We [VF] asked the world’s leading architects, critics, and deans of architecture schools two questions: what are the five most important buildings, bridges, or monuments constructed since 1980, and what is the greatest work of architecture thus far in the 21st century? Here are the answers from our 52 respondents, who are listed alphabetically. (Note: some people named more or fewer buildings than requested.)
not sure of the protocol, but many architects voted for them selves, sometimes for multiple projects. and the runaway winner.... FG bilbao by a landslide!!!! mind numbing how these fucks stick together. HIS BUILDINGS, THEY LEAK!!!!!!!!
- bill 7-08-2010 6:10 pm

What do you think has been more important than Gug Bilbao? Not arguing, just genuinely interested. From my severely limited knowledge viewpoint it's definitely the most important. It's probably the only recent "work of architecture" that a lot of people can even name (maybe the Chinese Olympic sports stadium too). But I guess maybe "most famous" isn't the same as "most important"?
- jim 7-08-2010 7:12 pm [add a comment]


i was just going to note how often they voted for their own work. but i see you already noticed that. guess its hard for some to admit that maybe they are not doing the transformational work. seems like a pretty egotastic profession. do you think they actually took the time to vote or just signed off on one of their assistance selections? it is vanity fair after all.
- dave 7-08-2010 7:29 pm [add a comment]


i think the answers are on the tips of their tongues. no fobbing off or research needed. they are all self obsessed. they and their clients read vf. its big. ill cull a list from their lists. key word "greatest." i catnt stand FG, "effect or not." but we knew that.
- bill 7-08-2010 7:43 pm [add a comment]


something like this?
Marfa, Texas installations (Donald Judd)
Rural Studio work, Alabama (Samuel Mockbee)
Katrina Cottages, Louisiana and Mississippi (Andres Duany and Steve Mouzon)
Gando Primary School, Burkina Faso (Diébédo Francis Kéré)
National Assembly Building, Dhaka, Bangladesh (Louis Kahn)

Bird’s Nest Olympic Stadium, Beijing (Herzog & de Meuron)

honorable mention
- bill 7-08-2010 8:28 pm [add a comment]


Picking the best 21st Century architecture is a little premature so they came up with the ridiculous expanded criterion "Constructed since 1980." It's almost like they wanted the Bilbo, built in 1997, so they shifted the timescape.
- tom moody 7-09-2010 12:53 am [add a comment]


As for voting for yourself, remember Dick Cheney? "I pick....me!"
- tom moody 7-09-2010 12:54 am [add a comment]


right. that eliminates Centre Georges Pompidou, which i would favor over bilbao.
- bill 7-09-2010 1:23 am [add a comment]


renzo piano menil collection

aldo rossi

rem koolhaas (poor taste - how about this) (for the blade runner contingent)

anything but bilbo and its Krazy Kartoon Kurves.

- tom moody 7-09-2010 1:48 am [add a comment]


in short, i nominate low cost vernacular housing, giant classy public arenas (and arena rock) and repurposed box stores. now lets go go-cart racing!!!
- bill 7-09-2010 6:12 pm [add a comment]


im still getting used to Saint-Pierre, Firminy, France (Le Corbusier) but it had sever votes as well.

Saint-Pierre will be radically unlike Le Corbusier's other churches and unique among religious structures. Its geometry is produced by the projection of a circle onto a square, a metamorphosis that represented for the architect the transition from the earthly to the spiritual realm and one made possible by a complex hyperboloid shell enclosure. The square base of the church containing functional rooms is surmounted by an enormous truncated cone housing the sanctuary, which is lit by an array of protruding "light cannons." The shell, and the winding pathway into and through the sacred space - another version of Le Corbusier's "promenade architecturale" - are the central elements of Saint-Pierre.

Oubrerie did not attempt to explain the building's symbolic associations. "I am too close to the nuts and bolts to be poetic," he said. "I leave that to others, like my younger colleagues." They point out that the church resembles a nuclear cooling tower, or maybe one of those volcanoes seen on Volvic water bottles. Both may have influenced Le Corbusier. Other people refer to it as the seau à charbon, the coal bucket, a signifier linked to Firminy's industrial past. Interpretation is encouraged by the fact that Saint-Pierre is cast almost entirely in concrete, a material Le Corbusier preferred in his later years for its economy and plasticity.

- bill 7-09-2010 6:27 pm [add a comment]





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