July 2009 What has happened to drawing? This recently posted rhetorical question on the Internet produced a torrent of responses, an ironic commentary from our digital age. Yes, we primarily draw electronically now. Yes, our several generations of active architects employ different media to think, to design, and to represent their ideas. Yes, our students and future architects still use hand drawing, but frequently as one tool in a kit that includes physical modeling and three-dimensional virtual manipulation. Yes, the architect’s world has changed. There should be no tears, only a glint at reality. Photo © André Souroujon And yet,

A fresh look at the state of historic preservation. Today’s Challenges Far beyond the small, precious numbers who initially saved individual houses, today’s preservation movement has been radically democratized. With the shift in demographics of the United States, and a wider visibility of Hispanic, Asian), and African-American populations, preservation has had to address the philosophical questions of representation, with an increasing need to clearly answer the question: Who is telling the story? Richard Moe, the longtime president of the National Trust for Historic Preservation, underscores this fact by saying that “preservation is threatening to become mainstream.” Photo courtesy the Preservation

A fresh look at the state of historic preservation. Preservation’s History And “grandmother” is right, because women constituted many of the first highly visible preservationists. Independence Hall in Philadelphia may be the first nationally important building saved, but The Ladies, with a capital L, of the Mount Vernon Ladies’ Association organized by Ann Pamela Cunningham resolutely raised $200,000 in 1853 to save George Washington’s home, Mount Vernon, Virginia, which had fallen into disrepair by the mid-19th century. Their accomplishments spurred others to action and set a pattern for preserving historic properties. Photo © Mount Vernon Ladies’ Association George Washington’s Mount

June 2009 The world unloads so much information on us today that communicating with just 140 characters – no more, no less – feels like massive relief. -0 Photo © André Souroujon Twitter comes with its own counter, so that every one of your postings keeps score of the total characters that remain. It’s hard to miss. -0 You can follow insipid things like when a famous celebrity brushed her teeth, or you can post when you brush your own. Lead or Follow? Pick. -0 Architecture fans register their own reactions to buildings and places, up to the minute, close

May 2009 One year ago, Architectural Record’s editorial addressed the issue of diversity in a column entitled, “Room for All Our Talents.” In the intervening months, despite the election of a new president of the United States and the economic free fall in our construction and design markets, little has changed to balance the national employee profile of the architectural office. African-Americans in particular still form only from 1.5 to 1.7 percent of the total number of registered architects. Photo © André Souroujon In turning again to the topic of diversity in architecture, this month’s editorial will not preach, but

April 2009 The student firmly raised his hand at the luncheon, catching my attention over the turkey sandwiches and cold drinks. We were there to talk, after all. Most of the questions thus far had been softball—related to publishing or favorite architects and their work, or to travel, but not to pushing the boundaries. He appeared eager and young. Then he spoke: “Can you tell me,” he asked, “why media like Architectural Record have continued to promote icons, when we are interested in a different kind of architecture today?” All eyes opened up around the long table, and heads seemed

March 2009 If, unlike the Congress or the President, we offer no silver bullet for the recession, we can all search for silver linings. While architects love a new construction site, strategically, preservation is sounding better and better—whether the historic variety or the act of saving or revitalizing ordinary structures. In a down economy, it makes good sense to make the most of what you already have. Photo © André Souroujon The arguments for historic or plain preservation are growing, and to expand the analogy, compounding, at a time that stock markets have contracted. Inertia, shrinking budgets, and sheer neglect

February 2009 Parachute into Dubai, the glittering chimera, for an architectural smorgasbord. Since the 1970s, the little city on the waterfront of the Persian Gulf has boomed into a unique, tower-inflected phenomenon, corresponding to the vision of its ruler, Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum. Photo © André Souroujon What does it add up to? For an architect, Dubai has become a required stop on the 21st-century version of the grand tour—a place to balance the firm’s portfolio of domestic work, to compete for a job, or to gawk. Imagine a totally new city (though a small trading center existed

January 2009 Inklings of promise from the new administration are shining out from the torrent of dire economic news. If you feel overwhelmed, listen up: “I still really admire architects, and I love looking at buildings.” Although proverbial music to our ears, that direct quote might seem innocuous, even simplistic, if it were not for the speaker—the future President of the United States. Barack Obama, responding in an interview with Barbara Walters on ABC television, declared his admiration for the built environment and his concern for energy usage, positions that have been amplified not only in words but actions. Photo