Danish office 3XN is “on fire” this year: they won the competition for the Randers Museum of Art, the competition for a new cultural center in Aarhus, the Saxo Bank won the RIBA International Award, and Kim Herforth Nielsen (partner and founder) received Denmark’s highest Architectural Honour, the C.F. Hansen Medal.

And now, they won the competition for the Frederiksberg Courthouse in Denmark, an extension to a neo-classical building. The new building follows the line of the neighborhood’s architecture, reinterpreted in a contemporary style, following the horizontal lines, materials and roof.

From the public square right next to the building, the heavy volume looks lighter as the opening in the corner give a sense of cantilevering.

More images and the architect’s description after the break:

As you may know, to celebrate 25,000 fans on our Facebook Fans (we are now over 29,000!), we launched a competition to look for the best architectural animation video. We received many submissions and now it’s time for you to decide the winner. You have till December 6 to cast your vote.

The good thing is you may vote once per day, so come back here and vote to support your favorite entry! Results will be published on December 7 and the winner will receive a brand new iPod Touch. See all the videos after the break and startvoting right now!

To see the videos in a larger size, just click on them to launch them on YouTube.

Spanish architect Jordi Badia, BAAS, shared with us a recent entry for a competition, awarded with the 1st prize.

This office has been doing a very good work lately, clean lines, pure materials… I recommend checking out the recently opened CAM Framis museum in Barcelona.

Project description and mor eimages after the break.

The competition hosted by the Northern Ontario School of Architecture (now known as Laurentian Architecture) searched for ideas for a new school in northern Ontario. Winners were selected at the end of October. This competition generated ideas which pushed the enevolope, questioning the roles of schools of architecture. What are the physical characteristics? What are the more abstract, theoretical ones? How can this new school satisfy the unique nature of Northern Ontario?

There are two distinct aspects proposed for the school that were to be carefully considered. First, it will be providing a dual-stream education – students can study in either French or English. The second is that it will deeply engage with and learn from the First Nation communities throughout the province. Winners after the break. More information on the competition’s official website.

The AR Emerging Awards have awarded the most promising young practices from around the world. Previous versions of this award confirms it: Sou Fujimoto, Miro Rivera, Plot (BIG), Pezo von Elrrichshausen and more, as you can see on our coverage last year.

These year, 4 projects were awarded:

• Bridge School, Xiashi, China by Li Xiaodong Atelier
• Knocktopher Friary, Knocktopher, Ireland by ODOS Architects (see more projects from ODOS Architects on ArchDaily)
• Curtain Door, Surat, India by Matharoo Associates
• Sports Research Centre, Guijo de Granadilla, Spain by Jose Maria Sanchez Garcia

The selection this year was very good… and it even included a door.

As for my favorite, I still can’t decide between the school and the sports center. Both show a new arrangement of the program, and affect the landscape in different scales.

Which one is your favorite, and why?

After the break, more photos and info about the awarded projects presented at Architectural Review:

Toya Design was awarded first prize for their design of an Archaeological Reserve in Poland. The form and function of the building were determined by parameters of founded archaeological substance and historical, architectural and natural context in Ostrow Tumski in Poznan, Poland. In this way, the building aims to accurately complete the existing backdrop of the area.

More about the winning project and more images after the break.

From England, Norway, Netherlands and China. Some great Cultural Centers have been featured in ArchDaily. In case you missed the first part, check it our right here.

The international jury for the Piranesi Award met on 20 and 21 November 2009 in the premises of Mestna galerija in Piran, in the context of the Piran Days of Architecture. The members of the jury were: Maruša Zorec, Milton Braga, Robert McCarter, Saša Randić, Wang Shu, John Wardle, Aaron Tan, Shelley McNamara, Yvonne Farrell and Diébédo Francis Kéré.

The Piranesi Award 2009 was awarded to deca ARCHITECTURE from Greece for the project Aloni House in Antiparos. You can see the two Honorable Mentions and the Student’s Honorable Mention after the break. For more information, visit the competition’s official website.

NL Architects have designed a stepped volume for the office of SOZAWE (Welfare Department and Work Agency) in the city of Groningen. The design includes an open marketplace which supports the architects’ intentions of creating an “open, inviting and sustainable place.” This public square allows interaction between the department and its customers, and the terracing condition of the building creates cross relations between floors. Each of the nine office floors open to an individual terrace, allowing workers to enjoy fresh air and take in the view of the city.

More images after the break.

Qi Pan, a PhD student at the University of Cambridge, has developed an interesting technique to model objects using a webcam.

SHIFTboston is calling on all visionaries to submit his and her most provocative ideas for the City of Boston. Think: WHAT IF this could happen in Boston? SHIFTboston seeks to collect visions that aim to enhance and electrify the urban experience in Boston. We want innovative, radical ideas for new city elements such as: public art, landscape, architecture, urban intervention and transportation. Competitors could explore topics such as: the future city, energy efficiency and ecological urbanism. YOU TELL US.

The 160m long wave shaped roof frame for Zaha Hadid’s Aquatic Center has just been lifted and lowered into place, marking one of the most complex engineering and construction challenges of the Olympic Park for the London 2012 games. Weighing in at over 3,000 tons, the gigantic steel trusses rest on a mere three concrete supports to provide open space for the facility’s large racing and diving pools. The roof is also designed to stretch, twist and contract in response to the effects of snow, wind and changing temperatures.

More about the construction and a video to follow.

The Singapore Pavilion at the Shanghai World Expo in 2010 is to be called Urban Symphony – a tribute to how Singapore houses a delicate harmony of cultures coexisting together in a city-state.

Designed by Kay Ngee Tan Architects, the theme is best expressed in the pavilion’s architecture, one which evokes images of a musical box. It forms an orchestra of elements and a symphony for the senses – from the choreography of the plaza’s water fountain, the rhythm of fenestrations on the façade, the interplay of sounds and visuals, to the mélange of flora on the roof garden.

Pictures and exhibits of Singapore adorn the way to the atrium space and main hall of the first floor, where visitors will enjoy various activities; taking in performances right up to the expanse of the second floor’s column-free open space. Topping off Singapore’s reputation as a much-admired garden city is the rooftop’s A Garden in the Sky, which ably captures the essence of life in Singapore. More info in the pavilion’s official website. More images and a video after the break.

For years, Northern Virginia’s Four Mile Run has functioned as a flood control channel and a border between the City of Alexandria and Arlington County. More recently, growing community interest in revitalizing and celebrating the Run has resulted in the Four Mile Run Restoration Master Plan. The plan outlines a broad range of ambitious, feasible goals to restore the ecology of the Run while re-establishing it as a cherished park space and a means of stitching together communities.

Probably, the first place outside our homes where we spend a large time of the day. So to finish this week’s Round Up, we bring you our second part of previously featured Kindergardens. See the first part here.

German office rasmussen | brunke | sauer shared with us their design of the new administrative building for BSU in Hamburg, Germany. It was an invited competition and they won the first prize ex aequo with three other offices (Sauerbruch Hutton, Behnisch Architects and GAP). More images and architect’s description after the break.

The architecture firm Bohlin Cywinski Jackson believes that “the sensuality of place, the emotive qualities of materials, and the ability to give pleasure and insight, to comfort and to transport can produce humane and spirited architecture.” Whether designing corporate headquarters for Pixar Animation Studios, the Software Engineering Institute for Carnegie Mellon University, the new Apple Stores in New York, Chicago, and Tokyo, or the twelve wooded retreats shown in this book, the firm’s architecture is alive to the subtleties of place, man-made or natural, and to the rich possibilities of materials and the means of construction.

Yesterday the mayor of Rotterdam, Ahmed Aboutaleb and city councilor Hamit Karakus officially started the construction of the new Rotterdam Market Hall (previously featured here). The arched building located in the centre of Rotterdam, developed by Provast and designed by MVRDV is a hybrid of public market and apartment building.

The project with a total of 100.000 m2 is set to be completed in 2014 and part of the current regeneration of Rotterdam’s post war centre. Project developer Provast realizes the building, Unibail Rodamco invested in the shops and restaurants whilst Housing Corporation Vesteda will manage the rental apartments, making the building a socially integrated part of the city.

More images after the break.

Coop Himmelb(l)au has designed a temporary mobile performance space for the Bavarian State Opera in Munich, Germany. The pavilion will house performances during the annual Opera Festival in 2010, and once that festival is over, the pavilion will be reassembled in various locations. Designed to “give the impression of a quieter environment,” the pavilion reduces the apparent noise to create a ‘zone of silence’ where visitors can sense a change in the soundscape.

More images and more about the pavilion after the break.

Twenty years after the Romanian government was overthrown and its dictator, Nicolae Ceauşescu executed, Anca Trandafirescu erected a “monument ” to that dark chapter in the otherwise peaceful events of Central and Eastern Europe ’s 1989 revolutions. Trandafirescu, an architect and assistant professor in architecture at the University of Michigan, designed and constructed the large inflatable, inhabitable structure ―in the iconic shape of the head of a toppled statue ―that was displayed on the Piata Victoriei (Victory Plaza) in Timişoara from November 3 -7, 2009.

This location was the site of the first large demonstrations in the country and that led to the subsequent fall of the Ceauşescu dictatorship. The head itself is without specific identity and is meant to signify, rather than a particular hero, a toppled everyman who has in the course of twenty years following the revolution continued to await a government free from rulers of the past regime.

The name HOT AIR refers to both the unusually warm temperatures in Romania during that special week in December 1989, which helped to bring citizens out into the streets to rally against the government; and also to the large amount of rhetoric surrounding the events that ensued.

The inflatable monument was erected in association with the city ’s Young Artists/Young Democracy expo and the American-Romanian Music Festival and was a venue for visitation,conversation,and a bit of recreation by the public.It kicked off a series of planned celebrations commemorating the events of December 1989 in Timisoara.

More images and a video after the break.

Situated on the southern bank of the Han River, Gimpo is a city in the process of transforming from an agricultural economy toward a consumer-based economy. Seoul architects G.Lab*’s, of Gansam Partners, proposal for the Gimpo Art Hall embraces the fact that the city is emerging as a contemporary regional hub and the design also reflects upon the region’s history.

More about the project and more images after the break.

Sometimes, designing a renovation or repair of a project may be more difficult than designing something from scratch. So to start this week’s Round Up, we bring you our first selection of previoulsy featured Refurbishment projects.

Deegan Day Design, an architectural installation at the SCI-Arc Gallery in Los Angeles started on October 23 and will be available to everyone till December 13 with changing visual media throughout and public discussions with artists, architects and critics, including: An Te Liu, Bettina Korek, Andrea Fraser, Rhea Anastas, Bennett Simpson, Josh Melnick, Lauri Firstenberg, Sarah Morris Richard Massey, Eric Owen Moss, and Joe Day.

You can learn more at the exhibition’s official website. Watch a video after the break.

The ninjas at AMNP just featured this short video shot from the top of the Burj Dubai, designed by SOM, the tallest building in the world.