https://architizer.com
"I met this guy Jay Z years ago. I sat next to him at lunch, and I didn’t know much about bippity boppity. I said to him, who was the first rapper? I didn’t know what else to say. He gave me a few names that sounded like bippity boppity, and I said, “Would you consider James Joyce?” He said, “Who dat?” So I sent him a complete works of James Joyce. It sounds pure rap. "
Read More
Photo By: Nick Oran
The following audio and related transcript is an excerpt from my lecture, Hip Hop Inspired Architecture, at Harvard’s Graduate School of Design on April 8, 2015. During the lecture I presented my project, Urban Renewal vs Urban Reality, which juxtaposes a series of hip hop music videos and architecture documentaries exhibiting The Golden Era of Hip Hop as a post occupancy report for inner city dwellers inhabitation of modernist visions.
Read MoreOn Friday, February 13, 2015 I will team with Eryk "The Arch-E-Tect" Christian to deliver a lecture at University of Wisconsin Milwaukee's School of Architecture and Urban Planning titled, "LeCorbusier, The Forefather of Hip Hop?". The lecture focuses on the subconscious contributions of famed architects and urban planners to the environments which necessitated the birth of hip hop culture. This lecture will culminate with urban culture’s influence on the architectural profession through three interconnected realms: academic research, professional practice and media, ultimately introducing a new architectural style, one inspired by hip hop culture.
Read MoreGEICO TV Spot, 'Push It: It's What You Do' Featuring Salt-N-Pepa Whether you're in an elevator or taking a baby class, be prepared to be ambushed by Salt-N-Pepa who will tell you to push. Besides pushing, we're all likely to switch to GEICO.
Europe’s first music hotel is here - in the heart of Berlin. Located directly on the banks of the river Spree, and at the epicentre of the music, fashion and creative scene, a new lifestyle hotel that has yet to meet its match in Europe: the nhow Berlin. The nhow Berlin is located right next to Universal Music and MTV Europe.
Read MoreWhat happens at the intersection of urban culture and architecture? How can the four elements of hip hop (DJing, MCing, Breaking and Graffiti) inspire the built environment? Participants are encouraged to create a sketch using mediums of their choice to depict new building forms, urban design concepts, and/or architectural products inspired by the four foundational elements of hip hop.
Read MoreCheck out this video of the "Beatbox" which brings together architecture and music through experience and form.
Beatbox by Asif Khan - Image courtesy of Hufton+Crow
Big thanks to my friend Emily Iremonger at Asif Khan, located in London, for sharing images of the "Beatbox" project ompleted for the 2012 Olympic Games in London. Khan and his team created an tectonic representation of what KRS-One describes as the essence of hip hop, the ability to remix. Although Asif Khan made no attempt to directly connect this project to hip hop culture, and as it focused more on the creation of music in general, it's impossible for me not to see it as a precedent for hip hop inspired architecture both programmatically and aesthetically.
Read MoreKouyate Toure with Dr. Craig WIlkins' "The Aesthetics of Equity - Notes on Race, Space, Architecture and Music"
Dr. Craig WIlkins' "The Aesthetics of Equity - Notes on Race, Space, Architecture and Music"
"Architecture is often thought to be a diary of a society, filled with symbolic representations of specific cultural moments. However, as Craig L. Wilkins observes, that diary includes far too few narratives of the diverse cultures in U.S. society. Wilkins states that the discipline of architecture has a resistance to African Americans at every level, from the startlingly small number of architecture students to the paltry number of registered architects in the United States today.
Read Moren Kanye West's video "Heartless", directed by Hype Williams, the background is the architectural work of Kanye himself. What West envisioned was a cross between a museum and a Louis Vuitton boutique. The finished product was featured in Interior Design Magazine. See my original post here, about Kanye's aspirations to be an interior designer.
Read MoreHerzog, half of Pritzker-winning design team Herzog & de Meuron, participated in a conversation moderated by Obrist with Kanye West about architecture and design Miami’s Design District.
Read MoreN.W.A.Straight Outta Compton 1988
Imagine if N.W.A never took off resulting in Ice Cube became an architect after starting his architectural education in 1987 at Phoenix Institute of Technology. Would Cube be the same house hold name that he is today? Could he have applied that same drive and determination and rawness to the field of architecture? The world may never know. I'm glad N.W.A. reached its level of greatness because where would hip hop be without N.W.A.? Another question that will go unanswered.
Ice Cube has the unique opportunity of employing anyone he wants and can be instrumental with pushing the concept of hip hop inspired architecture to the next level, through his various media projects. I would love to work with Cube, rather its being a movie scene location scout or designing architectural elements needed for scenes. The power to advance many of today's minority architects to starchitects does exist in the hands of those doing constant work with a high level of visibility and success, the hip hop moguls. One mention in a hip hop song, one shot in a hip hop video, or any permanent link to the culture will propel the field of architecture.
I wonder if Cube still has the love for architecture he had back when he was in school? What about some of the other film makers with architectural educations? Click here for an article on ww.archdaily.com which reveals some of the most relevant film makers who studied architecture.
Take a look at my previous video blog: Ice Cube Celebrates Eames
N.W.A. and The Posse 1987
Courtesy of Erik Butka, Meagan Calnon & Kathryn Anthony
"Discotecture is an original series by VICE featuring David Byrne, Andre Balazs, Peter Gatien, Kenny Scharf, Eric Goode, Michael Musto, Amy Sacco, Steve Lewis, and other icons of New York nightlife. The series follows five young designers from different disciplines as they come together to create their vision of the nightclub of the future. "
For more information visit Vice.com
Image Source: http://www.aceshowbiz.com
Its always been rumored that Dr. Dre studied architecture, I wish I knew if this rumor was true or not. Dr. Dre has taken over the music industry yet again with the design of Beats by Dre, which has redefined the way that music is to be heard. Check out the video below which ties Dr Dre's music career to architecture.
Ilja Karilampi’s video The Chief Architect of Gangsta Rap (2009) makes the conjecture that Andre Young, better known as Dr. Dre (b. 1965), studied architecture before becoming famous as a hip-hop producer and rapper. The Berlin-based artist describes Dre’s rise in the music industry, from his early techno-influenced records, to his role in the controversial group N.W.A., and finally to Dre’s solo albums and major collaborations with fellow rappers.Throughout the video, the artist proposes Dre’s connections to and opinions of the work of Modernist architects like Le Corbusier (1887–1965). Karilampi also incorporates his own biography into the video, speaking about how his life has intersected with Dre’s music. Though Karilampi offers no proof to his assertions, the video presents its own, nearly convincing logic. Although imagining of the types of buildings the music producer would design may seem far reaching, Karilampi’s suggestion that urban planning—in this particular case, it is that of Los Angeles’s Compton neighborhood—significantly helps in shaping the culture of a region contains more fact than fiction.
- Jean Nouvel
Mikal Hameed is a Brooklyn-based artist and designer who is constantly finding new corners of America's creative culture to explore. After starting out in music and theater, he shifted his efforts to visual arts and production design, all of which inform his latest efforts as a craftsman and maker.
I recently came across his "Eames Hotrod Boombox"—a refurbished and reimagined Eames lounge chair—at Brooklyn's Dijital Fix and I was fascinated by the notion of "remixing" an iconic design object, especially since it incorporated another vintage reference point in the turntable. Meanwhile, the allusion to the boombox is itself a reference to mixing and sampling music, and it so happens that the "Eames Hotrod Boombox" was featured as the album art for a compilation album called Verve Remixed 4. Although the project dates back to 2008, the video is certainly worth a minute of your time; New York-based readers can see it in person at Dijital Fix in Williamsburg, just a couple short blocks from the Bedford Avenue stop on the L.
Goethe’s statement about architecture serves as a foundation upon
which to convert music from an immaterial/ psychological state into a
tangible physical environment. Essentially creating spaces totally
inspired by music, in the case of my research, hip hop music.
Ballerine is a creative combination of a single bathtub and a free standing shower cabin. The integrated shower head functions as a bath faucet and a shower disc. It’s installed on a flexible arm which easily adjusts to any height and allows you to set the intensity of the water stream and direction. The flexible arm is constructed of an adjustable nylon-silicon surface. Once activated, the frame stiffens like a backbone.
Imagine if the motion of a break dancer is captured and represented in the built environment, what would we see?
Designer: Gustaw Lange
Read more at http://www.yankodesign.com/2010/05/20/ballerina-bathtub/#1uDLtHR62p3axleZ.99
In Collaboration with designer Domeau & Peres, Pharrell tries his hand in creating couture furniture for a gallery show in Paris.
I wish I was able to get in contact with Pharrell to show him some of my “BrandNU” custom and couture furniture designs! That would have been an assume meeting!
Blog Source
Hip Hop Mogul - Pharrell designs new furniture
Louis Armstrong Park was developed with the city of New Orleans to
highlight the site’s rich, historic African American heritage and
culture. The interpretive plaza celebrates six key contributors, linking
them through design elements and the creation of an animated public
space. Louis Armstrong Park is a 29.23-acreregional park, housing vital
cultural resources such as the Municipal Auditorium, Mahalia Jackson
Theater for the Performing Arts, the National Jazz Historical Park, and
Congo Square. The park provides an interpretive “journey” through New
Orleans’ history and culture, while creating educational and cultural
opportunities for families. As a team member while working at Hamilton Anderson Associates in Detroit, Michigan, Michael Ford was involved with developing the design concept and architectural graphics.
On April 8th 2010, The University of Michigan’s chapter of Hip Hop Congress invited me to give a lecture on “Cultural Innovation – Hip Hop Inspired Architecture and Design” in Ann Arbor. Click here to see the original posting by Hip Hop Congress.
