Toyo Ito Museum of Architecture, Omishima Island, Japan-image courtesy of Toyo Ito and Associates, Architects / Daici Ano The Toyo Ito Museum of Architecture on Omishima Island was designed by Ito himself.

Jet lag can do strange things to a person. But it wasn't just a mixed-up body clock that had me awake at 3 a.m. during a trip to Japan a few years ago, madly scrolling through online ferry schedules and trying to plot a route by train, boat and taxi to a new architecture museum on the southern island of Omishima. It was also a long-standing interest — OK, maybe an infatuation — with the work of Japanese architect Toyo Ito.

Since the economic crisis of 2008, there's been a substantial backlash against the idea that critics should write exclusively, or even mostly, about stand-alone buildings by prominent architects. We've found broader and more complex ways to explore the relationship between architecture and society. The culture of "starchitecture," that overused if sometimes bluntly effective term, has lost its luster.......Continue Reading

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