Michael Sorkin at the Green Living Room - West Woodlawn

Michael Sorkin presented at the soft opening of the Green Living Room in West Woodlawn, Chicago. Located in 6431 S. Cottage Grove Avenue, the Green Living Room is the result of the work and dedication of Naomi Davis, founder of community nonprofit, Blacks In Green, which:

“serves as a bridge and catalyst among communities and their stakeholders in the design and development of green, self-sustaining, mixed-income, walkable-villages in communities owned and populated by African Americans. In these places, every household can walk-to-work, walk-to-shop, walk-to-learn, walk-to-play, and neighbor dollars circulate to reduce greenhouse gases.”

— “Woodlawn’s new coffee shop teaches residents about sustainability, green neighborhoods” by Margaret Tazioli, Curbed Chicago.

Photographs by Blacks in Green. See more here.

“Davis doesn’t take the “living room” title lightly; the muti-purpose space is open to the public and designed to feel like a second home for West Woodlawn residents. Given Davis’ background in theater, she added a stage for performances, live broadcasting, mini concerts and film nights. The Green Living Room also holds a cafe with free wi-fi, computers with low to no-cost green economy curricula, and information on resources and job opportunities.”

— "Chicago Green Jobs Group Gets Official Headquarters" By Emily Nonko, Next City

Sorkin shared his housing design and collaborative journey with Davis at the opening.

NAOMI DENISE DAVIS: SURTHRIVE! in the cities where an entire acre is impossible to find -- consider the BIG: Blacks in Green BIG Urban Homestead plan and our "House As Garden" design that adapts to common Chicago lot sizes. Our award-winning design is by internationally renowned Michael Sorkin Studio, and we previewed it to standing room only at our #HardHatHappening on 8/31. From fruit/nut orchard and vegetable sanctuary to water reuse and of course solar, we're building a "living building" affordable to the black middle-income purse. Groundbreaking and breaking ground in 2020 -- visit us #TheGreenLivingRoom for info on how to own your own green 4-flat in the 'hood...and start building your family health and wealth!!

From public post below:

Learn more about Terreform’s work with BIG and Chicago on our South Side Stories project page.

Support Blacks in Green.

Kongjian Yu featured in WEF

“This man is turning cities into giant sponges to save lives.” - Kongjian Yu, featured in World Economic Forum.

And it all began in just one Chinese city, 20 years ago.

Today, 250 places in the country are working with Kongjian and his team, as well as urban areas everywhere from the US and Russia to Indonesia. — By Joe Myers, WEF

Learn more about Kongjian Yu, his life, work, and thoughts from Urban Research’s latest UR08: Letters to the Leaders of China: Kongjian Yu and the Future of the Chinese City (2018), which excerpts and updates Kongjian Yu’s 2003 classic text, The Road to Urban Landscape: A Dialogue with the Mayors, and contains additional, previously unpublished letters to high-ranking officials across the country, including President Xi Jinping.

Excerpts from selected reviews:

Through the letters, essays, and lectures, one gets a sense of how much Yu cares — and how driven he is to undo the unsustainable development patterns that repeat the same destructive errors made in the West over the past 50 years. — BY Jared Green for The American Society of Landscape Architects, The DIRT

Following them are essays by such academics as Thomas J. Campanella, Zhongjie Lin, and Peter G. Rowe. Concluding the book are an interview with Ai Weiwei and maps that show the remarkable extent of Turenscape's projects for Chinese cities -- 48 in Qinhuangdao alone (!), the city where the famous Red Ribbon Park is located. — BY John Hill, A Daily Dose of Architecture.

A testament to Kongjian Yu’s work but also an inspiring manifesto for contemporary urbanism, if not also for human survival more broadly.

–James Corner, Field Operations

Letters to the Leaders of China is edited by Terreform, with contributions by Ai Weiwei, Thomas J. Campanella, Zhongjie Lin, Xuefei Ren, Peter G. Rowe, Michael Sorkin, Daniel Sui, Julie Sze, and Kongjian Yu

ASLA 2014 Professional General Design Honor Award. Slow Down: Liupanshui Minghu Wetland Park. Turenscape / Kongjian Yu

---

Letters to the Leaders of China was included in the American Society of Landscape Architects - Best Books of 2018.

Listen to Kongjian Yu interviewed by GSAPP MSAUD student Angela Crisostomo in advance of his Kenneth Frampton Endowed Lecture at Columbia University.

---

UR (Urban Research), the imprint of Terreform, publishes progressive books about cities and their futures. Understanding that no single approach is adequate to the promise and problems of the urban, we publish a wide range of designs and analyses.

UR author Sereypagna Pen at TAK Berlin

Sereypagna Pen, co-author of our forthcoming Graham-funded book Genealogy of Basaac, will be a featured panelist in the public prelude to the project “Encounters with Southeast Asian Modernism”.

Encounters with Southeast Asian Modernism sheds light on the history, significance and future of modernism in selected cities of Southeast Asia in the context of the Bauhaus centenary 2019. With partners in Jakarta, Phnom Penh, Singapore and Yangon, Encounters explores the impact of modernism at the crossroads between early globalisation, local conditions, and the search for an own identity, starting with the period of upheaval that accompanied the transition to independence after colonial times.

Full panel list:

Avianti Armand, architect, Avianti Armand Studio, curator, architectural scholar, Jakarta, Indonesia

Puay-Peng Ho, Professor, Head of Department of Architecture, School of Design and Environment, National University of Singapore

Sereypagna Pen, architect, urban researcher, Executive Director of The Vann Molyvann Project, Phnom Penh, Cambodia

Pwint, Professor, Deputy Head of Department of Architecture, Yangon Technical University, Myanmar

farid rakun, artist, researcher and instigator, ruangrupa, Jakarta, Indonesia

Setiadi Sopandi, architect, Indra Tata Adilaras Architects, curator, architectural scholar, Jakarta, Indonesia

Shirley Surya, Curator for Design and Architecture, M+ museum for visual culture, Hong Kong

Lyno Vuth, artist, curator, Artistic Director of Sa Sa Art Projects, Phnom Penh, Cambodia

Johannes Widodo, Associate Professor at the Department of Architecture, National University of Singapore

Win Thant Win Shwin, architect, planner, lecturer at the Department of Architecture, Mandalay Technological University, Myanmar

The panel will be moderated by Ute Meta Bauer, Director of the Centre for Contemporary Art, Professor at the School of Art, Design and Media, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore and Eduard Kögel, curator, architectural scholar, lecturer, Berlin.

Berlin / 30 August 2019 /

TAK at Aufbau Haus
Prinzenstrasse 85 F
10969 Berlin

Registration is free. See full schedule.

Images: Buddhist Library Yangon, National Sports Complex Phnom Penh, Hotel Indonesia Jakarta, Golden Mile Complex Singapore. Graphics: Alexander Lech

Sereypagna in “One building, many voices” Phnom Penh Post (2015).

Sereypagna Pen is the director of the Vann Molyvann Project and urban researcher based in Phnom Penh, Cambodia. He has been awarded scholarships and fellowships including the Chevening Scholarship (2017–18), US/ICOMOS and East West Center (2015–16), Sa Sa Arts Project (2014–15), Asian Cultural Council (2012–13) and Parsons’ School of Constructed Environments as a visiting scholar (2012). Pen’s work on genealogy of urban form Phnom Penh, genealogy of Bassac, and Phnom Penh visions has been the subject of several exhibitions and presentations in Cambodia and selected venues in Asia, Australia, and the US such as Phnom Penh SaSa Bassac, Art Stage Singapore, Bangkok H Gallery, PARSONS the New School, Taipei Biennale 2016, and Sydney Biennale 2018. He has contributed essays to scholarly journals and books including Cité De L’architecture & Du Patrimoine (forthcoming 2019), Chulalongkorn University’s Nakhara: Journal of Environmental Design and Planning(2015), and Parsons Design Dialogues (2014).

Sereypagna Pen, Schizoanalysis of White Building, 2015, Phnom Penh, Cambodia. © Sereypagna Pen.

Genealogy of Bassac presents a careful architectural study of an area in downtown Phnom Penh constructed on twenty-four hectares of landfill along the swampy floodplain of the Bassac River from the perspectives of artists and residents who have lived through five decades of genocide, exile, return, and eviction. It highlights a new creative generation in Phnom Penh whose emergence is a counter narrative to the current “casino urbanism” of the Cambodian regime.