

That was once the proposed fate for Julia Morgans dashingly flamboyant Herald Examiner building in downtown Los Angeles. Completed in 1914, the block-long, Mission Revival structure, with its ornate-to-the-point-of-baroque lobby, represents one of only a handful of L.A. buildings designed by the pioneering architect the first woman to be licensed to practice architecture in California.

The freshly refurbished Herald Examiner building at the corner of Broadway and 11th street in downtown Los Angeles.

(Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)

It was the site of other important California history too. Throughout much of the 20th century, the building represented a key part of William Randolph Hearsts media empire, housing the Herald-Express, an afternoon newspaper, and the morning Los Angeles Examiner, which merged in 1962 and became the Herald-Examiner.

Five years later came an acrimonious strike that lasted several years and led to mounting losses. Despite an editorial revival sparked by the hiring of editor Jim Bellows, the general decline in finances and readership, spelled the end of the paper. By 1989, the Herald Examiner had shut down. For several years, the building sat empty. Three years later, a representative for the Hearst Corp. approached the city about tearing the place down.

The proposal generated an outcry. Morgans industrially scaled Mission Revival structure whose facade and gracious lobby feature an ebullient mix of Moorish, Spanish and Italian flourishes had at that point already occupied a slot on the citys Historic-Cultural Monuments list for almost 15 years. A spokeswoman for the Los Angeles Conservancy described the plan as a tragedy and disgrace.

Tiled cupolas adorn the roof of the historic Herald Examiner Building located at Broadway and 11th Street in Los Angeles.

(Al Seib / Los Angeles Times)

Thankfully, good sense or, more realistically, economic inertia won out. The Herald Examiner building remained standing, albeit in a somnolent state. For more than two decades, it was employed primarily as a filming location. Its Always Sunny in Philadelphia and The Usual Suspects were among the projects filmed at the site.

This fall, however, the Herald Examiner building came back from the brink. The building has reopened in a new guise: as a learning center for Arizona State University.

Sunlight streams through the arched windows of the Herald Examiner building. Since the 60s, these windows had been barricaded with block walls.

(Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)

The developers at Georgetown Co. and a team of architects at Gensler have lovingly revived this gracious structure. This has included tending to decades of deferred maintenance and removing unsympathetic additions. Among them: taking out a mezzanine level that cut through some of the more majestic double-height spaces and removing paint from the sawtooth skylights on the third floor that had been painted over during World War II and never unpainted. Also removed were the block walls that had, for decades, obstructed the graceful arched windows at street level. These were installed in the 1960s after the windows were smashed by bricks and Molotov cocktails during the strike.

Its kind of miraculous that the building was saved, says Melanie McArtor, a senior associate at Gensler who served as project manager on the buildings revamp. It would have been such a lost moment.

Now the Herald Examiner practically gleams, with a tenant that is in keeping with the buildings unusual history. In the place where newspapers were once printed and movies shot, ASU students can complete coursework in journalism and filmmaking.

Since the buildings historic lobby didnt meet modern accessibility standards, the architects designed a separate, more functional entry space for ASU. The historic lobby is now employed for events.

(Al Seib / Los Angeles Times)

The Herald Examiner building is one of two interesting reuse projects in this piece of downtown Los Angeles.

Travel three blocks north on Broadway and youll land at the old Tower Theatre, which is now a shiny new Apple store thanks to Foster + Partners, the namesake firm of British designer Norman Foster. The Pritzker Prize-winning architects team has designed numerous other retail and corporate spaces for Apple, including the companys headquarters in Cupertino.

Designed by S. Charles Lee and opened in 1927, the 900-seat venue was the first film palace in Los Angeles to be wired for sound. Al Jolsons The Jazz Singer the first motion picture to feature synchronized singing and soundtracks premiered at the Tower in 1928 and remained on the screen for weeks. An ad that appeared in the Los Angeles Evening Post-Record at the time described letters from people who have seen this picture, 3, 4 and 10 times.

An ebullient collision of Spanish, Romanesque and Moorish elements, the building features an Art Deco clock tower, decorative terra cotta facades and a lobby inspired by the Paris Opera (albeit on a far smaller scale). From the lobby, a grand staircase flanked by marble columns ascends to the mezzanine area. A stained-glass window bears a fleur-de-lis pattern and a celluloid film strip.

Like the Herald Examiner, the Tower Theatre had slipped into a grungy state after closing in 1988. By and large, the theater bided its time as a filming location it makes an appearance in David Lynchs Mulholland Drive and on occasion as a music venue.

Now the Delijani family, which owns the building, along with Apple, have found a new use for a type of architecture that isnt always sympathetic to reinvention. And it looks bright and elegant in an Apple kind of way (since no movie palace in its right mind would paint so many surfaces white).

Facades have been cleaned and the exterior neon has been repaired. The plaster and bronze details around the proscenium, which bear a delicate floral motif, have been scrubbed of accumulated layers of nicotine and grime and now sport fresh coats of paint.

Naturally, there have been changes. The oval ceiling mural, which once contained some buoyant cherubs, has been simplified into a view of a golden California sky. The ground-floor seating area has been leveled out and the seats replaced with blond wood tables bearing Apple merch. The repair shop must we call it a Genius Bar? has been placed in the balcony, where much of the seating has been retained, though in a modern guise. (Think elegant Minimalist pews wrapped in Italian leather.)

This will undoubtedly be the best location in L.A. to contend with a computer crash.

The view from the balcony inside the Tower Theatre on Broadway now an Apple store courtesy of a renovation by Foster + Partners.

(Mel Melcon / Los Angeles Times)

Linda Dishman, president and CEO of the Los Angeles Conservancy, is delighted to see the Tower make its comeback. For theater geeks, its incredible, she says. What Apple did is that they came to the Tower very respectfully and really took a very careful approach.

The building retains its theatricality. And Dishman notes that though the building doesnt currently contain its original seats, those have been preserved in the event someone wanted to reinstall them at a future date. Its thinking about how you balance what you need today and what it might one day be, she says.

For anyone who may roll their eyes over an Apple store occupying a historic theater, may I recommend a visit to the old Golden Gate Theatre in East Los Angeles, where one can acquire tampons and Alka-Seltzer in what is now a well-trafficked CVS, or the old Federal Bank Building in Lincoln Heights, a 1910 neoclassical bank on the citys list of Historic-Cultural Monuments that has been occupied by an El Pollo Loco since 1993.

As Dishman notes: A building that is in use is not usually threatened.

The restored marble staircase in the lobby of the Apple Tower Theatre is seen upon the stores opening in June.

(Mel Melcon / Los Angeles Times)

The renovation of some of this long-moribund Los Angeles architecture is significant for a couple of reasons.

For one, it finds new uses for existing architecture, thereby cutting down on the need for new construction (and its attendant environmental costs). But preserving these buildings also helps preserve some key historical episodes.

In the case of the Herald Examiner, that means preserving the work of a pioneering, early 20th century female architect whose profile has grown as of late. In 2014, Morgan was posthumously awarded the gold medal by the American Institute of Architects. More recently, she has been the subject of a belated obituary in the New York Times and a podcast by the Beverly Willis Architecture Foundation, which highlights the contributions of women in building and design.

Morgan designed hundreds of buildings, including Hearst Castle in San Simeon, but she built relatively few in the Los Angeles area. Among them is the Annenberg Community Beach House in Santa Monica, completed in 1926 another commission from Hearst, for his lover, Marion Davies. She also designed a YWCA in Pasadena, a handsome Mission Revival structure whose fate is uncertain, since the city of Pasadena and an investor are battling each other in court for control of the structure.

Chronicling Morgans legacy has been a complicated endeavor. Before her death in 1957, she destroyed most of her papers which leaves her buildings as the decisive record of her work. For scholars and architects who are just beginning to understand her design legacy, tearing down the Herald Examiner would have been a spectacular loss.

There are a lot of women who worked on this project, says McArtor, and we felt so honored to work on this.

A detail of the marble staircases in the lobby of the Herald Examiner building. The structure was Julia Morgans first commission from William Randolph Hearst.

(Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)

Finding a new use for the Herald Examiner building wasnt easy. Old newspaper buildings are peculiar: generally, a combination of a few fancy offices befitting of an institution that plays a role in civic life attached to what is essential a factory (the printing presses). Youre trying to put infrastructure that meets the expectations of the current market into a building that has that many idiosyncrasies, says McArtor. That is really challenging.

But the architects at Gensler did a thoughtful job of restoring and preserving the buildings iconic portions: the arched facade, the bright, tiled domes that cap the building, the ornate lobby, with the private elevator that once delivered Hearst to his suite. Other areas were revamped to suit contemporary needs.

A new lobby was added immediately to the south of the old one since Morgans design, with its high counters and marble steps, didnt meet contemporary accessibility standards. The original lobby remains as a dramatic gathering space. (The public is welcome to tour the space by scheduling an appointment with ASUs visitor manager, Jasmin Mejia at jasmin.mejia@asu.edu).

The ground floor, which once contained the printing presses, has been reimagined as an event space. (On the day I walked through, university leadership had gathered for a board meeting with remote video hookups.) The newsroom floors above have been reconfigured into classrooms, study areas and meeting spaces, as well as a television studio and editing bays for film and media students.

The spaces are generally plain, designed for flexibility and the wear and tear of student life. But the practical design gives Morgans architecture room to breathe especially on the third floor, where the restored sawtooth skylights make for a workspace that feels airy and bright.

Working on the building, says McArtor, gave her a real appreciation for the ways in which Morgan deployed daylight. Its not typical of the time.

The third-floor work spaces in the Herald Examiner building are bathed in light.

(Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)

The building, likewise, preserves some of L.A.'s more interesting media history.

Hearst founded the paper so that he might have a Southern California bastion in the event he ran for office. It was from this site that he pummeled Depression-era political narratives to adhere to his conservative vision. It was also where news of the Black Dahlia killing was first reported and where Louella Parsons gossip columns emerged. By the time the 60s rolled around, the company was in the hands of Hearsts grandson, George R. Hearst Jr. It was his attempts to break the unions that spelled the beginning of the end.

The whole ordeal began in 1967 as a contractual dispute over pay with NewsGuild employees and ended up snowballing into a strike that included workers from other divisions. One street rally devolved into violence. In addition to smashing windows, the protesters took baseball bats to the curving brass banister of an interior stairwell.

The banister remains as do its dents. The architects left that history in place.

That patina, says Dishman, is really important to continuing the story.

A brass banister that was pummeled by unionists during a 60s labor dispute remains in situ at the Herald Examiner building.

(Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)

And continuing the story is something that both of these renovations do admirably well: The Apple Tower Theatre maintains a site that was critical to the film industry, while the Herald Examiner bears within its walls stories about architecture, labor and the press.

Together, they help flesh out the character of Los Angeles as a city in the early 20th century: unorthodox in style and, in places, comically overstated. They are buildings that say, Check us out. We have arrived.

Thankfully, they remain here. And now we can revel in them.

Architectural details preserved in the historic lobby of the Herald Examiner Building in Los Angeles erected by publisher William Randolph Hearst in 1914.

(Al Seib / Los Angeles Times)

The original tile floor preserved in the historic lobby of the Herald Examiner Building in Los Angeles.

(Al Seib / Los Angeles Times)

Details of the original fire alarm system preserved in the historic Herald Examiner building located at Broadway and 11th Street in Los Angeles erected by publisher William Randolph Hearst in 1914.

(Al Seib / Los Angeles Times)

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Is an Apple store any way to revive an L.A. theater? Maybe - Los Angeles Times

Cities designed with expansive greenspace encourage residents to live a more healthy lifestyle.Destination Toronto

Reimagining urban centres as healthier places to live is essential to reducing the billions of dollars spent every year treating chronic illnesses, according to a panel on the future of cities.

A group of experts who gathered virtually this week for a Future Cities, Future Care event agreed that creating healthy cities requires collaboration between urban designers, builders, civic leaders and health care providers. The event was presented by The Globe and Mail and moderated by Globe reporters Andrea Woo, Andr Picard and Adrian Lee.

With eight out of 10 Canadians living in urban areas, according to a 2019 Statista survey, leaders and policy makers need to come together to listen to their communities, the panelists all agreed.

That starts with understanding barriers that people face, says Dr. Jane Thornton, assistant professor and Canada research chair in injury prevention and physical activity for health at the University of Western Ontario in London.

Good health depends on more than just an individuals medical situation, she explains. For example, having access to green space and looking at different ways people can get around in the city are important factors.

We have to think in a more circular, inclusive way about cities and health.

Understanding that some people feel ignored or discriminated against is also essential to encouraging healthier lifestyles for people living in cities, says Dr. Angela Mashford-Pringle, assistant professor and Indigenous health lead at the University of Torontos Dalla Lana School of Public Health.

When I think about cities right now, I dont see myself, she continues. Even products at grocery stores where Indigenous people shop are not familiar to their culture or customary to their diets, Dr. Mashford-Pringle explains.

There isnt even a word for banana in Cree its called the yellow curvy thing. Even the BMI [body mass index] doesnt take Indigenous peoples bodies into account. We have to think in a more circular, inclusive way about cities and health.

Dr. Sean Wharton, head of the Wharton Medical Clinic and adjunct professor at McMaster and York universities agrees, saying marginalized and racialized people need their voices heard as part of a continuing conversation among decision makers about making cities healthy.

Some of the ways are simple sitting less and walking more, for example. But you also need to involve lower-income people in how policies are made, he says.

Dr. Jane Thornton, assistant professor and Canada research chair in injury prevention and physical activity for health at the University of Western Ontario in London, said good health depends on more than just an individuals medical situation.Nathan Denette/The Canadian Press

Gil Penalosa, founder and chair of 8 80 Cities, a not-for-profit group that advocates for easier mobility and public space, says the political system needs an overhaul. Ranked balloting in elections would bring new people into the system, with better decisions, he says.

The current system of first-past-the-post tends to elect the same people with stale ideas; a more proportional system would bring about new voices and better ideas, he explains.

For example, we should not be spending $6-billion to turn green space into highways, as Ontario Premier Doug Ford has proposed, he says.

Mississauga mayor Bonnie Crombie raised the issue of how environment and infrastructure factor into the health of a city.

Mississauga grew into a community that was dependent on the car, she says, [But] we are becoming healthier; were building new waterfront communities and a completely urban downtown.

The experts agree that cutting down on the use of cars which results in cleaner air and making services such as shopping, doctors offices and gyms easier to walk to, are immediate ways to contribute to the robust health of intensified areas.

New facilities, such as the recently announced $40-million Novo Nordisk Network for Healthy Populations at U of T Mississauga, are taking a leading role in public-health research in the global fight against diabetes and other chronic diseases, the mayor added.

Dr. Lorraine Lipscombe, associate professor of medicine at the University of Toronto and staff physician in endocrinology at Womens College Hospital, says architects and designers are incorporating accommodation into their work more as they realize the value of collaboration.

Better health trickles down to the way cities are designed, she says, adding that fixing cities to be healthier requires extensive retrofitting.

Layla Guse Salah, co-ordinator of public and patient engagement for the Canadian Medical Association, and a person with a disability, says even a small measure of forethought can improve the quality of life for marginalized communities.

The building I live in is quite new, but the unit I live in was not designed for accessibility. I can manage fine, but given that it was built so recently, theres no reason that the design couldnt [have been] more accessible.

We can all do better at building healthier cities if we work together.

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From civic leaders to architects, improving the health of a city takes a village - The Globe and Mail

Staff of ASLA writes:

In an era of mounting climate change crises, racial and social inequities, and emerging variants of COVID-19, landscape architects are increasingly being called upon to help solve societys critical challenges. This years Conference will highlight the professions inclusive planning and design solutions for all communities. - Torey Carter-Conneen, ASLA CEO

Landscape architecture professionals will feature new approaches to inclusive design at the ASLA Conference on Landscape Architecture at the Music City Center in Nashville, TN, Nov. 19-22, 2021a year in which the profession has seen its role become even more important in helping communities, particularly historically marginalized and underserved communities, use nature-based solutions to become healthier and more resilient.

More than 6,000 landscape architects and studentsand 300 exhibitorsare expected to attend the event, the nations largest annual gathering of professionals in the field.

The conference this year is perhaps the most urgently needed event ASLA has ever held. At no time before in history have we faced more critical issues that require the unique planning and design expertise of landscape architects.Torey Carter-ConneenCEO of ASLA

The conference this year is perhaps the most urgently needed event ASLA has ever held, said Torey Carter-Conneen, CEO of ASLA. At no time before in history have we faced more critical issues that require the unique planning and design expertise of landscape architects.

This year, the Conference will feature multi-layered plans and designs from landscape architects that improve community health, increase resilience to climate change, and address long-standing racial and social inequities.

Landscape architects will show the incredible range of their workfrom city- and county-wide plans, to parks and gardens that ensure the long-term health of communities, said Carter-Conneen.

As communities around the world combat extreme heat and flooding, landscape architects are being called upon more and more to help reduce dangerously high urban temperatures and protect populations through smarter water management.

The Conference will feature several sessions that address these and other climate-related topics, such as:

The Conference will also host more than 100 educational sessions and field trips, led by many of todays leadingLandscape architects practicing around the world. These will include tracks on the Design and the Creative Process; Design Implementation; Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion; Leadership, Career Development, and Business; Planning, Urban Design, and Infrastructure; Resilience and Stewardship; and Technology.

American Hydrotech Booth #809 15,000,000+ SF of Garden Roof Assembly installed since 1996. Designed as a lightweight, low profile system, the Garden Roof Assembly can be safely installed on roof and plaza decks engineered for as little as 15 pounds per sf saturated dead load. And because the assembly incorporates Hydrotechs Monolithic Membrane 6125, a proven roofing/waterproofing membrane, the building owner can be assured of a water-tight structure. http://www.hydrotechusa.com/

LiveRoof/LiveWall Booth #1717 Green Roof and Living Wall Products That Work. LiveRoof and LiveWall allow you to create a unique visual signature for your designs, without risk. Both LiveRoof and LiveWall were designed to grow healthy plants to correctly interface with building structure. There is no need to figure it all out LiveWall has developed an effective Sketchup model and spec writer, and even provides design assistance. LiveRoof offers time saving tools like BIM models, CAD files, and a custom spec writer. Award winning designers choose LiveRoof and LiveWall for their natural function, ease of maintenance, and beauty. http://www.liveroof.com/

rooflite Booth #2000 The success of any green roof starts with rooflite! Many companies provide media, but none of them are like us with a core business of only green roof media. Why does it matter? Because it makes us experts in a way that other companies just cant be. With our range of rooflite soil products, our blender network across North America, our experience with complex logistics and our top-notch customer service, there is simply no other company that can offer what we do. And our products speak for themselves with successful green roof projects on vegetated rooftops covering more than 11 million square feet. http://www.rooflitesoil.com/

Tournesol Booth #817 Tournesol Siteworks has grown by focusing on innovative solutions for the commercial landscape market. Today, our brand is centered around relationships, trust, loyalty, and delivery striving to make our customers, specifiers, and partners successful! Our quality products include planters, site furnishings, fountains, root barrier, bollards, and more! We are headquartered in the San Francisco Bay Area and serve clients located throughout North America. http://www.tournesolsiteworks.com/

Read more: ASLA Conference on Landscape Architecture Focuses on Inclusive Design with Theme "Designing Shared Spaces"

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Don't Miss Exhibits by American Hydrotech, LiveRoof/LiveWall, rooflite and Tournesol at the 2021 ASLA Conference on Landscape Architecture in...

In May 2019, 17 renowned architecture firms launched a declaration of a climate, justice, and biodiversity emergency now known as Construction Declares. The group includes architects, engineers, and more disciplines who all signed a pledge that would define and expand sustainability efforts of future works.

Soon after the original UK Architects Declare, similar groups formed across the globe as others used the Declare name to make an impact on the profession and the world. Michael Pawlyn of Architects Declare explains that sustainable architecture today tends to just mitigate negativesor do less damage than a traditional buildinginstead of designing to do no damage or create a positive impact.

In an interview, Pawlyn shared, There's something inherently problematic in the framing of sustainability that implies the best you can aspire to is neutrality, and anything less than that is just part of a degenerative downward cycle. We urgently need to look at means to be regenerative, which is to get into a positive cycle in which everything we do we're trying to have a positive impact in terms of restoring ecosystems, taking carbon out of the atmosphere, regarding communities and so on.

This belief was summarized into 11 core changes or requirements. The requirements set by UK Architects Declare include:

The Declare movement has been replicated all over the world with countries taking ownership of Declare and using it to define their own list of commitments inspired by the one above, host town halls to execute these ideas, and to help local activists push for policy change.

More than 20 countries have actively created their own declaration and call for firms to sign the agreement. Still, adding a firm as a signatory does not mean that you are designing buildings as green as the statement demands. Two original signatories and renowned architecture firms, Foster + Partners and Zaha Hadid Architects, have recently left the Architects Declare network following claims that they are not meeting the requirements in their latest aviation projects.

Architects Declare did not actively rebuke the firms, explaining that they have a principle of not naming and shaming out colleagues in the industry. Though the group did not directly name names, they did publicly state that Declare was being undermined by a few practices who are not supporting the efforts of the initiative, and expressed future plans to conduct a survey and make tighter restrictions to the pledge. Declare also aired concerns that some companies may be using the Architects Declare platform as a PR program, seeking recognition for the agreement but not adjusting their practices to meet the demands.

Still, while many agree that Declare stands for an important shift in architecture and other professions in the construction industry, some companies disagree with the potential new restrictions and how Declare has otherwise been using its platform. Declare believes that no matter what sustainability measures are implemented, an airport in the desert is simply not the minimally invasive project that architects should be investing in. However, many other architects feel this is an unfair ask. Why should designers dictate this large-scale change? Why should firms have to turn away an important commission when policy is not limiting the project's environmental impact?

Zaha Hadid Architects left the group for these exact reasons after receiving criticism for their Western Sydney International Airport. We saw Architects Declare as a broad church to raise consciousness on the issues; enabling architectural practices of all sizes to build a coalition for change and help each other find solutions, explained Zaha Hadid Architects. We need to be progressive, but we see no advantage in positioning the profession to fail. In fact, it would be a historic mistake. While this seems reasonable, principal Patrick Schumacher's warning to avoid radical change surely seems antithetical to Declare's mission, and it makes one wonder why the firm signed an agreement that is seeking large-scale change.

Similarly, Foster + Partners left Declare following criticism of their Saudi Arabian airport that would serve a high-end resort. In response to these comments, the firm released a statement saying, We believe that the hallmark of our age, and the future of our globally connected world, is mobility. Mobility of people, goods and information across boundaries. Only by internationally coordinated action can we confront the issues of global warming and, indeed, future pandemics. Aviation has a vital role to play in this process and will continue to do so. You cannot wind the clock backwards.

A shift in sustainable architecture will surely be a long and difficult process. After becoming complacent in a building process that at best, mitigates damage, change will be easy to talk about but challenging to accomplish. Many may see reason in architects' unwillingness to refuse commissions, yet many others will demand integrity from those who promised to take the climate crisis seriously.

UK Architects Declare: Website | Twitter | Instagram | LinkedInUS Architects Declare: Website | Twitter | Instagram | LinkedIn

The IEA Announces Solar Power Is Now the Cheapest Form of Energy

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Student Creates Ingenious Solar Panels Made From Food Waste

Japan Announces Pledge to Be Carbon Neutral by 2050

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Architects Around the World Declare a Climate and Biodiversity Emergency - My Modern Met

Mr. Stull died Nov. 28 in his Milton home, according to the obituary information his family prepared. He was 83.

In 1966, Mr. Stull founded Stull Associates, and Lee while still in graduate school began working for him three years later. After graduate school, Lee joined the firm full time, and the two later cofounded Stull and Lee.

We were very much active in social change, Mr. Stull told the Globe in 2010, during an interview in his Boston office. We wanted people to have the opportunity to create their own destiny.

They did so in part by creating one of Bostons most diverse architecture firms, and perhaps one of the citys most diverse businesses of any kind.

It was like a mini United Nations, Lee said. We had people from Beijing to Boston who worked for us. We often brought women into the firm at high levels.

Building such a firm was always one of Mr. Stulls goals. At the time he founded Stull Associates in the mid-1960s, he was believed to be one of only a dozen Black architects in the country.

In a 1989 Globe interview, he said he had never attended any classes with another Black architect. Until he founded his own firm and began hiring a diverse staff, he had never worked with another Black architect.

When Lee arrived in Boston to attend the Harvard Graduate School of Design and arrived at Stull Associates seeking a summer job, Mr. Stull was happy to hire him.

When I met David, I couldnt believe it, Mr. Stull said in 1989. Here was another Black man who was studying to be an architect. I decided I wasnt going to let this guy go.

Together, they built Stull and Lee into one of the citys most prominent firms, often against the odds. They faced racism sometimes subtle, other times more obvious in the development community.

Being a Black firm has worked both ways, Lee told the Globe in 1989. We have had access to public sector projects driven by affirmative action goals. On the other hand, we have had to tell engineers: Dont just call us when you need minority representation on your project. Call us when you just want quality work. "

Their firms excellence was apparent in the $747 million Southwest Corridor project, for which Stull and Lee were lead architects and master planners. They designed the construction or renovation of nine Orange Line subway stations, along with a park that ran above them and stretched for miles.

The work earned them the Presidential Design Award from the National Endowment for the Arts.

The firms design of the memorable vaulted walkway at Ruggles Station, which connects Columbus Avenue and the Northeastern University campus, also was a point of pride.

It is one of the most successful pieces of urban design from that era, George Thrush, an architecture professor who was the founding director of Northeasterns School of Architecture, told the Globe in 2010.

Globe architecture critic Jane Holtz Kay simply called Mr. Stull one of the more talented and unrecognized architects.

One of four siblings, Donald L. Stull was born on May 16, 1937, in Springfield, Ohio, according to biographical information on thehistorymakers.org website.

His mother, Ruth Callahan Branson, was a domestic worker who opened Ruths Place, a restaurant in Springfield, after World War II. His father, Robert Stull, had been raised by a white sharecropper in West Virginia before moving to Ohio, where he worked in a foundry.

While Mr. Stull was a boy, he began sketching and making carvings that were reminiscent of African masks, according to the website of The HistoryMakers, which collects oral histories. He became interested in architecture while working on construction sites with an uncle who was a bricklayer.

Mr. Stull attended the architecture program at Ohio State University and graduated with a bachelors degree in 1961. He then received a masters from the Harvard Graduate School of Design.

In 1970, he received the Distinguished Alumni Award from Ohio State. Boston Architectural College awarded Mr. Stull an honorary degree in 2011.

While at Harvard, he met the renowned architect Walter Gropius and after graduating initially worked at The Architects Collaborative, a Cambridge firm Gropius cofounded. Mr. Stull also worked at Samuel Glaser Associates in Boston before launching his own firm.

Don came along at a pretty challenging time for Black architects, Lee said. Even today I think we only represent 4 percent of the profession. For him to succeed and have the audacity to start a firm in the mid-1960s is pretty amazing.

Mr. Stull, who had taught at Harvard, developed a sure hand early on at designing affordable housing, Lee said.

As a result of that, Lee added, he was able to attract clients and do some of the first afford housing around this area, even in towns like Stoughton and Amherst, in addition to doing projects in the Roxbury area.

At the firm, Mr. Stull had an infectious laugh, Lee said. He worked hard. He worked on the weekends. He was there, he was present, and was important.

Mr. Stulls longtime companion, Janet Kendrick, a former executive director of the Cambridge Community Center, died in 2008.

According to his familys obituary information, Mr. Stull leaves two daughters, Cydney Garrido of Melbourne, Fla., and Gia of Allston; a son, Robert of Milton; a sister, Virginia of Dayton, Ohio; and two grandchildren.

Services are private.

Mr. Stull, a fellow of the American Institute of Architects, was a charismatic guy. People liked to be around Don. He had good stories to tell. And he was a leader, Lee said.

There was a confidence about him that radiated. And people liked to listen to him, Lee added. He was so skillful in terms of his thinking and his ability to draw and frame design opportunities that I think people enjoyed being brought into that discussion.

That ultimately drew young architects to the firm, including many who went on to form their own firms, carrying on Mr. Stulls legacy of creating diversity in a largely white field.

Ive been told by many young Black architects who started firms that our firm had been a model for them, Lee said, and a lot of them looked first to Stull Associates, and then to Stull and Lee. Everybody wanted to work at Stull and Lee.

Bryan Marquard can be reached at bryan.marquard@globe.com.

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Donald L. Stull, pioneering architect of the Ruggles MBTA station and Harriet Tubman House, dies at 83 - The Boston Globe

The coronavirus pandemic has taken nearly 2 million lives around the world. Like every other industry, the design world has suffered some incalculable losses. Here, we remember just a few of the designers and creatives who have passed away this year due to COVID-19 complications.

Over his six-decade career, the renowned Italian industrial designer created modern, everyday objects that were beautifully simple, elegant, and effective. He made overlooked items such as trash cans and calendars into iconic pieces. Maris fierce ideological commitment to Communist principles was a throughline across all of his work. His greatest contribution to design culture is the zest with which he pursued his political concerns in his work: from anti-consumerism and workers rights to environmentalism, design critic Alice Rawsthorn told Fast Companyin October.

Enzo Mari [Photos: Leonardo Cendamo/Getty Images, Adriano Alecchi/Mondadori/Getty Images]Mari, who was 88, passed away on October 19. Lea Vergine, Maris wife and an art critic, passed away of COVID-19 complications a day later.

Though the Moroccan-born artist spent time studying in Spain, Italy, and the United States, he left the Western viewpoint behind when he returned to his home country. Instead, he created a new kind of modernism that drew from his lived experience in Morocco and from Islam, not Eurocentrism. Upon joining the Casablanca Art School faculty in 1964, Melehi encouraged his students to study Berber crafts and architecture and to find modernism in the world immediately around them.

A gallery worker poses with an artwork entitled Untitled by Moroccan artist Mohamed Melehi. [Photo: Tolga Akmen/AFP/Getty Images]For his part, Melehi applied the defined lines and geometric shapes of modernism in new ways, adding vibrant pinks, teals, oranges, and yellows that oscillate in waves across the canvas. Melehi hosted open-air exhibitions, and as protests grew in post-colonial Morocco, Melehi shifted to atypical painting materials more closely associated with the working class, such as car paint and wood instead of canvas.

In the 1980s and 90s, he took a position as arts director at the culture ministry and then cultural consultant to the ministry of foreign affairs, and he has had solo exhibitions worldwide. He passed on October 28 due to COVID-19 complications at the age of 83.

The architect and urban planner was a big believer that architecture and urban design could be used to further social justice. The answer to the crisis of exponentially growing cities, to the millions living in slums, to unequal distribution of access and privilege in the world, isamong other thingsto build different cities than those we have now, he said in a 2006 interview.

Michael Sorkin speaking to the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Awards in 2013. [Photo: Rob Kim/Getty Images]Through his studio, Sorkin Studio, Sorkin practiced what he preached. He devised new ways of living that are now ubiquitous, such as green roofs and sustainable energy sources. Sorkin was also a teacher at the Institute of Urbanism of the Academy of Fine Arts, Vienna, and at the Cooper Union in New York. He was the author of 20 booksand was an architecture critic for The Village Voice. Sorkin passed on March 26, at the age of 71.

The famed Italian architect was best known for his large-scale building projects and for popularizing the more funky, freewheeling post-modernist architecture movement. (Postmodern architect Robert Venturi described its guiding philosophy as Less is a bore.)

Vittorio Gregotti [Photo: Alberto Roveri/Mondadori/Getty Images]Gregotti was also an editor of the Italian architectural magazine Casabella and a critic. MIT Press called his writing and buildings instrumental both in the revision of some of modernisms foundational myths and in the spectacular rise of postmodernism during the late 1960s and 1970s. Gregotti founded his own firm, Gregotti Associati International, in 1974. Gregotti, who was 92, died on March 15.

The Japanese fashion designer known as Kenzo moved to Paris in 1964. He intended to stay for six months but ended up staying for 56 years, changing the face of fashion in the process. Kenzo opened his first store in 1970 and went on to establish his own design house. His ready-to-wear styles were splashed with bright colors, loud prints featuring florals, and jungle animals. They were reasonably pricedand made statement-making accessible. In 1993, he sold his fashion house to LVMH, Louis Vuittons parent company, to focus on art.

Kenzo Takada [Photo: Foc Kan/WireImage]Kenzo Takada has, from the 1970s, infused into fashion a tone of poetic lightness and sweet freedom which inspired many designers after him, Bernard Arnault, chairman and chief executive of LVMH, told the Associated Press. To mark his passing at age 81, the fashion house posted: For half a century, Mr. Takada has been an emblematic personality in the fashion industryalways infusing creativity and color into the world.

The iconic Italian shoe designer made tasteful, stylish, and beautifully crafted womens shoes that have stood the test of time. Iconic designs such as the sexy, strappy Opanca shoe were graceful precursors to the minimalist heels that took over the 90s, while the Godiva pump, a simple and feminine stiletto heel, is a now-ubiquitous style. In addition to his own label, founded in 1968, Rossi designed shoes for other titans in the industry, including Azzedine Alaa, Dolce & Gabbana, and Versace. He was an artisan and a genius, his shoes were feminine and made in the highest quality but wearable at the same time, said Santo Versace, who recalled Rossis longtime collaboration with his brother Gianni.

[Photo: Vincenzo Lombardo/Getty Images/Sergio Rossi] He loved women and was able to capture a womans femininity in a unique way, creating the perfect extension of a womans leg through his shoes, said Riccardo Sciutto, CEO of Sergio Rossi Group. A Rossi shoe wasnt just an accessory; it was an expression of the self. The designer died in Cesena, Italy, on April 3 at age 84.

Maeda was a resident set designer at the renowned La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club in New York, becoming a treasure and one of the pioneers of experimental theater, according toLa MaMa artistic director Mia Yoo.

Maeda arrived in the U.S. with Japanese experimental theater companies Tokyo Kid Brothers and Shuji Terayama in 1970 and was almost immediately sought after as a set designer. He was well known in the off-Broadway world, according to Deadline, and worked with theater greats such as directors Andrei Serban, Peter Brook, and Joseph Chaikin. Maeda won the 1981 Obie Award for Sustained Excellence in Set Design. His impact on La MaMa and theater has deeply influenced and touched generations of artists, read a remembrance by the La Mama Theatre club. We will miss him terribly. Maeda died on April 6 of COVID-19 in New York.

Cassegran was president of the French accessories brand Longchamp and served the family-run company for over 60 years. His most iconic work is likely the Le Pliage bag that he designed in 1993. Longchamp described the oversized nylon bag with leather closure flap as the quintessence of his design philosophy: simplicity, relevance and elegance. It also struck a chord with consumers: The bag became the companys best-selling style and has sold 30 million units to date, according to Womens Wear Daily.

[Photo: Longchamp]The introduction of the Le Pliage bag was one of many ways that Cassegran changed the company. He expanded Longchamp to international audiences in the 1950s and supported his father in a variety of roles, from manufacturing to marketing. Cassegran died on November 30 of COVID-19 complications at age 83.

The trailblazing Dominican fashion designer had a career that spanned nearly four decades. Through it all, she maintained an ethical brand with a strong national identity that recalled her native Dominican Republic. Polanco was known for her ability to combine clean lines and drapey silhouettes with details such as amber, horn, pearl, and coral, according to her companys website. She frequently showed at Miami Design Week.

Jenny Polanco [Photo: Johnny Louis/WireImage/Getty Images]You danced to your rhythm and you filled us with pride with every goal you achieved and we will see to it that your name continues to do so, the company wrote in a tribute on Instagram. Polanco died from COVID-19 complications on March 24. She was 62.

John Paul Eberhard founded the University of Buffalos architecture school in 1968. He profoundly shaped the schools design perspective with his adherence to general systems theoryand offered a macro vision of architecture as part of a social system, which required architects to work with engineers and politicians, according to the Architects Newspaper.

Eberhard continued to blend disciplines throughout his career while serving at a range of academic institutions and foundations. He left the University of Buffalo in 1972 and went to the American Institute of Architects Research Corp. before taking over the Building Research Board at the National Academy of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine with a special interest in sustainable design and urban planning. He joined Carnegie Mellon in 1988 and was the founding president of the Academy of Neuroscience for Architecture in 2003. Eberhard died on May 2 at the age of 93 due to COVID-19 complications and congestive heart failure, less than a month after the death of his wife.

The architect, critic, photographer, and thinker shaped the physical landscape in Iraq and offered a new way of thinking about architecture in the region. He melded traditional Iraqi heritage with contemporary forms in a style he called international regionalism. He was the architect behind 100 buildings in the country and became a pivotal cultural figure during Baghdads postwar modernization. He advanced the construction of factories, colleges, and more, according to the Columbia University Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation.

A telecommunications building in Bagdhad designed by Rifat Chadirji (damaged in the 2003 United States invasion of Iraq). [Photo: AFP/Getty Images]Nasser Rabbat, the director of the Aga Khan Program for Islamic Architecture at MIT, described Chadirji as one of the most influential shapers of modern Baghdad and an original theorist of architecture with a broad historical and cultural breadth. Charirji died in London on April 10 from COVID-19 complications. He was 93.

The renowned Manchester, U.K.-born architect was perhaps best known for the controversial Brutalist-styled Boston City Hall, which he codesigned with Gerhard Kallman. McKinnell launched his own firm, Kallmann McKinnell & Knowles, with Kallmann and Edward Knowles, after securing the massive project in 1962. It was his first building, and the Le Corbusier-inspired structure would become a monument in the Boston landscape for decades to come. He was 26 years old at the time.

Michael McKinnell [Photo: Jonathan Wiggs/The Boston Globe/Getty Images]The firm went on to design major buildings across Boston, including the Hynes Convention Center, the Cambridge branch of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and Harvard Law Schools Hauser Hall. In addition to his practice, McKinnell taught at Harvard Graduate School of Design and MITs School of Architecture and Planning; he was also a painter. McKinnell died on March 27 due to COVID-19 complications. He was 84.

The contributions of this legendary graphic designer are so extensive theyre truly hard to capture. Glaser introduced a shift to a more eclectic and illustrative design approach, reminiscent of Art Nouveau, with decorative typefaces more closely associated with counterculture psychedelia, according to Steven Heller in The Moderns. Glaser founded Push Pin Studios with fellow designers Seymour Chwast and Edward Sorel in 1954 and was a cofounder of New York magazine. He was also the designer behind some of todays most iconic logos, including I :heart: NY (see seven of his greatest works here). Glaser died June 26 at age 91. While his death wasnt due to COVID-related complications, his passing was another huge loss in a devastating year.

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Remembering the designers, architects, and creative thinkers who died of COVID-19 - Fast Company

To round off our review of 2020, Dezeen looks back at the designers and architects who passed away this year, including Italian designer Enzo Mari, British entrepreneur Terence Conran and Bulgarian artist Christo.

A number of the people we lost in 2020 were victims of coronavirus. They include fashion brand Kenzo'sfounder Kenzo Takada, architect and critic Michael Sorkin, Arper founder Luigi Feltrin and Swiss architect Luigi Snozzi.

The year also saw the passing of Manlio Armellini, one of the founding fathers of the Salone del Mobile, Hidden Art founder Dieneke Ferguson, French interior designer Christian Liaigre and Enrico Astori, co-founder of Italian design brand Driade.

Other creatives who passed away this year include Bill Menking, co-founder of The Architect's Newspaper, Italian architect Vittorio Gregotti, architect Adolfo Natalini and philosopher and architecture writer Roger Scruton.

In December, we also lost graphic designer Martin Lambie-Nairn, fashion designer Pierre Cardin and textile designer Jack Lenor Larsen.

Terence Conran

Iconic British furniture designer Terence Conran, the founder of furniture brand Habitat and London's Design Museum, passed away in September at the age of 88.

Conran was born in 1931 in Kingston upon Thames, UK. He founded Habitat in the 1960s, introducing a number of novel European designs such as flatpack furniture to the UK, and went on to found The Conran Shop in 1973. In 1983, Conran was knighted.

The designer, who established London's Design Museum in 1989 in a former banana warehouse at Butler's Wharf, is remembered as one of the most influential designers of his generation.

"No one has done more to create modern Britain than Terence Conran," said former Design Museum director Deyan Sudjic.

Find out more about Terence Conran

Christo

Bulgarian artist Christo was best known for wrapping buildings, including the Pont Neuf in Paris and Berlin's Reichstag, in fabric. He began creating the large-scale installations in the 1960s together with his late wife Jeanne-Claude.

She passed away in 2009 but Christo continued to work on the installations including his first major UK sculpture, the London Mastaba on the Serpentine Lake. Christo, who was born in 1935 in Bulgaria and escaped the then communist country to the west in 1957, died of natural causes at the age of 84.

Find out more about Christo

Enzo Mari

October saw the passing of Enzo Mari. The "giant" of Italian design died at age 88 from complications relating to coronavirus, followed by his wife Lea Vergine just a few hours later.

Mari, who was born in 1932, had a prolific career of 60 years that saw him design products for brands including Artemide, Alessi and Danese. Among them were the Delfina chair, which was designed for Driade in 1974 and won the Italian Compasso d'Oro industrial design award in 1979.

As well as working as a designer, Mari was an author and published the Autoprogettazione, a guide to making your own furniture from boards and nails, in the 1970s.

Find out more about Enzo Mari

Milton Glaser

Milton Glaser, the designer of the "I New York" logo, passed away in June in New York on his 91st birthday. He created the logo, which wasdesigned to create a positive emblem for the then crime-ridden metropolis, in 1977.

Glaser's six-decade career also saw him design posters for Bob Dylan, design logos for DC Comics and co-found the New York Magazine. The life-long New Yorker was born in 1929 in the Bronx and studied at The Cooper Union in New York. In 1954 he co-founded Push Pin, an influential graphics studio, before striking out on his own with Milton Glaser Inc. in 1974.

His recent work includes contributing to the Get Out the Vote initiative ahead of the 2016 US presidential campaign.

Find out more about Milton Glaser

Cini Boeri

Italian architect and designer Cini Boeri, the founder of Cini Boeri Architetti and one of the first post-war female Italian designers to rise to prominence, died in Milan at the age of 96.

She was known for her iconic seating designs and modular furniture, much of which is still in production. Among her work is Strips, a modular seating system for which Boeri won the Compasso d'Oro industrial design award.

Boeri also worked as an architect and completed residential projects as well as offices, shops and exhibition designs. She is survived by her three sons, one of whom is architect Stefano Boeri.

Find out more about Cini Boeri

Kenzo Takada

Kenzo Takada, the Japanese designer who founded fashion brand Kenzo, was one of the creatives taken by coronavirus this year. The designer, who was based in Paris, died from the virus at the age of 81.

His Kenzo brand, founded in 1970 and originally called "Jungle Jap," was a success from the beginning. Rebranded as Kenzo, it opened its flagship Paris store in 1976 and would become influential due to its use of bright colours and Japanese prints and textiles.

One of the defining fashion designers of the 1970s and 80s, Kenzo retired from fashion in 1999 but continued to design costumes for the opera.

Find out more about Kenzo Takada

Michael Sorkin

The death of New York-based architect and critic Michael Sorkin shocked the architecture world in March when he passed away at the age of 71 from coronavirus complications.

Sorkin, who was head of his eponymous architecture firm and president of non-profit research group Terreform, was the architecture critic for New York news and culture paper The Village Voice for 10 years.

He was also the director of the graduate programme in urban design at City College of New York (CCNY) and had taught at institutions including London's Architectural Association and the Cooper Union and Harvard University in the US.

"The architecture world has lost a brilliant mind," said Harriet Harriss, dean of New York'sPratt Institute School of Architecture.

Find out more about Michael Sorkin

Jan des Bouvrie

Known as the "Grandmaster of the white interior" in his native country, Dutch designer Jan des Bouvrie introduced the white, minimalist interior to the Netherlands.

The designer, who celebrated 50 years in the design industry in 2019, was also known for creating the Cube sofa. As well as furniture, Des Bouvrie designed a number of residences in the Gooi area of Holland. He also worked on collaborations with Dutch mass-market brands such as hardware storeGamma and electronics companyPhilips.

Des Bouvrie was born in 1942 and died at the age of 78 after a long battle with prostate cancer.

Find out more about Jan des Bouvrie

Kansai Yamamoto

Japanese fashion designer Kansai Yamamoto, who was best known for his dramatic costume designs for David Bowie, died at the age of 76 from acute myeloid leukaemia. Yamamoto's career started in 1971 when the designer founded his studio Yamamoto Kansai Company.

Bowie saw his first collection and became a client, showcasing Yamamoto's exuberant designs on stage. In 1992, Yamamoto showed his final collection, but he stayed in the creative industries by becoming an events producer and, later, designing costumes for Elton John and Lady Gaga.

Find out more about Kansai Yamamoto

Henry Cobb

Pei Cobb Freed & Partnersco-founder Henry Cobb passed away in 2020 at the age of 93. Cobb, who was called "one of the great architects of our time" by critic Paul Goldberger, was the architect of Boston's John Hancock Tower.

Other key projects during his career, which spanned almost 70 years, include the Charles Shipman Payson Building at Maine's Portland Museum of Art in 1983 and the Palazzo Lombardia in Milan, which was completed in 2013. At the time of Cobb's death, work was underway at a number of his projects, including the International African American Museum Charleston in South Carolina.

Cobb was born in Boston in 1926 and founded IM Pei together with Chinese-American architect Pei, whom he'd met at Harvard University, and American architect Eason H Leonard in 1955. The firm was renamedPei Cobb Freed & Partnersin 1989.

Find out more about Henry Cobb

Syd Mead

Industrial designer and concept artist Syd Mead was perhaps best known for his visual concept designs for Blade Runner, the 1982 sci-fi film. The American artist was born in 1933 and started his career in vehicle design for Ford Motor Company.

In the 1970s he started working on feature films and created the design for a number of sci-fi movies, including Tron, Johnny Mnemonic and Aliens.

He passed away at the age of 86 in his home in California due to complications from lymphoma cancer. Among those paying tribute to his work were Tesla's Elon Musk, whose Cybertruck is said to have been inspired by Blade Runner.

"Rest in peace Syd Mead. Your art will endure," Musk tweeted.

Find out more about Syd Mead

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Remembering the great architects and designers we lost in 2020 - Dezeen

A controversy has been playing out over the last several days over a decision by the Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Ahmedabad to bring down 18 dormitories built by legendary American architect Louis Kahn on the old campus, and replace them with new building. Since then, Kahns family has written to the IIM Ahmedabad authorities urging them to reconsider.

Kahn, in fact, is one among several foreign architects whose work defines several Indian cities.

Golconde, one of Indias first modernist buildings, was conceptualised in Puducherry by the founders of the experimental township of Auroville. Tokyo-based Czech architect Antonin Raymond was invited to design this space as a universal commune, and Japanese-American woodworker George Nakashima would complete it after Raymond left India. It is possibly Indias first reinforced concrete buildings, built between 1937 and 1945. Its faade creates the impression that one could open or shut these concrete blinds, without compromising on privacy, while the ascetic interiors helped provide a meditative atmosphere.

Berlin-bred Koenigsberger was already working for the Maharaja of Mysore in the late 1930s, when he was commissioned by Tata & Sons to develop the industrial township of Jamshedpur in the early 1940s. He would later design the masterplan for Bhubhaneswar (1948) and Faridabad (1949). Having seen children and women walk punishing distances to reach schools and workplaces, he planned for schools and bazaars in the city centre and for a network of neighbourhoods. At a time marked by Partition and rioting, his housing plans included people from different social classes and religions.

His friends Albert Mayer and Mathew Nowicki would go on to design Chandigarh. However, much before Koenigsberger, there was the Scottish biologist and geographer Patrick Geddes, who wrote town planning reports, from 1915 to 1919, for 18 Indian cities, including Bombay and Indore.

Though the legendary American architect never built a structure in India, his influence was unmistakable. Two of his students, Gautam and Gira Sarabhai, founders of the National Institute of Design, Ahmedabad, requested him to design the administration building for Sarabhai Calico Mills in 1946. It would possibly have been the citys first high-rise with terraces and a podium. Though the building never got built, Gira remodelled an existing bungalow using Wrights signature cantilever roofs and a strong indoor-outdoor connect. Padma Vibhushan Charles Correa, one of Indias finest architects and urban planners, was hugely influenced by Wright.

Before Swiss-French painter-writer-architect Corbusier came on the scene in Chandigarh, there was Polish architect Mathew Nowicki, an admirer of Frank Lloyd Wright and American developer Albert Mayer. Nowickis death in a plane crash ended the commission, and Corbusier came on board. With English architect Maxwell Fry and his wife Jane Drew, Corbusier with his cousin Pierre Jeanneret would design many of Chandigarhs civic buildings, from courts to housing. Corbusiers modernist approach, without decoration, gave India its brutalist, bare concrete buildings. Many architects thereafter, including Pritzker Prize winner B V Doshi and Shivnath Prasad, would be inspired by him. According to critic-historian Peter Scriver, Corbusiers contribution was a new cast of mind, not just shapes. He won favour with the Sarabhais of Ahmedabad and built the Sarabhai House, Shodhan House, Mill Owners Association Building and Sankar Kendra. He is often called the father of modern Indian architecture.

Futuristic innovator Fuller is known for his geodesic domes large-span structures made of a network of triangles. While Wrights Calico administration building never got permission from the Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation, its foundation had already been laid. Gautam Sarabhai, inspired by Fuller, designed the Calico Dome in 1962, at the same site that served as a mill shop. Since its recent collapse, it has been in disrepair and neglected.

He was invited by Vijayalakshmi Pandit in 1952 to come to India and establish the Department of Architecture and Planning at the West Bengal Engineering College. Though he also practised briefly in Orissa and West Bengal, its in New Delhi where Stein left the deepest imprint. From the Triveni Kala Sangam, with its temple-like repose, the High Commissioners Residence and Chancery for Australia, where his polygon-shaped masonry with local stone made its first appearance, to Steinabad in Lodhi Estate, where many of his buildings stand, including the India International Centre, Ford Foundation and the India Habitat Centre, Stein gave Delhi cultural landmarks that blended Indian craft with international modernism.

The importance of being Kahn is never more real than now, as the American architects only project in India faces bulldozers. The design for IIM Ahmedabad (1962-1974) carried the essence of learning in the humility of its material, and the way spaces were managed placing the dormitories, the library and classrooms at the same level, or the faculty residences across a waterbody.

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Explained: The signature of Kahn and other foreign architects on Indian cities - The Indian Express

Written by Isabelle Gerretsen, CNN

Indian architect Tejas Sidnal was shocked to discover the construction industry's role in the pollution crisis. "That was a crazy eye opener," he says. "As architects, we are responsible for so much air pollution. We can do better."

Determined to make construction more sustainable and tackle India's air pollution, Sidnal launched Carbon Craft Design in 2019. The startup takes blcack carbon extracted from polluted air and upcycles it to make stylish, handcrafted building tiles.

In 2019, New Delhi suffered record smog levels. Credit: SAJJAD HUSSAIN/AFP/Getty Images

"We found a way to add value to this recovered carbon by using it as a pigment in carbon tiles," he says.

Building with pollution

To create the carbon tiles, Carbon Craft Design partnered with Graviky Labs, an Indian company that previously created "Air Ink," a technology that captures carbon soot from cars and factories, and converts it into ink and paint.

Graviky Labs uses a filter device to capture carbon soot from diesel exhaust and fossil fuel generators, removes contaminants such as heavy metals and dust from the soot, and gives the purified carbon to Carbon Craft Design in powder form.

This mural in Hong Kong was painted by the artist Caratoes, using Graviky Lab's "Air Ink." Credit: courtesy caratoes

"Graviky Labs views pollution as a resource," company founder Anirudh Sharma tells CNN. "We are one of only a few companies in the world to capture these carbon emissions and turn them into new materials."

Carbon Craft Design mixes the captured carbon with cement and marble waste from quarries to produce monochromatic tiles. Sidnal says the company aims to ensure each tile contains at least 70% waste material. It sells the tiles to architects and retailers for $29 per square meter -- a high price compared to regular ceramic tiles.

As the company scales up production, Sidnal hopes to lower prices and produce a cheaper range of carbon tiles. "We want to hit the affordable sector," he says. "Sustainability is not only for the elite."

Carbon Craft Design uses a hydraulic press to mold carbon, marble and cement into a monochromatic tile. Credit: Carbon Craft Design

Since launching its first tiles a year ago, Carbon Craft Design's customers have included global fashion brands and architecture firms in India. In November 2020, the company retrofitted an Adidas store in Mumbai, covering the walls and the floor with its carbon tiles.

Architect Manan Gala, whose firm Bombay Contractors designed the Adidas store, describes the carbon tile as a "winner" for the construction industry. As well as being sustainable, "the product has better strength than conventional cement tiles due to the carbon content, and the raw and rustic feel adds to the overall charm," he says.

Carbon Craft Design is currently raising investment and hopes to start distribution in Europe this year, says Sidnal, adding that "we are swamped with inquiries from in and out of India."

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This company is making building tiles out of polluted air - CNN