Determined to make interior design affordable for all, this 23-year-old Stanford graduate recently launched his own firm, 50 for Fifty. Photo courtesy Noa Santos Armed with a joint bachelor’s degree in architectural design and management science from Stanford, Noa Santos took his first job at a Madison Avenue interior design firm in New York shortly after graduating in 2010. Disenchanted with the work, the 23-year-old decided to launch his own company, 50 for Fifty. Established in August, the one-man firm charges a mere $50 for a 50-minute consultation (“It’s more like an hour,” he says). The service is geared toward
Photo courtesy Studio Daniel Libeskind Although his design for a "Freedom Tower" was replaced by SOM¹s One WTC, Daniel Libeskind helped shape the rebuilding at the World Trade Center through his competition-winning master plan. RECORD editors Cathleen McGuigan, Clifford Pearson, and William Hanley interviewed Libeskind in his New York office overlooking the WTC site. Here are some excerpts from the conversation. On the special character of Ground Zero: This is now a site that has memory in it. This is a site where people perished. This is a site which forever has altered how we view New York and the
With a portfolio of widely praised projects, including Chicago’s Aqua Tower, to her credit, architect Jeanne Gang can now add “genius” to the list of accolades she has received for her work.
Fumihiko Maki During his many decades practicing architecture, Fumihiko Maki has accrued an impressive collection of awards, including the Pritzker Prize (1993) and Japan’s Praemium Imperiale (1999). Now, the American Institute of Architects has announced that this year’s Gold Medal will honor the esteemed architect, known for such projects as the Sam Fox School of Design and MIT Media Lab. A graduate of both Tokyo University and the Harvard Graduate School of Design, Maki was one of the first Japanese architects to study and work in the United States after World War II. Following his graduation from Harvard in 1954, Maki
Ole Scheeren After 15 years at the Office for Metropolitan Architecture—eight years as a partner—Ole Scheeren has split from Rem Koolhaas and set up his own firm. The new practice, called Büro Ole Scheeren, is based in Beijing (where Scheeren has lived for the past six years) and Hong Kong (where he has been a visiting professor at Hong Kong University since January 2010). He brings with him as a partner Eric Chang, an American architect who had worked at OMA in Beijing. At OMA, the German-born Scheeren spearheaded the design and construction of the China Central Television Station (CCTV)
Meet the man who'very wisely'acquired the 'Architect.com' Web site, which helps drive substantial business to his residential design practice. Thomas Bollay, AIA Santa Barbara, Calif.—In today’s brutal business climate for architects, even a small edge that can help a firm stand out and secure new business becomes extremely valuable. With a prescient purchase 16 years ago, architect Thomas Bollay, AIA, acquired for a few dollars a big marketing advantage that could be worth tens—or, in his view, even hundreds of thousands of dollars: the architect.com domain name. As those with even a rudimentary understanding of the workings of search engines