Architecture Web Sites: Reference Tools
- This lengthy guide is provided by the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, Architecture Library. Although billed as a selective guide, it is quite complete in coverage. Topics covered include architecture, building and construction, design, housing, planning, preservation, facility management, energy and the environment, and landscape architecture. Types of listings include discussion groups, electronic publications, databases and a wide variety of web sites.
Adam: The gateway to art, design, architecture and media information on the Internet
- ADAM, the Art, Design, Architecture & Media Information Gateway, is a searchable catalog of over 2000 Internet resources that have been selected and cataloged by professional librarians in the United Kingdom.
Art and Architecture Thesaurus Browser
- This vocabulary database, developed by the Getty Research Institute, provides definitions, related terms, alternate forms of speech, synonyms and spelling variants.
Cyburbia - The Urban Planning Portal
- Cyburbia, the Internet's oldest portal site for urban planners and others interested in cities and the built environment, was established in 1994. It contains a large selective directory of Internet resources relevant to planning, architecture, urbanism, growth and sprawl. Cyburbia also contains information about mailing lists and newsgroups, it hosts a bulletin board with job listings and discussions on many topics and an image hosting gallery.
This searchable site "documents a thousand buildings and hundreds of leading architects, with 3D models, photographic images and architectural drawings, commentaries, bibliographies, web links, and more, for famous designers and structures of all kinds."
The Pritzger Architecture Prize
- The Pritzker Architecture Prize World Wide Web Site provides current information about the world's most prestigious architecture award and its Laureates.
Voice of the Shuttle: Architecture
- This well-regarded site, originating at the University of California at Santa Barbara, provides numerous links to information on architects, works, projects, architectural historical preservation, design, museums and libraries, architecture journals, listservs, and newsgroups.
Landscape Architecture
- This searchable bibliography, produced by the University of MInnesota, indexes publications relating to the history of urban forestry; urban forest legislation; the benefits of urban forests, selection and planting of trees; maintenance of the urban forest; planning and management; and urban forestry programs. Covers 1982 - present
Centre for Landscape Research, University of Toronto
While under a comprehensive renovation, the CLR has made available several useful web resources. Urban Design Precedents is a 3D repository based on public spaces throughout the world. "These web pages are a teaching tool intended to encourage the comparative analysis of specific urban types, and to enhance students' knowledge of a variety of urban contexts. Material presented here is student work from the School of Landscape Architecture's Urban Design Studio." "CLIP is conceived as a collaborative research, teaching and practice initiative developed to provide a living case study/data base of contemporary landscape projects." Additional projects and publications are available through the CLR site including the legacy sites: Architecture Virtual Library and Landscape Architecture Virtual Library.
National Urban Forestry Unit
- In addition to providing information about the United Kingdom's National Urban Forestry Unit and its work, this site also provides links to other sites of interest, including urban and community forestry projects throughout the United Kingdom.
History of Landscape Architecture
- The images in this University of Oregon web site accompany the lectures in Kenneth Helphand's course on The History of Landscape Architecture - Art History.
Historic American Landscapes Survey
"The National Park Service has permanently established the Historic American Landscapes Survey (HALS) program for the systematic documentation of historic American landscapes...The intent of HALS is to document significant historic landscapes throughout the country via measured drawings, large-format photography, written narrative and other documentation techniques. HALS will document the dynamics of landscapes not already seen in the existing HABS/HAER program models."
Historical Landscape Initiative
As part of the National Park Services' Heritage Preservation Services, the Historical Landscape Initiative works "in partnership with federal agencies; state, local, and tribal governments; professional organizations; colleges and universities; and private organizations...The Historic Landscape Initiative helps define and protect the nation's designed and vernacular landscapes by promoting responsible preservation practices. The Initiative provides technical assistance to the public through its diverse products and activities, including guidelines on appropriate treatment, research source books, documentary videos, and training symposia and workshops.
A major initiative of the World Resources Institute, EarthTrends, is "an online collection of information regarding the environmental, social, and economic trends that shape our world. Committed to the principle that accurate information drives responsible decisions by governments and individuals, EarthTrends offers the public a large breadth of statistical, graphic, and analytical data in easily accessible formats. EarthTrends gathers data from the world’s leading statistical agencies, along with WRI-generated maps and analyses, into a single database for rapid searching and retrieving. To facilitate the comparison of data from different sources, EarthTrends supplements its content with detailed metadata that reports on research methodologies and evaluates the information’s reliability.
Made available by EcoIQ, a company that supports and promotes the transition to sustainability, this site includes numerous links to state, local, federal and international agencies, organizations and businesses that could serve as information providers in the following categories: sustainability, land use, air & atmosphere, water & wastewater, energy, transport & communication, solid waste & recycling, toxic & hazardous materials, pollution prevention, green design & building, urban greening, and conserving the built environment.
Specialized
ResourcesADA Accessibility Guidelines for Buildings and Facilities
- On this site, you can view all sections of this document using links from a contents page or you can download a zipped version.
Florida Architecture and Landscape Design
Florida Architecture and Landscape Design is a collection of resources describing and illustrating architecture, architectural practice, landscape design, and landscaping in Florida. The core of this collection is the publications (Florida Architect and Florida/Caribbean Architect) of the Florida Association of the American Institute of Architects. Continuing additions to this core form a documentary library of Florida's architecture and landscape design. Historic collections illustrate the "Cracker style" of northern Florida, the Caribbean designs of southern Florida, and the architecture and landscaping of tourist destinations across the state.
The Florida Sustainable Communities Center & e design Online
- The Florida Design Initiative (FDI) serves as a catalyst for promoting best practices in community and facility design and usage. Their website provides access to web information as well as their electronic journal, e design.
The Miami Metropolitan Archive (MMA) is a cooperative effort ... to provide digital access to important source materials on Miami-Dade County history. Currently, early City of Miami City Council meeting minutes, charters, departmental annual reports, and urban planning documents from 1896 to 1966 are archived here with more collections and services to come.
Museum of Modern Art: Architecture and Design
The architecture and design section of the MoMA.org site spotlights an online collection in addition to numerous online exhibitions and projects including Groundswell: Constructing the Contemporary Landscape; Tall Buildings; The Changing of the Avant-Garde: Visionary Architectural Drawing; and the concurrent MoMA/Whitney exhibits Mies in Berlin / Mies in America.
Periferia: Internet Resources for Architecture and Urban Design in the Caribbean
- Periferia is published by the Architectural Resources Network, a non-profit virtual organization of architects and urban designers linked by the Internet.
A Sourcebook for Green and Sustainable Building
The Sourcebook was developed to foster the implementation of environmentally responsible practices in homebuilding. It's purpose is to " offer the practical information needed to implement green building practices...it addresses a wide range of options available to architects, builders, and homeowners in seeking to create sustainable buildings. Many of the options have been grouped to fit one overall approach to building or one general category of materials." "The Sourcebook presents specific and general recommendations for homes that can be considered environmentally friendly. Many of the recommendations may also be relevant to some types of commercial development...The Sourcebook is directed to those with knowledge of the building trades and building terminology..."
Images
and Media"Aerial photography Florida is a collection of aerial photographs taken between 1930 and 2000. Literally, a portrait of the State, the collection will be comprised of hundreds of thousands of aerial photographs documenting the land use of Florida over time. Zoomable high resolution images represent every inch of Florida. Searchable databases and a map interface offer users easy access to the collections. The collection will continue to grow as multiple agencies make their images available."(PALMM) Viewing these photographs will require use of GIS systems.
Architecture of the 20th century is the main theme of this international database. “It includes over 12,000 built and unrealized projects from various architects and planners.”
Built in America: Historic American Buildings Survey / Historic American Engineering Record
Part of the American Memory Project, this site represents two collections from the Library of Congress. "The collections document achievements in architecture, engineering, and design in the United States and its territories through a comprehensive range of building types and engineering technologies including examples as diverse as the Pueblo of Acoma, houses, windmills, one-room schools, the Golden Gate Bridge, and buildings designed by Frank Lloyd Wright."
Developed by the University of Washington and conceived as a multi-disciplinary resource for students, faculty, and others in the academic community, the Cities/Buildings Database is a collection of digitized images of buildings and cities. These images have all been scanned from original slides or drawn from documents in the public domain. They are freely available for use in the classroom, student study, or for individual research purposes.
Digital Archive of American Architecture and Digital Archive of European Architecture
These image archives from Boston College Professor Jeffrey Howe consists of digitized images of American and European architecture and in some cases includes explanatory material. The American archive was originally constructed as a supplement to the course "FA 267 From Saltbox to Skyscraper: Architecture in America that surveys the development of architecture in America from the 17th century to the present, with particular emphasis given to local architectural monuments."
This searchable site "documents a thousand buildings and hundreds of leading architects, with 3D models, photographic images and architectural drawings, commentaries, bibliographies, web links, and more, for famous designers and structures of all kinds."
Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps of Florida
These maps, made available by the University of Florida, "were mainly designed to help fire insurance agents determine the degree of damage to a property and show accurate information to help them determine risks and establish premiums. They showed the size (including color-coding), shape and construction of buildings (brick, adobe, frame, etc), dwellings (including hotels and churches), and other structures such as bridges, docks and barns. Along with fire stations, you could also find water facilities, sprinklers, hydrants, cisterns, and alarm boxes as well as firewalls, windows, doors, elevators and chimneys and roof types. The maps included street names, property boundaries and lot lines, and house and block numbers. Other information such as the latest census figures, prevailing winds; railroad lines and Indian reservations and topography were included. Today, the maps are an invaluable guide to inner-city history, land use, and historic preservation." (PALMM)
- This is an online catalog to the University of California, Berkeley Architecture Slide Library collection of over 200,000 35mm slides. As of May 1999, SPIRO contained 32,000 records linked to images, approximately 16% of the total collection. Forty percent (40%) of the images in WebSPIRO come from images in books produced by copy stand photography under the fair use provisions of the U.S. Copyright Law. Ten percent (10%) of the images come from copy stand photography from periodicals. Thirty percent (30%) of the images are donor-supplied, and 20% are from commercial slide vendors. NOTE: See the link on copyright located on the SPIRO search page before downloading any images.
20th Century American Architecture and Interior Design
This digital collection is part of the Library of Congress American Memory Project. The photographs by Samuel Gottscho and William Schleisner were taken between 1935 and 1955. The collection is comprised of over 29,000 images primarily of architectural subjects, including interiors and exteriors of homes, stores, offices, factories, historic buildings, and other structures. Subjects are concentrated chiefly in the northeastern United States, especially the New York City area, and Florida. Included are the homes of notable Americans, such as Raymond Loewy, and of several U.S. presidents, as well as color images of the 1939-40 New York World's Fair. Many of the photographs were commissioned by architects, designers, owners and architectural publications, and document important achievements in American 20th-century architecture and interior design.
Professional
OrganizationsArchitectural Associations, Organizations, and Research Institutes
- A comprehensive list compiled by the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, Architecture Studies Library
American Institute of Architects
American Society of Interior Designers: ASID
American Society of Landscape Architects: ASLA Online
Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture: ASCAAssociation of Computer Aided Design in Architecture: ACADIA
Foundation for Interior Design Education Research: FIDER
International Interior Design Association
Society of Architectural Historians
- In addition to membership and chapter information, this site includes links to Net Resources for those with an interest in architecture -- past, present, and future. The Society encourages scholarly research in the field and promotes the preservation of significant architectural monuments that are an integral part of our worldwide historical and cultural heritage
This site "supplements the monthly magazine with expanded multimedia project stories, in-depth interviews with giants of architecture, daily news updates, weekly book reviews, green architecture stories and archival material, as well as links to people and products..."
Architronic: The Electronic Journal of Architecture
- Published by the School of Architecture and Environmental Design, Kent State University, Architronic is a scholarly refereed journal, exploring the new ranges of architectural communication available through digital media.
Garden and Forest: A Journal of Horticulture, Landscape Art, and Forestry (1888-1897)
- Garden and Forest was the first American journal devoted to horticulture, botany, landscape design and preservation, national and urban park development, scientific forestry, and the conservation of forest resources. The journal was established by Charles Sprague Sargent (1841-1927), the founding director of the Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University. This journal has been preserved as part of the Library of Congress' Preservation Digital Reformatting Program.
- Highlights of past issues are available online for this periodical which provides critical explorations of key contemporary issues and practices related to the built environment. This large-format publication includes essays, photographic and design portfolios, book reviews, and debates.
InformeDesign: Where Research Informs Design
Produced through the University of Minnesota, "the mission of InformeDesign is to facilitate interior designers' use of current, research-based information as a decision-making tool in the design process, thereby integrating research and practice." InformeDesign, a clearinghouse for design and human behavior research, is a close working collaboration between the American Society of Interior Designers and the University of Minnesota. This site includes research summaries of scholarly articles as well as a monthly e-newsletter to which one can subscribe.
Landscape and Urban Planning
- This journal is concerned with conceptual, scientific, and design approaches to land use and is based on the premise that research linked to practice will ultimately improve the human-made landscape. This electronic journal is available online, to FIU students and faculty, since February 1995.
- This online version of Metropolis Magazine includes some full-text articles starting from Dec. 1994. Also included are monthly web picks (with links).