Australia’s Green Architect

Modern house with asymmetrical roof arched like butterfly wings. Photo by Anthony Browell

Australia is famous for breathtaking architecture like the Sydney Opera House, but travel beyond the urban centers and you’ll find the kinder, gentler design of Glenn Murcutt. The Pulitzer-Prize-winning architect is fond of quoting the Aboriginal proverb: “Touch the earth lightly.”


Shown above: The Magney House, Bingie Point, New South Wales, Australia. Photo by Anthony Browell from ‘The Architecture of Glenn Murcutt’ and ‘Thinking Drawing / Working Drawing’ published by TOTO, Japan, 2008, courtesy of the Architecture Foundation Australia


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Celebrate Eero Saarinen

Gateway Arch in St. Louis, MO

Curving, organic shapes are the hallmark of Finnish-American architect Eero Saarinen. You may know him for grand, swooping structures like the Gateway Arch in St. Louis, Missouri, or the Dulles International Airport near Washington D.C.

However, Saarinen also designed on a smaller scale. He began his career designing furniture with Charles Eames. By the 1960s, Saarinen’s Tulip Chair became a classic interior design motif.

See works designed by Eero Saarinen

 

Photo CC Daniel Schwen, Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 

Celebrate Buckminster Fuller

Biosphère, Montreal, Quebec

Buckminster Fuller’s 1949 geodesic dome design influenced a generation of visionaries.Efficient and economical, “Bucky’s” dome was widely hailed as a possible solution to world housing shortages. Fuller reached an international audience when he  designed the U.S. Pavilion’s Biosphere at the 1967 World’s Fair in Montreal, Canada.

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Discover Michael Graves

Steigenberger Hotel in Egypt

Michael Graves changed the world in ways that often go unnoticed. Although famous for his postmodernist buildings and for the houseware products he designed for Target and JC Penney, his most important legacy may be his work on accessible housing. Graves was born July 9, 1934, and died March 12, 2015.

View Projects by the Michael Graves Architecture Firm >>

(Photo: Steigenberger Hotel in Egypt. Architects: Michael Graves & Associates and Ahmed Hamdy. Photo credit: Wikimedia)