“The new building has made me more excited and motivated to come in each day. It’s just such a lovely environment to work in.” – one of the students of Burntwood School told the Guardian. With this simple phrase, it is easy to understand why it was Burntwood School to receive the Stirling Prize for 2015. Designed by Allford Hall Monaghan Morris (AHMM), the project added six new buildings to the existing school campus in Wandsworth, designed in 19532, creating a coherent space of teaching blocks and sports and arts facilities, interspersed with public squares and lawns. The project was awarded not only for its formal architectural qualities, but more importantly, since it serves as a bold reminder for the power of design in education.

The phenomenon of the fashion show has come a long way since it first was introduced as a tool for buyers to see the clothes on living mannequins. The shows then were low-key and intimate, the public a small crowd sitting close to the runway, far removed from the giant and global shows we see today. With the evolution of media and ever faster rhythms of our society, the importance of fashion shows has grown dramatically. The runway shows are no longer just tools for showing the latest collections, but have instead become a platform for designers to build broader concepts completing the theme of their collections, experiment with ideas as well as establish their brand through visual representation of a specific kind of lifestyle‪,‬ rather than relying just on plain clothes‪.‬

Kenzo and Prada are two examples of brands who used that tool with the aim of merge fashion, architecture and design‪,‬ in a union of creative disciplines and contemporary ways of life. Fashion has for a long period of time been seeking legitimacy through different art collaborations, with the purpose of being categorised as an art form and taken more seriously. However, fashion has also taken inspiration from architecture, a world of references which has grown more important especially since the set designs become a crucial part of the show. Prada has for example teamed up with highly established architect Rem Koolhas to create its set design, which had a clear architectural approach. Kenzo‪’‬s latest collection had its set design built around an architectural and design perspective and kicked off their show with six holographic pillars that moved forward forming a wall, and then rotated again to create a divider in the center of the catwalk.

But are there any deeper reasons for this monumental, architectural approach than just a search for legitimacy and growing spectacularisation of the fashion world? If big brands continue proposing such masterpieces, fusions of creative disciplines that famish after the spotlight is turned off, does that say more about how fashion world is changing? Are clothes in themselves not enough? And what about smaller brands that cannot by any means produce such scenographic effects? Can fashion ever return to itself and be just that, an art form of thoughtful expression through the apparently most transient means, clothes? Only future will tell.

Set in wooded surroundings within the ancient perimeter of the imperial capital, Kyoto, the rikyu, or separated residence, of the Katsura Palace is the finest product of a secular and unofficial tradition. It was built in the 17th century by Kobori Enshu, tea ceremony master and architect, who sought to express his ideals of rustic simplicity and picturesque nature on a larger scale than had been attempted before. Katsura is not attributable to a single architectural style, nor to a unique project or to a single author, with its extremely heterogeneous mixture of compositional elements, but at the time perfectly integrated one with one another.

The villa of Katsura has been the focus of many different theories of interpretation on the part of the most powerful representatives of modern architecture. They, as architects, have focused their investigation of Katsura as architectural work; the analysis of Katsura is the analysis of the “space”, since it is the space to establish the extent of the architecture. The modernist architect Bruno Taut made a critical and utopian analysis, which he expresses through the language of architecture, with the search for “unity, simplicity and transparency”. So Taut read Katsura, as a place in which every element is in perfect harmony with the others, but at the same time perfectly independent, “as in a good society” thus giving the villa a symbolic political connotation. Katsura was seen as an “ultimate meaning of world through architectural form”, a “totality” in which they identified significance of higher order and conceived to unify man with nature. The carefully balanced environment considered the fragility of a human and caged its experience within proportions a man could relate to. The next western architect to comment on Japanese architecture, Walter Gropius, reiterates Taut’s earliest interpretations calling the simplicity, modularity, and indoor-outdoor relationship, “many of our modern requirements”.

Kenzo Tange was among the first in his “Tradition and creation in Japanese architecture”, in 1960, to speak of “symbiosis” of elements and stylistic tastes in villa of Katsura, analysing the evolution of architectural styles and showing how these in Katsura combine in a harmonious way. But although still admiring the villa to a degree, Tange expressed criticism of the tradition of Katsura. Tange claimed Katsura draws Japanese architecture away from reality and into a passive and contemplative space, rather than a progressive one engaged with progress and technique. But contemplation is not passive. If Katsura has hidden tensions, then is not a purely passive sanctuary, it is very much in a state of progress and a state of living, and one finds an acknowledgment of the vitality of Katsura in its unfinished character and its openness to expansion, not simply a machine for living in but an ever-changing living space as yet unclosed.

Tange tries to trace the characteristics of Japanese architecture in the villa that he will define Jomon and Yayoi, respectively “energetic, violent and popular” force and a “serene, refined and aristocratic” force. These two forces, popular and aristocratic, in Katsura collide, creating a strong spatial tension. Arata Isozaki did the latest, updated, interpretation of the villa; it contains a summary of the various interpretations so far attempted and thus provides a vision that leaves open the question of interpretation of the architectural space of Katsura talking about “ambiguity of space”. The purity of the materials used, the precious dark Hinoki wood, the rigour of design principles, the simplicity of structural elements – columns, architraves and balustrades – make it the ultimate expression of classical Japanese style.

Summer seems to be the season for everything light, temporary and superficial, therefore even design and architecture disciplines need to follow suit, with temporary pavilions popping up everywhere from London to Venice. Following this line of development, albeit leaving the superficial side to other creative practices like fashion and, more often than not, art, MoMA PS1 has recently unveiled the winning project of its Young Architect Program: The Living’s Hy-Fi tower.

With the aim of promoting emerging architectural talent and giving space to new forms of practice, YAP commissions a temporary, outdoor installation that needs to provide shade, seating and water, while, at the same time, addressing environmental issues. The winning project – Hy-Fi – designed by The Living’s David Benjamin, uses biological technologies combined with cutting-edge computation and engineering to create new building structure made from 100% organic materials. The building is structured as a simple tower made of rectangular bricks, inverting the logic of load-bearing construction and creating a gravity defying effect, with a porous bottom and a more dense upper part.

Yet, what is truly revolutionary about Hy-Fi is not its form or function, but the peculiar material from which it was built. The organic bricks are produced through an innovative combination of corn stalks (that otherwise have no value) and specially-developed living root structures. The reflective bricks are produced through the custom-forming of a new daylighting mirror film, used as growing trays for the organic bricks, and then incorporated into the final construction. The organic bricks are arranged at the bottom of the structure and
the reflective bricks are arranged at the top to bounce light down on the towers and the ground. The structure temporarily diverts the natural carbon cycle to produce a building that grows out of nothing but earth and returns to nothing but earth—with almost no waste, no energy needs, and no carbon emissions. This approach offers a new vision for society’s approach to physical objects and the built environment.

The Japanese artist and photographer Hiroshi Sugimoto made his first architectural work for Le Stanze del Vetro on San Giorgio Maggiore island in Venice that opened on June 6. Known throughout the world for his photographic works in black and white, Sugimoto for the first time in Venice designing a structure after opening his architectural firm just few years ago.

“Glass Tea House Mondrian” is inspired by the tradition of the Japanese tea ceremony, as it was reformed by the master Sen no Rikyu. The pavilion consists of two main components, one outdoor and one indoor. The uncovered structure (about 40 meters long and 12.5 meters wide) winds through a path that includes a long pool of water, which leads the visitor into a glass cube (2.5 x 2, 5 meters), where on a regular basis, there a Japanese tea ceremony will be held. The glass cube welcomes, together with the master of ceremony, two visitors at a time, while the public may attend and take part in the ceremony gathering at the sides of the glass cube. The tools that will be used for the tea ceremony were all designed by Hiroshi Sugimoto and produced by artisans in Murano.

The flexible structure of the pavilion and its temporary nature, will also transform the garden where it was built, so far unused, in a versatile space, able to accommodate meetings and debates, and encourage visitors to freely determine their own experience with the pavilion. The innovation of “Glass Tea House Mondrian” lies in its ability to suggest a space for exhibiting and experiencing architecture, where the pavilion itself becomes exposure – innovation to which is added the autonomy of the artist to propose a theme and a project free from restrictions, but rather open to the possibility of experimenting with shapes, place, building technologies and materials.

The external structure is built entirely of cedar wood from Japan, and realized by Sumitomo Forestry Co. Ltd. Chosen by Hiroshi Sugimoto for their efforts in contributing to the reconstruction of the areas devastated by the Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami of 2011 and instrumental in the construction of “Glass Tea House Mondrian” and the external enclosure, which is inspired by the Shrine of Ise. In the frame of the Island of San Giorgio Maggiore, the “Glass Tea House Mondrian” also acquires a symbolic value by encouraging the visitor to interact freely with the place, and also requiring you to find the right balance between personal and artifice architectural and the natural environment that surrounds it.

“Glass Tea House Mondrian” builds a strong dialogue between interior and exterior, nature and artifice, closed and open, light and heavy, water and land, a relationship that results in the use of timber from Japan – for the external path – , mosaic – for the hot water – and glass – for the deputy to the experience of Japanese tradition.

For the visitors of this year’s Venice Architecture Biennale, the exhibition was a though nut to crack. Not because it was particularly challenging or deep, rather because the usual radical-chic architecture crowd roaming the Arsenale and Giardini during the opening days couldn’t easily decide if they loved it or hated it. Titled “Fundamentals”, the exhibition, under the guidance of Rem Koolhaas, was divided into three separate projects: “Monditalia” set at the Corderie dell’Arsenale, “Elements of Architecture” staged at the central pavilion in Giardini and “Absorbing Modernity 1914-2014”, the unique theme elaborate by all the national pavilions.

“Monditalia” was conceived as an overview of Italian in a moment of crucial political change. Thus, the exhibition presents an eclectic mix of architectural projects, films, critical reflections and historical moments that deliver a chaotic understanding of the country’s past and present contradictions, problematics, curiosities and characteristics. For the first time, Koolhaas has also brought together the Biennale’s different sections, merging together architecture with dance, music, theatre, film and art.

“Elements of Architecture”, on the other hand, looks under a microscope at the fundamentals of buildings, used by any architect, anywhere, anytime: the floor, the wall, the ceiling, the roof, the door, the window, the façade, the balcony, the corridor, the fireplace, the toilet, the stair, the escalator, the elevator, the ramp. While many have lamented that this section appeared more like an introductory course to architecture rather than a ‘state of the art’ exhibition, the projects presented were often lined with political, social and cultural implications inherent in any built environment that are all too often forgotten by architects. Spaces like sad hospital corridors and waiting rooms, stairs and elevators, socialist-style ape’s nest balconies, were shown to reveal what the discipline happily overlooks.

For “Absorbing Modernity 1914-2014”, 65 countries – in the Giardini, at the Arsenale and scattered around the city – were asked to examine key moments in a century of modernization, revealing how diverse material cultures and political environments transformed a generic modernity into a specific one. Set as one of the most ambitious Architecture Biennale ever, Koolhaas’ “Fundamentals” may not have entirely reached its initial goal, but it would be a mistake reading it as a crowd pleaser that misses addressing issues that concern the social, the political or the marginal in our everyday experience of architecture.

After returning from their Le Corbusier ‘pilgrimage’ in France in 2004, the Feiersinger brothers – Werner, sculptor and photographer, and Martin, architect – came across the austere but magnificent church of Mater Misericordiae. Located near Milan and designed by Angelo Mangiarotti and Bruno Morassutti, in Baranzate in 1956, the church has in the recent years been restored to its original artistic value.

Facing the minimalist white cube of the church, framed with embroidery on the top of the concrete structure, appeared as a real shock to the Feiersingers: it was an utter counterpoint to Le Corbusier’s plastic exuberance as well as an unexpected discovery and the origin of a their research. One brother concerned with the sculptural qualities of the buildings, the other of the spatiality and landscape integration, they systematically began to travel through a considerable part of Italy, in the heart of the country’s post-war reconstruction heritage.

They chose to follow the path of the American Kidder Smith who, in 1955, stunned the world with a guide book, Italy Builds, which showed a defeated country emerging from war, miraculously blooming into a multitude of architectures that anticipated the future rather than nostalgically regretting the past. More than a half century later, the Feiersingers came out with a very striking portrait of the Italian miracle – a demonstration of creativity bordering with anarchy, not attributable to current patterns of international architectural historiography. Their account showed an Italy of separate but interconnected ‘talents’: the exaltation of a series of ‘differences’, constructed with a passion for experimentation that is now hard to beat.

The Feiersinger brothers’ ‘guide’ includes masterpieces – condos in Milan by Magistretti and Caccia Dominioni, the expressionistic vortices of Michelucci, the terse, almost rough, functional elegance of the factories by Gino Valle, the icy obsession of Rossi and Aymonino in Gallaratese – but also a myriad of uncrowded if not unknown ‘goodies’. The houses in ‘cubes’ in Gambirasio near Bergamo, for example, or Pizzigoni’s structural geometry; abstract expressionism of Henry Castiglioni and organic and almost zoomorphic work by Vittorio Giorgini (with a holiday house in Baratti comparable to the American master Bruce Goff); the ease of a master Gio Ponti, who designed the ‘house under the leaf’ in the province of Malo in Veneto, brilliantly liberated from the 60s internationalism. Italo Modern – with Werner Feiersinger’s unusual and beautiful photographs – is a little gem, but also a visionary essay on invisible monuments of the Twentieth century. The result of a meticulous obsession and fascination au pair with academically based research, this book reminds us that we should not forget our responsibility and commitment in continuing to explore.

Two days ago an assemblage of strange structures, thread and machines has taken over Gustavsbergs Konsthall in Sweden. What might appear as an architectural playground, a weaving laboratory, a crafts workshop and a design research studio, is actually an exhibition by Anton Alvarez, a Swedish-Chilean architect and designer, known for his bizarre device – a spinning plywood Stargate – which he calls the Thread Wrapping Machine. Titled “Thread Wrapping Architecture”, Alvarez’s solo exhibition at Gustavsbergs Konsthall is based on a new version of his particular machine, able to produce objects and architectural elements on a monumental scale.

The aim of “Thread Wrapping Architecture” is to activate “new encounters between technology, craft skills, design, architecture and art”, questioning their mutual relationships, their influence on our everyday reality and their possibilities for future development. The particular structure of the machine also questions – what happens in the artistic investigatory process and how do alternations between a controlled order and pure chance influence the result.

“Thread Wrapping Architecture” is the continuation of Alvarez’s Thread Wrapping Machine project initiated while still a student at the Royal College of Art in London. The Thread Wrapping Machine is a tool to join different types of material with only a glue-coated thread to bind the objects. No screws or nails are used to join the different components of the furniture. By using this construction method, materials such as wood, steel, or plastic can be joined to form objects and constructed spaces, offering both a new way of understanding the use of materials and technological possibilities as well as proposing an unorthodox design process.

Alvarez describes the project: “The art of using the tool and of practicing the craft is still at an early stage and is in a state of constant development. By working with my invention I am constantly learning new ways of creating objects using the thread-wrapping technique. I can assemble wood, plastic and metal without using nails, screws or traditional methods of assembly. The object is held together by fine yarn which is covered with glue during the wrapping process. Repeated wrappings create strong, load-bearing joints at the same time that the item being created is covered with a decorative surface of differently coloured yarns.”

“Thread Wrapping Architecture” will be on show until September 14th 2014 at Gustavsbergs Konshall.

Last week we have had the chance to visit Villa Necchi Campiglio, one of the four historic house museums in Milan. All situated on different locations, more or less around the centre of Milan, the four houses are guarded by FAI – Fondo Ambiente Italiano, the Italian National Trust, devoted to the promotion of Italy’s natural heritage, art, history and traditions. The four historic residences, all built between the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century, by noble milanese families which collected objects, artworks and furniture, are still preserved with their original furnishings and are currently open to the public.

Surrounded by old trees in a calm, yet pretty, central district, the location of the house appeared to be particularly attractive for its owners, sisters Gigina and Nedda Necchi and Angelo Campiglio, exponents of the lombard industrial bourgeoisie. Villa Necchi Campiglio was built during 1932-1935 by famous Italian architect Piero Portaluppi, and subsequently Tomaso Buzzi who will give the villa a more classic and monumental appeal. Conceived as a stylish yet comfortable and modern architecture in both style and equipment, the house was equipped with an elevator dumbwaiter, inter comps and telephones and even a heated swimming pool.

Still preserved in an excellent condition, the house’s architecture, decorative arts, furnishings and collections expresses harmony whole the high living standard of living of its owners. Important to mention are pieces like a Field desk by Bottega di Giovanni Socci from the first quarter of the 19th century or the Centrepiece with Fish (1930-1935) by Alfredo Ravasco. Two major art donations enrich the visit: the collection of paintings and decorative arts of the Eighteenth century by Alighiero De’ Micheli and a collection of the important milanese gallerist Claudia Gian Ferrari. The collection, donated to the Foundation before her death, consists of forty-four paintings, drawings and sculptures of Italian artists from the early Twentieth century.

Villa Necchi Campiglio is open from Wednesday to Sunday from 10am – 6pm, at Via Mozart 14, Milan.

On the quiet island of San Giorgio Maggiore, in front of San Marco square in Venice sits the Giorgio Cini Foundation, an institution whose mission is to promote the redevelopment of the monumental complex on San Giorgio and encourage the creation of educational, social, cultural and artistic institutions in its surrounding territory. In the last decade, the foundation has transformed the old Benedictine dormitory, known as “Manica Lunga” and originally built by Giovanni Buora at the end of ’400, into a modern and functional library that houses more than 150,000 volumes. The “long wing” is an extraordinary space: in the course of time it has housed monks’ cells, military accommodation, public dormitories and classrooms.

The restorative intervention was developed by architect Michele De Lucchi, who won an international design competition in 2005, transforming the old cells in reading and working areas. The restoration project of the long wing involved the creation of shelving systems both on the ground floor and an added balcony, with reception, workstations for multimedia material, lounge areas, meeting and conference rooms all placed on the ground floor, together with a recovered treasure room, office of the curator and cells used for archival purposes. With over 1400 meters of shelving, including 1000 open shelves, the new long wing is now the heart of the History of Art library complex at Giorgio Cini Foundation.

“What used to be a large living room was transformed into a library taking inspiration from Longhena – explains Michele De Lucchi – with open shelving covering the whole extent of long walls, while tables for consultation occupy the room’s the centre. A second level was added to the space with a balcony easily accessed by stairs placed on northern and southern sides of the central transept. The supporting structure and the shelves are made of metal. The perspective effect is amplified by adding a second line leading to the horizon, without further charging the visual impact of the room.”

The small doors of the monastery cells were additionally framed with wooden portals, which both support the balcony of the second level and add a curious visual appearance to the portals, where a smaller door seems to be inscribed within a larger one. The central space is thus left empty and plain, with only a few long tables left for consultation: other reading space, together with meeting, conference and event rooms can be found inside the cells.

The cells oriented towards Bacino di San Marco host the library’s service functions: librarian’s offices and consultation tables are placed in the central area for obvious reasons of safety and control. The cells are all similarly conceived, leaving the original monastic effect intact, even though they are variously connected according to different needs. Many walls of the cells are covered with shelving as well, leaving only doors and passages bare. The shelves arranged around each room aid a feeling of historical continuity and environmental unity to the space, while also maintaining the architecture’s static balance, since all the weight is placed against the walls.

The lighting of the new long wing was designed following the criteria of “territoriality” – adding light only where needed and avoiding direct light that precludes the concentration and study. The LED lighting adopted for the shelving is integrated directly into furnishings, concealing the fire extinguishing system, leaving a comfortable solution for consultation and reading. The restoration of the “Manica Lunga” is a particularly correct project in all of its aspects, respecting both the monastic history of the space, as well as calibrating functional and architectural additions with maniacal attention to details. Starting from an existing space of extreme quality, De Lucchi has succeeded in giving a new functional and cultural life to an architecture that otherwise would not be easily accessible.

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