Concerned about the fate of the art market? What about the art collectors market? We'll be better able to assess the latter after tomorrow evening, when the SCOPE Hamptons art fair kicks off with an auction not of paintings or prints but of art collectors themselves. The first ever "Collector Mentorship Auction" will put up for bid an hour of art mentorship from seasoned collectors, including Beth Rudin DeWoody, Melva Bucksbaum, Adam Lindemann, and Bob Colacello. All of the collectors are donating their time to mentor less experienced art enthusiasts, and the proceeds will benefit the two projects currently backed by the SCOPE Foundation: The Girl Project and The Arctic Circle Project.

Checking in for one last time on the London Festival of Architecture, which packed up and finished off this past Sunday, the event's planners are apparently pretty pleased with the turnout. According to Building, more than 250,000 people attended the hundreds of events associated with the festival, from the outdoor, temporary structures, to the exhibitions, to the conferences and lectures, making it, by far, both the largest and most popular architecture fest on the planet (assuming, of course, that there aren't any merpeople celebrating feats of building deep within the sea). Here's a bit from the guy who put it all together, Peter Murray:

"Architecture is now at the forefront of the cultural agenda, and the festival has show that it is an essential consideration for the many rather than a specialist interest for the few," said festival director Murray.

He added that many areas within London and organisations not included this year have been asking to be involved in the next of the biennial festivals in 2010.

Last month, we told you about Shoot the Day, online photo community PhotoShelter's plan to set aside this Sunday, July 20, to "focus energy and close the gap between buyer demand and what photographers are shooting," and so it is almost upon us. PhotoShelter has selected the lucky 20 photographers who will spend the day on all-expenses-paid shoots in five image categories, while hundreds of others join photo editors and photo buyers in a day of demonstrations and panel discussions at the Shoot! The Day event in New York City. Among the speakers is aphotoeditor.com's Rob Haggart, former director of photography at Men's Journal, who will present "Editorial Bootcamp" (on how photographers can get the attention of photo editors) before leading a discussion with photo editors from the likes of Time and Travel+Leisure. Rachel Rein, senior art buyer at ad agency Hill Holliday will present "From Start to Finish: Finding the Perfect Stock Photos for a Major Campaign." Those who can't make it to the sponsored events can participate by spending the day taking a whole lot of photos or, for the lazier among us, watching Blowup on DVD.

The Olympic Games (and their latest troupe of quirky mascots) are almost upon us, and the School of Visual Arts' MFA Design Criticism department is celebrating with an evening of sports-themed design reading at KGB Bar in New York's East Village. The fun begins next Tuesday, July 22, at 7 p.m. Check out the all-star lineup:

Michael Bierut, co-founder of Design Observer, laments stadium architecture's tendency to nostalgia. Metropolis contributing editor Jennifer Kabat scrutinizes Nike's new uniforms for the Chinese Olympics team. ESPN sports uniform critic Paul Lukas explores the cultural history of the humble baseball cap. Finally, The New York Times car critic, Phil Patton considers the curious conflation of celebrity athlete shoes and cars.

If you're heading to Chicago this weekend to catch the big Pitchfork music fest, we highly recommend skipping the massive, sweaty crowds for a good chunk of the day and heading over to the Flatstock 17 poster convention. Because really, who needs to see a band when you can just go get a fantastic, limited edition screenprinted poster promoting said group? We say this, of course, in all seriousness, given that our house is full of posters for events we never attended and bands we don't really even like all that much. But whatever your preferences are, if you're in town, it's well worth your time checking it out and meeting some of the best designers working today. But before you go, we highly recommend heading straight to the source by checking out this forum on American Poster Institute's site for a whole slew of Flatstock details.

Zaragoza isn't just a lot of fun to say, it's also the Spanish host town of the world's largest water festival, Expo Zaragoza, which through September 14 immerses visitors in an astounding number of water-themed events with the help of "Fluvi" (at left), a hydrophilic mascot who looks like a cross between E.T. and a loquacious blue hammer. As part of the festival, Zaragoza has acquired a new architectural landmark, the pedestrian bridge pavilion (pictured above) designed by Zaha Hadid with Patrik Schumacher. Organized around four "pods" that both distribute the bridge's weight and enclose separate exhibition spaces, Hadid's Zaragoza Bridge Pavilion is her firm's first completed bridge project.

While leaders of Expo Zaragoza describe the 853-foot-long and 98-foot-wide bridge as "gladiolus-shaped," Hadid emphasizes the project's structural ambition, fluidity, and dynamic nature. The pavilion houses an interactive exhibition "Water, A Unique Resource" designed by Ralph Appelbaum Associates, and the structure was created with an eye to the sustainability issues the show and the broader Expo address. "We designed an envelope for the Bridge Pavilion that encloses the exhibition spaces yet can be permeated by natural elements. The internal micro-environment varies with the external climate and requires minimal cooling or heating infrastructure," says Hadid. "In particular, we considered the local Cierzo wind when designing the Bridge Pavilion's skin. A variety of openings convey and direct air into the building's interior—cooling visitors in the heat of the summer."

Elsewhere in the UK, and just a little bit of a subject we've promised not to over-cover, we quickly peek back over the fence at the London Festival of Architecture and Wallpaper's coverage of it. They've put together a couple of very easily digestible reports from the field about the fest, as well as including the real meat and potatoes everyone's always after: lots of photos. In the first chapter, they offer up a bunch of quick details on the fest itself and give you a sort of pictorial tour of what you'd see as you approached the goings-ons. In chapter two, they start selecting their picks of the best of the best and what not to miss, should you be fortunate enough to attend (and, again, with lots of great photos). And so we leave you with both parts, and the suggestion that you check in with Wallpaper from time to time to see more, and then we promise to leave the subject alone, as to not over do it.

On Wednesday evening, many art lovers not dining at David Zwirner for the Friends of the High Line benefit could be found several blocks east at the Strand, where painter Christopher Wool (above, at far left) and writer/musician Richard Hell (center) sat down to talk about words with Barry Schwabsky (far right), the poet and art critic. Hell and Wool, which only sounds like an unstoppable vaudeville duo, teamed up to create Psychopts (JMC & GHB Editions), a slim paperback that collects 57 images of deceptive word pairs that caught Hell's attention over decades of reading. Out of the corner of his eye, he would spy "incest." The word was "nicest." He saw "Sinatra" in "sirens" and mistook "salve" for "slave," while "facts" turned into "farts."

"I've been collecting these pairs of words for years, but hadn't been able to figure out how to use them," Hell told the capacity crowd, which included painter Dana Schutz and a group of art students visiting from Stockholm. "For 30 years these things had just been mildly frustrating me." The idea for the collaboration was born after Hell and Wool, already friends, saw the 2006 exhibition at the New York York Public Library on artist/writer collaborations. They spent more than a year of Thursdays together to choose word pairs from Hell's list, experiment with typefaces, and figure out how to combine them into a single image. At first, Hell said, they "looked too much like design, something that could be in an advertisement." A breakthrough came when they turned to one of Wool's favorite tools. "We attacked the words with a Xerox machine," said Hell. The resulting images (like the salve/slave example, pictured above) wobble and glow with the ghostly fuzz of degraded copies.

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Before the days of "design hotels" and Raymond Loewy-appointed Concordes there were ocean liners, crossing and cruising while playing out a luxurious game of oneupsmanship when it came to speed, size, and over-the-top decorative flourishes (verre églomisé, anyone?). This evening in New York City, Christie's will auction 257 lots worth of ocean liner history, from a cork-filled canvas life preserver recovered from the wreck of the Titanic and a rare list of second class passengers aboard the doomed maiden voyage to a 1935 lithograph of Cassandre's iconic Normandie poster (pictured above, at far left) and a life ring from the ship.

Other items in the sale that caught our eye include a dashing French Line uniform, with a red wool "mousse jacket" that features a carapace of metal buttons and a certain Marc Jacobs flair; a trio of nautical-themed Hermès scarves (also designed for the French Line); and a mid-century French modernist chandelier (pictured above) made by Gilbert Poillerat for the André Arbus-designed first class smoking room on board the France. Meanwhile, in our heads we've designed the perfect gentleman's study around the set of four running lights, complete with protruding wires, salvaged from the mast of the Norway. For those who can't make it to tonight's sale, which will decide the fate of the only ice bucket we've ever coveted, we advise you to curl up with maritime historian extraordinaire John Maxtone-Graham's latest book, a fascinating and beautiful look at Normandie: France's Legendary Art Deco Ocean Liner.

New York City, summon all of your tensegrity and prepare to get geodesic. Today kicks off a Buckminster Fuller-filled summer in the Big Apple, as the Center for Architecture unveils Fuller's Fly's Eye Dome (pictured at left, at LaGuardia Park), courtesy of the Buckminster Fuller Institute and Max Protetch Gallery, in conjunction with the NYC Department of Transportation's Temporary Art Program and Friends of LaGuardia Place. Meanwhile, starting tonight and through September the Center for Architecture transforms into "The Dymaxion Study Center," displaying over 400 volumes of books by and about Fuller and hosting a variety of events featuring Fuller's friends and colleagues, including architect Shoji Sadao and designer Edwin Schlossberg.

On Wednesday evening in Chelsea, Max Protetch celebrates its newest exhibition, which includes Fuller prototypes, drawings, and photographs, as well as works from his art collection (turns out he was a de Kooning fan!), while a couple of blocks away, Sebastian + Barquet is showing Fuller's sculptures and prints. And, of course, mark your calendar for Thursday's opening of "Buckminster Fuller: Starting with the Universe," the Whitney Museum's exhibition devoted to the inventor, designer, environmentalist, and humanitarian. This may be your only chance to see Bucky's teardrop-shaped Dymaxion car! Here's a video preview of what to expect, courtesy of the Whitney.