Latest news with #RenzoPiano
Yahoo
6 days ago
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Sleep in the Clouds at Shangri-La The Shard, London
Sleep in the Clouds at Shangri-La The Shard, London originally appeared on L.A. Mag. The Shard building, designed by the Italian architect Renzo Piano to represent, as its name suggests, a shard of glass, is more than an iconic landmark. As the tallest building in the United Kingdom — standing 1,016-feet tall — the eco-conscious high-rise shines brightly over the Thames and some of the city's most recognized landmarks, such as St. Paul's Cathedral and the Tower Bridge. The behemoth is also home to Shangri-La The Shard, London, a five-star hotel that starts on the 34th floor and climbs up 18 stories to house its 202 rooms and suites, all with breathtaking vistas that can be taken in without leaving the luxury linens of the bed. In fact, there is little reason to leave the hotel at all if one is looking for unmatched luxe service and worldly, award-winning cuisine, especially after being greeted by General Manager Kurt Macher and his adorable little dog Rocky. Like many luxury properties, Shangri-La The Shard is leaning into not just being dog friendly, but encouraging the property to offer pet-passionate accommodations with Rocky acting as the unofficial diplomat for his fellow furry friends. The hotel's TING restaurant includes a renowned afternoon tea, and for those who don't suffer from vertigo, a visit to GONG — on the building's 52nd level, the highest hotel bar in Western Europe— is a must. But the real delight is the spa with an infinity pool that hovers over the entire city. This summer, the Shangri-La The Shard, London is offering an Eat, Play, Love package inspired by the bestselling book of a similar name by Elizabeth Gilbert, which became a hit movie starring Julia Roberts. You can Eat your way through the iconic Borough Market alongside an award-winning chef who will help handpick the finest seasonal ingredients - with a quick stop at the doorway of the building that served as the movie home of beloved character Bridget Jones - before returning to the hotel where the chef will prepare a personalized meal based on your choices. Or experience a high tea in the exquisite Hollywood star-worthy suite (rumor has it Beyonce posted up here) with delightful treats. Play came in the form of a private yacht experience along the Thames with bites and sips as we took in the sights, which included the headquarters for the legendary spy agency (Bond, James Bond) MI5 headquartered in the Thames Building and the neighborhoods built along the river. Love can certainly be found in the serene and scenic heights of the spa, where Elemis facials can be had in private rooms located high above London. Languishing in the warm waters is the epitome of romance, as are the bathtubs for two in many of the hotel's rooms. The city itself is spectacular, a walkable neighborhood and The Shard is in the center of it all. This story was originally reported by L.A. Mag on Jun 3, 2025, where it first appeared.
The Guardian
19-05-2025
- General
- The Guardian
Car-free streets, geothermal heating and solar panels: Paris's new eco-district
In recent years, Paris has undergone several transformations in an effort to become a greener, more pedestrian-friendly city. This commitment to sustainability and livability is on full display in the north-western neighborhood of Clichy-Batignolles. Photograph: Ed Alcock/Guardian Designers have spent the last two decades redeveloping a 54-hectare (133-acre) former rail yard into a dense, green, walkable neighborhood. Photograph: Ed Alcock/Guardian The new neighborhood, in the city's 17th arrondissement, exemplifies the '15-minute city' concept of urban planning, in which residents can access most services they need within a 15-minute walk, bike or transit ride from their homes. Photograph: Ed Alcock/Guardian The new development has a population of about 7,500 people, according to city estimates. About 70% of the neighborhood's 3,400 homes are either mixed-income social housing or rent-controlled. Photograph: Ed Alcock/Guardian Buildings, including the 13-story UNIC (pictured), are built to passive design standards. Photograph: Ed Alcock/Guardian The UNIC building houses a metro station and a kindergarten. Photograph: Ed Alcock/Guardian Clichy-Batignolles uses a geothermal heating system, and solar panels power many of the buildings. Photograph: Ed Alcock/Guardian The site is home to several ambitious and high-profile architecture projects, including the Paris courthouse, which was designed by the Renzo Piano Building Workshop. Photograph: Ed Alcock/Guardian The 10-hectare Martin Luther King Park, also known as Parc Clichy-Batignolles, anchors the neighborhood. Photograph: Ed Alcock/Guardian The park features a pond with native plants, as well as a fruit orchard, playgrounds and a skatepark. Photograph: Ed Alcock/Guardian The neighborhood is connected to public transit and features car-free streets and walking paths. Photograph: Ed Alcock/Guardian
The Guardian
19-04-2025
- The Guardian
Beaches, galleries, pintxos and more: why you have to visit Atlantic Spain
Set aside the familiar images of Spain's sunbaked landscapes and sweltering beaches. The Costa Verde surprises even the most seasoned travellers with its dramatic, verdant coastline and pleasantly balmy days. Meaning 'Green Coast', the name once referred to the Asturian shoreline but is now used to describe the entire Atlantic stretch from Galicia to the French border. The diverse landscape of Spain's northern coast encompasses white sandy beaches, crystal waters and forested headlands, as well as picture-perfect fishing villages and thoroughly modern cities. It offers something for everyone, from seafood lovers to adrenaline junkies – not to mention those in need of a relaxing sun-and-sand break. At the eastern end of the coast, Bilbao makes a perfect starting point for arrivals by sea (departing from Portsmouth). One of the two Brittany Ferries ports in Spain (the other is Santander), you'll be able to dive straight into your holiday – refreshed from a hassle-free crossing. The fortunes of this proud industrial city were turned around with the construction of the Frank Gehry-designed Museo Guggenheim in 1997. The arrival of this glittering palace of art provided a cultural and financial boost to the city so dramatic that this is now known all over the world as the 'Bilbao effect'. Bilbao continues to thrive, but many of its most charming attractions have been around for decades – its Casco Viejo (Old Town) is an atmospheric labyrinth of medieval alleyways, with the area known as Siete Calles (Seven Streets) at its heart. This is the best place to start the obligatory bar crawl to sample as many pintxos (the Basque take on tapas, served on a slice of baguette) as you can manage, and you won't leave disappointed. Real gastronomes, however, will want to head to San Sebastián, Bilbao's elegant neighbour an hour to the east. Famously home to a constellation of Michelin stars, San Sebastián has a proud culinary history, but is also a stunning city in its own right, curled around a picturesque bay. Stay: Hotel Codina, on the western side of San Sebastian; conveniently located near one of the city's three beautiful beaches and a pleasant stroll along the bay (one mile) from the town centre. The main entry point by sea via Brittany Ferries is Santander, Cantabria's lively capital, with departures from both Portsmouth and Plymouth. While not much remains of its historic centre, thanks to a devastating fire in 1941, Santander holds its own as a weekend-worthy stay, and experienced its own minor Bilbao effect with the 2017 opening of the Centro Botín, a dazzling seaside arts centre designed by Renzo Piano. For stunning views across the bay and beyond, walk to the end of Magdalena peninsula, where you'll find an extensive park with a mini-zoo and tourist train. Santander is the ideal base for exploring the rest of Cantabria. A half-hour's drive from the capital, impossibly beautiful Santillana del Mar is a preserved-in-aspic medieval village of cobbled streets and balconies groaning under their extravagant floral displays. Just 10 miles beyond that, Comillas is known for its wealth of modernista architecture – the offshoot of art nouveau mostly found in Barcelona – including El Capricho, a villa designed by Gaudí himself. Inland from here is the Picos de Europa mountain range, a vast Atlantic ecosystem that is home to – among many other things – brown bears and Iberian wolves, and one of Spain's most popular hiking regions. It's protected as a national park but there are various points of entry. The loveliest of these is Potes, a small medieval town of cobbled streets and riverside strolls. Stay: Parador de Fuente Dé, a modernist gem of a hotel surrounded by mountains and just a couple of hours scenic drive from Santander. Your ideal gateway to the Picos de Europa. Entering the Costa Verde proper, the landscape becomes more dramatic, with little coves chipped from the rock and towns that seem to tumble into the sea. The Asturian capital, Oviedo, is one of northern Spain's unsung delights, with a stunning cathedral at its centre along with a clutch of narrow pedestrianised streets, manicured gardens and attractive squares. Like its near-neighbour to the north, Gijón, Oviedo is an excellent place to explore the typical dishes of the region – fabada asturiana, a hearty bean stew with chorizo, ham hock and morcilla (blood sausage); cachopo, breaded veal fillets stuffed with cured ham and cheese; and tortos, corn fritters topped with minced chorizo and a fried egg. Seafood also plays a starring role, and it is the fishing villages scattered along the Asturian coastline that have shaped the region's identity – Llanes, with its hotchpotch of Romanesque, gothic and renaissance architecture; Ribadesella, a quiet fishing town carved in two by the river Sella; Cudillero, perhaps the prettiest of them all. This jumble of brightly coloured houses falls down two sides of a valley towards a narrow inlet. Linking these villages are stretches of coastline unlike any in Spain, not only for their quiet stretches of sand and unspoilt hinterland, but for their curious features. The area stretching between Gijón and Ribadesella is known as the Costa de los Dinosaurios for the dinosaur footprints and fossilised remains that have been found here. Midway, at Colunga, there's even a Jurassic Museum for those who wish to find out more. Similarly intriguing, just beyond the Asturian border and into Galicia, is the Praia As Catedrais, named for its otherworldly rock formations, which resemble the naves of mighty cathedrals. And you could always go on from there to see the real thing – in terms of cathedrals, that is – in Galicia's capital, Santiago de Compostela; known to pilgrims (and hiking enthusiasts) the world over as the final stop on the Camino de Santiago. Stay: Parador de Santiago de Compostela, Santiago's stunning Parador was constructed in 1499 and faces the cathedral at the centre of this enchanting medieval city and site of pilgrimage. The diversity of the Costa Verde is what makes it so special. Visitors can experience unfettered five-star comforts, or they can bivouac under the stars. They can spend their days kayaking and rockclimbing, or stretched out in a quiet cove before a candlelit dinner above a twinkling harbour. Spain's best-kept secret seems unlikely to remain so forever. Tempted by the flavours and flair of Atlantic Spain? Plan your trip now and save up to 30% on sailings when you book a Brittany Ferries Holiday
Euronews
15-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Euronews
İstanbul's creative renaissance: contemporary art and sustainability in the cultural capital
ADVERTISEMENT İstanbul is a city where tradition meets innovation. Its contemporary art scene is thriving, blending creativity with sustainability. At İstanbul Modern, designed by Renzo Piano, director Çelenk Bafra champions regional talent through immersive exhibitions like Ömer Uluç's 'Beyond the Horizon'. Artist Deniz Sağdıç turns waste into striking portraits, using denim, plastic and discarded materials to explore identity and environmental responsibility. Finally, at Arter, director Emre Baykal highlights Türkiye's evolving creative landscape through bold installations that reflect a growing public engagement with contemporary art across generations.
BBC News
27-03-2025
- Entertainment
- BBC News
The pioneering building that scandalised Paris
The daring, radical Pompidou Centre was derided by many when its design was first unveiled – yet it has continued to influence the architecture of public buildings ever since. As the building approaches a major renovation, its co-creator Renzo Piano recalls the furore. This summer, the Centre Pompidou will close for five years, as Paris's popular polychrome landmark undergoes changes necessitated by current requirements in terms of health, safety and energy efficiency. French studio Moreau Kusunoki Architects, Mexican practice Frida Escobedo Studio and French engineer AIA Life Designers will undertake a major overhaul of the six-storey arts centre, containing Europe's largest museum of modern art. Its renovation will add usable floor space, remove asbestos from all facades, improve fire safety and accessibility for people with reduced mobility, and optimise energy efficiency. As far as possible, the original building will be conserved as it was before. To do otherwise might be considered cultural sacrilege – after all the Pompidou's identity is indivisible from its original architects, Renzo Piano, and the late Richard Rogers. The duo set up their practice, Rogers + Piano, in 1970, and submitted a design to a prestigious competition instigated in 1971 by Georges Pompidou, France's President from 1969 until 1974. Its jury was headed up by Jean Prouvé, a metalworker and self-taught architect, and included such stellar architects as Philip Johnson and Oscar Niemeyer. Piano and Rogers' design was chosen from 681 competition entries. The result caught the duo, then unknowns in their 30s "with Beatles haircuts", as Piano puts it, by surprise: "We didn't think we'd win, we entered the competition for pleasure," the Italian architect, now 87, tells the BBC. "We never planned to create a revolutionary building. Our idea was a museum that would inspire curiosity, not intimidate people, and that would open up culture to all." In fact, the duo's insouciance may help to explain the building's uninhibited boldness, flamboyance and ludic quality. Its structural elements and services were placed on its facades, allowing it to maximise its internal, open-plan spaces – and prompting the futuristic structure to be dubbed the world's first "inside-out" building. Its exoskeleton of tubes and periscope-like pipes were playfully colour-coded: blue for air air-conditioning, yellow for electricity, green for water and red for pedestrian circulation. Visitors streamed up escalators – encased in transparent tubing affording panoramic views – that were designed to reinforce the museum's connection to the city. "Our idea was for the building to take up only half the site, allowing for a welcoming outdoor place – a piazza – where people could meet," says Piano, whose other projects include the California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco (rebuilt in 2008), the Shard (2012) in London, and the recently completed Paddington Square, also in the UK capital, a mixed-use building and public square. "Our credo was a place for all people – for the poor and rich, the young and old." The Pompidou's transparency, accessibility and adjacent piazza chimed with new ideas about democratising culture. "Street theatre and concerts in public spaces were rising in popularity at the time," says Piano. Inside the building, visitors had access to the Bibliothèque Publique d'Information – Paris's first free public library – the Musée National d'Art Moderne and the Institut de Recherche et Coordination Acoustique/ Musique (IRCAM), dedicated to research of music and sound. Piano and Rogers' winning entry provoked consternation and fury when it was announced at a press conference: "The room was packed," remembers Piano. "Richard and I were standing in the middle of the room being heckled. We felt elated yet terrible at the same time," says the architect. "Some people were shouting, 'Why have you designed something so horrible?' 'Why are you are destroying Paris's historic centre?'" Although surprised to have won the contest, Genoa-born Piano grew up feeling architecture was his destiny – aged 18, he told his father he wanted to be an architect. However in conversation his manner is humble, not entitled. Born into a family of builders in Genoa, he loved watching his father's work take shape. Perhaps his childhood experience of seeing buildings materialise successfully made him feel that architecture is open to all possibilities. "Building is a beautiful gesture," he once told The Financial Times. "It's the opposite of destruction… especially when you are creating buildings for people because they are civically important." In 1981, Piano founded the Renzo Piano Building Workshop (RPBW), with offices in Genoa and Paris, led today by 11 partners (in the spirit of a collective). In 1998, he won the Pritzker Architecture Prize. More like this:• The swinging 60s icon who revolutionised style• The star tidying guru who transformed our homes• How to transform your home with art The Plateau Beaubourg in central Paris – a stretch of wasteland occupied by a car park – was the site chosen for the new Musée Nationale d'Art Moderne (formerly housed in the Palais de Tokyo in Paris's haut-bourgeois 16th arrondissement). "It was a place waiting for something to happen," says Piano. A moment of change France's social and political climate at the time, still rebellious following the tumultuous events of May 1968, was conducive to the creation of a building as disruptive as the Centre Pompidou, acknowledges Piano: "In Britain, society was being revolutionised by [designer] Mary Quant and the Beatles. The same was happening in Paris." The Centre Pompidou was partly inspired by the ultra-pop architecture of experimental London-based architecture collective Archigram. "The idea that France should have a 'Maison de la Culture', bringing together art, cinema, music and literature in cities was first invented by André Malraux [novelist, art theorist and France's first Minister of Cultural Affairs]. Pompidou was very supportive, too. I really believe that major shifts in architecture are only possible if you have a good client. George's wife, Claude, too, was an excellent lady." Pompidou, like Claude, was passionate about contemporary art and design. In 1972, they invited Pierre Paulin, a designer known for his space-age era furniture, to create new interiors for the private apartment of the Elysée Palace, the French presidents' official residence. The results were radically modern – the walls of the living room, dining room and smoking room were lined to cocooning effect with wool and polyester panels that obscured the residence's neo-classical splendour. Walls were hung with paintings by Robert Delaunay and other modernist artists. One impetus behind these efforts to provide Paris with a prestigious museum was that France had lost its reputation as the world's pre-eminent centre of avant-garde art. "It is my passionate wish for Paris to have a cultural centre like the ones they've been creating in the US," Pompidou told Le Monde newspaper in 1972. "It will be both a museum and centre of creation, where the visual arts take up residence with music, film, books and audiovisual research." Initially, reactions to the Centre Pompidou, frequently compared to an alien spaceship, were often extremely negative. "Taxi drivers used to say to me: 'Regardez!' before launching into a tirade against the building. With so much hostility, I had to keep a low profile among strangers," says Piano. The building, derisively likened by many to an "oil refinery", was the target of countless lawsuits. "We were sued so often – once on the grounds that Prouvé wasn't a qualified architect," he recalls. The French press initially lambasted the building. "Paris has its own monster, just like the one in Loch Ness," scoffed Le Figaro. "One day Richard and I were outside the building, as yet unfinished. We saw a woman struggling with an umbrella that had turned inside out in the wind and Richard rushed over to help fix it. When he mentioned that he was one of the building's architects, she jokily mimicked hitting him with the umbrella as if to suggest he was a naughty scoundrel." Yet after the building's opening in 1977, Parisians soon began to appreciate the museum – now one of Paris's most visited public institutions, that ranks behind only the Louvre and Musée d'Orsay in terms of visitor numbers. It also inspires architects today. "The Centre Pompidou, radical on completion, has continued to influence the design of public buildings ever since," says Hugh Broughton, founder of London-based Hugh Broughton Architects, who finds qualities in it other than its famously high-tech idiom. "It's an amazingly brave, generous building whose large public space promotes congregation, street theatre and the highest quality people-watching. Its core concept – open-plan floor plates supported by peripheral structure and services – draws upon medieval principles of castle structures, and combines this with an Arts and Crafts approach that makes a virtue of construction as an aesthetic medium. The result is a building which is dynamic, inviting, egalitarian, transparent and has awesome views – all the best attributes of great architecture. It changed the way a whole generation of architects think about buildings – placing their users at centre stage." Piano is also known for harnessing light in his projects to ethereal effect, as is the case with the Shard, which can seem to disappear in certain light conditions due to its glass skin. Architecture critic Nicolai Ouroussoff has said of his works as a whole: "The serenity of Renzo Piano's best buildings can almost make you believe we live in a civilised world." For Piano, what is the main architectural legacy of the Pompidou Centre? "The building is proof that culture doesn't suffer from being more public. It's a place where people gather primarily. It brings together art, life and culture – not culture with a big C but culture with a small c. When it opened, it brought culture to all, and made the city a better place for it." -- For more Culture stories from the BBC, follow us on Facebook, X and Instagram.
