1122. University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA. Alfred Newton Richards Medical Research Building.

Dear Samuel,

"What, or where, was the source
of his inspiration,
of his judgement?
There will be found
the creative process
of Nature itself"

¿Cuál era y donde estaba la fuente
de su inspiración, de su discernimiento?
En ella encontraremos el proceso creador
de la naturaleza misma.

(Jonas Salk, In memory of Louis I. Kahn)

Happy new year to you!
R

1121. Istituto Tecnico Industriale Statale. Busto Arsizio

Dear Vladimir,

"The true mystery of the world is the visible, not the
invisible." (Oscar Wilde)

Regards,
R

1120. Sevilla. Barrio de los Remedios

Querida Cristina,

Esta es una interesante foto coloreada de la Plaza de
Cuba antes de que se configurara como rotonda de
tráfico con la fuente central en forma de riñón. De los
cuatro grandes bloques que conforman en la actualidad
la fachada de la plaza en la foto sólo está construido uno
de los que el arquitecto madrileño Luis Gutierrez Soto
proyectó para este enclave. El de la imagen se terminó
en 1957 y el segundo que es igual al primero y se situa
al otro lado de la avenida en 1964. Las grandes terrazas
ajardinadas, la calidad de los materiales, y la complejidad
de los espacios interiores de las 27 viviendas de lujo
incluidas en cada bloque, revelan el valor de estos edificios
que supieron además construir tan acertadamente un
importante fragmento de fachada urbana hacia el rio
Guadalquivir.

Besos,
R

1119. Montmagny. Chapelle Sainte Thérèse. Interieur

Dear David,

Tonight we will attend Christmas Eve mass (Misa del Gallo) at the church of Sainte Thérèse. The architecture 

of Auguste Perret and the art of  Valentine Reyre will make this celebration even  more special.

Merry Christmas,
R

1118. La Sala "O", Mostra della Rivoluzione Fascista, Roma, 1932

Estimado Umberto,

"Reconstruir mediante elementos fugaces y pasajeros de
la crónica cotidiana la perennidad de la historia, (...)
recrear la atsmósfera de los tiempos, toda fuego y fiebre,
tumultuosa, lírica y resplandesciente (...) hacer cosas
modernísimas y audaces, sin melancólicos recuerdos de
los estilos del pasado." (Alfieri y Freddi)

Agradecido,
R

1117. M.I.T. Chapel, Cambridge, MASS.

Dear Aline,

"I have always remembered one night on my travels as a
student when I sat in a mountain village in Sparta. There
was bright moonlight over head and then there was a soft,
hushed secondary light around the horizon. That sort of
bilateral lighting seemed best to achieve this otherworldly
sense. Thus, the central light would come from above the
altar-dramatized by the shimmering golden screen by Harry Bertoia- and the secondary light would be light reflected up from the surrounding moat through the arches" (Eero Saarinen)

Best wishes,
R

1116. MAM. Rio de Janeiro

Dear Lucio,

Brazilian architect Affonso Eduardo Reidy was born 

in France of a Brazilian-Italian mother, and an English father. Despite this circunstance his architecture is unmistakably Brazilian Modernist. His Rio de Janeiro Museum of Modern Art was intended to harmonize architecture with the natural landscape by stressing the horizontality of the building in contrast with the undulating line of the mountains. Inside the main 

building the entire ground floor with the exception of 

the entrance is completely free allowing an 

uninterrupted view of the sea.

Regards,
R

1115. Abdiij Roosenberg

Querido Gabriel,

"Hay en la arquitectura de Van der Laan, como en la
de otros grandes maestros, un sello de identidad, muy
diferente al de la fastuosa arquitectura contemporánea,
y que se refleja en la expresión natural de su condición
humana, reflejo de la historia interna de la arquitectura.
(...) Sólo lo permanente, lo intrahistórico. Lo antiguo y
lo moderno se anulan en su identificación con el presente
eterno."
(Otras Vias. Pikionis, Lewerentz y Van der Laan,
Jose Ignacio Linazasoro)

Saludos cordiales,
R

1114. Sao Jose dos Campos, C.T.A. Apartamentos

Dear Norman,

“When a form creates beauty it becomes functional and
therefore fundamental in architecture.”
(Oscar Niemeyer)

Best wishes,
R

1113. Hotel Punta Negra, Mallorca

Querido Félix,

El Hotel Punta Negra constituyó una innovadora y refrescante ruptura con el prototipo de hotel moderno en altura que dominó esta época en España. Su arquitectura, aunque incontestablemente moderna, mantiene una gran sintonía con la arquitectura ancestral que se manifiesta a través de su escala doméstica, su relación armónica con el paisaje, la diversidad de los espacios y la sabia elección de materiales y técnicas constructivas.

Saludos,
R

1112. Los Angeles Philharmonic

Dear Chris,

"The architect of the future will build imitating Nature"
(Antoni Gaudi)

Best,
R

1111. Salgina Brücke bei Schiers

Dear Maire-Claire,

The more rational the design was the
more alluring the bridge became.

Regards,
R

1110. Pfarrkirche Linz, St. Theresia

Dear Steven,

"The art of building, as we meant it, is the
creation of living form, and the church as
we meant it, is not merely a walled shelter,
but everything together: building and people,
body and soul, the human beings and Christ,
a whole spiritual universe–a universe, indeed,
which must ever be brought into reality anew"
(Rudolf Schwarz)

Greetings,
R

1109. Sanatorium Bucegi, Predeal

Dear Georges,

Marcel Janco, the leading advocate of Constructivism in
eastern Europe, was along with his brother Jules the
architect of the private sanatorium of Predeal, outside
of Bucharest. Marcel Janco was a leading Romanian
Jewish architect and art theorist, and the co-creator of
Dadaism.

Best wishes,
R

1108. Diaconessenhuis, Rotterdam

Dear Jaap,

This is an image of the hallway of a functionalist hospital
designed and built between 1931 and 1938 by J.A. Brinkman and L.C. van der Vlugt, the architects of the Nieuwe Bouwen movement who became internationally acclaimed for their Van Nelle coffee, tea, and tobacco factory in Rotterdam. Brinkman and Van der Vlugt also built the original Feyenoord Stadium and several private houses including those for Van de Leeuw, Boeve, and De Bruin.

Best regards,
R

1107. Annie Pfeiffer Chapel, Florida Southern College

Dear Eugene,

"A Child of the Sun where to bring God’s outdoors
into man’s indoors.” (Frank Lloyd Wright)

Best,
R

1106. Bond Centre Office Towers, Hong Kong

Dear Norman,

"Paul Rudolph believed that people
perceived the lower floors of a high-rise
building in a different manner: the upper
levels can be scaleless, but that at street
level should possess a human scale to
relate it to the urban context in which it
is located" (Tony Monk)

Regards,
R

1105. Estepona, Plaza de Toros

Querido abuelo Jose,

La fiesta de los toros se empezo a celebrar en España
en la plazas mayores de pueblos y ciudades. Con el
tiempo se llego a desarrollar un tipo de edificio especifico
para este fin llamado Plaza de Toros. Modernamente las
plazas de toros se siguen transformando en edificios cada
vez mas complejos en forma y uso. Un buen ejemplo de
ello es la Plaza de Toros de Estepona en Malaga que
responde con su graderio asimetrico a otros tipos de
espectaculos y que acoge en su conjunto varios museos
municipales.

Un abrazo,
R

1104. Nazareth, The Church of the Annunciation

Dear Leonardo,

"Only discipline and communal feeling could lead, shortly,
to a new architecture" (Giovanni Muzio)

Regards,
R

1103. Im Asmundur-Museum in Reykjavik

Dear Ríkarður,

Icelandic sculptor Ásmundur Sveinsson designed and
constructed his house and studio from 1942 to 1959
inspired by the vernacular domed buildings typically seen
in the Mediterranean and Middle East cultures. In 1983
an addition to the building was built to serve as the
Ásmundur Sveinsson Sculpture Museum. The picture
shows a crescent-shaped building that housed the
original scupltor's studio.

Greetings,
R

1102. Centre Pompidou-Metz

Dear Philips,

PdP: When you were a child, did you want to become an
architect?
SB: No, I wanted to be a carpenter.

Regards,
R

1101. The Menil Collection

Caro Gio,

"Architecture is about illusion and symbolism, semantics,
and the art of telling stories." (Renzo Piano)

Saluti,
R

1100. Genova, Piazza Sturla, Panorama

Querida Cristina,

La antigua Casa del Fascio de Genova construida en
1938 fue un proyecto del ingeniero y arquitecto italiano
Luigi Carlo Daneri. Contrariamente a otras muchas casas
del partido fascista, ésta muestra una clara influencia de
los preceptos racionalista defendidos por Le Corbusier,
concretamente de sus conocidos cinco puntos. Esa
influencia hace que su arquitectura tenga claras
concomitancias con la de la Ville Savoye del maestro
suizo. Gio Ponti, el gran artista y arquitecto italiano,
admiró enormemente la ligereza, claridad y transparencia
de este edificio.

Besos,
R

1099. Karlskirche mit U-Bahn-Station von Otto Wagner

Dear Joseph,

"Creativity means to push open the heavy, groaning
doorway to life." (Daisaku Ikeda)

Greetings,
R

1098. Ciudad de Mexico. Auditorio Nacional

Estimados Oscar y Guillermo,

El monumental Auditorio Nacional situado en el Paseo
de la Reforma de Mexico D.F. esta considerado
como uno de los mejores escenarios del mundo. El
edificio fue inaugurado en 1953 siguiendo el proyecto
de Fernando Peña y fue extensamente remodelado por
los arquitectos Abraham Zabludovsky y Teodoro
Gonzalez de Leon en 1991.

Saludos,
R

1097. Sculpture garden, Art Gallery. Yale University

Dear Lamont,

"Five crabapple trees would tend to lift the terrace and
create the 4th wall enclosing the sculpture court below."
(Louis I. Kahn)

R

1096. The Teikoku Hotel, Tokyo

Dear Richard,

"They all listened and they understood, in a way. But finally the chief rose to his feet and said: Mr Wright, (he spoke very good English) you are a very famous architect. You wouldn't come here and try to build us something that would fall down; and while we do not understand the principles  that you have tried to explain to us, we have confidence that you will do something from which we can learn. You may go ahead and build your building and we will watch and we will hope to learn" 

(Frank Lloyd Wright)

Regards,
R

1095. Helsinki. The eastern orthodox cathedral and modern architecture

Dear Carlo,

"Architecture must have charm; it is a factor of beauty 

in society. But real beauty is not a conception of form which can be taught, it is the result of harmony between several intrinsic factors, not least the social." 

(Alvar Aalto)

Best,
R

1094. Imperial Hotel, Tokyo, Japan

Dear Kazuyo,

"Space is the breath of art" (Frank Lloyd Wright)

Compliments,
R

1093. Humana Building

Dear Fernando,

"Good design to me is both appearance and functionality
together. It’s the experience that makes it good design"
(Michael Graves)

Best wishes,
R

1092. Hallenstadion Zurich-Oerlikon

Dear Mercedes,

"The achievement of Swiss architects rests less upon
pioneering work in the field of structure and form that
on the love of perfection and quality, in the painstaking
execution of details and in a highly developed sense of
social responsibility."(Jürgen Joedicke)

Cheers,
R

1091. Brasilia. Vista aerea do Palacio Itamarati

Dear Philip,

"After all, what remains in architecture are the monumental works, the ones that mark history and technical evolution, those that socially justified or 

not, still touch us". (Oscar Niemeyer)

Regards,
R

1090. New York City. The Freedom Tower

Dear Daniel,

“Freedom is what we do with what is
done to us.” (Jean-Paul Sartre)

Cheers,
R

1089. Dubai. Burj Khalifa

Dear Ann,

2010 Burj Khalifa.

Total height: 2,755 ft
Floor area: 3,331,100 sqf
Cost: about $1,500,000,000
Floor count: 163
Elevators: 57
Occupancy: 135,000 people
Parking spaces 14,000

1956 Mile High Skyscraper by Frank Lloyd Wright.

Total height: 5,680 ft
Floor area: 6,000,000 sqf
Cost: about  $522,000,000 (60,000,000 in 1956)
Floor count: 528
Elevators: 76
Occupancy: 100,000 people
Parking spaces 15,000

"Reality can be beaten with enough

imagination"(Mark Twain)

Regards,

R

1088. Hotel Jagua, Punta Gorda, Cienfuegos, Cuba

Estimada Maria,

En esta antigua imagen en color se muestra la singular
composicion de la fachada trasera del Hotel Jagua. La
combinacion ritmica de los antepechos ciegos coloreados
de los balcones de las habitaciones forman un gigantesco
mural no exento de ciertas connotaciones neoplasticistas.

Enhorabuena por su libro.
R

1087. Tbilisi, Georgia. Bridge of Peace.

Dear Pietro,

"To me the ultimate goal of Design is to promote pursuit
of knowledge through objects" (Michele De Lucchi)

Saluti,
R

1086. The California Aerospace Museum. Los Angeles

Dear Sam,

"An architect is given a program, budget,
place, and schedule. Sometimes the end
product rises to art -or at least people
call it that-." (Frank Gehry)

Regards,
R

1085. Hundertwasserhaus

Dear Pat & Dudley,

"Window in rank and file are sad, 
windows must be able to dance."
(Friedensreich Hundertwasser)

Love.
R