MVRDV, in cooperation with the Belgian furniture label Sixinch, have designed a playful furniture series that imagines an antidote to the sprawled, generic urban growth of East Asia's mega-cities. Each of the 77 large cushions in “Vertical Village” - currently on display at Milan's Design Week - take the form of small, densely-packed houses, colorful alternatives to the horizontal, block-like residential buildings that currently dot East Asia's skylines. From the exhibition:

"The Vertical Village - observation of the uncontrolled growth of Asian cities, which has lead to the disappearance of urban villages on a human scale, prompts the designers to develop a livable city model that promotes upward growth: a vertical village composed of small residential nuclei that ensure human relationships and, at the same time, leave room for green areas and gathering places. The installation is composed of 77 large cushions in the form of small houses, all different.”

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Dwell on Design, an immersive 3-day design exhibition at the Los Angeles Convention Center from June 20-22, will feature over 400 exhibitors and 90 presentations on ‘new ideas for modern living.’

The Architecture Lobby has released a seventy-question survey that seeks to gather a broad range of data about architectural work--from firm standards and policies to worker satisfaction--which will provide open-source information about the realities of architectural labor in the US. We will publish the results in the coming months; in the meantime you can aid in the project by taking The Architecture Lobby survey here (open through April).

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Interiors is an online film and architecture journal, published by Mehruss Jon Ahi and Armen Karaoghlanian. Interiors runs an exclusive column for ArchDaily that analyzes and diagrams films in terms of space. Their Official Store will carry exclusive prints from these posts.

The first season of Nic Pizzolatto’s True Detective, the product of creator/writer Nic Pizzolatto and director Cary Fukunaga, focuses on Detective Rustin Cohle (Matthew McConaughey) and Detective Martin Hart (Woody Harrelson) as they search for clues on a grisly murder case. The series takes place in Louisiana in three distinct time periods; 1995, 2002 and 2012. Each time period has a distinct look, as characters and their surroundings change and evolve over time. 

Cary Fukunaga, who comes from feature films such as Sin Nombre (2009) and Jane Eyre (2011), has always employed a distinct visual style in his work. In The Guardian, he discussed his approach to the direction of the show, noting that “one of my priorities as director was to defend craft despite the constraints on my time and budget.” In addition, he notes that he looked for specific moments in which he would treat the visual side of the medium with the same importance as the dialogue.

In the fourth episode, “Who Goes There,” he does just that, as he employs a lengthy, complex shot that brings the audience closer to the characters’ experience. This edition of INTERIORS will spatially break down that shot, revealing just how complex it was. 

The American Institute of Architects (AIA) has selected ten recipients for their 14th annual Housing Awards. Considered to be the year's most impressive works, the awards are designed to "recognize the best in U.S. housing design" and "promote the importance of good housing as a necessity of life, a sanctuary for the human spirit and a valuable national resource." The winners, after the break...

Developers Forest City Ratner Companies (FCRC) and Greenland Group have decided to realize SHoP Architects’ original plan to top Brooklyn’s Barclays Center with a 130,000 square foot green roof. Though the design was first disregarded due to budget cuts, the developers have deemed it necessary to enhance the marketability the Atlantic Yards’ three residential towers - the first is currently underway - and dampen the noise from loud concerts. Little details have been released about the green roof’s design, however rumor has it that it might not be open to the public as it was originally intended.

London's Royal Academy of Arts (RA) is selling off parts of their blockbuster architectural exhibition, Sensing Spaces. The Great Architecture Fair will see the seven practices behind the enormous installations select objects and materials from the exhibition to be repurposed as beautiful, unique items available to buy. In addition to these, the RA are offering members of the public the chance to experience the spaces out-of-hours "to give you your own exclusive moment in the exhibition."

Ranging from a top step from Chilean architects Mauricio Pezo and Sofia von Ellrichshausen's gargantuan installation for £450, to a bag of pebbles (plus certificate) from Li Xiaodong's Zen Garden for £10, slices of one of the world's most accessible architecture exhibitions in recent years are up for grabs.

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Architect Raymond Moriyama, founder of Toronto-based Moriyama and Teshima Architects, has collaborated with the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada (RAIC) to launch an international CAD $100,000 prize open to architects with “outstanding” work or non-architects who have had an “exceptional contribution to architecture.”

With an aim to raise the stature of the RAIC and “inspire all Canadians and Canadian architects to aspire higher,” as Moriyama stated, the biennial Moriyama RAIC International Prize has the potential to rival the Pritzker as one of the world’s largest, and expectantly most “prestigious” cash prizes in architecture.

However, based on the ideals of “Moriyama’s passion for humanistic architecture that transforms society through an emphasis on values such as social justice, equality and inclusivity,” the Prize is expected to set itself apart from Pritzker's focus on lifetime achievement.

Brooks + Scarpa has won a competition to design a new park-and-ride plaza for the future Angle Lake light rail station in Seattle. As part of the 1.6-mile South 200th Link Extension, which will connect Angle Lake to the airport and downtown area by 2016, the $30 million complex will provide the station’s anticipated 5,400 passengers with a pedestrianized plaza, drop-off and retail area, as well as a 1,050-stall parking garage and 35,000 square feet of reserved space for future transit-oriented development.

A jury of seven, consisting of three architects and four Statoil employees, unanimously chose Wingårdhs' design proposal—dubbed "E=mc2"—for the company's campus at Forus West in Norway. Four other firms were shortlisted along with Wingårdhs: Foster + Partners (UK) together with Space Group (Norway), OMA (the Netherlands), Snøhetta (Norway) and Helen & Hard (Norway) together with SAHAA (Norway). OMA, however, pulled out of the competition before the final submission.

The competition consisted of a proposal for an office building for 3500 work places and a masterplan for the entire Statoil property at Forus West. Wingårdhs' design features an elliptical, chamfered building that tapers to 16 stories, set within a masterplan that will give the company a high degree of flexibility for future development. Statoil announced on Thursday that "The jury sees the potential for [E=mc2"] to be a distinct identity carrier for Statoil, which will both strengthen the Forus area and give Statoil employees pride and inspiration. The project has a significant innovative nature through advanced technological solutions, which fits well with Statoil as a leading technology company. Its clear inclined surface towards the sun is suitable for Statoil's energy and environmental ambitions."

More information about Wingårdhs' winning proposal and images of the other teams' proposals can be found after the break.

As phase three of London’s Battersea Power Station regeneration, Foster + Partners has collaborated with Gehry Partners to design the 42-acre development’s primary entrance. Together, the duo has envisioned “The Electric Boulevard” - a massive gateway connecting the Northern Line Extension station to the Power Station, which will be formed by an undulating Foster-designed tower known as “The Skyline” and Gehry’s five-building “Prospect Place.”

Housing more than 1,300 homes and over 350,000 square feet of retail and restaurant space, the boulevard is expected to become one of London’s most distinguished high streets.

Skidmore, Owings & Merrill LLP (SOM) has been chosen to design a new teaching and learning facility for Barnard College - Columbia University’s world-renowned liberal arts college for women. The selection committee chose SOM after deeming them the best candidate in three categories: “a history of creative and innovative architecture,” a proven recorded on similar academic projects, and “an internal commitment to woman’s leadership reflected by women holding key roles in the firm.”

In this interesting article in the New York Times, Allison Arieff highlights the often unconsidered importance of sound in architecture (outside of theaters and museums at least). She profiles the work of Acoustic Engineers at ARUP who have begun to work inschools and hospitals, taking into account the effects poor sound environments can have on us in our everyday lives. You can read the full article here.

With Le Corbusier casting a long shadow over the last century of France's architectural history, it is not surprising that, faced with Rem Koolhaas's theme of 'absorbing modernity' at the 2014 Venice Biennale, the country might have a unique reaction.

Jean-Louis Cohen's initial proposal for the French Pavilion, titled "Modernity: Promise or Menace?" reflects this history: “since 1914 France has not so much 'absorbed' modernity as it has shaped it with significant contributions made by French architects and engineers in order to meet the requirements of different segments of society. As is the case in many countries, modernity has had to come face to face with social reform and by doing so it has made great dreams such as quality housing and community services for all partially come to fruition. But this encounter has come about in a original way, also generating considerable anxiety.”

Read on after the break for more about the themes explored by the French Pavilion

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Yesterday BIG, along with 9 other teams including OMA and WXY, unveiled their proposals for "Rebuild by Design," a competition which tasks teams with improving the resiliency of waterfront communities through locally-responsive, innovative design. Each proposal was required to be "flexible, easily phased, and able to integrate with existing projects in progress." As Henk Ovink, the Principal of "Rebuild by Design" as well as the Senior Advisor to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Secretary Shaun Donovan, stated: "Rebuild by Design is not about making a plan, but about changing a culture." The winners will be announced later this spring.

BIG's proposal, The BIG U, is rooted in the firm's signature concepts of social infrastructure and hedonistic sustainability. It envisions a 10-mile protective system that encircles Manhattan, protecting the city from floods and storm water while simultaneously providing public realms specific to the needs of the city's diverse communities. Bjarke Ingels states: "We asked ourselves: What if we could envision the resilience infrastructure for Lower Manhattan in a way that wouldn’t be like a wall between the city and the water, but rather a string of pearls of social and environmental amenities tailored to their specific neighborhoods, that also happens to shield their various communities from flooding. Social infrastructure understood as a big overall strategy rooted in the local communities.”

More on the BIG U, after the break...

Richter Dahl Rocha & Associés' "ultramodern" SwissTech Convention Center opened its doors today. Housing a 3,000-seat modular amphitheater which can be converted from conference auditorium, to exhibition hall, to banquet room in only fifteen minutes, the convention center is the first large-scale convention hall to use EPFL's dye-sensitized solar cells (also known as Grätzel Cells).

This latest addition to the campus's northern quarter already contains a collection of commercial stores and over 500 housing units. Its construction puts the finishing touch too what has been described as a "living campus where students can now stay on campus both night and day."

The National Building Museum (NBM) has announced that BIG has designed a 61x61 foot maze to be housed in the building's grand atrium from July 4th to September 1st of this year. According to the NBM's website, the labyrinth's Baltic birch plywood walls, which stand 18 feet high at the maze's periphery, descend as you make your way towards the center. From the core, then, visitors receive a view of the entire layout - and a better understanding of how to get back out.

According to Bjarke Ingels, "The concept is simple: as you travel deeper into a maze, your path typically becomes more convoluted. What if we invert this scenario and create a maze that brings clarity and visual understanding upon reaching the heart of the labyrinth?" Of course, those uninterested in the challenge of figuring out the maze can peek down on it from the Museum's second and third floors - but where would be the fun in that?

More images, diagrams and drawings after the break!

Socrates Sculpture Park and The Architectural League of New York have announced that Austin+Mergold have won “Folly 2014” – an annual competition among emerging architects to design and build a large-scale project for public exhibition at Socrates Sculpture Park in Long Island City – with their project SuralArk, an installation that is "part ship, part house."

The annual “Folly” program strives to give emerging architects and designers the opportunity to build public projects that explore the boundaries between architecture and sculpture. This year's proposal beat out 171 submissions from 17 countries; it was selected by a jury made up of Chris Doyle, Artist; John Hatfield, Socrates Sculpture Park; Enrique Norten, TEN Arquitectos; Lisa Switkin, James Corner Field Operations; and Ada Tolla, LOT-EK.

SuralArk will open on May 11th through August 3rd. Learn more about the project after the break.

UPDATE: Deadline for submissions extended to April 14, 2014!

Submissions are invited for the 2014 ACADIA 'DESIGN AGENCY' conference at University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California on October 20-25, 2014. Architects, designers, fabricators, engineers, media artists, technologists, software developers, hackers, researchers, students and educators and others in related fields of inquiry are invited to submit proposals.

“The building industry is one of the most polluting and inefficient industries out there,” Hedwig Heinsman of Dus Architects tells The Guardian's Olly Wainwright, “With 3D-printing, there is zero waste, reduced transportation costs, and everything can be melted down and recycled. This could revolutionise how we make our cities.”

Working with another Dutch firm, Ultimaker, Dus Architects have developed the KamerMaker (Room Maker), a 3D Printer big enough to print chunks of buildings, up to 2x2x3.5 meters high, out of hotmelt, a bio-plastic mix that's about 75% plant oil. The chunks can then be stacked and connected together like LEGO bricks, forming multi-story homes whose designs can be adapted according to users' needs/desires. For Dus' first project, they've taken as inspiration the Dutch canal house, replacing hand-laid bricks with, in Wainwright's words, "a faceted plastic facade, scripted by computer software."

In response to the recent study by New London Architecture, which found that there are currently over 230 tall buildings either planned or under construction in London, an argument is brewing over the UK capital's sudden, seemingly uncontrolled, growth.

The most vocal reaction to all of this has come from Rowan Moore, architecture critic for The Observer, who has teamed up with the Architects' Journal to launch a campaign calling for more rigorous planning and public consultation when it comes to tall buildings. The campaign has support from 80 signatories, a list that reads like a 'who's who' of British architecture, including architects, planners, politicians, developers and artists as well as a range of civic societies.

Read on for more reaction to London's tall building boom.

The Art Newspaper reports that the Guggenheim will launch an international competition on June 4th to find an architect to design a satellite in Helsinki, Finland focused on "Nordic and international architecture and design, and their connection contemporary art."

The ability of fermenting grapes has transcended through the centuries to be an art which blends science, pleasure and aesthetics. Cantina Valpolicella Negrar (Verona) produces some of the most prestigious classical wine labels in the world - such as Valpolicella, Recioto, Ripasso and Amarone.

In order to crown this excellence, the winery’s board of directors seek a design proposal able to match up to the prestige of its brand. The purpose is to rethink the “winery” under a contemporary perspective, transforming it from a simple storehouse / production facility into a catalyst for culture, tourism and research: what kind of architecture can be proposed?

After a year of gathering evidence and consultation, Sir Terry Farrell's review of UK architecture has finally been released. The review, commissioned by Culture Minister Ed Vaizey, includes 60 proposals to improve the quality of the UK's built environment, targeting a wide range of groups including education, planning, government and developers.

Vaizey has urged everyone involved in the construction industry to get behind the report, saying that it "needs to kick-start a national debate" in order to achieve its aims.

Read on for some of the recommendations from the report