Produce personalized presentation boards that distill complex concepts into simple visual representations with a few helpful tools and effects.

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.

The Harvard Graduate School of Design has announced the appointment of Mark Lee as Chair of the university’s Department of Architecture. Having taught at Harvard GSD since 2013, Lee is also a principal and founding partner at Johnston Marklee Architects. He will succeed K. Michael Hays, who has taught at Harvard GSD since 1998.

Lee has previously held the position of Frank Gehry Chair at the Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design at the University of Toronto, as well as Cullinan Guest Professor at Rice University School of Architecture. He has also been a design critic at Harvard GSD since 2013, where he himself earned a Masters in Architecture in 1995.

Danish firm Schmidt Hammer Lassen Architects has been selected to design the redevelopment of Kimmel Quarter, a historic district in the heart of the Latvian capital of Riga, after an international competition. The 19th-century Kimmel Brewery complex, now mostly abandoned, will be transformed into a mixed-use center featuring a new office building, hotel, and an array of public facilities. Schmidt Hammer Lassen was one of eleven participants, with firms such as Henning Larsen and Zaha Hadid invited to the open competition.

The proposal for the 120,000-square-foot (11,500-square-meter) district manifests as a vibrant, public-orientated program, including a gym, child care center, café, food court, and spa. A series of courtyards and plazas are laced throughout the scheme, connecting old and new in a “timeless, classic appearance that is also uniquely contemporary.” The design took 2nd place in a competition in which no first place winner was selected, as the jury felt that no entry fully met the competition criteria. As the highest-placing entry, the competition organizers have committed to begin negotiations with Schmidt Hammer Lassen to refine the design.

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The Norwegian Public Roads Administration is opening a new landmark, Ureddplassen, along the Norwegian Scenic Route Helgelandskysten. Consisting of seating benches, a toilet facility and viewing terrace facing the open sea, Ureddplassen evokes a sense of poetic solitude as it complements the natural landscape of Norway.

The Bahá'í International Community has unveiled a proposal for the national Bahá'í House of Worship of Papua New Guinea. In the capital city of Port Moresby, a celebration was held at the temple’s future site to showcase the scheme, coinciding with the Bahá'í New Year. Inspired by the art of weaving, the architects’ vision was for a temple where the people of Papa New Guinea could unite to worship and find inspiration.

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“Do people love tech companies so much that they would live inside them?” This is the question posed by The New York Times in an article reflecting on Facebook’s plans for Willow Village, a 59-acre urban district located at the company’s Menlo Park headquarters in San Francisco, California.

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The Statue of Unity, to be the world’s tallest statue when completed, has made significant headway with its construction. Designed by Michael Graves Architecture & Design, the Statue of Unity will be 182-meters tall and depict Vallabhbhai “Sardar” Patel, the first deputy Prime Minister of India. Standing at almost twice the height of the Statue of Liberty, the Statue of Unity project will also consist of a hotel, memorial garden, visitor’s center and miles of roadways and bridges to connect the statue to the town of Kevadia, India.

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After Pascall+Watson’s success with their concept design for the £130m Arrivals Terminal at Stansted Airport, the firm have been selected for the £600m transformation programme by MAG (Manchester Airports Group owners of Stansted Airport). As demand for air travel continues to increase, Pascall+Watson’s plans aim to provide a greater choice of airlines and destinations by making use of the airport’s spare runway capacity and supporting the future growth.

Adjaye Associates is among a team of high-profile architects tasked with generating ideas for the overhaul of Lancaster West Estate, an area of London containing the ruined Grenfell Tower, tragically destroyed by fire in 2017.

The team, comprising Adjaye Associates, Cullinan Studio, Levitt Bernstein, Maccreanor Lavington, Murray John Architects and Penoyre & Prasad, will work with the local community for the housing estate’s refurbishment to produce “resident-led” ideas for the area.

Harvard University Graduate School of Design (Harvard GSD) has announced the four finalists for the 2018 Wheelwright Prize, a $100,000 travel research-based grant available to early-career architects worldwide.

Selected from over 125 applications from nearly 40 countries worldwide, the four finalists are from Belgium, Mexico, Brazil, and the United States. This year’s jury includes 2014 Wheelwright Prize Winner Jose Ahedo, Edward Eigen, Frida Escobedo, K. Michael Hays, Mark Lee, Mohsen Mostafavi, and Michelle Wilkinson. A winner will be named in April.

Read more about the four finalists below: 

Since the concept of driverless cars first became a serious prospect, a lot of attention has been given to the possibility of their malfunction—if an autonomous vehicle damages property or even harms a human, who is at fault? And, given a worst-case scenario, how should a vehicle's software choose between whose lives it prioritizes, the passenger or the pedestrian? This last question even became the basis for the Moral Machine, an online platform created by the MIT Media Lab that essentially crowdsources public opinion on different variations of the classic trolley problem thought experiment.

However, all of these questions had been considered largely theoretical until last night when, as The New York Times reports, a woman was struck and killed by an autonomous vehicle in Tempe, Arizona. As a major component of many predictions of futuristic "smart cities," the development and testing of autonomous vehicles hold huge implications for urbanism (ArchDaily has previously covered predictions of major change by car manufacturers and researchers) meaning that this fatal event could have a ripple effect on the development of cities.

Riken Yamamoto & Field Shop has released images of the proposed Taoyuan Museum of Art in Taiwan, having won an international competition for the scheme’s design in 2018. Acting as a symbolic gateway to the heart of the city, the architect’s vision was for a hub where every visit leads to new discoveries and experiences.

Named “The Hill,” the competition-winning scheme is defined by a sloping green roof, hosting artwork, pavilions, trees, and an outdoor theater. Beneath the roof, a structure named “The Cube” contains permanent exhibitions and collections, and establishes a link between the museum and Blue Pond Park beyond.

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London-based Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners has released the first images of their 1.4-million-square-foot (130,000-square-meter) commercial tower for Toronto, Canada. Having won an international competition for the design of “The HUB” in 2017, the RSHP scheme has progressed with the potential to become a dominant fixture on the Toronto skyline.