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Professor Richard Weston (born 1953) is an architect, landscape architect, author [1] and is also the Chair of Architecture at Cardiff University. He is Director of Richard Weston Studio Ltd and Earth Images Ltd.
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Professor Richard Weston (born 1953) is an architect, landscape architect, author [1] and is also the Chair of Architecture at Cardiff University. He is Director of Richard Weston Studio Ltd and Earth Images Ltd.
Weston was born in Leicester in 1953. He attended Wyggeston Boys Grammar School. He went on to study architecture at Manchester University, gaining a BA in 1975 and BArch in 1977. Supported by the Thouron Award, he attended the University of Pennsylvania (USA) to study landscape architecture, gaining an MLA (Penn) in 1979. From 1979 to 1982 he worked in practice and was appointed as a lecturer at the Welsh School of Architecture (WSA) in Cardiff. He subsequently taught at the Leicester and Portsmouth schools of architecture before returning to Cardiff in 1999 as a professorial research fellow. In 2003 he was appointed to the Chair of Architecture, a position he holds today.
In addition to his teaching at the WSA, he is editor of arq (Architectural Research Quarterly, Cambridge University Press) and director of Richard Weston Studio Ltd and Earth Images Ltd. Alongside his teaching duties, Weston is an experienced researcher with numerous books and publications to his name. Most notably, he is author of two award-winning books, a monograph on the architect Alvar Aalto and a study of the modernist movement titled Modernism. In addition he is the author of the definitive work on the life and achievements of Sydney Opera House architect, Jørn Utzon. Famously reclusive and private, Utzon granted Weston unlimited access to his archives and himself, enabling the publication of a unique study.
In 1992, Weston designed a glass roof to cover the sunken courtyard of a house built in a redundant water tank in Hampshire. Formed of stainless steel 'gutter trusses' whose profile, like a river, widens and deepens in response to the flow of water, and between them span laminated glass arches, with an interlayer to reduce heat gain from the sun.
Weston's interest in structural glass found dramatic expression in a house he built for himself as part of FutureWorld (an exhibition designed to provide the public with a glimpse of the way homes might operate in the 21st century) in Milton Keynes. The 5.5 tonne stressed-skin plywood roof of Radiant House is supported only by glass – a feat achieved in collaboration with engineer Mark Lovell.
In 2002, he entered two architectural competitions, taking the opportunity they posed to explore ideas. The first for the Royal Playhouse in Copenhagen (in collaboration with John Pardey Architects and eventually won by Lundgaard & Tranberg Arkitekter, who went on to build it) and the second for the Great Egyptian Museum in Cairo. Whilst it did not win, the proposal, consisting of a 230m limestone dome, was selected for publication by the judges and Weston's learning of the Egyptians' fascination with the stars later became an inspiration for the designs for his own house and studio in Sully, South Wales - although sadly this was to remain on the drawing board.
Described by the Independent on Sunday as "the break out star of Britain's Next Big Thing", [3] he appeared in the seven-part BBC2 television series tracing the development of new products for leading retailers.
Using high-resolution scanners, he has generated designs for a collection of silk scarves from natural materials such as minerals and stones. This idea was presented at the 'Best of British Open Design Call' at Liberty of London (the world's leading retailer of scarves) and, since their debut on the shelves in 2010, have quickly established themselves as amongst Liberty's best selling lines. [3]
The images, which can be printed on most natural and man-made fibres, offer a wide range of application in architecture, interior design and fashion. In addition to the scarves, they have appeared in Liza Bruce's new ranges of swimwear.[ citation needed ] Architectural applications are also currently being developed, with leading British architects Patel Taylor featuring an 'agate façade' in a house in Camden Town. The London Olympic Games in 2012 followed suit, with four 5x3m images greeting athletes in the Olympic Village in Stratford. Weston's most recent public work is a four-storey banner installed in the atrium of the new Health Library at the Heath Hospital in Cardiff.
The scope of Weston's work has been extended by the purchase, in September 2014, of a sophisticated optical microscope and he is gaining increasing recognition internationally, with publications in the USA (Vincent Mok in Maniac Magazine, May 2013, p58-9), Ukraine (in Russian in Salon magazine, September 2013, p82-7) and The Netherlands (Mark magazine, June/July 2014, p160-167), as well as in two books on textile design published in the UK, the first by Melanie Bowles, Digital Textile Design (Laurence King, 2012), the second, Simon Clarke's Print: Fashion, Interiors, Art (Laurence King, 2014).
Hugo Alvar Henrik Aalto was a Finnish architect and designer. His work includes architecture, furniture, textiles and glassware, as well as sculptures and paintings. He never regarded himself as an artist, seeing painting and sculpture as "branches of the tree whose trunk is architecture." Aalto's early career ran in parallel with the rapid economic growth and industrialization of Finland during the first half of the 20th century. Many of his clients were industrialists, among them the Ahlström-Gullichsen family, who became his patrons. The span of his career, from the 1920s to the 1970s, is reflected in the styles of his work, ranging from Nordic Classicism of the early work, to a rational International Style Modernism during the 1930s to a more organic modernist style from the 1940s onwards.
Jørn Oberg Utzon,, Hon. FAIA was a Danish architect. In 1957, he won an international design competition for his design of the Sydney Opera House in Australia. Utzon's revised design, which he completed in 1961, was the basis for the landmark, although it was not completed until 1971.
Critical regionalism is an approach to architecture that strives to counter the placelessness and lack of identity of the International Style, but also rejects the whimsical individualism and ornamentation of Postmodern architecture. The stylings of critical regionalism seek to provide an architecture rooted in the modern tradition, but tied to geographical and cultural context. Critical regionalism is not simply regionalism in the sense of vernacular architecture. It is a progressive approach to design that seeks to mediate between the global and the local languages of architecture.
The year 1982 in architecture involved some significant architectural events and new buildings.
The year 1978 in architecture involved some significant architectural events and new buildings.
Erik Gunnar Asplund was a Swedish architect, mostly known as a key representative of Nordic Classicism of the 1920s, and during the last decade of his life as a major proponent of the modernist style which made its breakthrough in Sweden at the Stockholm International Exhibition (1930). Asplund was professor of architecture at the Royal Institute of Technology from 1931. His appointment was marked by a lecture, later published under the title "Our architectonic concept of space." The Woodland Crematorium at Stockholm South Cemetery (1935-1940) is considered his finest work and one of the masterpieces of modern architecture.
Aino Maria Marsio-Aalto was a Finnish architect and a pioneer of Scandinavian design. She is known as a co-founder of the design company Artek and as a collaborator on its most well-known designs. As Artek's first artistic director, her creative output spanned textiles, lamps, glassware, and buildings. It has been discovered that it was Aino who completed the first work commissioned through Artek which was the Viipuri Library in 1935. Her work is in the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York,and the MoMA has included her work in nine exhibitions. Aino Aalto’s first exhibition was Art in Progress: 15th Anniversary Exhibitions: Design for Use at MoMA in 1944. Other major exhibitions were at the Barbican Art Gallery in London and Chelsea Space in London. Aino Aalto has been exhibited with Pablo Picasso.
Juhani Uolevi Pallasmaa is a Finnish architect and former professor of architecture and dean at the Helsinki University of Technology. Among the many academic and civic positions he has held are those of Director of the Museum of Finnish Architecture 1978–1983, and head of the Institute of Industrial Arts, Helsinki. He established his own architect's office – Arkkitehtitoimisto Juhani Pallasmaa KY – in 1983 in Helsinki. From 2001 to 2003, he was Raymond E. Maritz Visiting Professor of Architecture at Washington University in St. Louis, and in 2013 he received an honorary doctorate from that university. In 2010–2011, Pallasmaa served as Plym Distinguished Professor at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, and in 2012-2013 he was scholar in residence at Frank Lloyd Wright's Taliesin. Pallasmaa has also lectured widely in Europe, North and South America, Africa and Asia.
Vyborg Library is a library in Vyborg, Russia, built during the time of Finnish sovereignty, before the Finnish city of Viipuri was annexed by the former USSR and its Finnish name was changed to Vyborg by the Soviet authorities.
Kristian Valter Alexander Gullichsen was a Finnish architect. The son of Harry and Maire Gullichsen, he was born into a family of industrialists, designers and artists. His siblings were the renowned Finnish philosopher Lilli Alanen and Johan Gullichsen, a professor of engineering. Kristian Gullichsen had three sons and two daughters, one of the sons was the artist Alvar Gullichsen. Gullichsen was married twice; his second wife was architect Kirsi Gullichsen.
The Säynätsalo Town Hall is a multifunction building complex, consisting of two main buildings organised around a centralised courtyard; a U-shaped council chamber and town hall with administrative offices and a community library with and flats. The Town Hall was designed by Finnish architect Alvar Aalto for the municipality of Säynätsalo in Central Finland. Aalto received the commission after a design contest in 1949, and the building was completed in December 1951.
Philip Morton Shand, known as P. Morton Shand, was a British journalist, architecture critic, wine and food writer, entrepreneur and pomologist. He was the paternal grandfather of Queen Camilla.
Roger Connah is a writer, and independent scholar based in Ruthin, North Wales, and has taught for over three decades in Finland, India, Pakistan, Sweden, Canada, and the United States. He is currently professor of architecture at the Azrieli School of Architecture and Urbanism at Carleton University in Ottawa, Canada.
Hélène Binet is a Swiss-French architectural photographer based in London, who is also one of the leading architectural photographers in the world. She is most known for her work with architects Daniel Libeskind, Peter Zumthor and Zaha Hadid, and has published books on works of several architects.
Bagsværd Church is a Lutheran church in Bagsværd on the northern outskirts of Copenhagen, Denmark. Designed in 1968 by Jørn Utzon, it was completed in 1976. The building is considered to be a masterpiece of contemporary church architecture, especially its bright, naturally illuminated interior and its ceiling straddled with softly rounded vaulting.
Utzon's House in Hellebæk is a one-storey private home in Hellebæk, not far from Helsingør, in Denmark's northern Zealand. Built by the world-famous architect Jørn Utzon for his family and himself in 1952, its innovative design was welcomed by the world of architecture.
Can Lis is a house the Danish architect Jørn Utzon built for his wife Lis and himself near Portopetro on the Spanish island of Majorca. Completed in 1971, it consists of four separate blocks linked together by walls and courtyards.
The Melli Bank, University of Tehran Branch, was designed by Danish architect Jørn Utzon, famed for his Sydney Opera House. The three-storey rectangular building on Enghelab Street near the centre of Tehran, Iran, was completed in 1962.
The Alvar Aalto Museum is a Finnish museum operating in two cities, Jyväskylä and Helsinki, in two locations each, dedicated to architect and designer Alvar Aalto. All four locations are open to the public. They are:
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