S, M, L, Xl

by Koolhaas, Remmau, Bruce

• ISBN13: 9781885254863
• ISBN10: 1885254865
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 1997-10-01
• Publisher: The Monacelli Press

Summary

S,M,L,XLpresents a selection of the remarkable visionary design work produced by the Dutch firm Office for Metropolitan Architecture (O.M.A.) and its acclaimed founder, Rem Koolhaas, in its first twenty years, along with a variety of insightful, often poetic writings. The inventive collaboration between Koolhaas and designer Bruce Mau is a graphic overture that weaves together architectural projects, photos and sketches, diary excerpts, personal travelogues, fairy tales, and fables, as well as critical essays on contemporary architecture and society. The book's title is also its framework: projects and essays are arranged according to scale. While Small and Medium address issues ranging from the domestic to the public, Large focuses on what Koolhaas calls "the architecture of Bigness." Extra-Large features projects at the urban scale, along with the important essay "What Ever Happened to Urbanism?" and other studies of the contemporary city. Running throughout the book is a "dictionary" of an adventurous new Koolhaasian language -- definitions, commentaries, and quotes from hundreds of literary, cultural, artistic, and architectural sources.

Author Biography

Rem Koolhaas is founder of the Office for Metropolitan Architecture (O.M.A.); the firm's most important projects include the Lille Grand Palais in Lille; the Kunsthal in Rotterdam; Netherlands Dance Theatre in The Hague; Nexus Housing in Fukuoka; the Dutch House in Holland; and Villa dall'Ava in Paris, all of which are included in S,M,L,XL. Koolhaas is author of the seminal Delirious New York and professor in practice of architecture and urban design at the Harvard Graduate School of Design.

Bruce Mau founded the critically acclaimed firm Bruce Mau Design in 1985. He is the author of Life Style and Massive Change.

Table of Contents

OMA Charts	i	(17)
ABOLISH	xviii	(1)
Introduction	xix	(10)
Acknowledgments	xxix	(1)
Project Credits	xxx	(2)
BABEL Foreplay	xxxii
Exodus, or the Voluntary Prisoners of Architecture AA Final Project, 1972	2	(20)
Delirious New York Appendix, 1978	22	(24)
Small	46	(166)
Less is More Installation for the 1986 Milan Triennale, Italy, 1985	46	(16)
The House That Made Mies Theory, 1993	62	(2)
Dutch Section	64	(12)
CANNIBALIZE House for Two Friends, Rotterdam, Netherlands, 1988	76	(4)
(+)(-)13,000 Points Nexus World Housing, Fukuoka, Japan, 1991	80	(8)
Learning Japanese Poem, 1993	88	(38)
Worth a Detour Renovation of Hotel Furka Blick, Switzerland, 1991	126	(4)
Obstacles Villa Dall'Ava, St. Cloud, Paris, France, 1991	130	(64)
Only 90(Degree), Please Video Bus Stop, Groningen, Netherlands, 1991	194	(4)
Imagining Nothingness Text, 1985	198	(6)
The Terrifying Beauty of the Twentieth Century Text, 1985	204	(8)
Medium	212	(282)
Field Trip: (A)A Memoir The Berlin Wall as Architecture, 1993	212	(22)
Revision Renovation of a Panopticon Prison, Arnhem, Netherlands, 1979-81	234	(20)
Shipwrecked Housing Kochstrasse/Friedrichstrasse, Berlin, Germany, 1980	254	(24)
Final Push	278	(4)
DANCE Extension of the Dutch Parliament, The Hague, Netherlands, 1978	282	(22)
Cadavre Exquis	304	(8)
EDIBLE Netherlands Dance Theater, The Hague, Netherlands, 1987	312	(22)
Typical Plan Meditation, 1993 Morgan Bank, Amsterdam, Netherlands, 1985	334	(20)
Byzantium Housing, Offices, Shops, Amsterdam, Netherlands, 1991 Cartoon, 1994	354	(8)
Globalization Text, 1993	362	(8)
Vanishing Act Biocenter, University of Frankfurt, Germany, 1988	370	(4)
Islam After Einstein Hotel and Convention Center, Agadir, Morocco, 1990	374	(26)
New Rotterdam	400	(2)
FACADE Architecture Museum, Rotterdam, Netherlands, 1988 Museum Park, Rotterdam, Netherlands, 1994 Kunsthall, Rotterdam, Netherlands, 1987-88	402	(28)
Life in the Box? Kunsthal II, Rotterdam, Netherlands, 1992	430	(44)
Neue Sachlichkeit Project for an Office City, Frankfurt Airport, Germany, 1989	474	(20)
Large	494	(332)
Bigness, or the problem of Large Manifesto, 1994	494	(24)
Soft Substance, Harsh Town Boompjes TowerSlab, Rotterdam, Netherlands, 1979-82	518	(26)
Indeterminate Specificity The Hague City Hall, Netherlands, 1986	544	(26)
Dirty Realism	570	(4)
GENEALOGY A Mini-Farce, 1993	574	(4)
Working Babel Sea Terminal, Zeebrugge, Belgium, 1989	578	(22)
Bifurcation Effects of Structure, 1993	600	(2)
Strategy of the Void Tres Grande Bibliotheque, Paris, France, 1989	602	(2)
Weird Science Excerpts from a Diary, 1989	604	(58)
Last Apples	662	(8)
HABITAT Speculations on Structure and Services, 1993 From the notebook of Cecil Balmond, 1992	670	(16)
Darwinian Arena Zentrum fur Kunst und Medientechnologie, Karlsruhe, Germany, 1989-92	686	(76)
Passion Play Epitaph, 1992	762	(2)
Organization of Appearances	764	(20)
IDEA Congrexpo (Lille Grand Palais), Lille, France, 1994	784	(38)
Palace of the Soviets Bedtime Story, 1994	822	(4)
JAM SESSION Extra Large	826	(444)
The White Sheet Dream, 1981	828	(4)
Atlanta Journalism, 1987/1994	832	(28)
Las Vegas of the Welfare State	860	(6)
KILL Bijlmermeer Redevelopment, Amsterdam, Netherlands, 1986	866	(2)
LABYRINTH	868	(20)
Unlearning Holland Point City/South City, Project for Redesigning Holland, 1993	888	(6)
Congestion Without Matter	894	(28)
MA Parc de la Villette, Paris, France, 1982	922	(14)
Elegy for the Vacant Lot Text, 1985	936	(4)
Their New Sobriety	940	(4)
NACH DRUBEN Exposition Universelle 1989, Paris, France, 1983	944	(14)
What Ever Happened to Urbanism?	958	(8)
OBJECTLESSNESS Text, 1994	966	(6)
Surrender	972	(6)
PAID Ville Nouvelle Melun-Senart, France, 1987	978	(12)
Dolphins Transportation Exchange Centers for Benelux, 1989, 1991	990	(18)
Singapore Songlines: Thirty Years of Tabula Rasa	1008	(80)
QUANTITY Reconstruction, 1995	1088	(1)
RADIUS	1088	(2)
Tabula Rasa Revisited	1090	(24)
SAME Mission Grand Axe, La Defense, Paris, France, 1991	1114	(20)
Side Show Zac Danton Office Tower, La Defense, Paris, France, 1991-93	1134	(24)
Quantum Leap	1156	(38)
TACTICS Euralille: Centre International d'Affaires, Lille, France, 1994	1194	(16)
Programmatic Lava Urban Design Forum, Yokohama, Japan, 1992	1210	(28)
The Generic City Guide, 1994	1238	(31)
UGLY	1269	(1)
Chronology	1270	(2)
VACUUM	1272	(10)
WALL	1282	(2)
Dictionary References	1284	(12)
XOCHIQUETZAL	1296	(1)
Y	1296	(2)
ZEROS	1298	(2)
Image Credits	1300	(3)
P.S. Unraveling 2 Bibliotheques Jussieu, Paris, France, 1993	1303