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Jean Nouvel

Architecture

The Most Beautiful Wellness Retreats in the World

By Claire Cottrell on

A New Year is upon us and now that the holidays are over, it’s back to business as usual (supposedly) all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. Recovering from combative cousins, tedious travel, and the countless cocktails that got you through it all is admittedly hard when you’re readjusting to the daily grind. Enter the wellness retreat. If you feel like you’re needing a vacation from your vacation, then set some time aside to join us in one of our favorite virtual pleasures: restorative research in the form of globe-trotting to rejuvenating retreats. From the world’s largest natural mineral spa in Turkey to Pritzker Prize laureate Norman Foster’s luxe and lavish spa in Switzerland, click through to check out the most beautiful healthy havens in the world. … Read More

Architecture

The Most Beautiful Tall Buildings of the Year

By Claire Cottrell on

As their site explains, Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat, the niche, non-profit organization that’s straight out of a Wes Anderson film, is “the world’s leading body in the field of tall buildings and the recognized source of information on tall buildings internationally.” Fittingly, their criteria is used to determine which building can lay claim to the title of tallest building in the world.

As we learned over at Kottke, the group has just released its annual roundup of the year’s best tall buildings. From an innovative tall building with computer-controlled sunscreens in Abu Dhabi to a naturally ventilated office building with a rooftop garden in Australia to a curvaceous tower nicknamed Marilyn Monroe in Mississauga, Canada, click through to check out the best vertically superior design in the world today. Tell us about your favorite tall building in the comments. … Read More

Architecture

10 Buildings That Could Possibly Destroy You

By Eva Hagberg on

We’ve always been fans of architecture around here and in life, generally. We’re used to looking at houses and marveling at their livability; at skyscrapers and feeling awe at their immense strength; at office buildings and relishing their floor are buy cheap cialis

a ratio. What we are not used… Read More

News

The Morning’s Top 5 Pop Culture Stories

By Caroline Stanley on

1. There are some troubling rumors that Amy and Rory (played by Karen Gillan and Arthur Darvill) will be leaving Doctor Who at the end of the current season. More details (along with a few spoilers) here.

2. A slightly squashed down version of famous French architect Jean Nouvel’s hotly-debated MoMA tower has… Read More

Art

The 10 Best Private Museums Worldwide

By Paul Laster on

With the news of Walmart heiress Alice Walton preparing to open her massive Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Arkansas in November and California’s billionaire philanthropist Eli Broad set to build The Broad, a stunning Diller Scofidio + Renfro-designed museum that will open in Los Angeles in 2013, we thought it was time to take a look a how wealthy art collectors are promoting their prizes. From the edgy Rubell Family Collection, housed in a former Drug Enforcement Agency storage site in Miami and Francois Pinault’s coveted contemporary art on view in historic buildings in Venice to a Sheikh’s rich collection of Arab art exhibited in a converted school in Qatar and Korean national treasures shown at Samsung’s masterfully designed Leeum in Seoul, here’s a glimpse at some of our favorite private museums around the world. If there are others that you think we should know about, please share. … Read More

Architecture

The World’s Most Eye-Catching Modern Museums

By Caroline Stanley on

With the rise of starchitect culture in recent decades, there has been a subsequent rise in the number of museums designed by celebrity architects. (It was believed that if a big name was behind a building, it would attract more attention, and in turn, visitors. Makes sense.) Click through to check out 10 of the most eye-catching modern museums on the planet — including a few that are still currently in progress — and we think you’ll see why it works. … Read More

Architecture

Sleeping Giants: The World’s Top 10 Scrapped Skyscrapers

By Wilson Dizard on

Nothing screams the hubris of urban life like a giant building. And while for some cities a skyscraper is just another building, plenty peg their self-worth on mammoth projects, designed to serve as iconic credentials of progress. However of those planned, only a handful ever result in a shovel in the ground — and even then their completion remains uncertain, held hostage by economic and technical realities. Chicago and Dubai, while already boasting some of the world’s tallest buildings, suffer such disappointment on a regular basis. In the grim midst of the Great Recession, not even the best laid plans of city or architect are safe. After the jump, check out some prime examples of the Tower of Babel’s modern heirs. … Read More

News

The Morning’s Top 5 Culture Stories

By Kelsey Keith on

1. James Franco will not be stopped at a double masters; after he finishes at NYU and Columbia, he’s reportedly heading to Yale to pursue a Ph.D. For a taste of Franco’s English mastery, read his short story from this month’s Esquire magazine. [via The Daily Beast]
2. Serpentine Pavilion’s latest starchitect pick Jean Nouvel gets snippy when asked about that MoMA project and declares that Abu Dhabi “doesn’t even know there is a financial crisis.” [via Bloomberg]
3. A New York dealer is hawking what he claims is the last privately held copy of “Schindler’s List,” a manuscript typed by German industrialist Oskar Schindler, whom you may recall from a little 1993 indie movie of the same name. [via Reuters]
4. At the Movies — the show that made Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert into household names — is being canceled after almost 25 years in national syndication. [via Variety]
5. Back issues of SPIN magazine are now available to read via Google Books. [via Fimoculous]

Bonus link: watch the (mock) trailer for the forthcoming Weird Al… Read More

Architecture

The Serpentine’s Ever Changing Pavilion

By Caitlin Brody on

London’s 40-year-old Serpentine Gallery may have housed works by Man Ray, Andy Warhol and Jeff Koons, but the gallery’s most impressive feature is its summer Pavilion series, which was created in 2000 by Gallery Director, Julia Peyton-Jones. Today it was announced that controversial French architect, Jean Nouvel, is on board for 2010′s installation. Images from the past ten years of Serpentine Pavilions, plus Nouvel’s mock-ups after the… Read More

Design

Open Caption: Jean Nouvel in Abu Dhabi

By Caroline Stanley on

According to the press release that accompanied this image, Sheikh Sultan bin Tahnoon Al Nahyan was inspecting a prototype of the dome for the Louvre Abu Dhabi, which is expected to open in 2013. Jean Nouvel, Pritzker Prize-winning architect for the project, smiles to his left. Give us your best caption. Our favorite response will… Read More