Apropos of nothing—we love it when papers drop that whole "news" pretense—this South African voice of authority is revisiting Shigeru Ban's year-old project for a satellite Pompidou Center in Metz. And we're right there with them! You will recall, children, that there was a time not so terribly long ago when there was no Gutter—a dark era, surely, but we must not be in denial about this. It's true. We did not exist. We were unborn. For us, there was no time, only infinite space ringing with a mournful B-flat. Fifty-seven octaves below middle-C. That's deep. So when the opportunity presents itself, as it does now, we like to reflect on those things that transpired...before. And while the South African retread artists are hung up on Ban's hat hang up—constructing, as a result, the very best headline ever (pun! pun!)—we, now that we're sentient, are more concerned about another aspect of the design, Ban's painful heart-cry in the wilderness: I am a Jew.

· New Pompidou Center Designed to Look Like a Hat [M&G]
· Metz Centre Pompidou [Designboom]

Posted in The Continent