Design and Architecture

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Public safety, YIMBY activist, Academy Museum Oct 03, 2017

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Can designers of public space and event planners avert mass shootings, like the one that occurred Sunday night in Las Vegas? Pro-housing YIMBY activist Sonja Trauss runs for political office in San Francisco. And the long-planned Academy Museum comes into focus, with a Renzo Piano-designed sphere.

The Academy Museum emerges Sep 28, 2017

Show notes

It's been a long time coming, and riddled with enough drama to fill a Hollywood movie. But today, the still-under construction Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Museum opened its doors for a close-up.

Smart nodes, CAFAM goes to the border, Crenshaw Cowboy Sep 26, 2017

Show notes

DnA goes to check out CAFAM’s timely show of art and architecture, The U.S.-Mexico Border: Place, Imagination, and Possibility -- and on the way encounters the installation of LA’s pilot "smart node." Will the streetlight of the future contain cameras, charging stations, speakers and sensors to detect gunshots? And we meet the homeless artist whose Los Angeles studio was a freeway on-ramp, until he was moved on.

Silicon Valley disrupts cities, Stacy Michelson Sep 19, 2017

Show notes

Apple has rebranded its stores as "town squares;" a vending machine startup called Bodega caused outrage; cities are lining up to woo Amazon's HQ2. DnA looks at tech's impact on cities. Plus, artist Stacy Michelson (creator of KCRW's Good Food tote bag and picnic blanket) tells us how Japanese snack food packaging inspired her goofy illustrations.

Stormy connections, Amazon seeks city, 'Found in Translation' Sep 12, 2017

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As Apple marks the iPhone's ten year anniversary with the launch of the iPhone X, thousands of people in hurricane-struck areas cannot make a phone call. And Amazon seeks a bride: North American cities are a-courting to house the tech behemoth's HQ2. Plus, LACMA's Found In Translation explores decades of cross-pollination in art and design between California and Mexico.

The crosswalks of Bunker Hill are alive with color Sep 07, 2017

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Four crosswalks in front of the Broad in downtown Los Angeles got a colorful paint job this weekend. Local high school students helped paint intersecting diagonal stripes in a design created by 94-year-old Venezuelan artist Carlos Cruz-Diez. The Broad invited him to re-imagine the crosswalks as part of the city-wide Pacific Standard Time: LA/LA.

Berggruen Institute, 'Condemned to Be Modern' Sep 05, 2017

Show notes

Billionaire philanthropist Nicolas Berggruen has likened his planned research center in the Santa Monica Mountains to a secular monastery. Swiss architecture firm Herzog & de Meuron is designing it. What is the Berggruen Institute, and will the building please the neighbors? And in Condemned to Be Modern at LA Municipal Art Gallery, artists from Cuba, Brazil and Mexico examine the legacy of modernism.

Angels Flight soars again Aug 31, 2017

Show notes

A downtown Los Angeles landmark returns this week. Starting Thursday, you'll once again be able to ride Angels Flight from Grand Central Market to the top of Bunker Hill and back. The newly-upgraded train has been dark for four years, following a series of derailments and other issues.

Harvey and Houston planning, road diets spark rage Aug 29, 2017

Show notes

The City of Los Angeles is trying to slow drivers down. We get perspectives on a road diet that caused road rage in Playa del Rey. And Tropical Storm Harvey is devastating Southeast Texas. While it is the region's worst storm, it is not the first. Has Houston's approach to design and planning made it susceptible to flooding?

Comparing LA's transit system to London and New York Aug 24, 2017

Show notes

Los Angeles is hoping to host the 2028 Summer Olympics, and is using its investment in a regional mass transit system as a selling point. How does the experience of riding on LA's subway compare to London, host of the 2012 games, and New York, which has never hosted the games? And what can LA learn from those two cities?

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