The words of Frank Gehry:

“Architecture in the Age of Gehry,” Matt Trynauer.

On the Guggenheim Bilbao (voted “the greatest building of the last 30 years” by 50 architects including Sir Norman Foster, Zaha Hadid, Daniel Libeskind, Richard Meier, and Jean Nouvel, for Vanity Fair): “I went there just before the opening and looked at it and said, ‘Oh my God, what have I done to these people?’”

(As the article describes, Philip Johnson stood in the Guggenheim in 1998, burst into tears, and compared the experience to standing in the Chartres Cathedral.)

On his profession: “I was different from the architects, who called me an artist, which was their way of marginalizing me.  And then the artists got competitive and said, No, you’re still an architect, because you’re putting toilets in your buildings, in your art.  Richard Serra dismissed me as a plumber.”

On Romanesque cathedrals: “…when I saw Chartres Cathedral, I peed in my pants.”

On postmodernism: “I got angry with it - all the historical stuff, the pastiche.  I said to myself, If you have to go backward, why not go back 300 million years before man, to fish?”

Despite these golden quotes from Gehry, what makes this article is the picture of architect Peter Eisenman’s ballot, which reads: “FIRMINY LE CORBUSIER NOTHING ELSE ALL PM JUNK”

The whole issue is a gold mine, actually, with Maureen Dowd visiting Saudi Arabia, a piece on the turmoil in LA’s art scene which just happens to include Dennis Hopper’s last interview, the story of how a con man blackmailed and tortured a noble family (I’m saving this gem for last), an interview with 100 year-old reclusive socialite and fantastic gardener “Bunny” Mellon, a look at Cary Grant’s therapeutic LSD use in the 1950’s, and oh right, an interview with Angelina Jolie in Venice.

The 11th “Most Awesome Floor”

A post I stumbled upon declared with an air of certainty that it would divulge to me the 10 “most awesome floors ever made.” Since I spend most of my time trodding upon neglected office floors, faded carpeting, subway platforms, and uninspired (and often poorly-maintained) sidewalks, it was refreshing to indulge in a gallery of floor porn.

Most of the “most awesome floors” outlined in the attached link deal with visual trickery.  While I am a strong supporter of optical illusions, and the carnivore in me is loving the salami floor at #3, I think interior designers and engineers have produced much more noteworthy results - such as #9, the pressure sensitive floor:

(via Floors to Your Home)

Developed by the Belgium company LightFader, these floor panels contain fluids that are displaced when touched.  (They’ve also received a lot of love on the internets.)

I hoped to find mention of the Sustainable Dance Floor, which was part of the Center for Architecture’s “Make It Work: Engineering Possibilities” exhibit last year.

(via NY Art Beat)

These floor panels capture the energy of dancers’ footsteps in order to generate electricity to power da clurrb’s sound systems and lights, including lights within the panels themselves.  The perfect ultimatum for your downer friend: dance or you will in fact kill the party.  Also, green!, which everyone loves.