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William E. Blurock, FAIA, a Newport Beach, California architect whose work from the 1950s through 1970s was considered visionary in the burgeoning field of modern educational design, died on June 12 at the age of 90.The Blurock Partnership—now tBP/Architecture—is recognized for a spectrum of award-winning commercial, institutional and civic projects, and primarily for school buildings worldwide (Europe, South America, Asia, Australia and the Middle East).  Over his career, Blurock guided the planning and design of buildings on 32 California college campuses and scores of other educational facilities throughout the state.  He pioneered the one-building model for schools: an open plan

This new, off-the-shelf product will provide a platform for design collaboration in the cloud. The promise of the cloud has always been twofold—web-enabled storage and computing on demand. Later this summer, Gehry Technologies (GT) plans to release an interactive, web-based collaboration platform called GTeam. It will be the company’s first off-the-shelf product incorporating both storage and computing, and it marks a shift in GT’s strategy from developing stand-alone software to offering cloud-based services. Related links Gehry Forms Alliance of Architects To Promote Technological Integration Frank Gehry Takes His Technological Expertise to the Masses Designed for architecture, engineering, and construction professionals

The New York architects recently won the bid to design a condo-hotel building on the Brooklyn waterfront. Image courtesy Rogers Marvel Rogers Marvel has designed a 550,000-square-foot building that steps back from the Michael Van Valkenburgh-designed Brooklyn Bridge Park. Twenty years ago, when Jonathan Marvel and Rob Rogers founded Rogers Marvel Architects, they decided to forego the route taken by many young Manhattan firms—designing residential and commercial interiors—preferring, Marvel says, “to cut our teeth on New York City’s’ bricks and mortar.”  They negotiated a city contract to oversee repairs to schools, libraries, and armories, which were jobs that left little

William “Bill” Louis Larson, FAIA, cofounder of DLR Group, died on June 29 at his summer residence in Pinetop, Arizona. He was 88. He maintained a home in Scottsdale, Arizona, and was a native of Nebraska and longtime resident of Omaha. William Larson, cofounder of DLR Group. Related links Marysville Getchell High School Campus by DLR Group DLR Group Goes Back to School By Putting a Classroom in its Office Joplin High School by Corner Greer & Associates, DLR Group Larson was born February 25, 1924, in Blair, Nebraska. After graduating high school, he assumed the responsibility of the Greatest

Photo © Peter Ash Lee/courtesy Checkerboard Liz Diller, Ric Scofidio, and Charles Renfro are featured in a film being shown at the National Gallery. This week, the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., will host the first retrospective of documentaries by the Checkerboard Film Foundation, a nonprofit founded in 1979 to produce, distribute, and archive films that document American artists and the artistic process. As the title suggests—“Celebrating New American Architecture and Design: A Salute to Checkerboard Film Foundation”—the retrospective will put the spotlight on the organization’s architecture documentaries, with 10 films screened over a two-day period. Related links Five

The 17-acre development is the first project in New York to earn the LEED-ND designation from the U.S. Green Building Council. Courtesy Columbia University This rendering shows 130th Street in West Harlem as it will look after development of Columbia University's Manhattanville campus. Columbia University’s 17-acre Manhattanville campus, which is now rising in West Harlem, has achieved New York State’s first Platinum certification under the LEED for Neighborhood Development (LEED-ND) rating system. The university's plan, designed in collaboration with SOM and Renzo Piano Building Workshop, is unusual for a college campus in that it integrates with and welcomes the surrounding

Image courtesy HOK and Moody/Nolan Construction is under way on the new James Cancer Center and Solove Research Institute at the Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center, a 1.2 million-square-foot project in Columbus, Ohio, designed by HOK and Moody/Nolan. The Supreme Court issued its landmark ruling last Thursday on the Affordable Care Act, essentially upholding the law. Following up on a story we published last week, we checked in with architects and industry experts around the country to hear their thoughts on the decision and how it might affect health care architecture. Share your own opinions in our reader survey.

The Supreme Court’s endorsement of President Obama’s health care law last week left us wondering how the decision will affect architects and their firms. How do you feel about the Affordable Care Act? Create your free online surveys with SurveyMonkey, the world's leading questionnaire tool.

Photo © Ernst Halberstadt/Wikipedia Boston City Hall was completed in 1968. Some competitions immediately catapult architects into architectural history. Gerhard Kallmann, who died June 19 in Boston at the age of 97, earned his place in the pantheon early in his long career when he and his collaborators, Michael McKinnell and Edward Knowles, all teachers at Columbia, won the competition for Boston City Hall in 1962. There were 256 entries in two rounds; the final vote was unanimous. Related links Record Reveals: Boston Boston was in decline. Architecture, as a means of shaping society and revitalizing cities, was ascendant. Their design

HWKN’s spiny blue beauty is a return to form for MoMA’s Young Architects Program. P.S.1 recently held an opening party for HWKN's Wendy. Prepare to get the song “Windy” stuck in your head. According to HWKN principal Mark Kushner, that 1967 bit of bubblegum was the inspiration for giving the name “Wendy” to his firm’s installation at the New York contemporary art space P.S.1. Part architectural experiment and part well-branded cartoon character, the giant blue sea urchin straddles a wall on one side of the courtyard at the Museum of Modern Art-affiliated former school building in Queens. Stretched across an