FAAB Architektura has unveiled their design that reimagines Warsaw's Piłsudski Square in Poland. Made to bring together the humanities, arts and sciences with nature, the proposal aims to inspire interactions between disciplines. As the team state, the proposal was formed as an intermingling of history and art, literature and music, film and design, science and innovation. The project is made to promote the creation of urban ecosystems.
Designed by Snøhetta in collaboration with Clark Nexsen, the new Main Library of Charlotte Mecklenburg Library reinterprets the space through a technologically-advanced approach and highlights the importance of this function in the community's daily life.
Zaha Hadid Architects were selected along with Esplan from Estonia to design the new terminal of the Rail Baltic railway at Ülemiste, Tallinn. Their proposal for the starting point of the Rail Baltic line connecting Tallinn, Riga and Vilnius with the European high-speed rail network, has been awarded the first place in the design competition.
Dutch design practice Mecanoo has revealed their design for the Konka mixed-use project in Shenzhen, China. As the team states, Shenzhen is searching for new models for urban and architectural innovation to replace the traditional model of large-scale indoor shopping malls and focus on flexible development. The new Kang Qiao Jia Cheng development was made to provide an urban regeneration paradigm and a new icon for the Shenzhen skyline.
The large biological reserves located in La Paz, Baja California Sur in northern Mexico have made this destination one of the most significant for ecotourism and its proximity to the United States has accelerated its development in recent years.
The Times Square Alliance has announced that Heart Squared by MODU and Eric Forman Studio is the winner of the 2020 Times Square Valentine Heart Competition. Curated by Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum, the competition celebrates its 12th anniversary creating proposals for a public art installation celebrating “Love in Times Square” during the month of February.
The Houston Endowment and the organizers of the Malcolm Reading Consultants (MRC) contest announced that the team led by Kevin Daly Architects (KDA) and PRODUCTORA, in collaboration with TLS Landscape Architecture, won the international competition to design the new headquarters for the foundation. The winning proposal stood out as a dynamic response to the architectural and landscape tradition of Houston.
The Museum of Art, Architecture and Technology, Lisbon, Portugal by Amanda Levete shot by Inge Schuster. Image Courtesy of The Architectural Photography Awards 2019
The Architectural Photography Awards 2019 has revealed its shortlisted images under 6 categories: Exterior, Interior, Sense of Place, Buildings in Use, Mobile, and Portfolio. Sponsored by Sto and supported by the World Architecture Festival (WAF), this year’s lineup was selected from nearly 2000 entries from 42 countries.
Foster + Partners have released their design for the new Red Sea Airport, expected to welcome one million visitors by 2030. Inspired by the forms of the desert, the green oasis and the sea, the terminal building aims to provide a new type of experience, diverging from the common hassles of airports.
OMA revealed the KUBE, an installation located in front of the main entrance of K11 MUSEA, on Hong Kong’s waterfront. The multi-functional installation creates an urban landmark, amidst the dense skyline of the city, through very simple yet engaging geometry.
Romanian architecture office CUMULUS, won the first prize in the solutions contest to design Romania’s National Pavilion at Expo Dubai 2020. Entitled “New Nature”, the sensory experience will focus on the importance of natural elements.
Artist Anish Kapoor will have his first permanent public work opening as part of 56 Leonard St. in New York. Located at the base of the residential tower by architects Herzog & de Meuron, the specially commissioned artwork is integrated into the architecture of the iconic New York tower. Marking the collaboration between artist and architect, the work aims to become a new cultural landmark in Tribeca.
Courtesy of JDS Development Group/ 111 West 57th Street
Centered over Central Park in Midtown Manhattan, 111 West 57th Street, the second tallest residential building in the Western Hemisphere has topped out at 1,428 feet. Designed by SHoP Architects with interior architecture by Studio Sofield, the tower is considered the most slender skyscraper in the world.
Next year, the Spanish manufacturer Kettal will roll out replicas of a Richard Neutra design—the penthouse of the architect’s VDL Research House II in Los Angeles. Two versions will be made available: This one, the VDL Pavilion, removes the glass walls to create an open folly. Courtesy Kettal
The Modernist architect Richard Neutra designed dozens of homes in and around his adopted city of Los Angeles, each one invariably rational, limpid, and generous. These qualities were underscored by Neutra’s wife, Dione, when, later in life, she wrote how “[o]nly those, who have lived in a Neutra house, would ever understand how wonderful the daily satisfactions and delights are and how much this experience helps to augment the joy of living.”
The Danish architecture firm Dorte Mandrup A/S won the international competition to design “The Whale”, a new touristic attraction for northern Norway, that will tell the stories of the majestic sea creature through art, science, and architecture.
The Kingdom of Cambodia has a rich history of Khmer architecture. Built from the latter half of the 8th century to the first half of the 15th century, these structures are embodied by the iconic Angkor Wat temple complex. But new architecture is being built throughout Cambodia, projects that reinterpret culture and tradition to create modern spaces for contemporary life.
The new Quayside smart city development by Sidewalk Labs will be scaled back after a vote last week in Toronto. As the subsidiary of Google's parent company Alphabet, Sidewalk Labs aimed to "unlock the potential" of the city’s Eastern Waterfront. The government agency responsible for development of the area, Waterfront Toronto, voted unanimously to limit the team’s original 190-acre plan to 12 acres.
City of the Future is a bi-weekly podcast from Sidewalk Labs that explores ideas and innovations that will transform cities.
In the third episode from season 2, hosts Eric Jaffe and Vanessa Quirk discuss the future of mobility in cities and share ideas that would make it way easier to get around without owning a car. In the podcast, author Horace Dediu talks about micro-mobility; TriMet's Bibiana McHugh tells the story behind GTFS and the OpenTrip Planner; MaaS Global CEO Sampo Hietanen explains the concept of Mobility as a Service (MaaS); and Sidewalk Labs' Corinna Li explains what Mobility on Demand could be like in the city of the future.
Rocco Design Architects created a vertical church, on a challenging site in Wan Chai District, Hong Kong. The Wesleyan House Methodist Church, with its 11,000m² program, sits on a tight 800m² plot, making it inevitable to go up and generate a skyscraper structure.
Cornell's new Mui Ho Fine Arts Library has opened in Ithaca, New York for the fall 2019 semester. The opening follows an 18-month renovation of the historic Rand Hall. Housing a circulating collections of fine art and design materials, the library aims to create space for the physical artifact as a durable and irreplaceable academic and creative resource in the visual arts and design disciplines.
As architects, curators and readers we are always interested in knowing and disseminating the latest trends in architecture, healing the best of architecture around the world and chatting and meeting those who build our cities in English, Spanish, Portuguese and Chinese. However, as much as we try, we will always be ignoring something. In that sense, our only certainty is that the more we know, the more we will ignore.
Courtesy of Carmody Groarke/ TRANS architectuur | stedenbouw
Carmody Groarke and TRANS architectuur | stedenbouw have won the Baumeister international competition to design an extension to the Design Museum Gent. Putting in place an innovative architecture, the project stands out from its historical context and encourages the city to explore new grounds.
Owen Jones - Persian Pattern. Image Courtesy of Priya Khanchandani and Sam Jacob
In 1856б Owen Jones released the book The Grammar of Ornament in which he presented a compilation of visual languages adopted by the most diverse cultures - made from the author's explorations in places such as Greece, Egypt, Constantinople and India. The work reflects how Victorians examined international art and design by placing Britain at the center of the debate in order to establish "general principles" that promoted a certain system of different styles through their own perspectives. At the time, the publication was a major editorial success and influenced everything from William Morris (from the Arts and Crafts movement) to modernist architects Louis Sullivan and Frank Lloyd Wright. However, in 2019, Priya Khanchandani and Sam Jacob re-read Jones's work and demonstrated not only the colonizing aspects of his point of view, but also proposed a reinvention of these visual systems and patterns in accordance with contemporary times.