Chandigarh

Le Corbusier went to town on this town.




Wikipedia.
Photos.

Vast Ice Drawing

13 square mile drawing on ice by artist Jim Denevan.

Reposted from Pete Hoge.

Maijishan Grottoes

"The Maijishan Grottoes, Tianshui, Gansu, are a series of 194 caves cut in the side of a 145-metre-high hill in northwest China. This example of rock cut architecture contains over 7,200 Buddhist sculptures and over 1,000 square metres of murals. Work on the grottoes started in the late 4th century."

St. Louis City Museum

This place in St. Louis sounds awesome. 600,000 square feet all-ages playhouse made of repurposed miscellany. A guy from the band Silkworm describes it as "a dangerous and terrifying children's museum." They have an adult-scale ball pit full of dodge balls. There are also lofts for rent above.

Official site.
Wikipedia.

Palace of the Soviets

The USSR's answer to the Empire State Building was partly built before it had to be disassembled for WWII materials.

Wikipedia.


This design won the contest:













But you gotta love this design:

ZahaMania: Shoes

Pritzker-winning architect Zaha Hadid has delved into shoe design.

Philly Skyline: Then and Now

Before 1987, Philly's "gentleman's agreement" that skyscrapers should not exceed the height of city hall's statue didn't lead to very appealing results.

Here are some 50s pics. This view from the art museum comes off nicely...



But these other views are pretty much showcase midrise mediocrity.






I prefer the new look, mainly because I think people put more into these designs, knowing they'd be very visible, rather than just saying "ah what the hell, no one cares anyway" (which is what Penn Center looks like, pretty much).