ARCHITECTURAL RECORDS INNOVATION CONFERENCE
SEPTEMBER 2024
On the 1st of October Níall will be giving a lecture titled 'Continuity' at Architectural Records Innovation Conference in New York. The conference brings together influential figures who are shaping the built environment and its future. Speakers will discuss how innovation in design happens from the small scale to the building scale. The extensive architectural work presented, both in the U.S. and around the globe, will include important cultural facilities, creative residential models, alternative forms of sustainability, and provocative public art incorporated in buildings. The agenda for the event can be viewed here.
ATHLETES OCCUPY OLYMPIC HOUSING
AUGUST 2012
In the run up to the London Olympics, the Athletes’ Village housing block N15, is now occupied with athletes’ preparing for the games. Niall McLaughlin Architects have designed the external skin of the housing block on a ‘chassis’ designed by Glen Howells. The facade samples fragments of the Elgin Marbles, scanned from the British Museum and converted into 3D pre-cast panels depicting galloping horses from the Parthenon Frieze.
Niall McLaughlin commented on the practice’s approach to the unusual commission in Building Design. ‘I was very interested in the principle of the facade being delaminated from the building’s core form. Usually it’s something one tries to swim against to retain a sense of ‘authenticity’, but here we decided to embrace it….I like the idea of setting Ruskin’s conception of the craftsman against the absolute Taylorism of the construction process. Through digital reproduction, these deracinated stones are now doubly lost.’ (Building Design 27.01.2012)