 We are happy to have you back on our search for the human humane here in architecture and our tropical exotic coast metropolis of Honolulu, Hawaii. And today it's going to be the three kids from the block. It's actually the harbor square block right here next to us over here at the beginning of downtown. And the two other kids from the block is our historian archive DeSoto Brown from and in the Bishop Museum. Welcome back DeSoto. Hello everybody Aloha. And it's Ed Killingsworth friend and business partner Ronald Lindgren live from his Long Beach, California again. Hi Ron. Hello and hello to you DeSoto. Nice to have you back with us. Thank you. Good to have you back. So before we dive in let's basically celebrate someone who's always with us at least spiritually and she's an expert in what drives us here on the island which is actually tourism our economy number one and we can get the first slide up here that's our exotic escapism expert Susanna and here she is her 42nd birthday. So congratulations. She at the very bottom left you see her when she came here first which was half through her life. So 20 years ago. So Suzanne our happiness and health first and foremost you're twice the age and just as beautiful inside out and thanks for the encouragement inspiration for us. And DeSoto maybe you want to congratulate her in your language. I do how old you are now Suzanne and I want to know how you say happy birthday in German. Herzlichen Glückwunsch Liebling. And Ron what are you doing there at the bottom? How are you gonna congratulate her? Well I'm happy to pass on some birthday congratulations to Susanna as well from a picture where I'm actually standing in the same one I as Susanna was at the last but 20 years later. So happy birthday Susanna from paradise. Yeah and you're looking at her swooping sexy curves from the swooping sexy curves of the Lanais which is the Kahala Hotel you guys first project on the island and there we go and we actually happened you around your guys keynote speeches of the National Locomomo Symposium you got us in there and it actually turned out to be the same sweet how sweet so what a reunion happy university again and anniversary. So let's go to the next slide here which is basically a recapping the last two shows we talked about both towers we did at the bottom right the our mandatory equal check and we had to say that while typologically there were you know the project was a pioneer in having caused and created more downtown living in high-rise condominiums in the same area but architecturally poetically and pragmatically performatively on all levels there they weren't able or willing to keep up with the high standard of Harbor Square but it had inspired other different typologies as this car dealership which you see at the top right sort of almost diagonally across the street up to other typologies and that gets us to the next slide and that is very personal to you Ron share with us what we see and how that relates. Yeah these are some pictures taken at my home in Long Beach which was not designed by an architect it was designed and built by a contractor and yet it has so many of those features of using the climate naturally to store living rooms adjustable louver glazing and doors that go from floor to ceiling all kinds of wonderful mid-century modern touches that did come out of some concerns about climate and how how the home is oriented directly north itself but not by an architect and I think that's great actually and I think we should look look back into that I think that makes for another show with you Ron about that I think so too I was just gonna say I think we need to see more of this house perfect and I think this is a perfect example how the avant-garde basically informs and motivates the mainstream so let's go back to Harbor Square and next slide we're promising to throw in some more sort of mystery that is sort of gravitating around the project we were told and I think it was our walking encyclopedia fellow Don Hibbert that originally the architect that was chosen for the side to build high-rise condos was actually Takashi Anbi and these are two projects from our previous shows to Soto left is King's Center and to the right is yeah and the other one is on the right is a two-story commercial building and Kaimo Key which unfortunately if you go there now it has been sold I think to a Korean climate client and they thought they need to repaint these louvers green which I think is a little sad because I assume this sort of goldish is actually the original so that being said Anbi was very very environmentally as you call it wrong environmentally conscious and and and was having his architecture dwell heavily upon that so you you would wonder how would he have brought that into the typology of a high-rise condominium and next slide there is actually a clue because there is a project that he did this is the Contessa Tower and versus this picture is taken very sort of ideal idyllically and and and idealistically from alawai where it looks like almost like a tree texture you know pretty much almost like a primitiva like a grandfather of primitiva and that's how we always thought about it but if you actually you know follow it where it actually is is actually close to age one or main through fair through Honolulu and with that it shares something with Harbour Square which is also on the very heavily frequented Alamona Boulevard and both obviously compromising your lanai luxury you know because of sound and and and basically noise pollution right right right but let's let's think about this so how would Ed have done that and you know I asked you Ron that question and your your answer is multitude it was rather surprising to me and that gets us to the next slide which is the beginning of a little mini-series here that that is illustrating your answers so what do we see here you know it of stroke to do high-rise condominiums around the world we're looking at a few and what is especially apparent is that the use of balconies lanais whatever they might be called in whichever part of the word they were built were definitely part of these projects this is showing some drawings from the Clementi Park residential complex in Singapore from 1973 to 1975 this in fact was Ed's first design for an entire community it consisted of 540 condos 470 of which were in four 29 story towers on 25 acres of tropical gardens and that sketch on the left shows that the top of each of those towers had four core units that were all two stories tall with two stories of glass looking out over Singapore and the next slide let's just hold on for one second what a what a pioneering proposition Suzanne and I were just last night talking about Singapore and Jay was sending me a little trailer that Singapore is basically praised for how innovative it is and there is this architectural firm they're called Woha and they're the most contemporary leaders in what we always propose in an easy breezy high-rise condominiums naturally ventilation and they do that and they're called Woha and here is Ed having been the pioneer in that and even more ironically that it didn't and probably he was ahead of his time right and just needed but now again his his inspiration comes to fruition through these colleagues work and I also want to point out there's a little show quotation on the top right with Richard Lowell where he was sharing his work with Victoria Ward and Steve Owl had been the architect and had then actually built as the Soto and you and I have been talking about unfortunately torn down what warehouse in Ward Plaza but he had proposed these towers that to me are surprisingly similar to that so it was definitely a zeitgeist phenomenon of the leaders in the avant-garde of that era so yeah keep on going next slide Ron yes this is a pursuit of the states of the Round Hill Plantation Resort in Montego Bay Jamaica from 1970 this is the Ed's first totally master planned resort and it combined 400 condos with 600 hotel rooms stories tall might not seem like a high-rise but in Jamaica out in the ocean front in the jungle it certainly is yeah this was being developed by Ed's most powerful and probably favorite real estate developer William Zekendorf and while this project was being contemplated Zekendorf happened to be at the same time the owner of New York City's iconic Chrysler building yeah we asked her hotel and for some reason he was the owner of late rights will be house in Chicago which is the ultimate prairie style home yeah yeah and the picture in the upper right corner shows how there's a consistency in Ed's architecture in terms of the display of exposed structure as ornament on a building the upper right picture is of the college apartments and again you told me the story before then the project fell through because of some political kind of turmoil and because of these Germans because Zekendorf is second off and that's German right all right let's move on this is embarrassing it was called the del Rey residential complex here again this was the first hospitality project in the office and it placed 400 condo units with 1,000 hotel rooms in this massive high-rise block and you'll notice that all the roof all the ones whether they're hotel rooms or kind of Indian units have these long horizontal balconies running across your entire width yeah and a picture that I thought I put in but I hadn't so I got to make you use your imagination one of the next shows we gonna do with your friend and colleague Larry stricker Ron and he is just now at the reopening of his monolani on the big island that we're gonna dedicate a show to and the monolani reminds me especially that iconic image from the distance from the ocean where it's at the foothills of the monarchy and as you the Soto said it's really emphasizing its or its horizontality right this sort of lani bands like ribbon bands yes really yes the monarchy hotel obvious by SOM further up that coast as well right yes very much so too and that leads us to a project that was proposing this similar and on the next starts on the next slide Ron right yeah this was another attempt I had to be a speculator of he joined with a contractor in a realtor to finance and build what one of the earliest proposed condominium developments in the entire Los Angeles basin and it was to have been located on an ocean front bluff in a very low wise residential neighborhood there were 44 mansions in the sky and 11 floors which meant that all of the condos were corner units with that desirable cross ventilation these two bedroom two bath convertible den units were really spacious up to 3200 square feet the condos were fully glazed from Florida ceiling beneath what was a six foot deep terrace setback that provided shade to the room so if we go to the next slide and I have to say shame on me I wasn't updating Eric our producer on the on the news slide so we're actually looking now at what you perfectly describe the collage of the three images the carless these exterior and the interior and the floor plan we don't have what used to be the first picture which you added some sorry but so we have the next two pictures is actually the model unit from up close and then the one from the distance just to let you know yes so the composite picture you'll see at the bottom left the mansions in the sky as they were advertised in this very early condo project and the next the next picture shows that those condos were were completely surrounded by six foot deep balcony terraces and in fact Ed's nod to promoting California indoor after living is the fact that those condos those those spaces outdoors are actually as large as the living rooms and dining rooms inside come out yeah wow and now I have to say this this is this is not a rendering as we like to call it these days it's also not a recent Carlos Denise photo realistic because that is actually real and you know tell us why from the previous projects we haven't seen any Julius Schulman documentary pictures yeah this this is a picture of something that does exist but the fact is that this very early condo just didn't fly and that was because the home by public couldn't really take to the idea of living under a you know condominium association rules of paying regular high condo maintenance fees this whole idea was new foreign and really off-putting it's time just at home yeah what was saying is that that this hardware as condo wasn't built and in fact none of the other other four that I was mentioning will also go yeah but as that as the next slide shows at least a demonstration unit was built upgrade which turns out to be a rather handsome home on the beach front in Long Beach California exactly and then so again here we go it sort of now is you know nothing less but also nothing more than what that killings worth work body of work started out we have the Frank house up there you know obviously one of the most popular case study houses so again as sad as it is for this project but also as beautiful at least to have a sort of exemplary one story sort of model home mock-up but let's go to the next slide this makes obviously a Harbor Square even more special because within the almost or a little more than you correct me 2000 projects total other killings worth body of work Harbor Square is in fact the one and only in the world that has been built and completed right that is correct and so that being said you know you just haven't been reflecting that it was sort of an exercise in Linai's and Harbor Square having some that made you think about Ron almost a I call it the manifesto for the must of Linai's and why and please say this in your words yeah hold tight because I'm about to do a diatribe that something that's been puzzling me when I see such a well-used Linai as the town tower Linai is at Harbor Square it does remind me of something that's really puzzling I I've had the great pleasure as a howly of a visiting Hawaii dozens of times once even for a full year of work but though I think I know the islands a bit not much but a bit I simply don't understand why someone residing in the tropics would prefer living in a hermetically sealed high-rise glass box without Linai's me either so here's my unsolicited list of why I believe Linai's in tropical high-rise condo towers are absolutely essential to the creation of a humane architecture that means an architecture that is lived fully in Hawaii and the reasons I'm going to list shortly might seem self-evident but I still think they're worth consideration first and rather obvious a Linai large enough to be furnished is surely a valuable a memory in itself as an additional outdoor room Linai's provide detail and the enlivening ever-changing play of shadows to tower facades and and the shadows cast by those stacked Linai's as shown in this picture effectively and naturally shade the indoor rooms Linai's provide human scale to tower elevations and that's mostly because everyone knows and has experienced and has grabbed onto the three-foot six inch height of balcony railings Linai's display furniture and potted plants like we see here provide a touch of human warmth and visual accessibility to the tower facades and by this I mean that distant viewers in a car for example can imagine as they're driving that they could enjoy such outdoor garden balconies in the sky also perhaps self-evident but worth mentioning the owners of high-rise condos with Linai's can personally keep their floor-to-ceiling glazing clean for both sides thus always ensuring clear use those living in fully glazed hermetic boxes cannot fully enjoy the late sunset shading in the evening or frankly any of the full nighttime views because the reflections of the glass of their all pale faces and their frigid fully air-conditioned obscured the beautiful experience of twilight awesome awesome and if we go to the next photograph I have one last item that many people don't think of it all about Linai's my my final point is every year in the United States alone 600 million birds are killed when they fly into these glassy high-rise buildings birds simply can't see these faceless scaleless transparent the signs but birds can perceive Linai's and balconies however as three-dimensional objects and they do use them as resting places in the sky so there's my diatron and let me just add to that this is something that makes my co-host and I say that why isn't it a legal requirement that new condos have to have absolutely absolutely and again we're we're not just dreaming I this bird here I contributed that to because I'm living that in Waikiki grand either sliding door open and this bird came in and was having a good time on my bed and it found its way out again so it's possible so only here in Hawaii 12 month summer you can embrace the fauna and the flora so let's go back to the to the lighter one go the next slide and and so why does this here happen Ron why does the green grow out of your signature louvers now this is an interesting development that really shows the love that the owners have had many who have lived there ever since the building open some of the homeowners this is showing the louvers that are concealing the parking garage from view but of course letting the air in so there's no need for mechanical ventilation in these parking floors but some of these owners have put pots of vines right up against the inside of the louvers where the blockers of their of their park cars occur and they did that with the idea that they wanted to see these vines head for the sun and suddenly appear growing through the louvers yeah and this is actually reinforcing a one of our many crazy ideas next slide and I give you a keyword at the solo from a previous show we did we call it the proletarian people power parking plans and what was that right well we were conjecturing that if the day comes that there is less or fewer amounts of private the own cars and there's better transportation that you can make use of that might in turn reduce the number of parking spaces that are needed in condos that are already equipped with them and if that in fact how comes to pass that's where your urban nomads as you say can come to live and they actually will have very comfortable spaces to live with a lot of flow through ventilation using what was made for cars absolutely and in a certain way maybe because this elevation is actually the west the ocean facing actually maybe better than the privileged people up there who are still facing some of the that west sun and the urban nomads down there at the lower part of the food chain and here at the lower part of the building might be actually more privileged so it's kind of flipping that's right that's very interesting that's right and keep just going more crazy and go to the next slide and push this to the next level of craziness and and you ran had had kindly a borrowed the term Staklan eyes and that traces back to basically copyright to our activist journalist Kurt Sandburn high curd hope you're fine haven't heard from you in a while so hopefully you're doing well and and we were then saying what if you start to basically populate downtown which you see at the very bottom left and you make this into journalism where the genetic code is basically barred from nature like a like a bamboo grove which is just as tight as it can be so plans shade each other by being loose enough to get enough light and rain into it to make it thrive so why can't that be the genetic code for basically urban planning and that way Harbor Square would be sort of embedded with these other skinny towers and it would be sort of a pioneering seed one could almost say for for such a development as having been the instigator and let's go to the next slide here and until then I throw these here in I took these we have to appreciate what it is because until that crazy vision becomes reality might take a little while longer but on the left you see it in this sort of amazing urban jungle next to the finest pieces of tropical brutalism on the right which I took this where you can see these two cars behind each other and the one in front actually belongs to pet more and pet reached out to me through our tropical tutor bill and consulting me what to do when she wants to sell her car and we're saying don't sell your car because again these cars these as else were put on the market same year as the building their young timers now they're relatively affordable as we pointed out in the last show both the cars and the unit so hold on to them there are coming classics and they will only increase in their value even if you want to still keep the sort of very American greedy capitalist view on things right so these are keepers we will next slide and last slide from here on we will leave Harbor Square to keep on cruising on sunset boulevards and where are we cruising I think we're going to your very long beach right and for what reasons do we do that you know first of all of course that forehead you're seeing in the bottom right is where the diatribes are formed inside the school but we're heading back to my hometown to consider some university campus master planning my city happens to be blessed with what I think is the most handsome architecturally unified and most beautifully landscape campus in all of the state of California and this happened because at Chili's worth broke all records by serving as campus master planner at this particular university for nearly 40 years absolutely and doesn't this remind us of our view of you age the solo I don't know that that no let's not get into that well we might have some suggestions again from learning from best practices for what I'll say practice so with that thank you guys so much for having had a good time together again so I see you next week actually for that we're going to start we're going to make this a multitude probably you know three shows or so so until then see you and until then please stay as a tropically exotically metropolitan as at so perfectly did here bye bye