Sofie De Caigny, director of the Flanders Architecture Institute, reviewed Caruso St John's Collected Works: Volume I for Drawing Matter. She discusses the book's choice to submerge the reader into the cultural sphere of the end of the 20th century, through contemporary texts, lectures and references.
‘It is a book about an engagement with the city and about finding inspiration in unintended beauty, about an attitude of modesty towards the given layers of the city, and the daily lives of people.’
Photo, Studio House by Hélène Binet.
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Casabella issue 940 features a review Caruso St John's Complete Works, Volume I, published by Mack Books. Federico Tranfa commends the book's thematic collation of projects, found texts and commentaries, stating it is a 'courageous way to come to terms with the past, because it is not analysed a posteriori, but instead with the cultural context of the epoch of pertinence'.
Edmund Fowles, director of Feilden Fowles Architects, reviews Caruso St John's monograph published by Mack books. Discussing the books openness, he praises the presentation of projects and references alongside commentaries, a 'constellation of culture, memory, construction and emotion'.
The first volume of Caruso St John's Collected Works is published this month by Mack Books. The publication covers the first fifteen years of Adam Caruso and Peter St John's partnership, following a thematic course shaped around key phases and aspects of their thinking, and offering a detailed reflection on the practice’s activities between 1990 and 2005. Through a chorus of voices including critics, clients, and artists, it narrates Caruso St John's early emergence and development through to the international recognition which came with projects such as Nottingham Contemporary, the New Art Gallery Walsall, and the Brick House.
Adam Caruso will be speaking on the theme of ‘Semper and Material Culture’, as part of the book launch for A New Agenda for Gottfried Semper. Alongside Elena Chestnova, Murray Fraser, Michael Gnehm, and Sonja Hildebrand, Adam will discuss the mid-nineteenth century’s emphatic interest in material history against the backdrop of the precariousness of a life in exile confronted with a globalised world.
Book launch, London
Caruso St John: Collected Works
Volume 1, 1990–2005
AA Bookshop, London
18:00 19th October 2022
Adam Caruso and Peter St John will celebrate the publication of their Collected Works: Volume 1 1990–2005, by presenting two personal projects from the formative years of their practice; their homes at Swan Yard and Orleston Mews.
Book launch, Zurich
Caruso St John: Collected Works
Volume 1, 1990–2005
Erikastrasse, Zürich
18:00 CET 1st November 2022
Adam Caruso will be in conversation with curators Fredi Fischli and Niels Olsen to celebrate the launch of Caruso St John's Collected Works: Volume 1 1990–2005.
Owen Hatherley takes an in-depth look at the first two volumes of Caruso St John's Collected Works for Sidecar, the blog of the New Left Review, charting the practice's origins in 1990s London and its 'principled refusal' of the tenets of the so-called starchitects that rose to prominence during that decade.
A+U magazine has published a second issue dedicated to the work of Caruso St John. The publication covers projects undertaken since 2015, with a particular focus on the practice's work with existing structures.
This second volume in Caruso St John’s Collected Works is published this month by MACK. The publication traces an interlacing set of themes through the practice’s work over the first twelve years of the twenty-first century. Its unique approach to history is revealed as a rejection of the myth of relentless novelty in favour of an understanding of the past as present and an interest in working with the existing. The influences of Milan, Chicago, and Rome on understandings of the city are explored, as well as the use of ornament and the place of Switzerland in shaping the practice’s evolving trajectory. Throughout these contexts, collaborations with contemporary artists including Thomas Demand and Damien Hirst continue to shape the practice's relations to the materiality and drama of space.
Published by Mack Books, The Triple Folly presents an account of the collaboration between Thomas Demand, Caruso St John, and textile manufacturers Kvadrat, which led to the construction of the new pavilion at Kvadrat's headquarters in Ebeltoft, Denmark.
Publication
Mount Royal
Adam Caruso
In a publication presented by ETH Studio Jan De Vylder, Adam Caruso reflects on his experiences growing up in Montreal and family visits Mount Royal, the mountain located directly west of downtown and one of the city’s largest green spaces.
The Swiss Life Arena is featured in Casabella 944. Federico Tranfa introduces the project and discusses its key references – the ruins of an ancient mosque in Syria and the 18th century Guards Tent in the gardens of the summer palace at Drottingholm in Stockholm.