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

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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

anchor

Pictured: exterior detail of the United States IRS building in Washington D.C. Photo: Carol M. Highsmith Archive, Library of Congress.

In fact, America has beautiful and popular non-traditional structures the Guggenheim Museum in New York, the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles and it has crude and soulless classical buildings. Unfortunately, the authors of the order are not completely wrong when they say that some architects have ignored public feeling. The Guardian

Rowan Moore, architecture critic at The Observer, responds to last week's presidential executive order that makes classical and traditional architecture the preferred style for federal buildings.

"If architects dont want to give ammunition to the repressive thinking behind this order," Moore writes, "they have to show that there are better ways to engage the public."

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Architects need 'better ways to engage the public': Rowan Moore on Trump's classical architecture order - Archinect

Life & StyleCenterbrook Architects Presents Nick Deaver with Land, Building, Spirit

By Press release from the Essex Library 12/30/2020 11:41 a.m. EST

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Nick Deaver AIA explores the personal journey of architecture and how awakening the senses can reconnect us with the natural world in Land, Building, Spirit, a Zoom presentation hosted by the Essex Library on Friday, Jan. 8 at 7 p.m. as part of the Centerbrook Architects Lecture Series.

This talk reflects on discovery and placemaking from Connecticut to Venice to Texas. Deavers award-winning work celebrates modesty, beauty, and meaning focusing on creating memorable places that respond to the local context with a commitment to minimal demands on the environment. Deavers work includes private residences, office buildings, theaters, arts and academic buildings, university housing, research laboratories, medical facilities, and recreational buildings.

This Zoom presentation is free and open to the public. Registration is required. For more information or to register, call the Essex Library at 860-767-1560 or visit http://www.youressexlibrary.org

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Centerbrook Architects Presents Nick Deaver with 'Land, Building, Spirit' - Zip06.com

for their latest project, the team at i29 architects has designed a three-story house in schoonschip amsterdams new floating neighborhood. located in the north of the city, the site intends to become europes most sustainable floating community. this dwelling realized by i29 marks one of 46, and is characterized by a simple yet smart design that embraces the eco-friendly and energy efficient principles that lie at the heart of schoonschip.

images i29 / ewout huibers

the urban plan for schoonschip is designed by space & matter. the project revitalizes a disused canal to create homes for over 100 residents. the location has a strong industrial past but today it is one of the most rapidly changing city parts of amsterdam, transforming into a more multi-functional residential area. the new floating neighborhood is intended to be an urban ecosystem embedded within the fabric of the city: making full use of ambient energy and water for use and re-use, cycling nutrients and minimizing waste, plus creating space for natural biodiversity.

the site is energy self-sufficient, employs circular building practices, and serves as a showcase for sustainable living. a smart jetty connects the 46 floating households with each other and the quay. on the top surface, the jetty is a social connector where people meet. down below the surface, the jetty is a functional and sustainable connector with all the energy, waste and water lines attached to every household connected together.

each of the 46 houses is uniquely designed by different architects. for this building, the client commissioned i29 architects and asked them to design a house that would maximize the modest footprint while creating an architectural expression that is both typical and surprising. the floating home has a pitched roof, but the coping of the roof is turned diagonal in the floor plan, giving an optimization in usable space on the inside and an outspoken architectural design on the outside.

for i29, architecture and interior designs are always intertwined and connected on each level to make a clear and unified experience. the floating home exterior design is the result of a space extensional study within the interior and vice versa. all areas are in open connection to the atrium which comprises three floors. the layout is extended with a split level connection to a loggia terrace just above water level.

the interior and faade play with the views on the outside. views appear and disappear while moving through the home. the basement offers direct water level views, the living room only gives a view on the surroundings when sitting in the lounge and the kitchen on the top floor has directed views towards the south and north side of the canal. on the top floor, a cut out of the roof enables a loggia and open terrace with a view towards the harbor in the west.

despite a tight budget, the project has a unified architecture and interior design that leaves a strong impression. at the same time, the floating home is extremely energy efficient, eco-friendly, and built with a small footprint. sustainability goes even to a higher level with the implementation in the smart grid of the floating village. energy can be even more valuable when you share it.

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i29 architects completes angular timber house as part of a floating village in amsterdam - Designboom