Results have been announced for the 5th Global LafargeHolcim Awards for Sustainable Construction, with three women-led teams awarded the gold, silver, and bronze positions. The design competition asked participants to speculate on future methods of balancing environmental performance, social responsibility and economic growth, “exemplifying architectural excellence and a high degree of transferability.”

The competition attracted over 5,000 submissions from 131 countries. Having been regionally assessed by juries in Europe, North America, Latin America, the Middle East/Africa and Asia Pacific, 55 successful proposals were entered for the global awards, where six winning schemes were selected.

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Last week, Sel Kardan, the President and CEO of the Colburn School, announced that Frank Gehry has been selected to design a campus expansion, adjacent to its existing facilities in Downtown, Los Angeles. The expansion site, located on Grand Avenue, will become the newest neighbor to other notable projects including Diller Scofidio + Renfro's Broad Museum, Gehry's Walt Disney Concert Hall, Isozaki's Museum of Contemporary Art, and just a few blocks away from Moneo's Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels, and Coop Himmelb(l)au's High School #9. Gehry's contribution to the school will make this area of Los Angeles one of the world’s largest sites for performing and visual arts programs.

The West Kowloon Cultural District Authority (WKCDA) has announced the winning design for the inaugural Hong Kong Young Architects and Designers Competition. The competition asked local architects and designers emerging in their careers to design a "temporary pavilion that promotes sustainability and addresses economic and natural resources." The winning design, titled Growing Up, by New Office Works is a timber pavilion that sits on the waterfront in Nursery Park at West Kowloon. Paul Tse Yi-pong and Evelyn Ting Huei-chung from New Office Works will serve as Design Advisors with the project set to open in fall 2018.

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The groundbreaking ceremony has taken place for Rubenstein Commons, a $20 million campus building for the Institute of Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey. Designed by Steven Holl Architects, the scheme aims to provide space for enhanced collaboration and communication between faculty and scholars at “one of the world’s leading centers for curiosity-driven basic research.” The ceremony took place on March 14th, the birthday of famed physicist Albert Einstein, who spent the last twenty-two years of his life working at the Institute.

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For all those Brickheads out there, interior designing has just reached another Lego-filled level. Created by an Italian team of designers, Stüda has made the dream of Lego compatible furniture a reality. Their modular furniture comes in an array of colors textured in studs that are capable of holding the infamous bricks and can be customized to your heart’s content.

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Research is the key to Andrea Oliva’s project for Shed #19—not only because this old factory was turned into a technopole for industrial investigation, but also because the architect’s proposal used research as a way of identifying the building’s possible transformations. In this case, the rich industrial history of the plant and the area is deemed essential for its refurbishment; its recovery depends on understanding its significance.

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French firm Coldefy & Associates has unveiled images of their design proposal for the world’s largest tropical greenhouse under one roof. Situated in Pas-de-Calais, France, “Tropicalia” will cover an area of 215,000 square feet (20,000 square meters) featuring a tropical forest, turtle beach, a pool for Amazonian fish, and a one-kilometer-long walking trail. The biome aims to offer a “harmonious haven” where visitors are immediately immersed in a seemingly natural environment under a single domed roof.

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The Vatican has released details of the Holy See Pavilion for the 2018 Venice Biennale, marking the Vatican’s first ever entry to the architectural exhibition. Situated on the Island of San Giorgio Maggiore, the Holy See Pavilion will lead visitors on a journey through ten chapels designed by ten architects.

The beginning of the journey will be marked by the Asplund Chapel, designed by MAP Studio and built by ALPI, drawing inspiration from the “Woodland Chapel” built in 1920 by Gunnar Asplund at the Woodland Cemetery in Stockholm.

Within a week of its successor being awarded the Silver Lion at the 2016 Venice Biennale, the original Makoko Floating School collapsed. Designed by Nigerian architect Kunlé Adeyemi of NLÉ Architects, the school was located in the Lagos Lagoon in Nigeria. Now, almost two years later, Lagos-based writer Allyn Gaestel has investigated the vulnerable coastal community and architect behind the project in a remarkable narrative nonfiction piece, "Things Fall Apart."

Aedas' latest project is inspired by the tech cloud as a platform to boast connectivity within the mixed-use development and enable maximum productivity between the zones. Vanke Tianfu Cloud City will be within the new development zone in Chengdu, China designated for new hi-tech and sci-tech industries and provide offices, exhibition, residential and retail facilities.

3D printing just got a whole lot more impressive. If we weren’t already enthralled by the bridges, homeless shelters and structural components that have been made possible through 3D printing, a Canadian team have managed to print the world’s first 3D printed campervan that beats records for the largest indoor 3D print ever – three times larger than the previous record holder. Made from hundreds of feet of plastic filament, the seamless camper measures 13 feet long and six feet wide and took over 230 hours to build on their custom ErectorBot 3D printer.

In an industry-affiliated overshadowed by the so-called ‘starchitects’, do we really know who is dominating in the field of architecture? Often it is found that for most of the projects bearing the big names, there are the firms assuming the roles of “executive architect” that work behind the scenes to enable the high-profile buildings to get through planning and construction.

To give us insight into which architecture practices actually have the most impact across in New York City, The Real Deal have compiled a list of the 30 firms with the highest square footage of new buildings across the five boroughs over a six-year period from the 1st of January 2012 until the 31st of January 2018. There are of course many of the firms that you would expect, although as you will see there are also a few that have gone under the radar so far and may be worth watching out for in the future...

Following up on their series of urban block flashcards, Spanish publisher a+t architecture publishers recently launched a new deck of cards featuring architecture that "promote[s] the compact city and the desirable dwelling." Titled 50 Housing Floor Plans, this new version contains examples of recent collective living projects, featuring buildings constructed between 2000 and 20017.

Recently, long-standing architecture critic for the LA Times Christopher Hawthorne announced that he was stepping down to take up the position of chief design officer for the City of Los Angeles in Mayor Eric Garcetti’s administration. According to Hawthorne, the role will involve raising “the quality of public architecture and urban design across the city — and the level of civic conversation about those subjects.” This dramatic shift from the question: what is the role of the critic and architecture criticism in shaping civic architecture?

While Moshe Safdie may be more well known for the bold forms defining his portfolio of built projects—ranging from the National Gallery of Canada and the horizontal Raffles City Chongqing to the iconic Habitat 67—the architect considers his unbuilt works as important, if not more. Safdie ponders the role of these projects and more in PLANE-SITE’s latest addition to the series Time-Space-Existence.

As hundreds of refugees continue to arrive in Paris, France, the city faces an ongoing struggle to find safe and suitable housing for the influx of migrants. As a result, many end up sleeping in underused urban spaces or on the side of the road with almost no access to water, sanitation, and food.

In response, Paris- and Santiago-based firm 1week1project in collaboration with Sophie Picoty unveil their design for a speculative public park titled “Illuminate Paris!” beneath an elevated railway bridge to provide additional support for organizations handling the influx of refugees. This modular “field of experiences” features a series of lantern-like environments forming a canopy along the underside of the bridge that allows for much-need space for migrants who are currently forced to sleep in encampments under similar infrastructure and in parks.

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The Shenzhen International Energy Mansion is the main headquarters of the Shenzhen Energy Company in China. In designing the building, Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG) paid special attention to one feature: the building's facade. The firm knew that in such a tropical climate, using a traditional curtain wall glass envelope would overheat the buildings and make people crank up their air conditioners. What BIG came up with in their winning design, and what is now the building's most defining feature, is a folded, origami-like facade. This facade provides high insulation and diffuses incoming sunlight, while reflecting the strongest rays onto solar panels.

Laurian Ghinitoiu points his lens towards this uncommon facade design and places the skyscraper within the lively metropolitan context of Shenzhen, China.

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Chicago-based Skidmore, Owings, and Merrill (SOM) have unveiled new images of their proposed 18-story office tower in the trendy Fulton Market area of Chicago. “The Porch,” situated on 330 North Green, will feature a five-story open-air deck, and series of luxury amenities to support the new office environment.

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We’ve all seen them: cringeworthy designs and abysmal construction fails. For architects and designers, it's difficult not to hone in on the details of every space we encounter. And, it’s even harder not to laugh at doors incapable of opening, plaster jobs that could have been completed by a 4-year old, and an overly liberal use of caulking to solve any construction mishap. 

Inspired by this guilty pleasure, the Instagram account of “Certified Caulk Installer” Trevor Lahey aka greaseball1987 has collected the best of the worst home improvement disasters for your viewing pleasure. See more of Lahey's plethora of hilarious tragedies below.