NEWS

By Kim McKnight

On a sunny afternoon May 30, Mid Tex Mod hosted a pre-conference tour of San Antonio’s modern heritage as part of the 15^th Annual International Scientific Symposium of US/ICOMOS, a leading international heritage conservation organization. Tour participants were delighted to encounter modern resources seldom seen by the casual visitor to San Antonio.

In the last few months, the controversy regarding the landmarked Manufacturers Trust Company building at 510 Fifth Avenue designed by Gordon Bunshaft for SOM came to relative conclusion both with the settlement of lawsuit between Vornado Realty Trust and the local activist group Citizens Emergency Committee to Preserve Preservation, and the opening of the new Joe Fresh retail store.

By Sarah Sher
In the past few months, there has been an extraordinary amount of press on Brutalist architecture, most of which has centered on the controversy of whether or not to demolish Paul Rudolph’s Orange County Government Center. The front-page article in the New York Times on April 7, “Architecture’s Ugly Ducklings May Not Get Time to Be Swans,” served as a catalyst for an explosion of newspaper, journal, magazine, and blog articles about the building and its Brutalist style, including pages and pages of reader comments.  

Los Angeles landscape architect and filmmaker, Ethan Mather, recently premiered his new short film "A Necessary Ruin" at the National Building Museum in Washington, D.C. and the New York City Center for Architecture.