Architectural Bacon

The Bjarke Ingels Group designed this 10 foot cube entitled, BIG♥NYC, which was commissioned by the Times Square Alliance. Located in the center of Times Square, the interactive sculpture has a series of acrylic tubes that provide a heart shaped light. A nearby stand with a heart shaped touch sensor detects heat from the hands of visitors, the more people touching the sensor, the more the heart light will pulse. The sculpture is only around for a few more days, it will be gone on February 29th.

Perhaps the creator of this mural advertisement inside Penn Station should have consulted the architectural drawings or before completing the artwork; or maybe this was intentional. It is funny how a seemingly unobtrusive set of emergency lights can really change a space once an ad gets installed. This particular advertisement is for the Florida Keys, personally, I think the lights and the fish enhance each other.

Wired magazine’s temporary store in Times Square has amazing technology, artwork, gadgets and design. It is definitely worth stopping by if you are in the area; but if you’re not nearby and don’t have a trip planned to New York before December 24th, fear not, you can’t buy anything at the store anyway. If you do want to purchase an item you see on display, you have to do it on the web from another source. The store itself is like a gallery of technology, ushering visitors through displays as though they are traveling through the pages of the magazine. Upon entering, the door guards were a little intimidating but don’t worry, they are only there to tell you that you cannot exit through the “in” door (which they did do, when I tried leaving the wrong way). As an experience, the Wired Store is excellent, you can wander around and try out the gadgets; when you’re done, the Buick people will even offer to give you a ride to your destination (within a reasonable distance and as long as you are 18). One of my favorite things was the 3D video camera that was hooked up to a television with glasses combo. There are two cameras slightly offset from each other causing a blurred image. The glasses fix the blurred image and cause a 3D effect. With the help of the Wired employee/aspiring actor, I discovered that you can take a photo and see the image more clearly through the glasses. It doesn’t quite have the dramatic popping out effect but it conveys the idea. There is also a schedule of technology demonstrations until the store closes on December 24. You can find the information on the Wired Store website.

Every year when winter rolls around ornaments come out and adorn houses, buildings and sculptures. Department stores are no exception, each winter they install amazing window displays that each contain an intricate diorama of events that often relate and tell a story. Many of them appear to be a feat of engineering that required astronomical amounts of design and development during the previous months of the year. The Macy’s store in Manhattan exceeded expectations with this year’s display, which contains several robotic puppets and intricately designed moving parts. This display is titled “Make-A-Wish” and is related to the Make-A-Wish Foundation.

If you are in NYC this Thanksgiving for the annual parade and find yourself near the flagship store in Herald Square. You can check out this little bit of ingenious marketing and design. This photo booth, operates through one of the Macy’s exterior display windows. They have placed a marker on the sidewalk for you to stand on, where the monitor detects your presence and then snaps a photo. They take the liberty of adding a humorous backdrop and you can find your photo on their Facebook page the next day, at no cost.

An interesting side note, as I watched people pass by the screen early one morning, I noticed that many people were stepping directly on the red star. Whether this was conscious or not, it was very amusing how frequently it seemed to happen. It is at least something to think about when designing a flooring pattern or just walking around the city.

Check out this pop-up store that Uniqlo put up near Penn Station. The two cubes provided the structure and the lighting to view the merchandise. Between the two cubes there was a generator that powers the lighting; a section of the wall slides on a track like a barn door and allows for lock-ability when its time to close up shop. It was only up for a couple days and has been taken down but it was an excellent example of a highly functional pop-up structure.

I have the opportunity to walk past the Empire State building on my way to and from work. The times that I pass by, the area surrounding the building is generally buzzing with commuters and people who want to sell you a ticket to take an elevator to the roof deck. After a few days in awe of this famous piece of architecture, it has a tendency to recede into the rest of the fabric of New York City. Now that the clocks have been rolled back this fall and the sky gets extra dark at the end of the workday, I took a moment to notice the formerly world’s tallest building anew. It really was amazing. The dramatic lighting on the three tiered tower creates a totally new experience between pedestrian and skyscraper that can turn even the most efficient biped into the equivalent of a text-walker. On the Empire State Building’s website, you can find the lighting color schedule for this winter. This page also has a link where you can create your own Tower Lights Postcard where you get to select colors for the three levels.

This year, Architecture Week in New York City has been expanded to Architecture and Design Month called Archtober, which effectively takes over the month of October with more design events and tours than humanly possible to attend.  You can find the calendar of events here, on the Archtober website. Throughout the city, there are many events and tours occurring all month long with many participating organizations and company sponsors pulling together to make each of the events a success. Check out the schedule, and if you are in the area, be sure to visit some of sites, learn the architectural history and the important role that design played in NYC.

View of NYC Skyline in the distance.

After the long awaited release of Architect Barbie, mine finally arrived in the mail.  With all the anticipation surrounding her arrival, complete with a design competition for her dream house, I nearly forgot to make my purchase. It has been many years since I was the recipient of a new Barbie, I remember there being a lot more cardboard in the packaging of the old version, but the excitement of receiving my new treasure was still the same as when I was five.  The packaging and Barbie herself are all much more amazing in person than through the initial photo released by Mattel. Everything is unbelievably pink, to an amazing degree, there are sparkles and silver stitching on the dress and the eyeglasses have the correct architect varietal frames.  The hard hat is totally adorable, I had not yet opened the box and was totally getting taken in by all the cuteness, when I saw…(cue the sinister music)… blueprints.  There were several of them all rolled up in the lower right quadrant of the box, right behind a label that wants you to download the Barbie I Can Be App for your iPhone.  The walls of my Barbie fantasy dream house came crashing down. Blueprints! Really? And they are really blue, which means that Barbie uses a blueline machine to make her drawings, no AutoCad for her. It is a shame there is a 2011 Career of the Year label on the box, it should say 1911 Career of the Year.

Once my initial dismay at the blueprints subsided, I noticed that there was a white drawing in the drafting tube, which leads me to conclude that the blueprints must be some sort of archival system for Barbie’s office, thus rebuilding my Architect Barbie fantasy which was so nearly destroyed.  I still have not opened the box, I’m worried I will lose the tiny pieces, or worse, accidentally swallow them. That is the primary concern about small toys, right?  Once I do open the box, I’m sure that any concerns I had about blueprints will all melt away; mostly, I just want to play with the hard hat.