It’s been a couple of weeks since our last “best of” so we thought it would be a great time to check back in and see the hot workplace topics on Work+Place.  Enjoy!

• Weather.  While it’s sunny and beautiful in May in most of the US (and northern hemisphere, for that matter), our Work+Place bloggers remind us of the good times in winter 2009-2010.  Check out Gerald Callo’s post on snow in Houston, Claire Whitehill’s documentation of the DC office, Vincent Ng’s work from home snow day, and Shelby Guazzo’s observation of design by snowplow.   Definitely reminds me of just how much a part weather plays in my

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An entire miniature city built from paper clips! Check it out; Ephemicropolis by Peter Root.

Hello everyone!!

I have an issue. I don’t know if you share it with me.
I feel that sometimes the architectural exercise that we do every day and that drives our lives crazy stands very far from the idealistic concept of architecture as an “art expression.”
I forget due to the stress and the business-oriented job that we do, that through architecture we can create ART.
Art that is visible, palpable, reacts to the place where it is, to the light, to the wind, it shelters us… it can be an artistic exercise that collaborates with so many other disciplines and shares with us, the users, its protagonism.

Have you forgotten it same as me?

Yesterday I watched a video that reminded me off all that. A video that …

Francisco Silva, CA Architect in Houston, is joining the ranks with Lance Armstrong in the cycling fundraiser against cancer this October! Here is Francisco in his own words:

“Call me crazy but I actually like the pain cycling brings.  The muscle just above your knee cramps up as you get off your saddle to climb.  Hands go numb from holding on to the bar.  Shoulders hurt from riding all day.  Other parts of your body that I do not want to mention hurt and I wonder if they are still there when you finish the ride.   …

Love this video of bikers around art and sculpture on Paris Streets. Love the music too!

thanks Jim Rice for passing it on!

I found this on my computer the other day and got a bit nostalgic. One day my computer went crazy and I got a free art piece out of it. Enjoy!

Domino Magazine recently did a write up on a very cool site called 20×200. The creator, Jen Bekman, launched the site in an effort to make art more accessible. The pieces are varied and include photography, paintings, and illustrations. They post new work every Tuesday and Wednesday but be fast because word on the street is they can sell out pretty quickly.

Rice Design Alliance and Cite magazine have collaborated on a new blog www.offcite.org and RDA is putting out some very intriguing work for this semester’s showcasing in the gallery. I’ll do a follow up post after seeing this with the FLIP and getting some responses from the locals. ; )

Paul Villinski proposes an idea within a “piece”/installation/mobile home/ studio. I agree with the concept of having artists present in disaster cites to help promote unseen ideas to those of more pragmatic set minds. Great art is a good way to rally people up against red tape.

Mobile Studio Video

Enjoy.

Today a bunch of people at the HOK WDC office are switching desks, which has inspired me to straighten up mine a bit.  I found a bunch of old holiday cards (fewer than years past, as many companies are switching to e-cards!).  I was going to throw them in the recycling pile, but I remembered a website passed on by a friend: St. Jude’s Ranch for Children Card Recycling Program. 

This program takes the front piece of used greeting cards to create a new card.  The program is not only environmentally friendly, and a good fundraiser for the charity, but also helps the children express themselves creatively and learn the …

Art collector Dakis Joannou has enlisted Jeff Koons and a crew of contemporary artists to create the most original sight on the seas.

Anyone cruising the Aegean should be warned that fantastically colorful, wildly eccentric apparition cutting across your bow is not a mirage. It’s Guilty, Dakis Joannou’s new boat.Koons and the boat’s interior designer, Ivana Porfiri, broke free of classic nautical architecture and gave birth to what their delighted patron calls “a totally magical object.” The exterior paint was inspired by Roy Lichtenstein’s mermaid for the America’s Cup racing boat competition that is now become a permanent collection at …

Inspired by his twins’ heartbeats during his wife’s pregnancy, Rafael Lozano-Hemmer thought this beautiful syncopation, like minimalist music, should be expanded into something that could be appreciated visually.

After Pulse Rooms in Puebla, Mexico and Biennale di Venezia, Italy, then Pulse Front in Toronto, now his installation Pulse Park is visualizing the heartbeats in a bigger scale.