Significant OMA Project for 2013

The most significant project in 2013 based on myappraisal was OMA’s office tower “De Rotterdam” http://www.archdaily.com/451377/de-rotterdam-oma/. Thisis a prime example where high rise program was pushed outside of the “box”.This building is an object of many “readings” which gives it an engagingdynamic which provides many “appearances”, in its context. The author of thisbuilding is to be applauded for not succumbing to the “form seeking fetish” andobsession with digital “phenomenology”; which has consumed today’sarchitecture. Such form seeking has nothing to do with context, or function butrelies on the “tool” to discover, rather than the architect to author it. Suchapproach to computing buildings ignores the datum and figure ground leading to“speechless discussions”, or information for the subject viewer to dialog.  Many buildings today are the result of sought afterform and then filled with function like a pretty vase with water which istypical of the past high rises and decorative formalism of post-modernism. RemKoolhaus questions the notion of the box organizing functions adjacently to oneanother as vertical elements, rather than stacking them typical to most 2Oth.cen. high rise buildings. The architect’s approach herein allows the buildingand typical function to be re-read in engaging originality informing the viewerof its place and presence. This is truly “a Project” that emanates the ‘spiritof architecture’ with its presence and many readings within its context. Koolhaushas submitted to his own manifesto as argued in his book “Delirious New York…..” http://architectureandurbanism.blogspot.com/2010/05/rem-koolhaas-delirious-new-york.html