Chris AbelArchitectural Press | 2004 | PDF | 268 pages | 14 Mb
DESCRIPTION
This new selection of essays follows Chris Abel's previous best selling collection, Architecture and Identity. Drawing upon a wide range of knowledge and disciplines, the author argues that, underlying technological changes in the process of architectural production are fundamental changes in the way we think about machines and the world we live in.
Key topics include: new patterns of urbanism in the fast growing cities of asia pacific; metaphorical extensions of mind and body in cyberspace; the divergent European and North American values shaping Sir Norman Foster's and Frank Gehry's work, and the collaborative work methods and technologies creating the adaptable design pratices of today.
LIST OF CONTENT
1 Architecture in the Pacific Century 11
2 Cyberspace in mind 33
3 Technology and process 61
4 Foster and Gehry: one technology; two cultures 91
5 Harry Seidler and the Great Australian Dream 163
6 Mediterranean mix and match 203
Appendix I: Biotech Architecture: a manifesto 233
Appendix II: Birth of a cybernetic factory 237
EDITORIAL REVIEW
'No one in my many years of work has ever written anything even remotely so erudite and penetratingly rational as Chris Abel's text. It is brilliant!' Harry Seidler
The (various) themes come together in what Abel calls Biotech Architecture, a shining vision of an integrated, collaborative, computerized building
design method, more like an organic process than a production line'.
Architectural Review, May 2005
