Thursday, 7pm

6

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20

DS+R: Reimagining Lincoln Center and the High Line

Liz Diller, Ric Scofidio, Muffie Dunn, Tom Piper

On Thursday, June 20, we welcome Diller Scofidio + Renfro to Van Alen Books for a film screening of Reimagining Lincoln Center and the High Line, a 54-minute documentary offering insights into the firm’s history, completed projects, and unique process of reimagining the public identities of two major New York urban spaces. The film includes commentary from the architects as well as interviews with New York City planning commissioner Amanda Burden as well as critics and theorists Mark Wigley, Anthony Vidler, Martin Filler, and more. Before the film, Liz Diller and Ric Scofidio will join directors Muffie Dunn and Tom Piper for a conversation about their work, moderated by VAI executive director David van der Leer. Stop by for the screening, and pick up a signed copy of DS+R’s latest book Lincoln Center Inside Out. Please RSVP to rsvp@vanalen.org. We’ve reached capacity, please join us next time.

Thursday, 7pm

6

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6

LA Forum for Architecture and Urban Design

Mimi Zeiger, Neil Donnelly, John Southern, Hitha Prabhakar

After an absence from print for over a decade, the Los Angeles Forum for Architecture and Urban Design announces the relaunch of the LA Forum Newsletter. The premiere issue features architect Frank Escher on the clinical restoration of the Eames house and The Retronaut’s Simon Reynolds on past futures, as well as an interview with Radio Iris author Anne-Marie Kinney and a centerfold by James Michael Tate. In celebration of the return to pulp and ink, the LA Forum will be in New York City at Van Alen Books for a panel discussion between editor Mimi Zeiger, architect John Southern, and graphic designer Neil Donnelly. A live interview with Hitha Prabhakar, author of Black Market Billions, follows the panel and will be published in the Fall 2013 Newsletter.

Monday, 12pm

5

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13

Architecture Book Fair

City College of New York

Van Alen Books heads uptown on Monday, May 13 to present a selection of new and notable architecture and design books at City College of New York’s Spitzer School of Architecture. Please join us on the ground floor of the main architecture library from 12-2 PM.

Thursday, 7pm

5

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30

PLOT Volume 2

Launch Party

The Graduate Landscape Architecture Program of the Spitzer School of Architecture, City College of New York, is launching Volume 2 of its student-edited journal, PLOT. Featuring submissions by students, faculty, and friends of the Landscape Architecture program, Volume 2 explores the theme of PATCHWORK, developed by the second year MLA student editorial board in collaboration with faculty advisor Catherine Seavitt Nordenson and designer Isaac Gertman. Contributions to this issue explore ad-hoc and innovative assemblages, commensal species, and incongruous urban wilds. Come celebrate PLOT’s new issue and raise a toast to the 2013 graduating class of Master of Landscape Architecture students.

Thursday, 7pm

5

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2

Building Seagram

Phyllis Lambert, Cynthia Davidson

This comprehensive personal and scholarly history chronicles how at 27, Phyllis Lambert, daughter of Seagram founder Samuel Bronfman, took over the search for an architect to build a New York corporate headquarters and chose Mies van der Rohe, resulting in an iconic modern landmark. Designed with Philip Johnson, the 38-story tower also established Lambert as a leading architectural patron and played a substantial role in shaping landmark legislation and zoning laws in New York City. Lambert makes use of previously unpublished personal archives, company correspondence, and photographs to tell an insider’s view of the debates and dramas of the building’s construction, as well as its crucial role in the history of modern art and architectural culture. Phyllis Lambert, founding director of the Canadian Centre for Architecture in Montreal, will discuss this newly launched volume in conversation with Anyone Corporation director and editor Cynthia Davidson, exploring the Seagram’s history in the context of New York’s urban development and the forces that continue to shape the city’s streetscape and skyline.

Friday, 7pm

5

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10

Fabrico Próprio: The Design of Portuguese Semi-Industrial Confectionery

Frederico Duarte, Pedro Ferreira, Rita João, Akiko Busch, Naz Sahin

No one takes cakes more seriously than the Portuguese: every morning, countless one-portion, sweet pastries fill the counters of cafés and stores across the country in a myriad of shapes, doughs, fillings, creams, jams and colors. These semi-industrial cakes are neither precious confections nor factory-made sweets—anonymously made, yet often displaying highly creative designs. Fabrico Próprio means “own production” or “made on premises,” and is a term used on shop signs, windows and packaging as a warrant of baking freshness and quality. This 332-page, hardcover book dedicated to Portuguese confectionery and its relation to design contains an encyclopedic record of sweets accompanied by written and photo essays by architecture and food critics, commissioned illustrations, and much more. Join design critic Akiko Busch in conversation with authors Rita João, Pedro Ferreira, and Frederico Duarte, as well as designer and food blogger behind FeastingNeverStops Naz Sahin, on the intersections between confectionery, culture, and design.

This is the kick-off event for Counter/Point: The 2013 D-Crit Conference.

Thursday, 7pm

5

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16

Designing Suburban Futures: New Models from Build a Better Burb

June Williamson, Rob Lane, Kazys Varnelis, Jocelyn Wenk

Suburbs deserve a better, more resilient future—and June Williamson shows that they can be reinvigorated through inventive design. Drawing on award-winning design ideas for revitalizing Long Island, she offers valuable models not only for U.S. suburbs, but also those emerging elsewhere with global urbanization. Williamson argues that suburbia has historically been a site of great experimentation, and is not destined to remain filled with strip malls and excess parking lots. Providing a broad vision of suburban reform based on the best schemes submitted in Long Island’s highly successful “Build a Better Burb” competition, she presents designs that operate at a regional scale, tackling systems such as transit, aquifer protection, and power generation. Join June Williamson;  Rob Lane, Senior Fellow at RPA; Kazys Varnelis, Director of the Network Architecture Lab at GSAPP; and Jocelyn Wenk of the Long Island Index as they discuss pragmatic yet visionary strategies to take the sprawl out of suburbia, creating a vibrant, new suburban form.