Architecture

This video is about the Swiss architects Jacques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron, who were jointly awarded the 2001 Pritzker Prize, for combining "the artistry of an age-old profession with the fresh approach of a new century's technical capabilities". Over the past 20 years they have been involved in finding inventive architectural solutions to building a diverse range of projects - domestic, municipal and commercial.

Life in the megacity is exhilarating and difficult. How do urban spaces enhance or disturb our interactions and intimacy with others? How can we make our streets more accessible by foot or bike, nd make our cities more inclusive? Through his acclaimed urban theories and practices, architect and professor Jan Gehl is leading a revolution to transform cities worldwide

As an architect, educator, and philosopher, Louis Kahn played a prominent role in the history of 20th century architecture. An examination of six of his most significant buildings gives insight to his unique vision: The Salk Institute in La Jolla; the Kimbell Art Museum in Fort Worth; the Center for British Art in New Haven; the library at Philips Exeter Academy in Exeter, New Hampshire; the Indian Institute of Management in Ahmedabad and the Parliament Buildings of Bangladesh in Dhaka.

Built in 1956, Pruitt-Igoe was heralded as the model public housing project of the future, "the poor man's penthouse." Two decades later, it ended in rubble - its razing an iconic event that the architectural theorist Charles Jencks famously called "the death of modernism." The footage and images of its implosion have helped to perpetuate a myth of failure, a failure that has been used to critique Modernist architecture, attack public assistance programs, and stigmatize public housing residents.

The film not only examines the thinking behind Aqua which makes the building's presence against the skyline so striking, but takes visitors to the award-winning "Brick Weave House" (2009) in a Chicago residential neighborhood, where brick walls form a large open-air "screened porch" at the house's front.

Tadao Ando, a self-taught architect, proposes an international architecture that he believes can only be conceived by someone Japanese.

Over half the world's population now lives in an urban area, and 75% will call a city home by 2050. But while some cities are experiencing explosive growth, others are shrinking.The challenges of balancing housing, mobility, public space, civic engagement, economic development, and environmental policy are fast becoming universal concerns. Yet much of the dialogue on these issues is disconnected from the public domain.

8 architects, 8 houses, 8 stories, 8 paradigms of contemporary living. The diary of an exploration into the houses and private spaces of 8 protagonists of world architecture: Shigeru Ban, Mario Bellini, David Chipperfield, Massimiliano and Doriana Fuksas, Zaha Hadid, Marcio Kogan, Daniel Libeskind and Bijoy Jain / Studio Mumbai.

Illustrated talks by architects and related designers. This continuing archive, to which new talks are being added regularly, is a unique library of contemporary attitudes.