Obra Architects Logic: Selected Projects, 2003 - 2016 by Jennifer Lee, Pablo Castro
B Architecture Publisher, 2016
Distributed by Idea Books
Hardcover, 416 pages

Like many others, I'm guessing, I first heard about Obra Architects, the duo of Jennifer Lee and Pablo Castro, in 2006, when they won MoMA PS1's Young Architects Program (YAP) and realized BEATFUSE! in the museum's Long Island City courtyard. Writing about it that summer (without having seen it in person, unfortunately), I described the wood and mesh construction as "more substantial coverage" than previous YAP installations and "a happy medium" between more open structures and blobby forms, the two evident poles at the time. More than other YAP winners before and since, Obra took the shade consideration of the competition to heart and produced something that actually looks like a respite from the summer heat.
[BEATFUSE!, Long Island City, Queens, NY | Spread from Obra Architects Logic]

Close to ten years later I got reacquainted with the work of Castro and Lee when they contributed Casa Osa in Costa Rica as a Building of the Week (BotW) at World-Architects. After two years of doing state-by-state BotWs, I opened up the feature outside of the US for 2015, highlighting American firms producing buildings overseas. Casa Osa was the first in that series and a promising start. The New York-based architects exploited the benign climate of Costa Rica by designing the vacation home with outdo...