N O R T O N unleashes a new line of thank you cards

N O R T O N, a recent college graduate in search of jobs that don't actually exist, has amassed a pile of rejection emails and letters. In response to these dire employment conditions (and out of pure boredom) a new line of "Thank You" cards has been released. Sporting images of campus buildings manipulated with bold Sharpie line work, these cards attack an otherwise critically serious problem (the architecture profession is in trouble right now) with humor. When asked about his intentions, N O R T O N laughed saying:

"Oh, you just reviewed my portfolio in ten minutes and decided I would not be able to contribute to your firm in a positive manner? Why thank you! ...what's that? no, thank YOU. really...I insist!"

It would appear N O R T O N has lost it...it seems that he is mentally unable to juggle the combination of six years of expensive higher education, no job prospects, and a lack of social interaction with the outside world.

Subversion: Immersion, Cranbrook Version

This is an example of some great mockitecture. It is a project by a student for the Campus of Cranbrook Academy. There are many layers to the project, the most obvious being a floating brick in the sky. Bricks are very heavy, so to loft a brick up on the air and have it float there is subversive to start with. Usually, heavier elements are thought to be placed in the ground. Much like the work of Sverre Fehn, the giant brick in the sky breaks with expected convention, a kind of second glance architecture. It is about architecture, but it also utilizes everyday shapes (bricks) to make ironic gestures which can be interpreted on some level by non-architects.

The next ironic gesture is that of a truss in the ground. Many would say that is absurdism. (not as a compliment) The truss is just the image. The sloped columns that make up the image of the truss in the ground are completely structurally rational. The fact that a huge truss is sitting in the ground would be quite a sight.

When you strip away the heavy-feeling materials from the brick, we realize that the structure makes sense. The treatments and detailing are meant to subvert this inherit structural logic.

Truss in ground, brick in sky. Makes sense to me.

City as Sex

Freud would say that sex is at the root of all subconscious.  He would also say that subconscious is at the root of all human activity. If the city is the construction of such human activity, then sex is at the root of all cities. Everything from storefronts full of scantily clad models to buses taking people to eventually fulfill their conquest for sex are the pulse of the city. Is this a by-product of consumer society, where advertising has taken over as organizer? Probably...but sex sells. Even our cars are based on bodies and sex. The car is adventurous, the city is romantic.

Most of our buildings are inexpressive of their interiors. This lack of transparency not-so-accidental facadery represent some of humankind's most sexual urges for privacy. What goes on behind the curtains in the windows of those buildings? That is not for us to know. The construct of the city as millions of private areas is City as Sex.FAT's Semi Dysfunctional House explores these themes about what goes on in the private sections (of a house in this case.) The public areas are designed with the ultimate goal in mind: privacy.

In his book Building Sex, Aaron Betsky outlines the inplications gender plays in creating space. Interiors and side spaces such as cafes, homes, and salons are feminine, warm sensuous spaces, while Exteriors, Streets, Public Spaces, and Monuments are cold, masculine constructions. How can we develop the ambivalent both-and of gender roles in constructing the city scape? In other words, can we have the desirable qualities of the interiors of our cafes, homes, and salons in our streets? Can irony and humor help fight the stark and violent gray of a city? What are the limits of the combative ironic warmth in the cold city? What is the cure for this cold, hostile environment that our cities have become? How does the boundary between interior and exterior, warm and cold, feminine and masculine break down?

Early Sketch Reveals Interest in Mockitecture

A study recently pulled from Norton's archives reveals a rare glimpse into the mind of a budding mockitect.  Here are ten examples of how humor can be injected into YOUR renderings...

1. Sketchy van approaching the scene

2. Empty baby carriage

3. Two men following the mother very closely

4. A textbook "hot beef"

5. Old man walking a bike across the road

6. Man in trench coat in pursuit of handicapped citizen

7. Kid being knocked over by friend on horse

8. Reference to the endangered Smitty's store from Over-the-Rhine

9. Man walking quickly with briefcase

10. Old lady selling lemonade next to a gay man with a baby carriage

Bulbous Buffont

This is a nice bit of irony. Sergio Silva's Oyule Lamps use old methods and modern materials. There is something sinister about the overtaking of the light bulbs' body, almost like a parasite which has overtaken its host. And the parasite is the old method. Beautiful design, however. [more...]

Concept: Clown Shoe

While this is not a good building, it brings up a good point. It is funny to have absurd concepts for a building. When people have no idea that they are walking around in a functional building where the concept is "a metaphor for the sexual tension in Major League Baseball dugouts," I would laugh. Only because Daniel Libeskind actually does this. Im not sure if hes trying to be funny. I cant tell.

Awkward Flurry of Wipers

This is a beautiful piece of environmental technology by N_O_R_T_O_N. It is one of the earliest exaamples of mockitecture. Applied to any building, the window wall would have many wipers on it, all different sizes and all different speeds. Some would rotate 360 degrees, some would rotate 30 degrees, and most would fall somewhere between. Imagine a really big wiper spinning really slowly 360 degrees. It makes me warm and fuzzy, just thinking about it; this, would be a great, critique on modernity, and, simultaneously, a goofy thing, to see.

trees by MDRDV

--..Yes, You Can.

Distortions of scale. Irony. Unexpected convention. This is a play on the expected convention, a flower in a pot. A full size tree in a pot is unexpected convention, familiar objects in an unfamiliar arrangement, context, juxtaposition, or use.

This is a tower by Eduardo Francois. He is really into these tree-covered buildings.

Goofy Massing. Legible Form. New Spatial Experience.