i am nothing of a builder..................

And I am nothing of a builder
But here I dreamt I was an architect
And I built this balustrade
To keep you home, to keep you safe
From the outside world
But the angles and the corners,
Even though my work is unparalleled,
They never seemed to meet
This structure fell about our feet
And we were free to go.........

by The Decemberists

white house, kandy (#39)

White House, Cafe and Restaurant, Kandy
Architect: Shyan Kumaradas
Photos: Waruna Gomis

rethink DC metro stations - ablog on metro architecture

Nice blog in metro (underground) architecture and the urban issues that goes with it. Great graphical analysis of urban systems.

serendib

 

Waruna Gomis' work has been published as part of an article in Serendib Magazine (Sri Lankan Air Line in-flight magazine). Few other phots of the same session are here.

Note: If you have not noticed, this article, sub-titled as "a Dutch Legacy" goes with a background picture of a British period building! 

bad architecture

Here are two interesting links on bad architecture
One is on Bad British Architecture,
and the other is on Bad South African Architecture.
Is there one on bad American architecture, I wonder?

Bad architecture Flickr group

the residence: having lived in the movie centuary

Here are the winners of the Shinkenchiku residential competition 2009. Shinkenchiku are the publishers of the Japan Architect.
The competition theme is a very interesting one as it invites you to design, not for a person/s or a place but for an epoch. It goes like "A little more than a century ago, the first motion picture was shown before an audience. Thereafter, “the movie” grew with tremendous vitality as a medium. In the course of the 20th century, countless movies were filmed in virtually every nation in the world, and countless people attended theaters to see them. Today, the movie has become an integral part of our everyday reality. Since the advent of the movie, we have changed in the way we see and think about things." ........

First Prize: Julian King and Christina Lyons

Second Prize: Yuuki Takayama

Third Prize: Abre Etteh

See all the results
Images via japan-architect.co.jp 

small holiday house, kalpitiya (#38)

Small Holiday House, Kalpitiya
Architect: Sudharshana Senadheera
Photos: Waruna Gomis

readymade music - how architecture helped music evolve

a lot has been written on how architecture has been influenced by music (or cinema). --- ---- But here is a view the other way round. How music has been influenced by the surrounding architecture or the context. Do we subconsciously make music to fit the spaces we occupy? Do we make art to fit galleries?  General or the traditional way to think about creativity is to say, first come the passion then the emotional outpouring of it which  only as the last stage will be shaped in to the context or the space. But apparently this is not not entirely so. The very emotions the make the art or the music itself is preconditioned by the space or the context. there fore the music is 'ready made' for the space or the architecture to which the musician (in this case) associate him or her self with. Listen to David Byrne.


Source: TED Talk

galle fort (#14)

Ramparts, Ramparts, Keeper-Dutch Church, Bell Tower, Square, People (kk)
Photos: Waruna Gomis

Dutch Gate, Dutch Gate, Museum (Old Warehouse), Mosque, Rock Divers, Woman, Man & Woman
Photos: Waruna Gomis

Dutch Church x 4, Morris Minor, Dogs, Rock Divers & a .......... , Shopkeeper, Plain Tea
Photos: Janaka Dharmasena
For these photos Waruna was using his Leica M9  and I was using his Panasonic DMC-LC1. If you can find one go buy it. It is a nice camera. I mean the DMC-LC1.

another retirement home in another country

I  wasted a little bit of time on the web while reading the comments for my last post and came across this. Thought it would be interesting.

A place to die for.
A retirement home for a philosopher on the hills of Peru. Find more info here.

"A hill in Pachacamac, located 40 km south of Lima near Peru’s coast, is the site for the retirement home of a philosopher. The response to the site’s conditions was to bury the house, trying to create a balanced dialogue between architecture and landscape"

Architects: Longhi Architects
Location: Pachacamac, Peru  

winners of 2010 aga khan award for architecture

Winners of 2010 Aga Khan Award for Architecture.
The five winners of the prestigious 2010 Aga Khan Award for Architecture will be announced today at a ceremony in Doha, Qatar. The projects range in scope and purpose, from an urban revitalization scheme in Tunisia to a small school in rural China.

Recipients of the 2010 Aga Khan Award for Architecture
Bridge School, Xiashi, Fujian, China
Wadi Hanifa Wetlands, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
Revitalisation of the Hypercentre of Tunis, Tunisia
Madinat Al-Zahra Museum, Cordoba, Spain
Ipekyol Textile Factory, Edirne, Turkey

Info via architectural record
photos via Aga Khan Award for Architecture