Some architects develop their sense of form from buildings (Richard Meier), construction technologies (Renzo Piano), or program (Lina Bo Bardi), but most architects submit to the discipline’s stylistic tropes du jour, whether raised extruded volumes projected into space or classical pediments. This is inherent to a culture of precedents disseminated by the media. Original proposals […]
When I was invited to represent the US in the 1980 Venice Biennale I wanted to counteract the superficiality of the main exhibit –a series of post-Modern façades called the Strada Nuovissima –with a project that resonated with larger social and cultural issues. My proposal for Ellis Island in the New York Harbor, long abandoned […]
I always found the I- beam profiles Mies Van der Rohe applied in front of the hidden and fireproofed structural columns in his Chicago towers profoundly disturbing, because they blatantly contradicted his professed belief in structural truth. The best reason he could offer for their use was “We looked at it on the model without […]
“When the hope for closure is abandoned, when there is an end to fantasy, adventure for women will begin,” wrote Carolyn Heilbrun in Writing a Woman’s Life. When I read her book in 1988, I determined to write about that adventure one day. That day seems to have arrived, but I have been troubled for […]
SPACE AS MATRIX INTERVIEW
10.20.2025