Softcover. New Haven CT, Yale University Press, reprint, 1990, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, 271 pages, paperback. Cultural criticism regarding the Weimar Republic. With many color and black-and-white illustrations throughout. Unmarked. Bright and clean; a tight copy. Examines intellectual life in the Weimar Republic, looks at paintings, caricatures, dance, architecture, and films, and discusses the Nazi rise to power.
Hardcover. NY, Oxford University Press, 1st, 1987, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright, unclipped dust jacket, 251 pages profusely illustrated in b&w. In this groundbreaking volume, architect and planner Christopher Alexander presents a new theory of urban design which attempts to recapture the process by which cities develop organically. To discover the kinds of laws needed to create a growing whole in a city, Alexander proposes here a preliminary set of seven rules which embody the process at a practical level and which are consistent with the day-to-day demands of urban development. He then puts these rules to the test, setting out with a number of his graduate students to simulate the urban redesign of a high-density part of San Francisco, initiating a project that encompassed some ninety different design problems, including warehouses, hotels, fishing piers, a music hall, and a public square. This extensive experiment is documented project by project, with detailed discussion of how each project satisfied the seven rules, accompanied by floorplans, elevations, street grids, axonometric diagrams and photographs of the scaled-down model which clearly illustrate the discussion. Clean copy.
Hardcover. NY, Van Nostrand Reinhold Company, 1st, 1995, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket. This resource includes hundreds of photographs and interviews tracing the careers of 30 architects who were apprenticed to Frank Lloyd Wright at Taliesin. Amongst those interviewed are Fay Jones, Aaron Green, John Lautner, Anthony Puttman, Paolo Soleri and Edgar Tafel. 256 pages, color illustrations. Laid in is a large color 28 page brochure "Taliesin West". a color guide to the Wright building in Scottsdale Arizona. Clean copy.
Hardcover. NY, Rizzoli International, 1st US, 1982, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket. 228 pages, illustrations in color and b/w. Photography by Roberto Schezen. This was the first book to present all of Loos's 180 works and an essay on this architect's relation to the society of his time. Embossed stamp to prelim page, otherwise clean.
Hardcover. London, Church Missionary Society, 1st, 1925, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, 118 pages, gray cloth with gilt titles, frontispiece color illustration and foreword by Randall Cantuar, Archbishop of Canterbury dated March, 1925. No publication date on copyright page, crease on frontispiece, minor corner and edge wear, otherwise, very clean and tight copy.
Hardcover. Berlin, Hatje Cantz, 1st, 2012, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover, 200 pages. Like new in publisher's shrink-wrap. Aitor Ortiz's photographs of buildings such as Frank Gehry's Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao and Norman Foster's viaduct in Millau use the most elementary sculptural qualities of their subject matter to create photographic abstractions. This volume is the first overview of the Spanish photographer's work to date.
Softcover. New York, Princeton Architectural Press, 1st, 2002, Book: Near Fine, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, 184 pages, b&w illustrations. Albert Kahn's contribution to North American industrial architecture is best characterized by a simplicity of expression in his designs of flexible spaces for manufacturing and production. Working in Detroit, Kahn began a long and fruitful collaboration with the automobile mogul Henry Ford, that was based on a shared vision of modernism and industry. Kahn rapidly established himself as an architect capable of responding to the new demands of mass production by employing the patented system of reinforced concrete developed by his brother, an engineer. Guided by functionalist principles and a sense of manufacturing organizations, Kahn anticipated assembly line operations and developed innovative typological characteristics for the modern factory. His projects included Ford Motor Company River Rouge Plant, Dearborn, Michigan; Burroughs Adding Machine Company, Detroit, Michigan; Tractor Plant, Stalingrad, Russia; General Motors Building, Chicago World's Fair; and Kellogg Company, Battle Creek, Michigan. Through incisive text, Albert Kahn - part of a growing series with Adalberto Libera and Adolf Loos - brings to light the novelty of Kahn's designs and his advancement of the machine aesthetic. Over ninety black-and-white photographs and drawings illustrate the extensive number of projects realized by "the architect of Ford."
Hardcover. NY, Harry N. Abrams, 1st, 2000, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover, 300 pages. This book accompanies a major traveling exhibition that showcases works by some of the most visionary designers and architects, from chairs and tables to jewelry and entire buildings.
Hardcover. New York, Museum of Art New York, 1st, 1998, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, 320 pages. Hardcover. Dust jacket unclipped. Color and b/w illustrations throughout. In excellent condition, clean inside and out.
Hardcover. NY, Dorling Kindersley, 1st, 1993, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover, 48 pages, large format. In a bright, unclipped dust jacket. Full-color artwork, including cutaway illustrations and exploded views, explores some of the world's most famous architectural landmarks, including the Paris Opera, the Taj Mahal, and Grand Central Station. Clean copy.
Hardcover. North Hollywood CA, National Association of Theatre Owners, 1st, 1993, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover, 256 pages, color and b&w illustrations. Lavish and marvelous pictorial on movie theatres and how movies were presented including the publicity and all the hoopla that surrounded the movie going experience from the first nickelodeons to the majestic movie palaces and all the wonderful small neighborhood theatres. Loaded with 100's of b&w photos publicity material and more with many color photos.
Hardcover. New York , W. W. Norton & Company, 1st, 2003, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Like new in publishers shrink-wrap. For most of his life as a photographer, David Plowden has admired and photographed barns. In recent years, as their disappearance accelerated, he made it his mission to document these beautiful structures, before they too are lost. The result is this beautiful book, his hymn to the American barn. 160 pages, 140 duotone photographs.
Softcover. US, Laurence King Publishing, 1st, 2013, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, 186 pages, illustrated throughout in color and b&w. Light edgewear to wrappers, else a clean, tight copy. This is the first comprehensive survey of Modernist graphic design as it emerged in America in the period from 1920 and 1960 in various media--advertising, information design, brand identity, magazine design, book design, and posters. It examines the great works which by mid-century had defined American graphic design. The book begins with a section devoted to the emergence of Modernism and its major historical influence, such as European avant-garde movements, popular culture, educational innovations such as the Bauhaus School, architecture, industrial design, and photography. The heart of the book includes the key works of mid-century Modernism as it matured into a fully-formed American style, bringing together such great names as Alexey Brodovitch, Lester Beall, Paul Rand, Saul Bass, Will Burtin, and Alvin Lustig. The final section looks at the impact of and reactions to this new movement as graphic design in America matured in the 1960s and beyond.
Hardcover. Woodstock, New York, The Overlook Press, 1st, 1981, Book: Near Fine, Dust Jacket: Near Fine, Encyclopedic volume featuring the historical evolution of American homes. Hardcover, 320 pages. Over 1000 black/white illustrations, including architectural plans for each variety of home discussed. Cloth bound book is in near fine condition, only flaw on the dust jacket is a small blue ink stain on the front.
Hardcover. New York, NY, Rizzoli International Publications, 1st, 2000, Book: Near Fine, Dust Jacket: Near Fine, Hardcover, 197 pages, color photographs throughout. Very clean and tight copy. This is the first book to put together all of the extraordinary houses designed by Antoine Predock. Each of the twelve remarkable private houses featured here--ten from Texas, Arizona, and New Mexico, and two from California--harmoniously blend with their landscape in ways for which Predock is now so renowned. Characterized by environmentally conscious design, the houses display both exquisite refinement and an ingenious level of invention.
NY, Praeger, revised ed., 1971, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover,192 pages. Illustrated in color, b&w. Dust jacket with light edgewear, soil. Small quarter-size stain to front cover.
Hardcover. New York, 1st, 1984, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, 144 pages, b&w and color illustrations throughout. Light edge wear, fading to dust jacket. Previous price written on front dust jacket flap. Else a very clean, tight copy.
Hardcover. Baltimore, Johns Hopkins University, 1st, 2002, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, An extraordinary work, unparalleled in its breadth and depth of detail, this three-volume set offers the first comprehensive history of architecture and town planning throughout colonial North America, from Russian Alaska to French Quebec, to Spanish Florida and California, to British, Dutch, and other settlements on the East Coast. Across this vast terrain, James Kornwolf conjures the outlines of the constructed environment as it emerged in settlements and communities, in structures and sites, and in the flourishes and idiosyncrasies of the families and individuals who erected and inhabited colonial buildings and towns. Here as never before readers can observe the impulses and principles of colonial design and planning as they are implemented in the buildings and streets, harbors and squares, gardens and landscapes of the New World. Incorporating more than 3,000 illustrations, Kornwolf's massive work conveys the full range of the colonial encounter with the continent's geography, from the high forms of architecture through formal landscape design and town planning. From these pages emerge the fine arts of environmental design, an understanding of the political and economic events that helped to determine settlement in North America, an appreciation of the various architectural and landscape forms that the settlers created, and an awareness of the diversity of the continent's geography and its peoples. Considering the humblest buildings along with the mansions of the wealthy and powerful, public buildings, forts, and churches, Kornwolf captures the true dynamism and diversity of colonial communities-their rivalries and frictions, their outlooks and attitudes-as they extended their hold on the land. His work conveys for the first time the full scale, from intimate to grand, of their enduring transformation of the natural landscape of North America. NOTE: DOMESTIC SHIPPING ONLY.
Hardcover. Baltimore MD, Penguin Books, 2nd pr., 1965, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket housed in a pictorial cardboard slipcase. 234 pages, 192 b/w plates, glossary, bibliography. Describes the architecture of the period that stretches from the Early Renaissance to the post-Waterloo Greek and Gothic Revivals. Among the great names of those centuries were Inigo Jones, Christopher Wren, Vanbrugh, Robert Adam, and John Nash. During the same period were built Hampton Court, Hatfield, the new St Paul's, the City Churches, the graceful London Squares, and the crescents and terraces of Bath. In addition to the main text there are two long appendices, one on Scottish architecture and the other on the architecture c f the Thirteen Colonies. Numerous plans, the majority of which have been especially drawn for this book, and over three hundred half-tone illustrations form an integral part of the author's account. Clean copy.
Hardcover. Salem, MA, Essex Institute, 1983, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Good, Hardcover. Reference guide to historical architecture in Salem, Massachusetts, with reviews of over 350 buildings. 311 pages, fully illustrated with black/white photographs and maps. Cloth bound book is in near fine condition, no internal marks; dust jacket has wear at the corners and on the ends of the spine, two rips along the top edge.
Softcover. Princeton, New Jersey, Princeton University Press, 1998, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover. Historical and biographical volume on the architect Frank Lloyd Wright. 544 pages. Includes drawings, notes, and writings by Frank Lloyd Wright. Near fine condition; book is still in shrinkwrap that has some tears near the spine and on some corners.
Hardcover. Boston, Bulfinch, 1st, 2002, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover, 336 pages. Oversized. Still in publisher's shrinkwrap. Some light wear on dust jacket corners. Color photographs throughout. A bright, clean copy. A foreword by Johnson himself, an essay by his biographer Hilary Lewis, and nearly 400 vivid color and b/w photos accompanied by detailed building descriptions presented in chronological order.
Hardcover. London, Country Life, 1st, 1922, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Two volumes complete, large folio (15" X 12"). 344 and 361 pages plus 100 appendix and index pages. pale green cloth with gilt lettering and design, top edge gilt. Color frontispiece in Volume II, profusely illustrated with about 700 b&w illustrations, plans and drawings. Clean, bright set. First edition of Arthur T. Bolton's monumental monograph on the architecture of Robert (1728-1792) and James Adam (1732-1794), two Scottish brothers who were renowned neoclassical architects, interior and furniture designers.
NY, Hearst Books International, 1st, 1997, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright, unclipped dust jacket. Black & white and color photos and illustrations. 191 pages. Light edgewear to dust jacket.
Hardcover. New Haven, Yale University, 1st, 1977, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover, 68 pages, b&w illustrations. Introduction by Edmund Pillsbury. INSCRIBED BY BROWN on front fly leaf. Light rubbing to front edge of embossed dust jacket. Published on the occasion of the opening of the building.
Softcover. Munich, Prestel, 1st , 1997, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, 271 pages. Softcover. Features full color and black & white illustrations. Features the German design groups best work 1965-1997. Clean, unmarked copy with only minor bump to bottom right corner.
Hardcover. Chicago, University Of Chicago Press, 1st, 2010, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover, 110 pages, in a bright dust jacket. Photographer Stanley Greenberg explores the anatomy and engineering of some of our most unusual new buildings, helping us to understand our own fascination with what makes buildings stand up, and what makes them fall down. An historical and critical essay by Joseph Rosa and an afterword by the author.The 80 captivating and thought-provoking images collected here focus on some of the most high-profile design projects of the past decade.
Hardcover. New York, H.N. Abrams, 1st, 1986, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, 606 pages. Hardcover with dust jacket. A very clean, unmarked copy with only minor wear to dust jacket edges. Black & white photographs throughout.
Softcover. New Haven, Yale University Press, 1st, 2000, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover. This gorgeous volume was published in conjunction with the Metropolitan Museum of Art exhibition "Art and the Empire City: New York, 1825-1861." Its 636 pages include a stunning array of prints and photographs. A painted overlook of New York City wraps around the front and back cover. The front cover has a small crease at the top left edge. On page 240, type is slightly out of register but remains readable.
Hardcover. Mesa AZ, PDA Publishers, 1st, 1983, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket. 176 pages illustrated with color, b&w photos.A portfolio of work the landscape architect executed for various clients. Clean copy.
Softcover. Paris, Books & Co., 1st, 1999, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, 169 pages. A volume on French Art Nouveau design, architecture and interior decoration. Features designs by Emile Galle, Alphonse Mucha, Paul Signac and others. Color illustrations throughout.
Hardcover. Antique Collectors Club , reprint, 1997, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket 272 pages. This charming book, first published in 1912 as Gardens for Small Country Houses by Country Life at a time when both Jekyll and Weaver were writing for the magazine, contains the substance of a legend. It embodies the period when the Arts and Crafts Movement had evolved into country house architecture and then found its most delightful expression in the making of gardens. This new edition, which has been re-titled to distinguish it from the original book, is now illustrated with color photographs and reproductions of contemporary paintings and watercolors which bring new color and light to a vanished world. In their collaboration on this book, the authors found common ground and reveled in their mutual intuitive approach to artistic and historic gardening ideas. Arts and Crafts Gardens is a practical handbook with invaluable information on garden restoration, insights into craftsmanship and planting relationships, and provides a fascinating classic text on garden design.
Hardcover. New York , Rizzoli, 1st, 2010, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, 240 pages. Photographer Ian Macdonald-Smith has captured more than forty of the most characteristically innovative extant houses designed by M.H. Baillie Scott (1865-1945), as well as their gardens, in color photographs that express the craftsmanship and planning of this early-20th-century master. Like new in publisher's shrink-wrap.
Hardcover. Verba Volant, 1st, 2005, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket, 480 pages, 796 b/w & 12 color illustrations. A showcase of the Architecture & Decorative arts of the Art Deco period. Originally published in 1930, in Italy, under the title 'Le Arti d'Oggi' the book is divided into six sections - Architecture, Interiors, Metalwork, Ceramics, Glasswork & Fabrics. A superb pictorial reference for anyone interested in the art & design of the 1920 art deco period.
Softcover. Bright Mountain Books , 1st, 2007, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, 358 pages, b&w illustrations throughout, Sometimes called the Paris of the South, Asheville, North Carolina, is known for its grand mountain views, rich and diverse culture, deep-rooted artistic heritage, historic architecture, and the legendary Biltmore Estate. Asheville: Mountain Majesty is an excellent source for discovering, or rediscovering, these and other facets of the city and its history.A lifelong resident of Asheville and regional historian, author Lou Harshaw offers a firsthand look at the history and development of this magnificent city by drawing upon a host of historical sources as well as an extensive oral tradition. She follows the development of Asheville from village to town to city, always reflecting the feeling of the times. The result is a journey through time, documenting the evolution of one of the most intriguing cities in the United States.Asheville: Mountain Majesty is enhanced by a wealth of period images, complemented by the author's contemporary photography.
Hardcover. London, Twin Palms Publishers, 1st, 2002, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, 192 pages. 2 volume set, slipcased. Like new in publisher's shrink-wrap. Jonathan Anderson and Edwin Low have worked as the photographic team of Anderson & Low since 1990. Based in London, the two met while sharing a darkroom and have since collaborated on a broad range of photographic projects encompassing portraiture, architecture, and nudes. Recently their work has focused on various aspects of sport and the lives of athletes. We are pleased to release simultaneously two books, available separately or as a boxed set. Release of the books coincides with a major exhibition of the Athletes photographs at the National Portrait Gallery in London, scheduled for February 2002. Athletes features photographs taken during the three years prior to the 2000 Olympics in Sydney. Athletes from many countries and various sports are included. Taken as a whole, these images meld into a single reflection of athletics and sport - a dynamic portrait replete with the beauty, toil, and determination of some of the world s finest young athletes as they strive to achieve their Olympic dream. Photographs of the National Danish Gymnastic Team are featured in Gymnasts. This series of nudes emphasizes the beauty and grace of these athletes as they assume classical poses, work through routines, or seemingly defy gravity in aerial photographs.
Hardcover. New York , Quantuck Lane, 1st, 2005, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover, 176 pages, color photographs. Like new in publisher's shrink-wrap. The North Fork is the roughly sixty-mile-long spit of New York's Long Island that runs from Riverhead to Orient Point. With the fairly well protected Long Island Sound on the North and Peconic Bay on the South, it was a logical place for some of the earliest English immigrants to settle and build barns. It is still home to more working farms than any other part of the island. And from the timber-frame barns of the British farmers of the seventeenth century to the pole barns of the twentieth, the variety is stunning. In a survey sponsored by the Old House Society in Cutchogue, Mary Ann Spencer spent the last few years making a comprehensive inventory and photographing more than six hundred barns on the North Fork. Two hundred of them are still in use, although their fate is by no means certain. Here in their glory (and sometimes less than that) are the most interesting barns,which reveal, among other things, their functional development, their often haphazard fenestration, their soft patina of age, and their fit in the landscape. Spencer's complete survey forms a second part of this book, which provokes feelings of nostalgia and raises our fears for the future of these wonderful structures. More than 150 color photographs.
Hardcover. Larkspur Landing, Lapis Press, 1st, 1985, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, 157 pages. Hardcover. Illustrated with full color and black & white photographs. Wrinkling to bottom right corner of page 147/148. Dust jacket with light wear along edges. Clean, tight copy.
Hardcover. Norman OK, University of Oklahoma Press, 1st , 1950, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a lightly worn dustjacket. Ground plans of the Indian villages of New Mexico and Arizona with aerial photos & scale drawings.
Hardcover. New York , Monacelli, 1st, 2003, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, 336 pages, illustrated with color plates, additional drawings and plans. Very good hardcover in a bright dust jacket.
Hardcover. New York , Monacelli, 1st, 2003, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, 336 pages, illustrated with color plates, additional drawings and plans. Very good hardcover in a bright dust jacket.
Hardcover. NY, Reagan Books, 1st, 2006, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Hardcover, 272 pages. Through striking illustrations and stunning photographs, Bohemian Modern explores the unique structural and interior designs that have put California's ultra-chic Silver Lake neighborhood at the forefront of a new style phenomenon. One of the country's most renowned modernist architects, Barbara Bestor has fully embraced and perfected Silver Lake's "bohemian modern" style: a practical philosophy that is Californian in origin but achievable anywhere. It is a look that favors raw, authentic materials, brilliant colors, creative space planning, and a natural flow between indoors and outdoors. The results, as Bohemian Modern presents, are striking: a flawlessly restored Neutra house decorated with both whimsy and restraint, a rooftop constructed for viewing the stars, a lavish outdoor garden delicately integrated into the surrounding architecture, a double-sided bookcase that soars three stories and serves as a functional art installation...there is no limit to the creativity and beauty of Silver Lake style.
Hardcover. NY, McGraw-Hill, 11th ed., 1946, Hardcover, black cloth in a worn, chipped dust jacket. Small sticker on dj spine. 169 pages, b&w illustrations, Practical reference data on materials, design, and construction methods employed in brick construction; for contractors, builders, architects, engineers, and students...".
Hardcover. NY, Harry N Abrams, 1st, 1996, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket. 208 pages illustrated in color. A surprising look at who designed for Disney: Michael Graves, Frank Gehry, Aldo Rossi, Robert Venturi etc. Based on interviews with those involved plus original photos and drawings. From fairy-tale castles to extraordinary buildings designed by the world's most distinguished architects, The Walt Disney Company has set new standards for the imaginative use of popular imagery in architecture. The company's enormously influential architectural philosophy, first expressed more than fifty years ago at Disneyland, draws on characters and settings from the world's most compelling legends and stories, especially Disney's own remarkable animated films. Clean copy.
Softcover. Chennai India, Dakshinaa Publishing, 1st, 2001, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, 8 1/2 X 11", 436 pages, b&w illustrations. The science and technology of Vaastu Shastra, archetypal building forms illustrated and explained. The text is enhanced by measured drawings. A work of scholarship by India's leading authority on the subject. Scarce.
Hardcover. Boston, MA, Houghton Mifflin, 1st, 2000, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover, 192 pages, illustrated throughout in color. Blue cloth, silver titles. Pictorial dust jacket. Light wear to cover, else like new.
Hardcover. Boston, Houghton Mifflin, 1st, 1999, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover, 112 pages. David Macaulay's large format architectural volumes are always instructive in their detail. This volume amps up that opportunity. On the 25th anniversary of the his publication, "Cathedral: The Story of Its Construction", Macaulay published this volume literally illustrated with the step-by-step development of that book. So, here are the quick drawings, smudges, early drawing drafts, hand-written and typed copy, reproduction proofs, revision notes, and more. Intriguing.
Hardcover. Boston, Houghton Mifflin, 1st, 1999, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover, 112 pages. David Macaulay's large format architectural volumes are always instructive in their detail. This volume amps up that opportunity. On the 25th anniversary of the his publication, "Cathedral: The Story of Its Construction", Macaulay published this volume literally illustrated with the step-by-step development of that book. So, here are the quick drawings, smudges, early drawing drafts, hand-written and typed copy, reproduction proofs, revision notes, and more. Intriguing.
Softcover. Berkeley CA, University of California Press, 1st, 1999, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, 220 pages. This book provides a fascinating history of the planning, design, and construction of the six-building Getty Center in Los Angeles, one of the great cultural complexes to be built in our time. Writing with wit and passion, Richard Meier takes us behind the scenes of the thirteen-year-long, one-billion-dollar project.