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Architectural Review, The, May, 2002

Regular reports

One of Archive-Grotto's linked sites is to Archibot (www.archibot.com) -- which already sends this column a sort of weekly newsletter. The main headlines at the beginning of April were 'Is There a Gay Aesthetic?', Bruce Mau Design, Three Moving Projects, Only Title 'Architecture' (Magazine) Will Stay, 'Safe Rooms' Come Out Of Hiding, Great-Looking Product (Too Bad Nobody Wants It) with the subhead 'why good design is not always good business' and Architect Prays 4 Churches, Builds 'God's Way'. These are links to news stories in a variety of US newspapers and magazines. There is a small forum, a Who's/What's your favourite, book reviews, the inevitable Amazon links to nice architecture books, a guide to sites, and a smart search engine. The authors of this site, whoever they are, have got together the sort of student-orientated news and update site you might have hoped for.

Architectural ideas boot sale

It's called E-Design Forum -- Environmental & Green Design and it's at www.designcommunity.com/e-design/e-forum.html. It's a bit of a disappointment because it is really a big chat room with offers to do very cheap Distance Architectural Designing, discussions around such headings as Airflow on the Beach (about touristic over-development) and quite a lot of things not really very related to either green or environmental design. It's actually closest to a virtual architectural boot sale except what's on offer are raw, not necessarily well-thought-out ideas and rather a lot of dross. But in there may be...

Construction site

A reminder that the great Dutch site, Archined, is being rebuilt and until practical completion the English version is to be found at http://www.classic.archined.nl/endex.html.> Roses are red and snails are bred

And finally something rather sweet. Because it's entirely virtual it's just the ironic thing to send that client who's tardy with the invoice payments. 'It's fast and simple!' enthuses the Make Me Happy.com website at www.makemehappy.com/. You choose a flower, add your message and send it off over the ether. You select from more than a dozen roses, a score of assorted flowers -- or a selection of oddities ranging from a Venus fly-trap through earthworms to mating snails. 'Browse the list of great gifts for girls'. Snails? you ask.