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All too often, it’s said that our urban environments fail to put people at ease, leading to higher rates of depression compared to other populations. People living in dense cities are among the least happy, which poses a challenge for planners, landscape architects, and architects alike. With the built environment directly linked to happiness and wellbeing, Justin Hollander, professor of urban and environmental planning and policy at Tufts University, says that these professions have a responsibility to design a built environment that increases well-being. “We have an automatic (non-conscious) response to shapes, patterns, and colors. Our minds are like icebergs – we are only aware of less than 5 percent of our responses to our environment,” says Hollander. He shares how our connection to shapes and faces tell us about buildings and places and our innate attraction to biophilia and landscapes that provide refuge or a sense of safety.
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Location: Atlanta, GA
Product: Reynobond FR (MCM)
General Contractor: Humphries and Company
Architect: ASD SKY
Colony Square in Atlanta recently underwent a transformation, nearly 50 years after it was originally built. The project fully opened this year as an urban, amenity-rich and arts-infused place to gather and soak up Midotwn’s vibe. The project, which was originally just two office towers, is now one million square feet of class A office space with 160,000 square feet of retail, restaurants, and entertainment, a 20,000-square-foot food hall, along with 262 residences and a 466-room hotel. MillerClapperton fabricated and installed 2,150 square feet of Metal Composite Material for the six-story building occupied by Jones Day.
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San Francisco has long been one of the country’s most coveted cities, which has led to an affordable housing shortage that’s lasted for nearly three decades. It has some of the highest rents of any major US city, leading experts to find creative solutions in the form of policy and design to make a new path forward. “From dense residential towers to multi-unit developments, modern housing aims to strike a balance between economy and urbanity.” The city has an eclectic mix of housing styles from Victorian residences to expansive single-family homes, while more dense housing projects hope to make use of the city’s limited space. Explore different programs and housing types from the last decade below.
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Building on Mars has become a popular topic in recent years and interest in how to create those structures has only grown. NASA, in addition to two companies, Austin-based robotics startup Icon Technology, and global design firm Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG), recently revealed their plans for Mars Dune Alpha, “a 3D-printed habitat created to research the potential for human habitation of the red planet. Designed by BIG and 3D printed by Icon’s Vulcan construction system, the 1,700-square-foot rectilinear structure is currently being printed inside the Johnson Space Center.” The design includes for private crew quarters, workstations, medical stations, food-growing stations, and shared living spaces.
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Recommendation: Grace and Gravity | Architectures of the Figure
Reviewed By: Architect Magazine
Architect and local Atlanta professor at Georgia Tech, Lars Spuybroek, dives deep into architecture’s philosophical underpinnings in his new book, Grace and Gravity. According to Aaron Betsky of Architect Magazine, the book refers to the laws of physics and considers space a “useless concept”. If space is just a construct, then there is a case for imagining architecture, and the book frames it in terms of a “gap” which is the playing room between form and function, which is where we effectively live. Grace is ultimately what the book is about, and according to the author, grace and charity embodied in art and architecture, or any cultural artifact, create what he calls “the grace machine.” You can read more about the book and how Spuybroek defines the “grace machine” below.
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