Architecture News

The Canadian Centre for Architecture (CCA) is presenting "The fortune of the city is that it has never been perfect," an exhibition dedicated to the urban work of Portuguese architect Álvaro Siza. On view in the institution's Main Galleries from May 21, 2026, to January 10, 2027, the exhibition examines Siza's approach to city-making through a selection of projects that engage with the historical, social, and physical conditions of existing urban environments.

Curated by Giovanna Borasi with Laura Aparicio Llorente as curatorial assistant, the exhibition explores how Siza's architectural practice extends beyond the design of individual buildings to encompass neighborhoods, public spaces, and broader urban structures. Rather than presenting the city as a fixed or idealized condition, the exhibition focuses on Siza's method of working with existing contexts, considering history, topography, infrastructure, and everyday life as fundamental components of the design process. Through this perspective, the exhibition reflects on questions surrounding urban transformation, the continuity of the built environment, and the relationship between architecture and planning.

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UNESCO-UIA World Capital of Architecture is a title created jointly by UNESCO and the International Union of Architects (UIA). On 5 August 2026, Beijing was named World Capital of Architecture for 2029, a title awarded every three years to a city that hosts a year of architecture-focused programming timed to coincide with the UIA World Congress of Architects. The designation was made upon the recommendation of the Joint Committee for the World Capital of Architecture, chaired by architect Dominique Perrault. It follows the recent conclusion of the UIA World Congress of Architects 2026 in Barcelona, current World Capital of Architecture, and builds on the experience of Rio de Janeiro and Copenhagen.

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This week, architecture's relationship with culture took center stage through exhibitions, public projects, and new cultural infrastructure that extend architectural discourse beyond the building itself. While major exhibitions from Australia, Shanghai, Barcelona, and Copenhagen examined themes of housing, landscape, and place through research and design, newly unveiled projects in China and Italy demonstrate how museums, performance venues, and mixed-use projects are increasingly conceived as open public landscapes rather than isolated institutions, while new exhibitions and construction milestones reflect ongoing experimentation in adaptive reuse, context-responsive design, and flexible urban environments.

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The Grand Paris Express project consists of 200 kilometers of new, fully automated metro lines, 68 new stations, and four new orbital lines (15, 16, 17, and 18), in addition to the extension of Line 14. The network is being delivered in phases between 2024 and 2031: Line 14's 8 stations are fully operational following its 2024 extension, Line 18 is the most advanced of the new lines, with testing underway ahead of its first opening, and civil engineering is largely complete on many sections, with tracks, systems, architectural fit-out, and testing now progressing station by station. Each of the 68 stations is assigned to a specific architect or architectural team, sometimes in collaboration with landscape architects for above-ground elements.

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Designed by MVRDV, Bihailou Art Village is a mixed-use cultural and commercial centre currently under construction in Shenzhen, China. Located in the Shatoujiao neighborhood near the Hong Kong border, the mixed-use project combines cultural, commercial, and public programs within a vertically stacked composition derived from the firm's "Vertical Village" concept. Designed to accommodate independently operating venues while maintaining publicly accessible circulation, the development reinterprets the scale and spatial character of the surrounding urban fabric through a series of distinct volumes.

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MAD / Ma Yansong's Shenzhen Bay Culture Square exhibition hall and park project began in 2018, with the project completed in 2020. The 188,000 m² building sits on a site area of approximately 51,000 m² along the city's waterfront, at the heart of Houhai, Nanshan District, the headquarters hub of Shenzhen's Greater Bay Area. The masterplan for the site, which includes the Creative Design Hall, the Shenzhen Science and Technology Museum, and a vast public green space, was announced by MAD in 2020 and was expected to be completed in 2023. After eight years, the project, led by Ma Yansong, Dang Qun, and Yosuke Hayano, is now complete and is intended to serve as a cultural facility for design and cultural exchange.

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Photographer Paul Clemence has unveiled a new photo series documenting Le Corbusier's Notre Dame du Haut in Ronchamp, France. The collection revisits one of the 20th century's most influential works of religious architecture through an exploration of light, materiality, and atmosphere, highlighting the sculptural qualities of the chapel and the changing relationship between its concrete surfaces and natural illumination. Combining black-and-white exterior photographs with color interior images, the series presents a new documentation of a building that continues to shape architectural discourse more than seven decades after its completion.

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The idea of a "Great Green Wall" designates a large-scale reforestation initiative undertaken specifically to halt desertification. Currently underway in Africa to prevent the advancement of the Sahara Desert and in China around the Gobi Desert, it is a landscape, agriculture, economic, and social development project in reaction to the rise of global temperatures, over-farming, and unsuitable land management. Both projects, currently underway, are intersectional initiatives involving governments from different countries, civil society organisations, and both individual volunteers and organised groups, guided by the idea of a unified response to global environmental issues through wildlife restoration. It is a large-scale, infrastructural application of a 'green' or 'wildlife corridor': a linear strip of vegetation or natural landscape that connects fragmented ecosystems and wildlife populations separated by human development on a continental scale.

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Museum of Art Pudong (MAP) in Shanghai is presenting "Jean Nouvel: Without the Artist, Architecture Disappears" until August 31, 2026. Marking the museum's fifth anniversary, the exhibition is dedicated to the work of Pritzker Prize laureate Jean Nouvel and represents the first time the French architect has staged a solo exhibition inside a building of his own design. Organized by the Museum of Art Pudong in partnership with Ateliers Jean Nouvel, the exhibition brings together architectural models, films, archival documents, installations, and a reconstruction of the architect's Paris studio to examine more than fifty years of architectural practice.

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The Getty Foundation's Conserving Black Modernism initiative is a program dedicated to preserving and celebrating the architectural contributions of African American architects in the Modernist movement across the United States. It was launched in 2022 as part of the National Trust's African American Cultural Heritage Action Fund, the largest preservation campaign to support the longevity of African American sites. Established initially as a two-year initiative, it has since expanded to support 26 historic modern sites and is launching its fourth funding cycle this year. The grants are given to support conservation planning, professional training, and storytelling across a diverse array of building types in 17 states and D.C., including academic, spiritual, residential, civic, cultural, and commercial sites of historic importance.

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Architecture across Latin America this month reflects a growing emphasis on adaptation, whether responding to environmental risks, rethinking cultural institutions, or extending the life of existing buildings. Recent developments reveal a regional conversation shaped by resilience, heritage, and public space, where architecture is increasingly understood as part of broader urban, social, and environmental systems. From the aftermath of major earthquakes in Venezuela to the debate surrounding Ecuador's future National Museum, the month's stories highlight how design is intertwined with questions of identity, civic life, and long-term sustainability.

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As part of the official programme for Barcelona as the UNESCO-UIA World Capital of Architecture, the Jardí Botànic de Barcelona is hosting "Parlour Gardens: Dreams from the Rooftop," a display of ceramic installations proposing a journey through landscape architecture. Curated by Marina Cervera (Barcelona International Landscape Biennial, CEO of NablaBCN), James Hayter (former president of IFLA, Oxigen), and José Luis Cortés (former president of the UIA), the exhibition marks a century since the 1926 invention of the jardinets de saló (living room or parlour gardens), miniature ceramic landscape worlds created originally by Nicolau M. Rubió i Tudurí, Llorenç Artigas, and Raoul Dufy. Installations by 14 global landscape architects will be scattered across the botanical grounds, grouped by homoclimatic zones to pair each design with fitting regional plant life, through 4 October 2026.

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The Australian Institute of Architects has announced "Lived In" as Australia's official contribution to the 20th Venice Architecture Biennale, to be held in Venice, Italy, from May 8 to November 21, 2027. Developed by Kerstin Thompson, Maryam Gusheh, Lee-Anne Khor, and Louise Wright of Monash Urban Lab at Monash University, the exhibition is based on the ongoing Housing Atlas of Australia research initiative. Presented in response to the Biennale's theme, Do Architecture – For the Possibility of Coexistence Facing a Real Reality, curated by Wang Shu and Lu Wenyu, the exhibition will present a selection of Australian multi-dwelling housing projects through drawings, photographs, film, and data.

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This week was marked by recognition and major announcements for the cultural industry. Amid international reports of both deliberate and natural destruction, UNESCO added 25 new sites of Outstanding Universal Value to its World Heritage List, protecting a diverse range of places that includes funerary landscapes and landmark works of modern architecture. Beyond heritage, contemporary architectural practice also received renewed recognition through Alejandro Aravena and Smiljan Radić, while new developments were announced for cultural projects across the United Arab Emirates, Ecuador, China, India, and the United States. Recent updates include the restoration of a landmark cinema in Los Angeles, a new museum dedicated to innovation and entrepreneurship in Bengaluru, and the topping out of a 39-story hybrid timber tower in Sydney.

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The UNESCO World Heritage Committee has announced 25 new inscriptions to the World Heritage List during its 48th session, expanding the international register with sites that reflect a wide range of architectural, cultural, and natural heritage. The 2026 additions include 19 cultural properties, five natural sites, and one mixed property, alongside approvals for two significant boundary modifications and one revision to the criteria of an existing inscription. Spanning every inhabited continent, the newly recognized places range from archaeological landscapes and historic urban centers to modernist architecture and industrial heritage, underscoring the diversity of the built environment and the evolving scope of heritage conservation.

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On Monday, 27 July, the shortlist of finalists for the 2026 National Architecture Prize was presented at an extraordinary session of the National Board of the Colegio de Arquitectos de Chile (Chilean Institute of Architects). Representing the institution, the five board members jointly awarded the prize to architects Alejandro Aravena Mori and Smiljan Radić Clarke, in recognition of their contributions to positioning Chilean architecture internationally. Both architects have been awarded the Pritzker Architecture Prize: Aravena in 2016 for his work with ELEMENTAL, and Smiljan Radić Clarke this year. The institution also recognised the quality of their work and the contribution of both professionals to the local development of the discipline, as two major figures in architecture from the context of a small country at the southern end of the world.

Designed by the 3XN, B+H Architects, and Zhubo Design consortium, the Shenzhen Natural History Museum has opened to the public in Shenzhen, China. Covering more than 100,000 square meters, the institution is the largest natural history museum in South China and among the largest recently completed museums of its kind worldwide. Developed as part of Shenzhen's expanding cultural infrastructure, the project brings together exhibition, research, education, and public space within a single civic destination. 3XN led the architectural design, B+H Architects served as lead consultant, executive architect, and landscape architect, and Zhubo Design provided local technical expertise and regulatory coordination throughout the project's development.

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Abu Dhabi's Department of Culture and Tourism has announced that Guggenheim Abu Dhabi will open to the public on December 11, 2026, on Saadiyat Island. The museum, designed by the late Frank Gehry, becomes the fourth institution in the Guggenheim's global network, joining outposts in New York, Venice, and Bilbao.

The project was first announced in 2006. Construction began in 2011, was suspended for several years amid economic strain and contract changes, and resumed in 2019. A 2025 completion date, set in 2021, ultimately slipped to this December. 

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