Iwan Baan is an architectural and documentary photographer du jour, working for clients in the architectural avant-garde including Rem Koolhaas, Herzog & de Meuron, Thom Mayne, Michael Maltzan and Bjarke Ingels (heard on this DnA).  
He, like LA photographer Julius Shulman and, later, Dwell magazine, broke away from the tradition of people-free architectural photography. But his striking photos go even further, situating buildings in relation both to the people in their orbit and to the surrounding context, sometimes jarringly, and interestingly, different or gritty.
Now some of his work, along with the paintings of recent UCLA grad Daniel Cummings, will be on …

Street Art is in the air (as well as on the streets) right now. Witness the fuss about the misbegotten Blu mural, JR getting the TED award, and Banksy almost winning an Oscar for Exit Through The Gift Shop. I am not sure why it is so hot when street art of the spray can era has been around for several decades now. But it is having a zeitgeist moment, perhaps because of the titillating anonymity of some of the current masters of the genre. Or perhaps because it …

Conversations on Making Place
Painted Over/Under Part 3: Making Place is the architecture-inspired section of a yearlong exhibition conceptualized by artist Kim Schoenstadt. Featuring Los Angeles-based architecture and design firms Predock_Frane Architects, Chee Salette Architecture Office (csao), and Florencia Pita mod and curated by Erin Cullerton, Making Place showcases two-dimensional, abstracted vignettes of the Los Angeles cityscape.
Moderated by KCRW’s Frances Anderton, Conversations on Making Place will explore the exhibition’s themes while broadly looking at the ways thoughtful placemaking has shaped the city of Los Angeles. The panel will feature artist …

The core belief underlying DnA is that architecture and design, at its best, is an act of optimism, and that human ingenuity can improve lives and solve problems. One of the guests on today’s show, Bjarke Ingels, of BIG (the Bjarke Ingels Group), is the living personification of that optimism. An energetic, charismatic, 30-something, the Danish Ingels is a protege of Rem Koolhaas and believes that buildings can embody the iconic form and big idea beloved of architects like Koolhaas, while at the same time satisfying multiple functional needs in an energy-efficient …

This week is the beginning of Palm Springs Modernism Week (Feb 17-27), in a week of architectural tours, lectures and exhibitions throughout the Palm Springs area that illuminates how modernism transformed this growing community at mid-century and continues to thrive to this day. Palm Springs plays a critical role in the development of modernism in California and during the week many homes will be available for public viewing. Speakers include Alan Hess, Michael Stern, Donald Wexler, William Krisel, and architect Linda Taalman. Taalman, one of a new generation of architects …

Of the many design awards programs out there, this has to be the most mouth-watering: the James Beard Award for Design and Architecture. LA graphic designer Noreen Morioka, of AdamsMorioka, is chair of the 2011 awards committee and is calling on designers of restaurant architecture and graphics to submit entries by the January 28 deadline, in readiness for jury selection on February 5th. The lucky winners get to receive their awards at the Lincoln Center in New York. Last year the restaurant design award was won by Andre Kikoski …

I write from chilly London (to rainy LA) where I have joined my family for the holidays. London, like other mega-cities, is trying to find ways to remain liveable with its ever expanding population and teeming central city streets. Its preoccupations are echoed in major cities worldwide, including in less dense LA.
This became crystal clear when I was working on the show for this month and two seemingly unrelated segments came together under a common theme: quest for community.
We had already decided to do a story on the Downtown …

You heard Bobbye Tigerman on DnA today. On Thursday she will be wearing her professional hat, as LACMA assistant curator of decorative arts, when she will introduce a panel she has produced about the relationship between architecture, design, and (dare one say it?) craft. I’ll be moderating the discussion with two excellent guests: glass artist Alison Berger and potter Adam Silverman, both RISD architecture grads-turned artist-makers. Hear why they made their career choice, the influence of their architecture training and much, much more.

Two institutions are seeking architectural talent. One is Woodbury University, where curators Jayna Zweiman and Christian Stayner are mounting a show of women-designed architecture.  The other is the AIA/LA where members (and noted LA architects) John Friedman, Li Wen and Warren Techentin  are calling on architects of all stripes to enter a talent competition that will judged by such luminaries as Neil Denari, AIA (Neil M. Denari Architects), Lisa Iwamoto, AIA (IWAMOTOSCOTT Architecture), Mia Lehrer, FASLA (Mia Lehrer + Associates), and Geoff Manaugh (BLDG BLOG). 
The Woodbury Exhibit, entitled “13.3% is an exasperated reply to those who …

I owe today’s show to chance meetings with other people. Why do I say this? Because a couple weeks back I met a young designer who asked me to explain in this blog how I select the topics for shows.
In brief, generally my co-producers and I look for design stories that are tied to current events, have a compelling design and human storyline while reinforcing the essential belief that design matters. We also tend to look for design stories that are located in, or relevant to, Los Angeles, and we mostly …