The ambitious environmental agenda of a new elementary school by Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (SOM) on Staten Island, New York, is obvious from the first encounter: almost 1,600 photovoltaic (PV) panels cloak the 68,000-sqare-foot, two-story structure, covering the south facade, extending over its roof, and cantilevering out to float above a playing field.
The City College of New York (CCNY) is a bit like an academic Acropolis. Situated in Upper Manhattan on one of the island’s highest points, its collection of early 20th-century neo-Gothic buildings, by George B. Post—and more recent additions by architects that include Skidmore, Owings & Merrill and Rafael Viñoly—sit high above the surrounding neighborhood of townhouses and low-scale apartment buildings.
Aficionados of the musical West Side Story will know the New York neighborhood Lincoln Square, once called San Juan Hill, as the backdrop for the clashes between the Jets and the Sharks. But in real life, this is the part of Manhattan’s West Side that was bulldozed in the 1960s to make way for the performing-arts complex Lincoln Center.
The International Living Future Institute’s latest program considers all stages of a product’s lifecycle. Industrial goods made with processes that are socially beneficial and environmentally sound might sound unattainable. But this is the aim of the Living Product Challenge. It is the latest program developed by the International Living Future Institute (ILFI), a nonprofit best known for its role in administering the demanding green building certification system, the Living Building Challenge (LBC). To qualify for certification under the new standard, launched as a pilot program in April, products must be safe for human exposure at all stages of their lifecycle—from
A sign on the door of Dudley Dough, a soon-to-be opened caf' on the ground floor of Boston's recently inaugurated Bruce C. Bolling Municipal Building, advertises 'pizza, coffee, and economic justice.' This improbable menu gives a clue to the larger goals behind the construction of the 215,000-square-foot, six-story structure completed this past spring.