Category: Placemaking

Projection Mapping Facade Design Essay by Christina Lanzl

8/30/2020

Design Innovation in Architecture:
The Spatial Augmented Realities of UrbanScreen
Essay by Christina Lanzl

Edition Menges has published a new anthology by Anne-Catrin Schultz, Associate Professor of the Department of Architecture at Wentworth Institute of Technology. Through her research she realized that the condition of »fake« and »real« in architecture is rarely publicly discussed nor has it encountered broad journalistic or scholarly attention. This book explores the realm of truth, authenticity and fakery in architecture, providing a timely collection of analytical essays and projects. The authors challenge our perception of »authenticity« through the examination of built and simulated environments, architectural fiction, theatric illusions and mannerist trickery. Expanding from the discussion about truthful materiality and tectonics, this book provides an understanding of real, authentic, and fake in urbanism and architecture.

The diverse contributions shed light on unexpected identities in architecture inviting critical thought about our built environment–analog and digital. Editor Anne-Catrin Schultz invited colleagues and friends to contribute essays: Dan Hisel, Morgan McMahon, Nicole Lambrou, Christina Lanzl, Eric Lum, Jennifer Lee Michaliszyn, Tom van Arman, Justin Vigilanti and Kemo Usto. Featured also are projects by Rima Abousleiman, Stefan Al, Alun Be, Kelly Hutzell and Rami el Samahy, Mat Maggio, Jessica Ronayne, Gregor Sailer, Allen Spore and Edoardo Tresoldi.

The authors challenge our perception of »authenticity« through the examination of built and simulated environments, architectural fiction, theatric illusions and mannerist trickery. They examine the notion that the principle of Sullivan’s »form follows function« contains a paradox caused by the ambiguity and complexity of architectural expression. Buildings are perceived through an individual’s personal experiences while also being interpreted along broader cultural values. The works shown demonstrate that under scrutiny, any built environment harbors both, reveals moments of truth, deception and ambiguity – all of it partially in the eye of the beholder.

The goal of this publication goes beyond unmasking deception in architecture, it aims at unfolding time-lines and revealing the layered nature of people and places. The images and essays reveal our contemporary condition and let collective and individual narratives unfold, a range of truths in themselves. Expanding from the discussion about truthful materiality and tectonics, this book provides an understanding of real, authentic, and fake in urbanism and architecture.

Publication:
Anne-Catrin Schultz (editor). Fake and Real in Architecture: Close To The Original, Far From Authenticity? Stuttgart: Edition Menges, 2020: 131-140.

Design Innovation in Architecture:
The Spatial Augmented Realities of UrbanScreen
Abstract | Essay by Christina Lanzl

Design innovation in architecture frequently is the result of a continual, thoughtful consideration of human habitation, its evolution, research and experimentation. The innovation of materials in architecture and design is tested at a smaller scale, where experimentation can happen on modest budgets, in the incubator atmosphere of a workshop environment. Artistic applications and the internet, exhibitions and temporary installations or tradeshows serve as a platform to introduce new ideas, materials or groundbreaking scientific research to a public audience for the first time. At a large scale the intersection of research and innovation increasingly occurs in virtual environments, where ideas can be visualized without the pressure to invest in construction. This phase of theoretical application usually precedes prototyping or, at times, it may occur simultaneously.

A most promising new technology with potential for development of neoteric applications for building façades is projection mapping, a process that maps projected light on the surface of any 3D form. The types of “fake” architectural façades (skins) thus created offer an opportunity for innovation in architectural design and permanent construction.

Projection mapping is a burgeoning field. Therefore, this essay is limited to a case study approach. Particularly noteworthy are the architecturally inspired, “fake” designs by UrbanScreen, a cutting-edge practice based in Bremen, Germany since 2005. UrbanScreen creates cataclysmic possibilities of architectural design as spatial augmented realities that are projected onto iconic buildings. Opera Sydney in Australia, Romania’s Palace of Parliament in Bucharest, Houston’s Rice University, the Leopold Museum in Vienna/Austria and Kunsthalle Hamburg in Germany have staged dazzlingly symphonic and imaginative choreographies developed by the firm. The development of a generally poetic and magical theme on each of these buildings offers fertile ground for exploration.

UrbanScreen concepts offer innovative visions for kinetic façade design leading to a series of relevant analytical questions. Which bright ideas may architectural designers deduce from temporary visualizations? Can the production of projected visuals and motion design inform permanent applications or, may this already have occurred? What kind of questions may arise concerning the digital interface and software codes when converting a projected to a static design? Can the visual drama and theatricality of a night-time projection that also features mesmerizing music and sound components be transformed into the design of a building envelope? This essay is intended to shed light onto these queries into fake architecture.

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Toward a New Paradigm by Christina Lanzl in Extraordinary Partnerships Book

8/9/2020

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Lever Press has published a new pathbreaking book on the humanities, Extraordinary Partnerships: How the Arts and Humanities are Transforming America, edited by Christine Henseler, Chair of the Department of Modern Languages and Literatures and Co-Director of 4Humanities at Union College. Her "inspirative and hopeful collection demonstrates that the arts and humanities are entering a renaissance that stands to change the direction of our communities." (book jacket)

Among the authors are Kim Cook of the Burning Man team, Ella Maria Diaz of Cornell University, Ari W. Epstein of Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Doris Sommer of Harvard University as well as Christina Lanzl of the Urban Culture Institute. Her essay, Toward a New Paradigm: Public Art and Placemaking in the Twenty-First Century, is featured in part 1 of the anthology, Toward a New Common Humanity: Creating Space, Context, and Moment.

Christina Lanzl, initiator and co-author of the Placemaking Manifesto, applies its six principles from her professional practice and research to highlight examples of extraordinary partnerships. These public art and placemaking initiatives, created in partnership with diverse communities, offer key insights, provide tips and offer potential for new endeavors.

The six principles anchored in the Placemaking Manifesto:
1. Placemaking = Quality of Life
2. Placemaking = A Sense of Place
3. Placemaking = Caring About the Community
4. Placemaking = Collaboration and Communication
5. Placemaking = Active Participation
6. Placemaking = Tradition and Innovation

Publication:
Christine Henseler (editor). Extraordinary Partnerships: How the Arts and Humanities Are Transforming America.
Amherst: Lever Press, 2020: 108-148.
The book is available as an open resource.

Abstract – "Toward a New Paradigm: Public Art and Placemaking in the Twenty-First Century" by Christina Lanzl

Quality of life and caring about community are at the core of a contemporary movement, which is increasingly becoming a grassroots-driven approach to consciously embrace the places we inhabit: Successful placemaking, the arts and culture––in short, ways for people to engage in public––are at the center of thriving, functioning neighborhoods. How can we create successful public places that provide all with powerful incentives for active participation? Which tools can we employ to ensure diversity and inclusivity? What kind of hands-on processes can be utilized? Are there universal platforms for discourse? Which creative activities and solutions produce improved, shared environments? This essay will look at strategies that encourage inclusive neighborhoods with ways to bridge the past, the present and the future.

Placemaking activates our lived environment, offers cultural grounding and sense of place. Makers of all disciplines come together to think, plan, create and celebrate together. Storytelling is key to sharing community and place. Stories introduce ways to deal with difficult pasts, bridge differences and celebrate our common humanity. How are digital and social media as well as grassroots communication used to further community building? How can our built environment––architecture, open space, landscapes or parks, public art, and infrastructure be activated without being overbearing or becoming stale?

The new paradigm of placemaking is to eliminate professional boundaries, to bring together professionals with engaged citizens of all ages, backgrounds and abilities. Everyone can contribute to community, in both urban and rural contexts. Methodology and practice will complement case study examples to underline approaches and various perspectives. Experience shows that placemaking practice is overcoming the limitations of individual disciplines that have traditionally served to design and activate public spaces, such as architecture, urban design, landscape architecture, arts and community or social programs

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Christina Lanzl Receives Recognition of Service Award from Boston Society of Architects/AIA

1/31/2020

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Christina Lanzl received a Recognition of Service award from the Boston Society of Architects/AIA for "work, time, creativity and knowledge as Committee Chair for the Placemaking Network", which she initiated as a platform for cross-disciplinary dialogue and exchange in 2007. The explicit vision of the Placemaking Network is to “investigate ways to enrich the public realm through dialogue among urban planning, landscape design, architecture, and public art/design professionals” as well as engaged citizens.

The initial Boston Society of Architects newsletter announcement started with the premise: “The topics of placemaking and quality of life have entered architecture and planning conversations as they have entered creative arts conversations.” Rather than simply functioning as a standing committee, the Placemaking Network had a mission to build a network of like-minded people who would introduce placemaking principles to their work and communities. By now, the network has grown to include engaged citizens and professionals of many backgrounds and disciplines.

Since the beginning, concepts and case studies have been shared at monthly seminars where invited speakers present topics that are then discussed in a moderated roundtable format. The foundation of our work is that placemaking offers interdisciplinary dialogue on a successful public realm that engages communities and enriches lives. Initially, the spark of successful public places that are actively used or programmed by communities was ignited by proactive urbanists, whose publications honed in on the placemaking tenets.

After ten years of experience and conversations, the Placemaking Manifesto took form. Christina Lanzl invited co-chair Robert Tullis and architectural historian Anne-Catrin Schultz to co-write a one-page policy that lists the core placemaking principles in six points. Using the equation symbol to summarize each value the document reads like a poem. Our draft was reviewed and confirmed by our network’s interdisciplinary ad hoc working group. Succinctly, we concluded that placemaking is about sense of place. Everybody––people of all backgrounds, ages and abilities––can participate in creating successful public places. Everyone can serve the agenda of excellence in design, healthy communities and thriving neighborhoods. We see our built environment as a common good that comes alive through an understanding of how humans instinctively relate to space, design leadership that leverages it, and activity programming that capitalizes on it. Over the years, my ongoing work in the field of public art and with the Placemaking Network has been a cross-fertilizer on how to best mark place, history and time through integrative, community-based public art and culture that furthers identity, local storytelling as well as learning.

This story includes an excerpt from the essay "Toward a New Paradigm: Public Art and Placemaking in the 21st Century" by Christina Lanzl, published in Extraordinary Partnerships: How the Arts and Humanities are Transforming Society, edited by Christine Henseler (Lever Press, 2020).

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Placemaking in Action: EPIC Making in the Classroom

3/15/2018

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Wentworth Institute of Technology | Spring 2018 Faculty Showcase
Watson Hall | March 15, 2018

Wentworth Institute of Technology organizes the annual Faculty Showcase to celebrate and recognize the accomplishments of faculty. Fifty faculty showcased 34 examples of excellence and creativity with teaching, scholarship, EPIC, grants, sabbaticals, and interdisciplinary collaborations. Organized by the Provost Office and Learning Innovation & Technology, participants hosted information tables to illuminate services and resources.

Dr. Christina Lanzl, Adjunct Professor of the Department of Architecture and Director of the Urban Culture Institute presented Placemaking in Action: EPIC Making in the Classroom. The exhibit offers documentation, outcomes and insights in the power of interdisciplinary, collaborative learning. Surveyed are three seminars from the past two years that focus on placemaking and art-in-architecture, an investigation of urban placemaking within a hands-on learning platform that combines theory with the making of successful places on and off campus. Focus and outcomes are cultural mapping, idea competition and exhibition projects developed by Wentworth senior and graduate students (two funded by EPIC Mini Grants).

Architecture student Shuxin Huang, Dr. Lanzl's spring 2018 co-op student, assisted. Thank you to Don Tracia, Tes Zakrzewski and the entire Provost Office and Learning Innovation & Technology team for incredible support.

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Lunchtime Conversation on Placemaking

3/13/2018

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Christina Lanzl and Anne-Catrin Schultz presented a faculty lecture on placemaking, which introduced the Placemaking Manifesto, which they co-authored and issued together with Robert Tullis and members of the Boston Society of Architects/AIA Placemaking Network in fall 2017. Lanzl and Schultz highlighted placemaking principles outlined in the Manifesto by discussing a series of case studies from their professional practice.

The Lunchtime Conversation faculty lecture series is coordinated by Associate Professor Antonio Furgiuele, Department of Architecture within the College of Architecture, Design & Construction Management at Wentworth Institute of Technology in Boston, Massachusetts.

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Kinetic Facades: Inventive Architecture, Design, Fabrication at ABX Greenbuild

11/3/2017

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Boston Exhibition and Convention Center
Wednesday, November 8, 2017, 11 am – 12:30 pm

Architecture is typically associated with a sense of permanence, solidity and the perception that it stands still. At the same time, architects and engineers have been intrigued for centuries by more flexibility. They have attempted to mobilize elements, to create responsive facades that react to site conditions, microclimate and the users’ desires. Site conditions such as wind, sun and shadow or movement and the presence of spectators might be processed and visualized in moving parts as a process of kinetic response. Kinetic mechanisms are used in the engineering world to satisfy increasingly complex requirements of sustainability and in the art world to engage with buildings and the city. An interdisciplinary panel representing the fields of architecture, engineering, public art and fabrication will investigate case studies as well as the present and future of kinetic applications in facade design. Explored will be kinetic façade design, such as Logan Airport’s Central Garage West Expansion and insights on select projects by Arrowstreet, EXTECH, Ned Kahn, Asif Khan and soma, among others. The focus will be on projects that involve kinetic mechanisms, explore potential already realized and evolving visions. This panel is sponsored by the Placemaking Network of the Boston Society of Architects/AIA.

Kinetic Facades: Inventive Architecture, Design, Fabrication

Presenters
Christina Lanzl, Urban Culture Institute & BSA Placemaking Network (moderator)
David Bois, Arrowstreet
Anne-Catrin Schultz, Wentworth Institute of Technology
Kevin Smith, EXTECH

Session Objectives
• Examine the physical, environmental, social or
psychological impacts of kinetic facades in the context of
placemaking.
• Learn about the design, technology and fabrication of
kinetic façades.
• Explore the integration of moving elements into
architecture, such as features animated by the elements
(wind/air, water), software and/or mechanics.
• Discuss the potential of kinetic facades for the future of
design.

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Placemaking Manifesto Issued November 2017

11/1/2017

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Placemaking is about sense of place. Everybody – people of all backgrounds, ages and abilities – can participate in creating successful public places. Everyone can serve the agenda of excellence in design, healthy communities and thriving neighborhoods. Our built environment is a common good that comes alive through an understanding of how humans instinctively relate to space, design leadership that leverages it, and activity programming that capitalizes on it. The BSA Placemaking Network celebrates its 10-year anniversary with the release of the Placemaking Manifesto. To solicit community input the Manifesto was launched at a public writers' workshop with the co-authors, Christina Lanzl, Robert Tullis and Anne-Catrin Schultz at BSA Space in Boston on October 23, 2017.

The Placemaking Network explores what it takes to further the creation of high-quality, distinctive public places. Participants of the public Placemaking Manifesto review at BSA Space on October 23, 2017 were Placemaking Manifesto co-authors Christina Lanzl, Robert Tullis and Anne-Catrin Schultz as well as Polly Carpenter/BSA Foundation, A. Vernon Woodworth/AIAMA Board of Directors, Anthony Clayton, Deborah Fennick, Kathryn Firth, Júlia Hilário, Marek Jacisin, Victoria LaGuette, Doris Martinez, Neil McCann, Stephanie Osser, Sergio Arturo Perez, Coco Raynes, Eric Reinhard, Renata von Tscharner, Sara Wermiel, Douglas Wohn and Claudia Zarazua

The Placemaking Manifesto
Placemaking transforms space into place. Our public realm is a common good that comes alive through an understanding of how humans instinctively relate to place, design leadership that leverages it, and active programs for and by communities as a civic benefit for everyone. Placemaking activates our built and lived environment. We acknowledge and actively work towards improving hard as well as soft quality of life factors.
Placemaking = Quality of Life

Placemaking engages the five senses. It is about developing and continuing identity, distinctive, specific and memorable character in our public spaces. It’s about fostering a sense of place: our body-mind’s positive kinesthetic, emotional and cognitive experience in, and in relationship to our public surroundings. It’s achieved by putting the importance of our shared, exterior spaces between buildings above that of our private, interior spaces within them. We recognize that storytelling gives meaning to our lives and is therefore an important narrative device of human civilization.
Placemaking = A Sense of Place

Placemaking is about the benefits that accrue to us, our neighbors, our community, and even our culture when we engage with each other in a high-quality and healthy public realm. Including public participation in its design and use helps create community identification. Active programming, public events, and public art are powerful tools that help foster community pride.
Placemaking = Caring About the Community

Placemaking integrates the individualized focus of disciplines such as architecture, urban design, landscape architecture, public art, and community cultural programming; and supersedes their boundaries by focusing on collaboration, communication and place instead of isolated projects, bringing together individuals of all backgrounds, interests and talents.
Placemaking = Collaboration and Communication

Placemaking embraces inclusivity by offering a universal platform for discourse. Everyone is a maker of place. Everyone can serve the agenda of excellence in design, supportive environments, healthy communities, and thriving neighborhoods. In a high-quality public realm, we shed our individual bubbles and participate in a life of greater civic engagement.
Placemaking = Active Participation

Placemaking combines an awareness of tradition with an embracing of new and emerging technologies. It respects time-tested rules of form and space, but also employs the research, development and innovation along with contemporary digital and social media tools to further community building.
Placemaking = Tradition and Innovation

Download the Placemaking Manifesto
Download the Oct. 23, 2017 Writers' Workshop Notes
Download the Authors' Biographies
See the Jan. 2, 2018 article on ArchDaily
Download the Letter to the Editor of ArchDaily

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HUBweek Panel on Creative Placemaking

10/15/2017

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HUBWEEK 2017 | Oct. 10-15, 2017
HUBweek explores the future being built in Boston at the intersections of art, science, and technology. HUBweek kicked off with events taking place across the city, and landed on Boston’s City Hall Plaza, which transformed into a
first-of-its-kind festival site. Filled with 80 shipping containers, dozens of art installations, and 6 geodesic domes, thousands of artists, innovators and creators from across Boston and the globe converged at The HUB. Among the panels featured:

Creative Placemaking
A View on Tactical Urbanism
HUBweek – Red Dome, 1 City Hall Square, Boston, MA
Sunday, October 15, 2017 | 3:30 pm – 4:30 pm
Moderator
Christina Lanzl, Director, Urban Culture Institute
Presenters
Julie Burros, Chief of Arts and Culture, City of Boston
Christine Dunn, Chair of Arts & Culture, Sasaki
Janet Echelman, Artist
Christopher Janney, Artist/Composer
David Nagahiro, Principal, CBT Architects – Master Planner of HUBweek's The HUB on City Hall Square (see rendering)

A View of Tactical Urbanism––Abstract
We are in the midst of a public art paradigm shift. Most cities struggle to afford investment in monumental public art and new high quality public realm designs. Often time, public spaces are missing the vital programs that aid in full activation potential.

Planners, architects, landscape architects, artists in collaboration with community members, cities, policy makers, private entities and grassroots organizations are working to transform these spaces through “creative placemaking”. The maker movement, tactical urbanism, readily-available tools of digital production, and other cultural drivers are steadily chiseling away at the prominence of iconic public art.

Discuss with us how HUBweek transforms Boston’s City Hall Plaza into a first-of-its-kind centralized festival site “The HUB”; how a curated art program activates the Rose Kennedy Greenway; and how a temporary flex space like “Lawn on D” becomes the new urban and hip place to be. Join our esteemed panelists from the HUBweek Change-Maker series, which showcases the most creative and inventive minds in art, science, and technology making an impact in Boston and around the world.

Hosted by HUBweek in partnership with the City of Boston and the Boston Society of Architects/AIA.

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Urban Culture Institute Wins Award

9/28/2017

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The Urban Culture Institute is the proud recipient of a 2017
Businesswoman Award from CV Magazine for Best Woman-Run Arts & Culture Initiative 2017 in the Northeastern United States. The dedication and hard work of the entire team at the Urban Culture Institute contributed to this achievement. Many thanks to Dieta Sixt, Stephanie Sherman, Ricardo Barreto and Anne Marie Purkey Levine for all their hard work.

The Urban Culture Institute stands out because it is deeply rooted in community. Christina Lanzl's philosophy is to "listen and enable". The Institute's practice is creative and multidisciplinary, working with diverse clients, communities and institutions, artists, design teams and professionals in the creative and service sectors. Expertise and projects range from advisory services and public art facilitation to cultural planning and public engagement. Projects typically bring together a range of diverse partners and communities, offering opportunities to come together and find consensus, an undertaking that is often delicate and fraught with challenges. Lanzl observes that keeping the goal in mind is crucial to achieve a positive outcome, for the greater benefit of all.

Through its work, the Urban Culture Institute brings together and enables people of all backgrounds and abilities to fulfill the desire for an improved quality of life, the enhancement of cultural economic development and creative placemaking. The Institute facilitates the development of high quality arts and cultural assets, helping others by bringing expertise and resources to the table: a unique combination of curatorial expertise, savvy and efficient process with an eye towards positive outcomes for the built environment and economic impacts.

CV Magazine notes that its Awards are based on merit:
"To ensure this, our in-house research team will go in-depth to find the industry firms and leaders who deserve acknowledgement for their outstanding performances within the sector. Winners of this award can rest assured that their win was one that was truly deserved."

Read the editorial on page 11 of the Award Supplement.

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Ridership Engagement Roundtable at Metrorail Congress Americas

6/28/2017

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The World Metrorail Congress Americas took place at The Inn at Penn Station in Philadelphia on June 28 and 28, 2017. The conference surveyed strategic discussions related to light rail planning and management in metropolitan areas. Sandra Bloodworth, Director, MTA Arts & Design, Metropolitan Transit Authority in New York City chaired the roundtable, Ridership Engagement: The essential role of art and design in engaging your ridership and communities. Presenters included Katherine Dirga, Program Manager Arts Administration of MARTA in Atlanta GA, Elizabeth Mintz, SEPTA Director of Communications, Philadelphia artist Ray King as well as Caitlin Martin, Media Communications Manager of the Association for Public Art in the conference city. Christina Lanzl of the Urban Culture Institute’s contribution to the conversation focused on questions related to placemaking in transportation planning:

How can public transportation agencies work towards better services and policies in the U.S. that support placemaking and a high quality public transportation environment?
What is the future of digital applications in public transportation art and placemaking projects? Can an overload of visual and sound/noise stimulation deteriorate the ridership experience?

Lanzl laid out the benefits of an integral, holistic perspective and multi-disciplinary approach that leverages placemaking, the arts and culture to enhance abutting communities through collaboration. The goal is to improve quality of life and to create opportunities for neighborhoods, businesses, organizations and individuals/residents.

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<<Previous

Projection Mapping Facade Design Essay by Christina Lanzl

Toward a New Paradigm by Christina Lanzl in Extraordinary Partnerships Book

Christina Lanzl Receives Recognition of Service Award from Boston Society of Architects/AIA

Placemaking in Action: EPIC Making in the Classroom

Lunchtime Conversation on Placemaking

Kinetic Facades: Inventive Architecture, Design, Fabrication at ABX Greenbuild

Placemaking Manifesto Issued November 2017

HUBweek Panel on Creative Placemaking

Urban Culture Institute Wins Award

Ridership Engagement Roundtable at Metrorail Congress Americas

Urban Culture Institute

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