Joann Gonchar, FAIA

Joann Gonchar, FAIA, LEED AP, is deputy editor at Architectural Record. She joined RECORD in 2006, after working for eight years at its sister publication, Engineering News-Record. Before starting her career as a journalist, Joann worked for several architecture firms and spent three years in Kobe, Japan, with the firm Team Zoo, Atelier Iruka. She earned a Master of Architecture degree from the University of Pennsylvania and a Bachelor of Arts from Brown University. She is licensed to practice architecture in New York State.

Frick Chemistry Laboratory

Joann Gonchar, FAIA

February 15, 2012

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At Princeton University's new Frick Chemistry Laboratory, dedicated in April, a highly efficient lighting scheme is one of several tightly integrated strategies that contribute to the building's ambitious energy-saving goals: Frick is designed to use 24 percent less site energy than allowed by the 2007 version of ASHRAE 90.1 standard. This building's configuration is a product of both environmental and programmatic goals, according to its architects, London-based Hopkins and Payette Associates of Boston. The 265,000-square-foot structure has two four-story, largely glass-enclosed wings'one on the east for research and another on the west for offices. The pieces are joined by a

Joann Gonchar, FAIA

February 15, 2012

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Low energy use was a particular priority for the Triskelion, a 1,300-square-foot moveable pavilion commissioned by the nonprofit arts organization FOR-SITE. Designed by Ogrydziak/Prillinger Architects, San Francisco, the building consists of three shipping containers arranged at 120-degree angles to define a central skylit atrium. Since May 2010 it has been installed at the Presidio, where it was part of the yearlong Presidio Habitats'an exhibition of artist-created animal habitats distributed around one corner of the national park. The pavilion served as a space for the display of sketches and models. Because Presidio officials required that the building be easily demountable and

Joann Gonchar, FAIA

February 15, 2012

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Last June, Yotel'a U.K.-based hotel chain inspired by Japanese capsule hotels and luxury airline cabins'opened a location on the far west side of Manhattan. It is just one component within a vast, $800 million, mixed-use complex designed by Arquitectonica. But the hotel, with a facade, public spaces, and 669 rooms by Rockwell Group and lighting firm Focus, possesses its own distinct character. It has a '2001: A Space Odyssey feel,' says Michael Cummings, Focus design director. The hotel's public spaces are illuminated almost exclusively with LEDs. The brightness of the source worked well with the sleek, predominately white and gray

Natural History Museum of Utah

An elegantly powerful structure reflects its dramatic natural setting and the mission of the institution housed within.

Joann Gonchar, FAIA

January 16, 2012

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From the first glimpse of the $103 million Natural History Museum of Utah in Salt Lake City, the metaphor is unambiguous.

First Look: Absolute City Centre

Residents begin to move into the first of MAD's two convention-busting apartment towers near Toronto.

Joann Gonchar, FAIA

December 16, 2011

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Instead of the boxlike apartment and commercial towers in cities everywhere, architect Yansong Ma, principal of Beijing-based MAD, prefers structures that are “organic and soft.”

Tel Aviv Museum of Art

A folded and faceted facade.

Joann Gonchar, FAIA

November 15, 2011

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Preston Scott Cohen, architect of the recently opened expansion to the Tel Aviv Museum of Art, refers to the addition’s exterior as “the urban version” of the building’s Lightfall—the spiraling skylit atrium and circulation space that vertically connects the new galleries.

Tel Aviv Museum of Art

A spiraling and twisting core.

Joann Gonchar, FAIA

November 15, 2011

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The atrium, or Lightfall, inside the just-completed Amir Building addition to the Tel Aviv Museum of Art serves much the same purpose as the space at the heart of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York City.

Tel Aviv Museum of Art

A new spin to the White City.

Joann Gonchar, FAIA

November 15, 2011

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Seen from the flat plaza that wraps around it on two sides, Preston Scott Cohen's radical addition to the Tel Aviv Museum of Art strikes a geometrically independent pose.

Gilman Hall, Johns Hopkins University

Kliment Halsband replaces the void at the core of a stately building with a lively space for study and socializing.

Joann Gonchar, FAIA

November 15, 2011

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When a college expands and grows, building shiny state-of-the art facilities at its periphery, the oldest buildings at the heart of campus are sometimes neglected.

One World Trade Center

A controversial tower rises at ground zero

Joann Gonchar, FAIA

September 16, 2011

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There is no denying that One World Trade Center (WTC), the 104-story tower now rising at the northern end of the Ground Zero site, is a tremendously ambitious commercial real estate venture.