Yesterday's lecturer was a man of bombastic personality and inspiring vivacity. My favorite projects discussed were the apartment for the ballerina consisting of folded, twisted planes and the multipurpose tower with "communities" designated by different metaphysical and/or natural elements. The ballerina apartment is an embodiment of the undulation, the contortion, and the twisting nature of dancing. The multipurpose tower, despite its forty storeys, subverts the notion of the monolithic high rise by separating the floors into groups of elemental themes. I also liked the L'oreal/Nestle' labs and the project with the orange facade, internal gardens and theoretical iguanas.
I think Vitruvius would be proud of Rojkind because of his well-rounded capabilities. He could have been a rock star, yet he insisted on going to school and proving himself as an architect even when his professors told him to quit wasting their time and go be a drummer. What is particularly impressive that having studied architecture while being a drummer and being discouraged, he went on to build an independent firm that has been recognized by Architectural Record as a top ten Design Vanguard firm. Additional testament to his well-roundededness is his team project redesigning the soccer ball.
His presentation was by far one of the best I've seen in the lecture series since my first year. I liked his reiteration of the fact that "the time for being passive is over" (which earned a slow clap from someone in the audience). This is key in today's design world: design must move forward in an active and deliberate way; though sometimes fortuitous epiphanies happen, but by and large a designer pushes forward intentional elements and decisions.
i just burst into laughter (lol) about the 'which earned a slow clap from someone in the audience' love it.
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