BOSTON, May 31, 2012 /PRNewswire/ --GRAPHISOFT, the global leader in Building Information Modeling (BIM) solutions for architects, has been selected as the winner in the desktop category of Architosh's Best of Show awards for software presented at the 2012 AIA National Convention & Exposition recently held in Washington, DC.

Architosh is an Internet magazine dedicated to Mac and iOS CAD and 3D software applications led bySenior Associate Editor, Pete Evans, AIA and Editor-in-Chief Anthony Frausto-Robledo, AIA, LEED, AP. Evans and Frausto-Robledo selected the best software items in two categories: desktop and iOS mobile.

"ArchiCAD 16 introduces powerful, new direct-modeling technology," Frausto-Robledo stated, "and explicit modeling has beenclearly identified in BIM market researchas a need, includingArchitosh's 2010 BIM report. In addition, the integration of GRAPHISOFT's EcoDesigner into ArchiCAD 16 encourages architects to design buildings with the environment in mind."

"GRAPHISOFT is committed to bringing products and services to market that add value to the design process and extend the reach of the architecture building information model," said Steve Benford, GRAPHISOFT North America managing director. "We are pleased and honored ArchiCAD 16 was selected by the Architosh editors for a Best of Show award."

About GRAPHISOFT GRAPHISOFT ignited the BIM revolution with ArchiCAD, the industry first BIM software for architects. GRAPHISOFT continues to lead the industry with innovative solutions such as the revolutionary GRAPHISOFT BIM Server, the world's first real-time BIM collaboration environment, and the GRAPHISOFT EcoDesigner, the world's first fully integrated building energy modeling application. GRAPHISOFT's innovative solutions have fundamentally changed the way architects around the world design and collaborate. GRAPHISOFT has been a part of theNemetschek Group since its acquisition in 2007.

http://www.graphisoft.com

Tweets by ARCHICAD

Original post:
GRAPHISOFT's ArchiCAD 16 Recognized by Architosh as AIA 2012 Best of Show

The phone call from China came out of the blue in 2009, just after Williams + Paddon Architects + Planners won a prestigious Gold Nugget award for the design of a clubhouse on California's Central Coast.

Terry Green, a principal with the Roseville firm, fielded the call from a consultant whose clients were interested in using a Western architect for similar work.

"I spent a year-plus sending brochures and proposals, and then we arranged a business trip where we went out there to China and we went all over the country ... and we landed two really good clients," Green said.

In two years, those "really good clients" names are confidential agreed to work that makes up almost 40 percent of Williams + Paddon's billings. Increasingly, small architectural firms from Heller Manus Architects in San Francisco to Goettsch Partners in Chicago are booming with demand from China where they find clients who are adventurous with design and have money to spend.

"Budget's not an issue," said Green, a Sacramento native who attended Mira Loma High School. "They want the right design for the right project."

Williams + Paddon had been cultivating deals in South America and the Caribbean before the call from China, but funding for those projects is pending. In the meantime, the firm has begun work on everything from teahouses to golf clubhouses to a 100,000-square-foot exhibition hall in China.

Foreign business interests also came calling on Jim Schraith, but this query arrived via a form at his small startup's website, http://www.boardevals.com.

Dozens of corporations and nonprofit organizations use the online questionnaires at BoardEvals.com to assess the performance of their boards of directors, exposure to risk and more. On average, clients pay annual fees of $6,000 to $8,000.

"Our largest customers are literally multibillion-dollar organizations," said Schraith, a director for BloodSource and Folsom's SynapSense, among others. "Our smallest customer is a three-person board of a private company."

Schraith expects to add 400 director accounts this year to a base of 600. Directors log in from any computer to rate the board, company management and processes. It cuts down on paperwork or oral interviews and, because it's anonymous, often leads to franker assessments.

See the article here:
Cathie Anderson: Roseville architects land big China contracts

May 31, 2012 15:12

Metallers also speak about the departure of guitarist Tim Hillier-Brook

Photo: Ross Gilmore/NME

Architects have have said that fan reactions to them on Twitter and Facebook are causing a "culture of relentless negativity" and "put a cloud over reality".

The Brighton metallers, who released their fifth album 'Daybreaker' on Monday (May 28), said they found the online reaction to their new record bemusing and can't understand why so many people feel the need to criticise them via Twitter and Facebook.

Speaking to NME, singer Sam Carter said: "Everyone thinks they're a journalist now. Everyone thinks they're working for a magazine or for fucking BBC News. They all feel like they can comment and say what they want to thousands of people. It gets to me, it's like we live in this culture of relentless negativity."

Guitarist Tom Searle went further, adding: "The culture today is so critical, we live in a very strange culture, where even people who love an album will find a problem with it and they'll let you know. This didn't exist when we were kids. It pisses me off when its kids you've met and been nice to suddenly start talking about how shit you are."

He continued: "I sometimes think about removing myself from all that, because when you go out and play a show, none of that shit matters. Social networks put a cloud over reality. If we believed the internet; we'd have been done after our last album."

The band also spoke about the departure of guitarist Tim Hillier-Brook, who left earlier this month. Hillier-Brook had been in the band since they formed in 2004 and has been replaced by Sylosis frontman Josh Middleton on a temporary basis.

Speaking about his departure, singer Sam Carter said: "We didn't know during the making of the album, but on the tour that followed it became pretty obvious that it was coming. He kept himself to himself on the last couple of tours. It's not thrown anything off in the way we sound, we're playing the same as we ever were."

Go here to see the original:
Architects: 'We live in a culture of relentless online negativity'

The Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences has picked Renzo Piano and Zoltan Pali as the architects charged with transforming the old May Co. building at Wilshire Boulevard and Fairfax Avenue into the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures.

The Italian-born Piano, who was awarded the Pritzker Prize in 1998, is behind the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris, the Central St. Giles Court in London, and the headquarters of the New York Times. Piano also designed the expansion of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, which he began working on in 2003.

The building that will house the film museum sits next to, and is owned by, LACMA.

Pali, a Los Angeles native, has been responsible for the restorations of Los Angeles' Greek Theatre, the Gibson Amphitheatre and the Pantages Theatre. He worked on the renovation and expansion of the Getty Villa museum and is designing the Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts, which will open in fall 2013.

"Renzo's track record of creating iconic cultural landmarks combined with Zoltan's success in transforming historically significant buildings is a perfect marriage for a museum that celebrates the history and future of the movies," said Dawn Hudson, the academy's chief executive.

[Updated 11:54 a.m., May 30: Hudson, in a conference call with the duo, said the organization chose them because "we actually responded to and fell in love with both architects." The architects spoke from Genoa, Italy, where they are already working on plans for the L.A. site.

Pali and Piano have never worked together but have known each other for a long time. "Obviously, Renzo is a hero for me," Pali said. "It's an incredible honor to team up with his team."

Both men intend to work closely together on the project's interior design. "The idea is that we don't divide the work," Piano said. "Creativity has no limit, no boundaries."

Hudson added that she and the museum committee, which includes some academy governors, current President Tom Sherak and former President Sid Ganis, still need to hire a firm to design the specific exhibits.

Read the original here:
Academy chooses architects for its movie museum project at LACMA

Canadian architect Bruce Kuwabara, Officer, Order of Canada. Photo credit: V. Tony Hauser. (CNW Group/Kuwabara

OTTAWA, May 29, 2012 /CNW/ - Last Friday, His Excellency the Right Honourable David Johnston, Governor General of Canada, invested Bruce Kuwabara of Toronto, Ontario, as an Officer of the Order of Canada.

"Bruce Kuwabara has shaped our built landscape in lasting ways. A founding partner of KPMB Architects, he has earned public and critical acclaim for such projects of national significance as Canada's National Ballet School, the Canadian Museum of Nature, the Bell Lightbox for the Toronto International Film Festival and Manitoba Hydro Place. Committed to raising the profile of Canadian architecture, he has taught at the University of Toronto and at Harvard University. He continues to act as an advocate for excellence in architecture, urbanism and sustainable design." - Office of the Secretary to the Governor General

Bruce Kuwabara is one of Canada's leading architects and a recipient of the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada (RAIC) Gold Medal. Throughout his career, he has been dedicated to raising Canadian standards in architecture and urbanism by integrating design excellence and innovation, city building and sustainable design. He was the design architect for Manitoba Hydro Place in Winnipeg, the first and only large office tower in Canada to achieve LEED Platinum Certification, to winning design competitions for civic architecture including Kitchener City Hall, Richmond City Hall, the Canadian Embassy in Berlin and Vaughn City Hall.

Kuwabara is a graduate of the University of Toronto. Prior to founding Kuwabara Payne McKenna Blumberg Architects with his partners Thomas Payne, Marianne McKenna and Shirley Blumberg in 1987, he worked for two prominent architects, George Baird and then Barton Myers. He is the first chair of the Waterfront Design Review Panel for Waterfront Toronto, and a member of the board of directors of the Canadian Centre for Architecture in Montreal.

He is currently design architect for the Remai Art Gallery of Saskatchewan, the Departments of Economics and International Initiatives at Princeton University, the new Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University, the Global Centre for Pluralism for the Aga Khan Foundation and the Athletes' Village for the 2015 Pan/Parapan American Games.

Born in Hamilton to Japanese-Canadian parents who were interned in Vancouver during World War II, along with 26,000 people of Japanese descent. Kuwabara has sought meaningful commissions and opportunities to contribute to the communities and institutions which shaped his experience, including the design of the Japanese Canadian Cultural Centre in Toronto and ongoing teaching and fundraising for the Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape and Design at the University of Toronto.

Kuwabara says "The Order of Canada reinforces my commitment to express the unique qualities of Canada through architecture and to contribute to building an open world full of promise for future generations."

Image with caption: "Canadian architect Bruce Kuwabara, Officer, Order of Canada. Photo credit: V. Tony Hauser. (CNW Group/Kuwabara Payne McKenna Blumberg Architects)". Image available at: http://photos.newswire.ca/images/download/20120529_C2996_PHOTO_EN_14218.jpg

See original here:
BRUCE KUWABARA, FOUNDING PARTNER Kuwabara Payne McKenna Blumberg Architects INVESTED AS OFFICER OF THE ORDER OF CANADA ...

More than 20,000 architects from around the world attended the annual convention with a standing room only ceremony for the Investiture of Fellows at the Washington NationalCathedral.

It was the first time in more than 20 years that a Santa Barbara-based AIA member was elected to the College of Fellows, which is an honor given to less that 3 percent of architectsnationwide.

Had it not been for the fantastic clients and the talented team of design professionals working along side me, I would not have received this award, Holliday said. The credit for this recognition deservedly goes tothem.

Fellowship in the AIA recognizes architects who have made significant contributions to the profession of architecture and society and who have achieved a standard of excellence in the profession. The AIA was founded in 1857 and represents more than 80,000 professionalsworldwide.

A South Coast celebration and reception for the AIA and community members will be announced in the comingweeks.

Holliday has been a leader on the South Coast for more than two decades. Last year, he served as the chairman for the Santa Barbara Region Chamber of Commerce. His clients include an array of public and private institutions, including the city and county of Santa Barbara, UCSB, Westmont, SBCC, as well as a number of private corporations and high-tech start-upcompanies.

Most recently, Holliday founded Synergy Business & Technology Center, which opened in April to provide working space for start-up businesses and firms who want to accelerate their success. It represents the groundswell of the resurgence of entrepreneurism, Hollidaysaid.

Holliday is a past president of the AIA Santa Barbara Chapter and has served as the government relations chairman for the group. He has helped the organization lead various planning, energy conservation and green environmental initiatives to benefit thecommunity.

He serves on the boards of the UCSB Economic Forecast, the Santa Barbara Region Chamber Commerce, the Central Coast MIT Enterprise Forum, Kids Helping Kids, and is chairman of the South Coast BusinessForum.

View original post here:
Michael Holliday FAIA Receives Top Honor from American Institute of Architects

Hundreds of activists descended on the home of Deputy Prime Minister, in London today, naming him one of the 'architects of austerity' and challenging his role in pushing devastating public sector cuts to education and social services.

Anti-austerity protesters outside UK Prime Minister Nick Clegg's declare, 'Don't Cut Our Future.' (Photo: UK Uncut) Reports said disabled campaigners had secured the quiet residential street shortly beforehand by chaining their wheelchairs together. This demonstration was one of perhaps a dozen 'alternative street parties' around the country organised by UK Uncut in what is expected to be a series of protests.

UK Uncut have said that the street parties are are designed to resist the government's cuts and celebrate the much-needed alternatives to austerity. They plan to block roads and hold street parties that will celebrate public services and a future decided by the people, not big business and a cabinet of millionaires.

A UK Uncut supporter outside of Clegg's home, Jean Sandler, 42, said to The Guardian: "Nick Clegg is one of the architects of austerity. He's a millionaire and lives in a million-pound home.

"The cuts are a political choice of this government and the cabinet of out-of-touch millionaires. They are not necessary. No one voted for Cameron and Clegg's disastrous plan that means that we end up paying for the banks' crisis."

* * *

UK Uncut: Street Parties target 'architects of austerity'

UK Uncut will hold street parties around the country that will directly target high profile individuals they see as responsible for the government's cuts, dubbed the architects of austerity. The anti-cuts group promises that the protests in ten cities across the UK today will take a radical new direction and will not be quickly forgotten or easily ignored by the government, tax avoiders or City bankers.

UK Uncut have said that the street parties are are designed to resist the government's cuts and celebrate the much-needed alternatives to austerity. They plan to block roads and hold street parties that instead of celebrating the Jubilee, will celebrate public services and a future decided by the people, not big business and a cabinet of millionaires.

In London, details of the target are a closely guarded secret, but the group has said that the street party will be held on the streets 'of high profile people who caused the cuts'. Hundreds of people are expected to turn out to what the group intends to be a fun and family friendly day out that brings the message home to the 'architects of austerity'. Comedians, musicians, public sector workers and activists concerned about the impact of the cuts on women, the NHS and welfare state are all taking part in the events.

More here:
UK Uncut: 'Street Parties' Target 'Architects of Austerity'

His Jolly Roger (Smokestack Books, 7.95) is an epic series of 12-line stanzas inspired by Hans Holbeins sixteenth-century woodcuts, The Dance of Death.

As in the Rolling Stones song Sympathy For The Devil, this Roger is a handsome devil, charming and powerful. Everyone is brought low by him the great and the good, the rich and the poor.

He hides in speak-your-weight machines, Nato bombing missions and a bag of Semtex: I am the bone to which all other bones/have bent. I am plastic. My grammar is I will. Words wear my terrorist explosives ... I scream outrage/in times unhearing amphitheatre. I will./Language within a world that lacks language moulds me the semtex architect of hell.

Howdens devil is a political survivor. Hes also a pornographer, merchant banker, democrat, humanist and the enemy of humanity.

Ribald, ironic and irreverent, he hands out justice and denounces greed and the abuses of power in an age where death is a statistic and everyone gets rogered: Fight the good fight for any tune you choose:/Courage and Honour, boys, the bugles blow /but stay away from me. I never lose.

Dante In The Laundrette (Smokestack Books, 7.95) is also set in hell the Third Circle, to be precise where it is always raining.

Never sleep with anyone who has more scars than you, warns outsider artist and disability arts activist Sean Burn in a book about historical scars, scarred landscapes and mental chains.

In this inferno, Lear is a council estate bully and Caedmon has been gender-reassigned and rehoused in a Newcastle tower block.

Meanwhile the poet is sitting contemplating the endless washing-cycles of hell: and im reading dante in the laundrette/ and gulls are so many carrier bags/spewed feral on wind and hurled through my/kingdom all towerblocks and tenements/churchless towers huddle in conspiracy/outsized car stereos for the taking tuned/permanently to uneasy listening by now/im reading our minds will go completely null/as badly worn smalls mediums larges spin/the polycotton mix no longer washing/just like his vowels at the jobless centre.

Tea With The Taliban (Smokestack Books, 7.95) is a book about the real and imagined warring tribes to which we all belong.

See the original post:
Artful architects of hell

MENDOTA, Calif., May 25, 2012 /PRNewswire/ --After an extensive architectural selection process, the Mendota Unified School District Board of Trustees, in a unanimous vote on Wednesday, May 23rd, selected BCA Architects to design the district's third elementary school (Cost - $25 million) and to modernize its two existing elementary schools (Cost - $18.8 million).

BCA and the district have had a long-standing relationship of trust and success. BCA had previously been selected in 2011 by the District to prepare the long-range master plan, which is nearing completion. BCA identified the need for a third elementary school along with a series of other short-term and long-term facilities goals to accommodate the current and projected growth in this central valley community.

Superintendent of Schools Mike Crass, said, "Half a dozen firms submitted qualifications to the district for our projects. Three firms were interviewed, and BCA Architects was the unanimous choice of the interview committee for our major projects. Our district prides itself on the quality of our schools, and we are confident that BCA Architects will deliver the highest-quality designs for our community while bringing our learning environments into the 21st Century."

BCA President Paul Bunton said, "What an honor. We sincerely appreciate the board's and administration's confidence in BCA, and we look forward to working together to bring the very best facilities to the students of Mendota."

District Board President Jose Zavala said, "We are thrilled that BCA Architects will be able to complete the work they started on the long range master plan for our district. They are a first-class organization, and we are thrilled with the foresight and professionalism that they bring to our district. Paul Bunton, BCA's president, makes us feel like we are their only client."

The new elementary school opening is anticipated for Fall 2014 while the elementary school modernizations will be completed between 2015 and 2016.

During the same meeting, the board unanimously approved placing a $19 million General Obligation Bond Measure on the November ballot to fund the facilities improvements outlined in the Master Plan.

BCA Architects partners with clients on a mission to achieve excellence in design. Since 1989, BCA strives to strengthen communities through projects to: design facilities, help define partnerships, locate financing, and save energy or present alternate delivery methods. BCA goes above and beyond the task at hand to ensure their clients succeed. http://www.bcaarchitects.com

MEDIA CONTACT: Rachel Del Fierro (925) 785-1435 or RachelD@bcaarchitects.com

Read the original:
Mendota Unified School District Board of Trustees Selects BCA Architects to Build Schools for the Future

In a move likely to inflict a sudden pang of inadequacy in bicycle clubs the world over, NL Architects has cooked up a concept both radical and supremely simple: a bicycle club with a velodrome on the roof

In a move likely to inflict a sudden pang of inadequacy in bicycle clubs the world over, NL Architects has cooked up a concept both radical and supremely simple: a bicycle club with a velodrome on the roof.

Architects are under increasing pressure, it seems, to come up with innovative uses for the roofs of the buildings they design. Where once it was perfectly acceptable for building tops to merely keep out the rain, or perhaps, at a push, prop up an air conditioning unit or two, they are now expected to combat climate change, generate energy, and if possible, provide functional living space.

Asked to come up with a design for a bicycle club to be built in a large resort somewhere in Southern China, NL Architects have arguably gone one better, proposing to site a fully functional velodrome on the roof. Sitting on top of a bike rental shop and a cafe, if built it will be perfectly possible for people to hire a bicycle and ride it for a few hours without ever leaving the building.

The Netherlands-based designers compare their concept with a traditional pagoda, with the steeply banked bends of the bicycle track forming upward-curving eaves from the point of view of outside observers. NL Architects also claims the high, protruding roof could be "very welcome" in South China's tropical climes, presumably for the shade casts in the immediate exterior.

Architizer reports that the bicycle club-cum-velodrome could be built before the year's out.

Source: NL Architects, via Architizer

Just enter your friends and your email address into the form below

For multiple addresses, separate each with a comma

Privacy is safe with us because we have a strict privacy policy.

Read the original post:
My other bicycle club has a velodrome for a roof