Architecture’s Era of Excellence?

In this cover story for The Financial Times I try to explore whether the unprecedented building boom that gripped many parts of the industrialized world will come to be seen as architecture’s golden era – where higher levels of sustainability, innovation and excellence were achieved – 0r a period marked by bloated wealth and architectural egotism.

Above, a home in Japan designed by Shigeru Ban Architects.

The Museum Next Door

The soaring art market is creating a new architectural niche: Private collectors are hiring noted museum and gallery architects to design homes to showcase their Damien Hirst sculptures and Matthew Barney installations.

In this feature article for the The Wall Street Journal, I profile projects that run the gamut from revamping existing spaces to building new residences from the ground up. Many of these projects include all of the trappings of professional-grade museums — soaring ceilings, high-tech temperature and humidity controls, and state-of-the-art lighting systems.

Left, a home designed by Olson Sundberg Kundig Allen Architects.

Condos With a Name: ‘Available’

The building boom that engulfed Manhattan and other monied areas earlier this decade attracted high profile architects from Richard Meier to Daniel Libeskind who were commissioned to erect stylish, urban condos across the U.S. and Europe.

Yet as this piece I wrote for The Wall Street Journal makes clear, high-end developers who bankrolled these projects discovered that it takes more than a brand name architect to move the merchandise.

Above, a view from inside 173 Perry Street designed by Richard Meier.

No Banking on Art

When my editor at Conde Nast Portfolio.com asked me to examine how the global credit crisis was putting a squeeze on art financing, I chose to explore just how the credit crunch was hurting the very niche the art market once counted on: budding contemporary art collectors.

Left, a Mark Rothko work that recently fetched $3,386,500 at auction.

Chinese Blueprints

Western architects and developers once had an easy run at bidding for big Chinese building projects. But as I detailed in a recent story for Portfolio.com, these days they’re finding themselves without contracts as Chinese firms increasingly take advantage of their country’s building boom.

Left, an image of SOHO China Ltd’s $792.3 million Chaoyangmen SOHO complex in central Beijing.

Red-Light Gets the Green Light

Across Europe and around the world, soaring land prices and increasing demand for luxury living are fuelling a building boom in Red Light districts. As I reported in this cover article for The Financial Times, despite a global economic downturn that has pummelled many new condominium projects and erratic global financial markets that have spooked wealthy home buyers, developers’ appetites for building in areas long associated with adult entertainment have not waned. Left, a David Chipperfield designed hotel in Hamburg’s Red Light district.

Geothermal New York

In a weekly real estate column I wrote for The Wall Street Journal I got the opportunity to profile some spectacular residences. But this one was easily among the most interesting. The townhouse in the TriBeCa district a few blocks north of the World Trade Center site untilizes an unusual geothermal energy system that provides heating, cooling and hot water to the five-story residence.

Architect and developer John Petrarca designed the property and lived there with his wife, business-journalism professor Sarah Bartlett, until his death from lung cancer in 2003.

Art’s Numbers Game

The contemporary art market has been rising steadily for more than a decade. But the prices of the artworks aren’t the only things soaring. The costs of creating many of the sprawling, edgy pieces increasingly coveted by today’s collectors are also skyrocketing, according to veteran gallery owners and art dealers, who say that ballooning production costs are squeezing their profits. Conde Nast Portfolio.com.

Left, Damian Hirst’s $100 million diamond-encrusted skull.

Presidential Preferences

The inauguration of Barack Obama as the 44th US president brought historic change to the White House. But in this piece for The Financial Times, I explain that the porticoed building that serves as an office, private home and official ceremony venue for the first family is in line for much more than different occupants. Soon after the new president was sworn in, the 208-year-old executive mansion – set between Lafayette Square and The Ellipse in Washington, DC – started to receive a makeover that stretched from the Entrance Hall to the Lincoln Bedroom.

Russian Rubble

Nearly two decades after the fall of Communism, Russia’s rapidly expanding economy is transforming Moscow real estate. Construction cranes have joined the cupolas of Russian Orthodox churches and the spires of Stalinist-era edifices on the city’s skyline. The building boom may be good for Moscow’s swelling upper class, but it has endangered the city’s architectural heritage. As this report for Conde Nast Portfolio.com reveals, a number of landmarks, including important examples of Russian avant-garde and Constructivist design of the early 1920s are in danger of being wiped out.

The Scandal Effect

It’s the convergence of two global obsessions: real estate and scandal. Property professionals call homes tainted by murder, sex scandals or messy divorce “stigmatized properties.” While they make up a sliver of the market, as I reported for The Wall Street Journal, they have been the subject of academic research, provided fodder for lawsuits and posed a challenge for brokers.

 

 

Above, a home in East Hampton, N.Y., where a murder took place in 1998.

Architects’ Designs on Fashion and Boating

With the real estate boom all but over and skittish property developers breaking ground on fewer glitzy projects, architects from Norman Foster to Frank Gehry are finding creative ways to stay in the spotlight and extend their brands. As I reported in this piece for Conde Nast Portfolio.com, the creative outlets of today’s star designers include everything from yachts to jewelry.

 

 

 

 

 

Above, a yacht designed by Norman Foster that’s part of a fleet of $40 million luxury superyachts for the British firm YachtPlus.

My A-List Architect

Architects such as Rem Koolhaas and Zaha Hadid soared to fame  by designing beautifully modern cultural institutions and soaring skyscrapers, but a growing number is now accepting more residential commissions. As I reported for The Financial Times, they’re being persuaded to accept such projects by an expanding set of the global wealthy that increasingly sees great architecture as a collectable art similar to painting and sculpture.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A home designed by Richard Meier.

Dinning in Berlin

Dining in Berlin has long been an East-versus-West affair, with the eastern half of the capital bereft of anything more exotic than Hungarian goulash in the years prior to German reunification. But these days, the most interesting dishes are found not along the upscale thoroughfares in the West but nestled within the canyon of renovated prewar buildings of the Mitte and Prenzlauer Berg districts in the East. Conde Nast Portfolio.com was kind enough to let expense a few meals (and drinks) at an emerging crop of new eateries in Berlin.

 

 

 

 

 

Above, Grill Royal in Berlin.

Pint-Sized Perfection

The market for 20th-century furniture has long been booming, with the well-crafted, highly polished pieces created in the postwar period routinely commanding huge sums at auction and in international furniture galleries. But in this piece for The Financial Tines I explore how the boom has spawned another expensive niche: original children’s furniture designed by modernist masters from Arne Jacobsen to Harry Bertoia.

 

 

 

Left, kids chairs designed by Arne Jacobsen.

The Future of Housing: Think Small

One of the biggest questions swirling in global property circles these days is how a reeling real estate industry will reshape and redefine itself for the future. Few signs of a quick reversal of fortune exist, but in this essay piece for Conde Nast Portfolio I take a closer look at the future of the industry and find it reveals important trends and, surprisingly, reasons for optimism.

Taxidermy for City Dwellers

This piece, a cover story I wrote for The Wall Street Journal, garnered quite a bit of attention from decor followers and animal lovers alike.

It’s a look at how taxidermy, long confined to log cabins, lodges and trophy rooms, was coming to life in some unusual places: high-end decor retailers and urban decorators who were aiming to help clients add warmth to their modern and often-cold interiors. Guess which side found the piece amusing? (Relax, PETA. The decor item, left, is faux taxidermy.)

Over There and Underwater

Real estate investors have been flocking to far-off locations for years in pursuit of a better climate, a lower cost of living, tax breaks, and other advantages. The migration accelerated during the real estate boom in the U.S.,and Europe as prices in traditional second-home communities soared.

But in this cautionary tale I reported on for Conde Nast Portfolio.com, house hunters who packed their passports and sought bargain properties in up-and-coming overseas locales from Belize to Bulgaria watched their investment shrivel during a real estate downturn that affected nearly every corner of the property market.

 

 

 

 

 

 

A home for sale in Trsteno on the Croatian cost.