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What's New in Architectural Publishing?

Archtober's selects of the latest architecture and design publications worth exploring.

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Published on
November 22, 2024
Category
Roundups

What’s new in architectural publishing? We’ve curated a selection of recent publications that dive deep into the latest projects and ideas shaping architecture today. Searching for the perfect gift for an architecture enthusiast? A thoughtfully chosen book or journal subscription could be just it! There’s so much to discover...

SO-IL: In Depth: Urban Domesticities Today

For over a decade, Brooklyn-based architecture firm SO–IL has been envisioning houses and other projects in between and adjacent to domestic spaces. Reflecting on the state of housing design today, often constrained by pressures of production, SO–IL approaches these projects with generous experimentation. They adapt and adjust the architectural and physical “body languages” of domesticity while operating through the framing and occupation of liminal spaces. The projects featured in In Depth represent SO-IL’s attempt to “hack” the codes, cores, courts and corridors; to stretch and inhabit “inefficiencies”; to turn the old stones and bring fragments of buried treasures from the past into the present; to question if housing for all should be the yardstick for the shelters of our souls; and to ask the future generations what kind of home we should design for them.

Head Hi: Days Without Number, New York City

Head Hi is excited to announce the publication of their second book, co-published by Mousse Italy, featuring the work of Milan-based architectural photographer Giovanna Silva. Titled Days Without Number, New York City, the book features a collection of more than 700 photos shot by Giovanna Silva during the last three years of long walks through NYC and includes an introductory text from New York-based writer Sasha Frere-Jones.

The book is organized as a calendar, but it follows no sense of time and no chronology: it is a puzzle of images. Silva walked often more than ten miles a day guided by architecture, seeing as much as she could, obsessively passing by the same site again and again, exercising the body and the mind, mobility versus observation.

The Met: Materialized Space: The Architecture of Paul Rudolph

Architect Paul Rudolph (1918–1997) was known for his iconic modern houses and exemplary Brutalist buildings in exposed concrete. Rudolph’s popularity peaked during the 1950s and 1960s, when he served as the chair of Yale University’s Department of Architecture, but his work fell from favor with the advent of postmodernism in the 1970s. This compact volume provides an introduction to and long-overdue reassessment of the architect’s trailblazing career, from his modernist Florida houses to his public and institutional buildings, unrealized mega-structures, experimental interiors, and later mixed-use developments in Asia. Abraham Thomas examines how Rudolph explored concepts such as functionalism, urbanism, and modular construction across decades and continents. Richly illustrated with photographs of the structures and Rudolph’s own drawings as well as models, furniture, and period press clippings, this book sheds light on the architect’s process and takes up themes as important in his time as in our own, such as civic design, housing development, and experimental materials and methods. The exhibition in tandem is on view September 30, 2024–March 16, 2025.

American Modern: Architecture; Community; Columbus, Indiana

The midwestern city of Columbus, Indiana, is more than a mecca of modern architecture, but an example of how design can help foster a remarkable community. The dozens of buildings and projects by legendary architects, from mid-century titans such as Eero Saarinen and I. M. Pei to contemporary practitioners Deborah Berke and IwamotoScott, remain integral to its urban fabric. This book explores Columbus’ optimistic program of bold new architecture and landscapes, initiated by the legendary industrialist J. Irwin Miller and local leaders, and the generations-long quest to develop the ideal American city through design excellence.

This is the first in-depth history of Columbus, Indiana, demonstrating the unique convergence of civic, industrial, and social forces that produced the pre-eminent laboratory of architectural modernism in the USA. It presents a rich showcase of outstanding, generation-spanning architects and is published in association with Landmark Columbus Foundation, the civic organization behind the progressive preservation and promotion of the city’s architectural heritage, as well as the producer of the acclaimed program Exhibit Columbus, a two-year cycle of events that uses the context of Columbus to host conversations around innovative ideas and then commissions site-responsive installations in a free, public exhibition.

Le Corbusier: Album Punjab, 1951

This reprint of the notebook Album Punjab Simla. Chandigarh, Mars 1951 kept by Le Corbusier (1887–1965) during his two-week visit to the Indian state of Punjab in anticipation of the planning and construction of Chandigarh, presents his written or sketched memos and personal reflections as well as notes and schematic solutions elaborated during meetings. The Album Punjab constitutes a primary source for reconstructing the topics addressed by the small team of architects and governmental officials who in only a few days developed the outlines of the Chandigarh plan.

The spiral-bound notebook facsimile is accompanied by a paperback volume featuring previously unpublished photographs taken by Le Corbusier’s cousin Pierre Jeanneret (1896–1967) during this early expedition. The detailed commentary by architectural historian Maristella Casciato reflects upon the variety of topics assembled in the notebook and retraces the story of these days in which the new capital city was planned. By transcribing Le Corbusier’s famously illegible handwriting in French and English, this book allows its readers complete access to the architect’s mind.

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