Garage Door Magic

The owners of a Haight district apartment building found a clever way to maintain their building's Victorian facade when adding a garage.

Afternoon View - Orlando Main Library

Like many Brutalist buildings, Orlando's Main Public Library looks like a prison. Unfortunately my alma mater, UCF, also features a major example of ugly Brutalism.

The World's Most Expensive House

Mukesh Ambani, the fourth-wealthiest person in the world, has built himself the first-ever billion-dollar home in Mumbai.

The lavish building– named Antilia, after the mythical island– has 27 stories, is 173 meters high and has 37,000 square meters of floor space — more than the Palace of Versailles. It contains a health club with a gym and dance studio, at least one swimming pool, a ballroom, guestrooms, a variety of lounges and a 50-seat cinema. There are three helicopter pads on the roof and a car park for 160 vehicles on the ground floors. It's obviously quite a job keeping all this running smoothly, so the house, if you can call it that, also boasts a staff of 600. And all this for just Ambani, his wife and their three children to enjoy.

Spectacularly ugly.

See The Empire State (While You Still Can)

While some of Manhattan's most iconic buildings have been obscured from enjoyment by enormous bland glass boxes (one can scarcely discern the Woolworth Building from some angles), the Empire State Building has soared alone in lower midtown for nearly 80 years, with no neighboring building daring to approach even half its height. That may soon change with the planned 15 Penn Plaza building, seen above in an artist's rendering. The Architect's Newspaper Blog comments:

Currently 15 Penn Plaza is 42 percent bigger than current zoning allows, with no setbacks, but at the same time, as garish as it looks in these renderings, it also shows the dynamic way in which our iconic skyline is always changing. Just think of the thrill you get looking back at old pictures of the city and comparing them to today. Even monstrosities like the Trump Wold Tower across from the U.N. look half-decent in this context. To build is to survive as a city and it’s good to know that, for better or worse, there are no sacred cows. After all, these were some of the same groups who complained when Burden cut Nouvel’s MoMA Tower down to size. Significantly, the tower is in Council Speaker Christine Quinn’s district, and she is an avowed friend to developers: Tenant or no tenant, building is in the cards.

A full-page ad was published in today's New York Times calling for the City Council to reject 15 Penn Plaza. According to a poll commissioned by the owners of the Empire State Building, 76% of the respondents feel the new building would detract from the Manhattan skyline. I have a feeling that with Bloomberg and Quinn being so pro-developers, this may be a lost cause.

Afternoon View - The Beekman

The 76-story Frank Gehry-designed Beekman is almost finished in downtown Manhattan. It's presently the ninth-tallest building in the city, however six much taller buildings will soon push the Beekman out of the top ten. It contains 903 "luxury" apartments, all rental. Hello recession. These pics embiggen nicely. (I'm quite pleased with the zoom on my new camera.)

SINGAPORE: World's Most Expensive Hotel Opens With World's Largest Outdoor Pool

The $6B Marina Sands Hotel opened in Singapore this weekend with a 650-foot infinity pool on the 55th floor. More cool/scary photos here. What global recession?

Stay Right, No...Left

China is planning a massive 22-mile bridge connecting its mainland to Hong Kong. However Hong Kong drives on the left and China drives on the right. Above is the rendering of a Netherlands design team's solution to the problem by splitting the bridge mid-span and crossing the lanes under each other. Lots more about the planned bridge at the link.

Shanghai: 1990 Vs. 2010

Via Business Insider, a startling look at the transformation of Shanghai in the space of a mere 20 years. Has any city in the world ever changed so rapidly and dramatically? Abu Dhabi, maybe? Meanwhile, here at home, Ground Zero remains a raw gaping wound upon the city almost nine years after 9/11.

90+ Story Apartment Building Planned For Manhattan Near Central Park

The ugly Trump World Tower will be deposed as New York City's tallest residential building after a planned 1005 foot apartment building is completed in Manhattan's near the southern end of Central Park.

The tower, designed by the French architect Christian de Portzamparc, will rise 1,005 feet above 57th Street east of Seventh Avenue, feature striking views of Central Park and house what Mr. Barnett hopes will be 136 of the most expensive and luxurious apartments in the city. A 210-room Park Hyatt hotel is to occupy the first 20 floors, hotel analysts say. “We’re going vertical in the next three weeks,” said Mr. Barnett, chief executive of Extell Development. Sounding a little like the developer he is one-upping, he said, “We think it’ll be the nicest project ever built in New York.” The project is the first major construction start in New York since the fall of Lehman Brothers in September 2008, and it is an ambitious, even risky undertaking. Unemployment still hovers at 10 percent in the city, which has only just begun to gain back some of the 150,000 jobs lost during the recession. Not so long ago, the real estate industry was right behind Wall Street and the nation’s automakers in crying for a federal bailout.

The building is being partially financed by a bank owned by the Abu Dhabi government, of course. It's slated for completion in 2013. It looks like yet another bland glass box, at least to judge by the renderings released so far.

Apartment Transformer

An architect in Hong Kong has turned his tiny studio into an "apartment transformer" through clever rolling walls and hidden spaces. His place is the same size as mine, but I think I'd tire quickly of all that rolling. Lazy American.

Hotel Hollywood

Danish architect Christian Bay-Jorgensen is being praised by some for his idea to turn the iconic Hollywood sign into a hotel.

The iconic Hollywood sign is in danger of being obstructed by hulking mansions. There's fear that future generations will point toward Mount Lee and ask: Mommy, why can I only see the letters "OO" on the hill? If the demise of the view of the Hollywood sign were a movie, then Danish architect Christian Bay-Jorgensen is among the hopefuls auditioning to be the swashbuckling hero. His plan: Transform the sign itself into a hotel, each giant letter hosting guests marveling at the sweeping views of the Los Angeles basin. The hotel-letters would be about twice the size of the current 45-foot tall sign, and include amenities such as an observation deck. The ultimate goal, he says, would be to preserve an internationally recognized landmark while helping the city generate badly needed funding. "I'm a fan of the Hollywood sign and the unused spaces of America," Bay-Jorgensen, a Denmark-based architect, said Monday after visiting Los Angeles. "It could be interesting to make it a center for such events as the Golden Globes and Oscars. This could be the future of the sign."

Hit the link for more renderings of the proposal. The folks charged with maintaining the sign admit they are strapped for funding, but aren't too interested in the hotel idea.