Author Archives: Joao Cruz Neves

Critica de la Arquitectura Pura

Una reflexión visual. Después de unas extrañas vacaciones en las que no nos hemos podido desprender de las mascarillas, volvemos a lo nuestro… una pincelada audiovisual y dos recomendaciones. ( Lecturas recomendadas: “Un habitar más fuerte que la metrópoli ” del Consejo nocturno y “Sobre héroes y tumbas” de Ernesto Sabato.) Cuando la metrópoli dondeContinueContinue reading “Critica de la Arquitectura Pura”

Abandoned Buildings of Istanbul – Data Gathering – Diamond of Istanbul

The Diamond of Istanbul The Diamond of Istanbul as it is today. Photo by Joao Cruz Neves. According to the Wikipedia, the Diamond of Istanbul is the tallest building under construction in Istanbul. The article states that the building will rise 63 floors above ground and reach 311 meters. It also specifies that the functionalContinueContinue reading “Abandoned Buildings of Istanbul – Data Gathering – Diamond of Istanbul”

Abandoned Buildings of Istanbul – Data Gathering – The Bostanci AVM

The Unfinished Bostanci Shopping Center The Bostanci AVM (Shopping Center) South Building. Photo by Uğur Yavuz. The first ideas to build a Shopping Center in the Upper Bostanci area started in 1995, 25 years ago. A few years later the construction process started but, after the main rough works were done, it came to aContinueContinue reading “Abandoned Buildings of Istanbul – Data Gathering – The Bostanci AVM”

Abandoned Buildings of Istanbul – Data Gathering – The GPIH

THE GRAND PRESTIGE ISTANBUL HOTEL The GPIH seen from the Taraby Bayıarı Avenue. Photo by Joao Cruz Neves. During the 90’s, Uran Holding started the construction of the Grand Prestige Istanbul Hotel (GPIH) in the area of Hacıosman, on the top of the hills of the Tarabya neighborhood, over the European Bosphorus side. If itContinueContinue reading “Abandoned Buildings of Istanbul – Data Gathering – The GPIH”

Sketches of Spain

Miles Davis’ Sketches of Spain album (with Gil Evans conduction) is a superb blend of symphonic and jazz arrangements mainly inspired by Joaquin Rodrigo’s Concierto de Aranjuez. A true work of fusion between modernity and classicism, expressing how the European folk tradition and jazz can marry in a sublime way. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mSS5p9BdNGU SEGOVIA, Alcazar de Segovia,ContinueContinue reading “Sketches of Spain”

Travelling Sketches (II) – A Praise to Cities

From small details to broader perspectives, drawing the city can easily become an addiction for architects. Understanding how men’s ultimate habitat developed and took over the natural territory is something almost irresistible. How the oldest cities seem to grow organically, in permanent adaptation to physical conditions and with an exponential empirical method of expansion. OrContinueContinue reading “Travelling Sketches (II) – A Praise to Cities”

Travelling Sketches (I) – Intimate Mappings

As I pull up from the shelves some of my old sketch books and start flipping the pages, inevitably my mind starts to travel back to all those places and states of mind. That’s a good thing, I think to myself, even a two minute sketch can bring so many memories! That is the wholeContinueContinue reading “Travelling Sketches (I) – Intimate Mappings”

Covid Airports – A Canvas for Otherness

Disruption Until the Covid-19 crisis, airports were a point of convergence. Symbols and manifestations of globalization. They were places where thousands of people would gather in utter ignorance of each other’s presence. With the ‘’new normality’’, there is a timid approximation to that same state of things. The reality is that coming back to anContinueContinue reading “Covid Airports – A Canvas for Otherness”

Occidentalisms in Ottoman Architecture

Contaminations If in many western countries Orientalism became fashionable during the XVIII and XIX centuries, in the Ottoman Empire a similar process also happened, in the oposite direction. Through the centuries, the Ottoman architecture assimilated and added many influences to its own principles. In these two centuries, it was the winds blowing from the westContinueContinue reading “Occidentalisms in Ottoman Architecture”