Danny Forster

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Daniel Keith Forster (born September 19, 1977) is an

Science Channel series Build It Bigger
; as the creator and executive producer of the Emmy-winning Rising: Rebuilding Ground Zero; and as the principal of DFDS, a New York-based design firm.

Early life and education

Born in

The Elisabeth Morrow School and went on to graduate from the Dwight-Englewood School in 1995.[3] After, he attended Wesleyan University, graduating with honors in 1999 with a BA in Art and Architectural History. After college, Forster worked as a real estate agent in New York City for several years. He was also the founder of UrbanFilter, which was later acquired by Citi Habitats. He then moved to Cambridge, Massachusetts, to matriculate at Harvard University's Graduate School of Design. He earned his Master's in Architecture in 2006. His master's thesis proposed a vertical urban campus containing both apartments and office space in a post-college collaborative living and working environment.[citation needed
]

Television host

Forster's television career began in the midst of his studies at

voiceover narrated documentary series about outsized construction projects underway around the world. The new episodes[6] were a success for the Discovery Channel, which subsequently gave Forster his own show, Build It Bigger.[7]

Build It Bigger ran for five seasons, during which it became the highest rated show on the

Directors Guild of America Award.[8] The show took Forster and a camera crew around the world to investigate pioneering architectural and engineering projects, and put them in cultural, historical, and environmental context. Build It Bigger brought Forster to more than fifty countries.[citation needed
]

Television producer

In 2007, Forster became an executive producer as well as the host of

LEED platinum-certified eco-town in America.[citation needed
]

Forster's next major producing project was the Emmy Award-winning documentary miniseries Rising: Rebuilding Ground Zero,

Promotional Announcement.[14]

In 2014, Forster was the executive producer and on-screen host of a three-part documentary series for

Discovery International called How China Works.[15][16]

The show focused on urbanization, innovation, and the growth of the middle class. The show examined, among other topics, the expansion of high-speed rail, China's fiscal policy in the face of the 2008 financial crisis, changes in the diet of the middle class, and the government's ambitious space program. How China Works received seven million hits in its first six hours of being available online.[citation needed]

Film producer and director

Beginning in 2013, Forster directed and produced a feature-length documentary on the South Korean photographer and businessman known as

Prague National Gallery,[17] the Louvre, Versailles,[18] Grand Central Terminal,[19]
among others) and possible explanations of its origin.

The project was shelved when, in the spring of 2014, after an investigation into the disastrous sinking of the ferry Sewol, prosecutors issued an arrest warrant for Ahae, the ferry's de facto owner. Ahae subsequently went into hiding; in July, South Korean police reported that he had been found dead.[20][21]

Forster has also written and directed several real-estate marketing films for clients such as the Macklowe Properties and the Howard Hughes Corporation. His film for Macklowe, to promote the multibillion-dollar skyscraper 432 Park Avenue, received notice in the New York Times for its inventiveness and scope.[22]

Made in 2013, in conjunction with marketing agency DBOX, this 4-minute, $1 million movie is the most expensive and complex real estate marketing film ever made. Rather than touting statistics and amenities, the movie evokes the building's place in a larger art historical and cultural lineage that encompasses architecture, film, dance, sculpture, painting, music, and even—through the appearance of tightrope walker Philippe Petit—performance art.[citation needed]

Forster directed a slightly more traditional marketing film for 510 W. 22nd Street,[23] while continuing to focus more on story, context, and atmosphere than on specs. For the Howard Hughes Corporation, his filmic vision of the future Gateway Towers by Richard Meier helped shift the perception of Honolulu, Hawaii, from a mid-brow tourist haven to an epicenter of high-end architecture and culture.[24]

Architectural designer

In 2007, Forster founded the eponymous architecture design firm Danny Forster Design Studio (DFDS).

LEED Gold certified home in Northern Michigan, which was completed in 2008. The home, a lake house in Omena, Michigan, has since been featured in Architectural Review,[26] Architectural Record,[27] and Traverse Magazine.[28]

DFDS, headquartered in Manhattan, has a small portfolio of New York City-based projects including brand hotels and apartment/condo renovations of various sizes. One of the past projects in New York includes a penthouse renovation for Lord of the Rings director Peter Jackson. A current project in New York City is the apartment renovation for pop star Taylor Swift. Past theoretical and non-realized projects include a 280,000 square-foot mixed-use tower for the American Bible Society. In 2012, DFDS worked on a 30-story Courtyard by Marriott on the World Trade Center's Southeastern edge, which has been called "a standout even among the starchitecture of Ground Zero"[29] and "will boast a faceted façade that makes the 317-room hotel look like it floats above the National September 11 Memorial."[30]

DFDS then worked on the design for one of the first North American

transformative redevelopment of Manhattan's Far West Side.[32]

Lecturer of architecture

In 2009, Forster began his academic career, returning to the

Tribute Center on the campus of the WTC. And at Baku, Azerbaijan (2012), Forster's Syracuse students were asked to design a new arts and culture building as part of the expansion of a new International School in Baku
.

Speaker

Since 2006, Forster has lectured nationally and internationally on architecture, education and sustainability to audiences as large as 10,000 and as small as a fifth grade class in

Discovery Education
, acting as their engineering and architecture expert and promoting STEM education at events around the country and the world.

He was the keynote speaker at the 2008 Solid Works World Expo, the largest 3-D conference in the world. He also keynoted Construct 2008, an architecture/engineering conference, and spoke at the Copenmind conference in Copenhagen, and delivered the 2008 commencement address for the Dwight-Englewood School in New Jersey. In 2011 and 2012, Forster hosted the Edison Awards, which honors "top innovators around the world."[33]

In 2013, Forster spoke at the Global Minds conference in Yekaterinburg, Russia, on behalf of Russian bid to host the EXPO 2020. In 2014, Forster delivered a TED talk in Traverse City, Michigan, "Looking vs. Reading: Filmmaking Architecture”[34] and spoke at the 34th annual Future of Education Technology Conference. He was host as well as speaker for Chicago Ideas Week in 2013 ("Creative Process: A Method to the Madness”)[35] and 2014 ("Creative Process: The Impulsive, Calculated, Evolving, Joyful, Maddening Journey from Idea to Reality”).[36]

References

  1. ^ "GEORGE FORSTER obituary on". The New York Times. Retrieved September 14, 2015.
  2. ^ "Alice M. Forster obituary on". The New York Times. Retrieved September 14, 2015.
  3. ^ "Dec. 5 'First Thursday': That's Entertainment!", Dwight-Englewood School, November 30, 2013. Retrieved June 14, 2018. "Danny Forster '95, Host, Science Channel's Build It Bigger."
  4. ^ Weiss, Joanna (February 19, 2006). "Laying the groundwork for a TV career". Boston Globe. Retrieved September 14, 2015.
  5. ^ Extreme Engineering, April 13, 2003, retrieved September 14, 2015
  6. ^ "Danny Forster, Extreme Host". archinect.com. Retrieved September 14, 2015.
  7. ^ Build It Bigger, July 10, 2007, retrieved September 14, 2015
  8. ^ Build It Bigger, July 10, 2007, retrieved September 14, 2015
  9. ^ Build It Bigger: Rebuilding Greensburg, November 15, 2008, retrieved September 14, 2015
  10. ^ Rising: Rebuilding Ground Zero, January 1, 2000, retrieved September 14, 2015
  11. ^ "Rising: Rebuilding Ground Zero/Steven Spielberg". August 25, 2011. Retrieved September 14, 2015.
  12. ^ "Steven Spielberg's 'Rising: Rebuilding Ground Zero': Constructing One World Trade Center (Exclusive Video)". The Hollywood Reporter. August 22, 2011. Retrieved September 14, 2015.
  13. ^ "Interview: "Rising: Rebuilding Ground Zero" Executive Producer Danny Forster". thefutoncritic.com. Retrieved September 14, 2015.
  14. ^ "The Emmy Awards – Winners of The 33rd Annual News & Documentary Emmy Awards – The Winners". emmyonline.org. Retrieved September 14, 2015.
  15. ^ "五洲传播中心与美国探索频道联合打造《运行中国》新媒体上线仅6小时点击量突破700万". mp.weixin.qq.com. Retrieved September 14, 2015.
  16. ^ "Discovery Channel launches new 'Hour China' program". CCTV America. November 30, 2001. Retrieved September 14, 2015.
  17. ^ "Ahae Exhibitions". korrenbethany.prosite.com. Retrieved September 14, 2015.
  18. ^ "AHAE. Fenêtre sur l'extraordinaire – Château de Versailles". chateauversailles.fr. Archived from the original on March 4, 2016. Retrieved September 14, 2015.
  19. ^ "New Photo Exhibit by Ahae Opens in Grand Central Station". Retrieved September 14, 2015.
  20. ISSN 0190-8286
    . Retrieved September 14, 2015.
  21. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved September 14, 2015.{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link
    )
  22. ISSN 0362-4331
    . Retrieved September 14, 2015.
  23. ^ "510 West 22nd Street [HD] – DBOX". dboxcreative. Retrieved November 12, 2012 – via YouTube.
  24. ^ "Gateway Towers by Richard Meier". wardvillagegateway.com. Retrieved September 14, 2015.
  25. ^ "PROJECTS". Danny Forster Design Studio. Retrieved September 14, 2015.
  26. ^ "Michigan Lake House, USA by Danny Forster". The Architectural Review. August 3, 2009.
  27. ^ "Top Ten Reader Photos". archrecord.construction.com. Retrieved September 14, 2015.
  28. ^ "Danny Forster's Cool, Green House". August 17, 2009. Retrieved September 14, 2015.
  29. ^ "A surge in hotels near World Trade Center". New York Daily News. Retrieved September 14, 2015.
  30. ^ "A surge in hotels near World Trade Center". New York Daily News. Retrieved September 14, 2015.
  31. ISSN 0099-9660
    . Retrieved September 14, 2015.
  32. ^ "Hudson Yards New York". hudsonyardsnewyork.com. Retrieved September 14, 2015.
  33. ^ "Edison Awards™ – Honoring Innovations and Innovators". edisonawards.com. Retrieved September 14, 2015.
  34. ^ "Danny Forster profile". Tedx Talks. Retrieved October 15, 2014 – via YouTube.
  35. ^ "Creative Process: A Method to the Madness". Chicago Ideas Week. Retrieved September 1, 2014.
  36. ^ "Creative Process: The Impulsive, Calculated, Evolving, Joyful, Maddening Journey from Idea to Reality". Chicago Ideas Week. Retrieved September 1, 2014.

External links

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