The In Crowd

From today's New York Times:

"FEW people would question the quality of Rem Koolhaas's mind: he has long been celebrated as one of architecture's most audacious thinkers. But his recently completed Casa da Musica here is something new for him - a building whose intellectual ardor is matched by its sensual beauty.

The project's sculptural qualities will inevitably draw comparisons to Frank Gehry's exuberant design for the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, Spain. Both were commissioned as part of a broader effort to revive industrial port cities that have long been in decline; both are dazzling displays of virtuosity.

But if Mr. Gehry's masterwork evokes the eruption of an unbridled id, Mr. Koolhaas's creation is a more self-contained experience - one that vibrates with emotional and psychological tensions. Its surprises reveal themselves slowly, as if to draw you into a deeper unconscious experience. In originality alone, it ranks with Mr. Gehry's 2003 Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles and Hans Scharoun's 1960's-era Berlin Philharmonic as one of the most important concert halls built in the last 100 years." (Click here to read more)

The Casa da Musica Concert Hall is an interesting looking building with a fantastic and bold design, but doesn't it kind of look like the Jawa Sandcrawler from the original Star Wars?

Click here for Rem Koolhaas's official website.