
This guide covers a workflow that moves from project parameters to generated floor plans, 3D perspective views, exterior design exploration, and site context visualization, using AI tools in place of preliminary CAD and rendering work.

This guide covers a workflow that moves from project parameters to generated floor plans, 3D perspective views, exterior design exploration, and site context visualization, using AI tools in place of preliminary CAD and rendering work.

As part of the commemorations marking the 30th anniversary of the passing of architect Luis Barragán, Cosentino and Arquiphilia invited 20 Mexican architecture firms to participate in a group exhibition titled "Inspiración, magia y embrujo 2018" (Inspiration, Magic, and Spell 2018). The initiative proposed an exercise to demonstrate how collaboration and creativity are key to design, challenging participants to create a sculpture using Dekton® by Cosentino to pay tribute to the work of the 1980 Pritzker Prize laureate. The resulting models were subsequently exhibited at the Instituto Cabañas in Guadalajara.
Operational coordination was led by Arquiphilia, represented by architects Bertha Elia Gutiérrez Gómez and Carlos Lassala Mozo, who previously organized the Do It Yourself exhibition in Guadalajara in September 2015. Mónica Urbán, from Cosentino's corporate team, was also part of the coordination team, serving as the liaison between the brand and the architecture firms. Before fabrication, the participants selected their materials from a catalog, evaluating different characteristics to find the ideal match for what they wished to express in their pieces.

I recently learned that the word "testa" means "head" in Italian. It made me think of Clorindo Testa and how fitting his last name was.
Yesterday marked the 95th anniversary of his birth. Possessing infinite creativity and charisma, he was one of those personalities that appear once every century. In him, the intelligence of the architect coexisted with the sensitivity of the artist, the precision of the professional with the joy of a child, and greatness with humility. His hand did not tremble when curving a line or adding color to a plan.
To mark this anniversary, we look back at some of his quotes and anecdotes.

From September 28 to October 7, Madrid will host the 15th Architecture Week, organized by the Official Association of Architects of Madrid (COAM) and the COAM Architecture Foundation, in collaboration with the Madrid City Council and the Embassy of Italy, with ArchDaily as a media partner. This year's edition will feature Milan as the guest city, following in the footsteps of Paris, New York, and Berlin in previous years.
With this new edition of Architecture Week, COAM's primary goal is to continue bringing architecture and urban development closer to society as a whole, while showcasing the valuable architectural heritage that makes Madrid one of the world's leading capitals for the discipline.

The 16th International Architecture Biennale China Pavilion will be on display in Venice, Italy, from May 26 to November 25, 2018. On April 27, a press conference for the China Pavilion was successfully held in Beijing, officially announcing this year's theme: "Building a Future Countryside." The curator, Professor Li Xiangning, outlined the curatorial concept and structural framework of the exhibition. He noted that the Chinese countryside has become an open field brimming with diverse possibilities and opportunities, making the theme "Building a Future Countryside" a direct response to this year's Biennale theme, "Freespace." The exhibition features six sections—"Production," "Tourism," "Community," "Culture," "Dwelling," and "Future"—showcasing recent rural projects by Chinese architects. It aims to return to the birthplace of Chinese culture to recover forgotten values and overlooked possibilities, offering a vision for the future of our countryside.

The Municipality of Cascais, with technical support from the OASRS, launched the "Sommer Pavilion International Ideas Competition" in May of this year for the construction of a temporary intervention in Jardim da Parada, next to Casa Sommer, in downtown Cascais, Portugal. The project "Gravidade em Suspenso," by architect Inês Abreu Ribeiro and engineer Fernando Coutinho de Vasconcelos Pereira da Silva, was named the winner. Out of the 49 proposals evaluated, the jury considered that the winning entry stood out for its “stimulating approach to the competition theme, exploring different states of water in the form of a 'rain pavilion' and a 'fog pavilion' that relate to each other.”

The History Channel has released its first entirely Brazilian production. Titled Mil Dias - A Saga da Construção de Brasília, the series tells the story of the construction of the new capital from the perspective of four characters who built the city in the cerrado: a surveyor, an engineer, an architect, and a construction worker.

The site of a fire that left part of Luz Station in ruins in 2015, the Museum of the Portuguese Language, located inside the iconic station, had its new roof completed this week. Built with nearly ninety tons of certified timber from the Amazon, the new roof structure is another completed element of this project, which will ultimately cost around R$ 60 million.

In 2010, humanity marked a new milestone: more than half of the world's population lives in cities. And by all accounts, this process only seems to be intensifying, alongside rising consumption, resource depletion, increased pollution, traffic congestion, water scarcity, and a lack of planning. Is urbanization spiraling out of control?
Drawing on a published study by Daniel Hoornweg and Kevin Pope, British newspaper The Guardian reflects on an extreme scenario: if countries are unable to manage fertility rates and urbanization continues unabated, over the next 35 years, more than 100 cities will each have a population exceeding 5.5 million.

Designed by the firm of Ramos de Azevedo and built in the famous Praça Clovis in downtown São Paulo between the 1920s and 1940s, the Palácio da Justiça de São Paulo occupies an area of 25,000 square meters. The building features a symmetrical layout with four corner towers whose wings house the interior spaces.
Between 2004 and 2009, the building's facades and the copper roof of the Jury Hall were restored by the firm APBA – Arquiteto Paulo Bastos e Associados. Later, between 2014 and 2016, another section of the building was restored by Kruchin Arquitetura.

One of the most highly anticipated collateral events of the 16th Venice Architecture Biennale was the *Young Architects in Latin America* (YALA) exhibition, an open call organized by Architecture-Studio through its CA’ASI cultural center to mark its tenth anniversary.
Following editions focused on Chinese, Arab, and African architecture, CA'ASI's fourth open call invited young architects from across Latin America to showcase their built work on a global stage. Out of more than 200 submissions, 60 Latin American practices were selected for the digital catalog and the exhibition presented in Venice. In the digital catalog, the organizers note that "in a region so vast, diverse, and in constant flux, we find common characteristics among the submitted works that bear witness to the efforts of young architects to improve habitat conditions in Latin America."
At the exhibition's opening ceremony on May 25, the organizers announced 15 honorable mentions and 3 winners, including practices from Mexico, Argentina, Chile, Ecuador, and Brazil, among others. Discover them below:

The NGO Soluções Urbanas launched a crowdfunding platform earlier this month to enable technical assistance, the purchase of materials, and renovation work in precarious housing. Named Arquiteto de Família, the tool was developed with sponsorship from CAU/RJ.
The platform's goal is to facilitate access to better housing conditions, and the funds raised through the tool can be combined with resources from other sources, such as microcredit and barter fairs.

The third edition of Hello Wood Argentina is approaching—the renowned timber architecture and design festival that aims to teach thinking with your hands and learning through experience.
From March 2 to 10, 2019, 10 selected projects will be built around this edition's theme: a space of containment, a space of CON-TENSION.
Discover the projects selected for Hello Wood Argentina 2019, described in the words of their creators, below.

In 1958, Tsinghua University established the Architectural Design and Research Institute of Tsinghua University (THAD) as a practical platform for architectural education and academic research, serving the development and construction of the newly founded republic. In 2018, THAD celebrates its 60th anniversary. Over the past six decades, the institute has navigated the shifts in China's social and economic development, witnessing the evolution of modern Chinese architectural design. To mark this 60th anniversary, THAD and the Tsinghua University School of Architecture are jointly hosting the "60 Years of Tsinghua Design Practice" event, inviting key figures and institutions from across the Chinese architectural community to join the celebration. Through a series of exhibitions, forums, lectures, and publications, the event aims to review the institute's history, reflect on the progress of Chinese architectural design over the past 60 years, and share research, practice, and insights to continue serving national development and the advancement of architectural scholarship and practice.
To celebrate the 60th anniversary of the Architectural Design and Research Institute of Tsinghua University, the Tsinghua Design Academic Week will be held on October 25, 2018. Prominent Chinese academicians, including He Jingtang, Wang Jianguo, and Meng Jianmin, alongside international guests such as Coop Himmelb(l)au and UNStudio, will attend. Concurrently, the exhibition titled "6X10: The Modern Architectural History of a University Design Institute" will officially open.

Now in its sixth edition, the Arquitecturas Film Festival invites directors, architects, and production companies to submit documentary, experimental, and fiction films—including feature, medium, and short-length films produced after January 1, 2017—on themes related to architecture, space, and cities. The official launch of the call for entries was marked by the screening of Henrique Pina's documentary "Aires Mateus: Matéria em Avesso," dedicated to the work of the renowned studio, in the main hall of Cinema São Jorge in Lisbon.

The Mexican architecture scene is increasingly shaped by young architects committed to holistic, globally conscious design. One such firm is LANZA Atelier, which will present three of its projects at SFMoMA on March 31.

After winning the elections on November 16, Lluís Comerón Graupera today assumes the presidency of the Higher Council of Colleges of Architects of Spain (CSCAE) for the 2018–2021 term. Founded in 1931, the CSCAE is the organization that unites all regional associations to achieve and defend the general common interest of architecture and its professionals. It also serves as the highest representative body for these associations and the profession before the state administration and international organizations.
According to the CSCAE, Comerón Graupera holds an architecture degree from the Barcelona School of Architecture (ETSAB), is an associate professor at ETSAB, and is a co-director at the Vallès School of Architecture (ETSAV). He also runs his own practice, where he has developed a diverse portfolio for both public administrations and the private sector.

The Gustavo Capanema Palace will officially serve as one of the venues for the 27th World Congress of Architects – UIA 2020 Rio. The authorization agreement for the building's use was signed on Thursday, September 20, during an event marking the completion of the restoration work on the building's facades. The ceremony was attended by the Minister of Culture; the president of Iphan, Kátia Bogéa; the president of the IAB, Nivaldo de Andrade; the UIA Vice President for the Americas, Roberto Simon; the president of UIA2020RIO, Sérgio Magalhães; as well as the presidents of CAU/BR and CAU/RJ, Luciano Guimarães and Jeferson Salazar, respectively.

The results of the design competition for the Carcavelos Health Hub, in Portugal, were announced last month. The jury, comprising architect Luís Campos Guerra, engineer Paulo Nunes, and architect Gabriela Gonçalves, evaluated 40 proposals. The competition was organized by the Municipality of Cascais, with technical support from the Southern Regional Section of the Order of Architects.

Spanning 4.2 million hectares—an area similar in size to Denmark—and making it the largest natural park in Colombia and the continent, the Serranía de Chiribiquete National Park has been declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Located in the heart of the Colombian Amazon, the park is one of the richest regions in biodiversity, history, and archaeology, safeguarding one of the world's most important wilderness areas.
A 50-meter-high stone amphitheater serves as the gateway to this natural sanctuary, where trees reach up to 20 meters tall. Its rocky, tabletop mountains—known as tepuis—are over 1.5 billion years old and rise to heights of 800 meters, equivalent to the height of the iconic Burj Khalifa in Dubai.

After a week of nominations, more than 25,000 readers selected their favorite projects from nearly 1,000 built works across Latin America and Spain. Today, the finalists for ODA18 have been announced.
Now in its tenth edition, this award has become a true tradition. We invite all our readers to recognize the projects published during 2017 that inspired them and represent the identity of their local contexts in a globalized world, shaping how architecture is practiced in Latin America and Spain within an increasingly diverse and multicultural landscape.

Physical distance is no longer an obstacle for the world's major museums. Once limited by their geographic locations and accessible only to those who could visit them in person, many museums have now digitized their collections, while others are in the process of doing so—a strategy that broadens reach and, to some extent, democratizes access to culture.

Portugal will be home to another project designed by Álvaro Siza. The renowned Portuguese architect was invited by the authorities of Oleiros to design the revitalization of the Miradouro do Zebro, a prominent tourist attraction located in the country's central region.
Budgeted at two million euros, the revitalization project will also feature the construction of a suspension bridge connecting Oleiros, Pampilhosa da Serra, and Fundão.

For the first time, a team of Peruvian architects has won first prize in the prestigious EUROPAN competition. The theme of this 14th edition was "Productive Cities" (Villes Productives), which explored the connection between habitat and production within a framework of sustainability. YDEA, the national team comprising Sebastián Morales, Johana Salazar, Elaine Sanchez, and Diego Morales, presented an urban regeneration project for the Terres Saint-Lazare sector in the communes of Grigny and Ris-Orangis, located south of Paris, France.
"It is a remarkable proposal due to its genuine understanding of the site and its challenges. The proposal fully aligns with the competition's theme (productive cities) by exploring how people can become active participants in their environment and producers of their own services," noted the jury.
This also marks the first time that a team composed entirely of non-European professionals has won the competition. EUROPAN is a biennial urban design competition and one of the most prestigious architectural awards for emerging talent in Europe, open to architects and urban planners under 40 years old. Since 1971, mayors from various European cities and communes have put forward their territories for the development of innovative urban and architectural proposals. Below are the details of the project.