The World Health Organization (WHO) has launched an international design competition to redevelop and extend its 1966 headquarters in Geneva. The new facilities, a 25,000 square metre office block and 700-space underground car park will replace a series of smaller additions, hastily constructed in response to various health crises in the years after the main building was completed.

In addition, the new building will facilitate a redevelopment of the original building, housing extra staff while work on the Jean Tschumi-designed building is carried out.

Read on for more details on the competition

The Moscow Metropolitan is the second busiest metro line in the world, transporting 2.4 billion passengers a year. However despite this, it is a long way short of being the most extensive, with Beijing, Shanghai, London, New York, Tokyo, and Madrid all surpassing it in terms of total track length.

In order to rectify this, in 2012 Moscow launched an ambitious expansion plan, aiming to add over 150km of tracks and 70 new stations by 2020. For the first time, they have launched a competition to design two of these new stations in the South-West of the city, in the Solntsevo and Novo-Peredelkino Districts.

Read on for more about the Moscow Metro and the competition

The Science Museum in London has announced two shortlists of high-profile architects in its competitions to design new Mathematics and Medicine galleries. Due to open by 2018, the new galleries will double the space inside the museum. Among the shortlisted practices are Zaha Hadid Architects, Amanda Levete Architects, Wilkinson Eyre and Caruso St John. Winners for both galleries are expected to be announced in early August.

Read on after the break for the full shortlists

London based Heatherwick Studio have won a competition to design a Learning Hub at Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. The construction of the Hub, part of a £360 million scheme, will be the first redevelopment of its campus in twenty years. Having already won the BCA Green Mark Platinum Award for Sustainability from the Singaporean Government, the design seeks to redefine the aspiration of a university building. Within this new context the purpose of the university is to "foster togetherness and sociability" so that students can meet and learn in a space that encourages collaboration.

Today the President of Estonia announced the Spanish firm Nieto Sobejano Arquitectos as the winner in an international competition to design a new Cultural Centre in Estonia. The Arvo Pärt Centre is dedicated to the Estonian composer and will house an archive of his work, making it available to researchers and enthusiasts at the new site in Laulasmaa.

Nieto Sobejano Arquitectos came first from a shortlist of 20 architects, including names such as Zaha Hadid Architects and COOP HIMMELB(L)AU. Second and third prize went to US practice Allied Works Architecture and Kavakava Architects of Estonia respectively. See images of the top three projects after the break.

+ 2

Building Pictures, a Portuguese website specialized in architecture videos, decided to celebrate the year of Portuguese architecture by creating a competition inviting architects, artists, designers, directors, and students to submit their favorite spaces. 31 videos answered the challenge and shared their experiences and inspiring places. The jury selected three winners, whose beautiful videos can be seen after the break.

SOM, working alongside Danish practice Entasis Arkitekter, has been selected to design a new residential building in Gothenburg that will be Sweden's tallest tower. Coming out on top against an international shortlist that included Zaha Hadid Architects, SOM's 230m tall proposal 'The Pole Star' features four connected prisms which twist 90 degrees near the top.

The competition, run by developers Serneke, called for proposals for a 32,000 square meter mixed-use masterplan, including a 200+ meter residential tower, in Gothenburg's Lindholmen area. A particular focus for the jury was for proposals to "demonstrate how the skyscraper can be integrated into the structure of the neighborhood," adding that "the building should be a part of the area’s social and architectural context, not stand as a solitary monolith."

Read more about the jury's decision after the break

+ 6

Amsterdam-based firm NL Architects have been selected to design Arnhem's new ArtA Center, a new public arts cluster that will house the Arnhem Museum and Focus Cinema. Coming out on top in a shortlist which included BIG, Kengo Kuma & Associates and SO-IL, NL Architects' terraced design features a rooftop urban park with views over the Rhine, subterranean movie halls and an adaptable, open plan stepped museum.

The jury's decision commends the design for the way it "radiates enthusiasm", and the "simple and clear" concept, as well as praising the "inventive and innovative" mentality of the architects. 

More on the design and the jury's selection after the break

+ 12

In our progressively digitized world, factories are often left behind. Outdated and no longer capable of serving their original purpose, these vast spaces become vacant and full of potential. A recent Young Architect Competition (YAC), entitled Space to Culture, recognized this trend and called upon young minds to turn such a factory in Granarolo, Bologna into a center for culture and entertainment. The competition asked entrants to focus on the idea of temporality and ensure the re-purposed factory's longevity through dynamic and flexible spaces. To see the winning entries, continue after the break.

Prodigy Network have selected the winners of the crowdsourcing design competitions for their 17John 'Cotel' in New York, including winners for the design of the public interior spaces and the private rooms. The Cotel concept is intended to meet the changing needs of the modern business traveler; providing living spaces somewhere between a long-term apartment and a short term hotel, but also flexible spaces that can be used for work and meetings.

The crowdsourced competitions were run via Prodigy Network's Design Lab website, and judging was conducted with a mixture of public voting and jury selection. "The winners of the 17John competition were intuitive to the needs of travelers, creative in the interactive spaces and understood the function of extended stay residences," said Prodigy Network Founder Rodrigo Nino. Read on after the break to see the winning proposals.

+ 15

Swedish based Mandaworks + Hosper Sweden have recently won an international competition to find the "best comprehensive urbanistic proposals for connecting the city centre of Trenčín with both waterfronts of the River Váh." The winning scheme - Tracing Trenčín - "is not a proposal which is noticeably stunning" but is, according to Thomas Matta, deputy chair of the jury, "considerate to the existing structure of the historic core of the city."

The top prize in CANactions' 2014 Youth Competition has been awarded to Valentyn Sharovatov of Unika Architecture & Urbanism, for his "Extrasmall Shopping Mall", a design for a miniature shopping center on a tight site on Lviv. CANactions is Ukraine's largest architectural event, running since 2008.

The design by Sharovatov activates a neglected public square, using the draw of cafes and retail to regenerate this small corner of Lviv. More on the design after the break.

The University of California, Santa Cruz have selected Tod Williams Billie Tsien Architects to design their new Institute of the Arts and Sciences building, a 30,000 square foot building containing exhibition spaces, seminar rooms, studios and offices, a café, and ample public gathering areas.

Set into a natural landscape of redwood trees and with views over Monterey Bay, Williams & Tsien's building avoids monumental or sculptural gestures, instead creating a dialogue with the site, with a series of paths, bridges and open spaces criss-crossing the site to provide a rich network of spaces.

More on the design after the break.

The shortlist for the 2014 Wolfson Economics Prize has been announced, rewarding five teams who rose to the challenge to design new garden cities which address the UK's growing housing shortage. The topic of garden cities is becoming a major focus for the UK's planners and architects, with proposals by the government for a new garden town of 15,000 homes at Ebbsfleet providing the starting point for debate.

However despite the debate within the built environment professions, with some arguing that garden cities are best left in the past, a survey commissioned by the Wolfson Economics Prize in conjunction with the award found that 72% of the British public believed there was a serious shortage of housing in the UK, and 70% believed that garden cities were a better way of delivering this housing compared to how - and where - housing is currently delivered. The five shortlisted teams will receive £10,000 to further develop their proposals and aim for the grand prize of £250,000.

Read on after the break for the list of proposals

The Guggenheim Helsinki Design Competition, first open international competition organized by the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation, was officially launched today. Submission deadline for stage one is September 10. A jury that includes Mark Wigley, Jeanne Gang, Juan Herreros, and Yoshiharu Tsukamoto will announce the shortlist during Fall 2014.

Yesterday, US Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Secretary Shaun Donovan announced OMA, BIG and four other teams as the winner of "Rebuild by Design", a competition aimed at rebuilding areas affected by Hurricane Sandy focusing on resilience, sustainability and and livability.

In total, HUD have allocated $920 million to the six projects in New York, New Jersey and Long Island to enable the completion of this vision.

Read more about the winning schemes after the break

+ 2

Our friends at The Morpholio Project have just announced that submissions are open for Pinup 2014 - a free competition for students and young professionals to submit up to three digital images of their studio, 3D-printed, or unbuilt work. All work should acknowledge the existence of technology and question why/how "we harness it as designers." The guest jury includes participants from Fast Company, Metropolis Magazine, Columbia GSAPP, and even our very own Editor-in-Chief, David Basulto. Learn how to apply after the break!

Just as the 2014 winners of the Young Architects Program (YAP) in Chile and Korea were announced this week, the architecture collective of Orizzontale was crowned victorious for the program’s MAXXI edition in Rome.

The winning scheme, dubbed “8 1/2,” will be a translucent wall of recycled beer kegs and an inhabitable timber podium that will be used as a stage for summer events within the confines of the MAXXI piazza. Shaded during the day and illuminated at night, the glass wall is intended to inspire people to rest, play, watch and listen.

KCAP has recently won a shared first place title in the Eteläpuisto Park competition for the city of Tampere, Finland. The competition brief specified that entries were required to create an “urban residential area and provide for programs suitable for the city structure and for the landscape.” Recreational access to the nearby lake shore was required, as was enabling access to Tampere’s Hämeenpuisto Esplanade. KCAP’s residential park proposal was chosen unanimously by the competition jury from six total entries.

The Museum of Modern Art and MoMA PS1 has announced a partnership with the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art (MMCA) in Seoul that has expanded the international Young Architects Program (YAP) to South Korea. Just as YAP presents opportunities for emerging architects to design and build temporary installations in New York, Chile, Rome and Istanbul, YAP Korea will offer the MMCA’s outdoor Museum Plaza as the summer installation site.

Already, a winner has been chosen from 26 submissions to serve as the inaugural YAP Korea installation. With completion planned for July 8, winning team Moon Ji Bang (Threshold) is amidst the final preparations for mystical, mythology-inspired installation that will transcend visitors from the daily hustle into a cloud-like landscape of air balloon structures.