Source Books in Architecture No.14: Rem Koolhaas / OMA + AMO Spaces
for Prada is the most recent volume in the Source Books in Architecture
series. Among the topics discussed in the book are the long-standing
relationship with Prada and how the early objectives in that
relationship have both maintained and shifted.
An underlying theme to the conversations held with students and faculty
of the Knowlton School community is the topic of architect-client
relationships, their history, their problems, and how they have
contributed to the discipline over time. Explicitly, a focus of the
conversation is a number of projects that OMA has developed or completed
with Prada, a large number of which are installation-scale environments
that manifest in the form of runway shows and exhibitions. The challenge
of such projects is to retain a commitment to the political and cultural
agenda that OMA embeds in the larger and permanent buildings. Given the
ephemerality and role of these environments as literal backgrounds to
highlighted events, the projects are ideal scenarios in which to develop
an architecture that lacks the permanence of buildings while still
carrying potency and contributing to larger cultural discussions
involving, for example, event, place, concept, product, staging, the
crowd, lighting, and materiality.
Source Books in Architecture No.14 contains project documentation from
the OMA and Prada archives, transcripts from Koolhaas' conversations
with students at the Knowlton School at The Ohio State University, and
commentary and critique from architects, critics, and theorists.
