Architecture News

As part of our 2018 Venice Architecture Biennale coverage we present the proposal for the UAE Pavilion. Below, the participants describe their contribution in their own words.

The National Pavilion UAE will present “Lifescapes Beyond Bigness,” an exhibition exploring human-scale architectural landscapes, at the 2018 Venice Biennale. The exhibition aims to highlight the role of architecture and urban design in forming the choreography of people’s daily routines. It particularly investigates the role of ‘quotidian’ (every day) landscapes in accommodating, enhancing, and facilitating social activities across different places in the UAE.

Update 3/2/18: A previous version of this article named Snøhetta as the leader of the team; the principal architect is in fact Liminal Studio.

Australian firm Liminal Studio, in collaboration with Snøhetta and Rush Wright Associates, has been selected as the winner of an international competition for the design of the new History and Interpretation Center at Cascades Female Factory Historic Site in South Hobart, Tasmania.

One of the most significant female penal sites dating back to 19th century, when Australia was still a British penal colony, the Cascades Female Colony was inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2010. The new History and Interpretation Center will allow visitors to learn about the site’s history and how its social, cultural and political implications have impacted present day Australia.

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Studio Gang has revealed the design of their $70 Million expansion of the Arkansas Arts Center, located in historic MacArthur Park in the state capital of Little Rock. Working with associate architects Polk Stanley Wilcox and landscape architecture firm SCAPE, Studio Gang has envisioned a sweeping roof structure that will connect the existing architecturally disparate museum pavilions into a cohesive whole.

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An “Ice Breaker” is a colloquial term used to connote something that relieves inhibitions or breaks the tension between people. In Toronto, Ice Breakers is an annual international design competition for innovative public works that break up the dreary, seemingly endless winter with engaging, colorful, and humorous installations along the city’s waterfront that encourage spontaneous interaction.

Now in its second year, the 2018 exhibition is produced in partnership between Ports Toronto and the Waterfront BIA to bring five unique structures to life around the theme of “Constellation.” Proposals from enlarged bears inspired by the Ursa Major constellation to giant wind chimes were among those selected from hundreds of entries from all around the world, now on view until February 25.

See all five winning installations below.

OVO Grąbczewscy Architekci's stacked garden-like proposal has been awarded third place in a competition for the new Małopolska Science Center in Krakow, Poland. The competition brief asked for the design of an innovative cultural institution with an iconic architectural form that would represent creativity, openness and independent thinking. As a reflection of both the city and the region, the center is also intended to provide a model for sustainable construction, energy efficiency, and education that inspires immersive visitor engagement.

See the complete design below.

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Hudson Yards’ first condominium tower, 15 Hudson Yards, has topped out at its full architectural height of 914 feet, with exterior cladding also more than halfway complete. Designed by Diller Scofidio + Renfro (the firm’s first true skyscraper) in collaboration with Rockwell Group and executive architects Ismael Leyva Architects, the tower will contain a total of 285 residences, half of which have already been sold.

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Following last week’s announcement of JPMorgan Chase’s plans to demolition the historically significant modernist masterwork 270 Park (formerly known as the Union Carbide Building), the US chapter of international non-profit Modernist architecture advocate Docomomo has penned a letter to New York City Landmarks Preservation Committee chair Meenakshi Srinivasan arguing for the structure’s preservation.

In the letter, Docomomo US President Theodore H.M. Prudon and Docomomo US NY/Tri-State President John Arbuckle highlight the structure’s critical acclaim and essential place within Modernist architectural history, urging the Commission to calendar the building for designation as quickly as possible.

Find the letter reprinted in full, below.

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The iD Town in Shenzhen, Guangdong, China, is a project with many charms. The building itself has a distinctive history: in its prime, it used to be the Honghua Dyeing factory, but then was abandoned. Topographically, too, this building occupies a unique place, perched on a hilltop and surrounded by the mountains and the coast of the Southern Chinese Sea. 

With minimal interventions, O-OFFICE architects have managed to refurbish this 8-hectare factory in Shenzhen into a thriving cultural and community center. The original ground floor was converted to form a large open concrete pavilion. What was once a workshop for purifying rough cloth was turned into a reception center – the Z gallery – with 7 individual artist studios, exhibition and meeting rooms and a café. Rotating wall-doors and sliding glass doors help the gallery take on different expressions during different events or in different seasons.

Global higher education analysis firm Quacquarelli Symonds (QS) has revealed its rankings of the world’s top universities for the study of Architecture / Built Environment for 2018. The eight edition of the survey compared 2,122 institutions across the globe offering courses in architecture or the built environment, narrowing down the list based on criteria including academic and employer reputation.

For the fourth straight year, MIT has topped the rankings, once again coming out ahead of the Bartlett School of Architecture and the Delft University of Technology (TU Delft) in 2nd and 3rd respectively. Read on for the full rankings.

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Humphreys and Partners, a Dallas-based architecture firm, presented a vision of future residential living at the 2018 International Builders’ Show earlier this year. Tackling current issues of affordable housing, sustainable design and how technology is changing the way we live, their futuristic vision Pier 2: Apartment of the Future consists of two soaring skyscrapers on the Manhattan waterfront.

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Internationally acclaimed architect Frank Gehry (born 28 February 1929) has been headlining architectural news platforms since he established his Los Angeles practice in 1962 and remodeled his home in Santa Monica. Notorious for his expressive use of form (and its-sometimes inflationary effect on project budgets), Gehry is best known for the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, which fellow architect Philip Johnson once dubbed “the greatest building of our time.”

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Despite being heralded as services that will reduce congestion on our streets, ride-hailing companies like Uber and Lyft actually are making traffic problems worse, a new study from Boston’s Northeastern University has revealed.

Seattle’s historic KeyArena is set to receive a $600 million renovation that will transform the venue into the region’s “premier sports and entertainment destination” as part of plans to launch the city’s first-ever NHL team.

Designed by Populous, the renovation will open up the arena to its surroundings, specifically the 72-acre Seattle Center, site of the 1962 World’s Fair and home to the currently under-renovation Seattle Space Needle. As part of the project, the sports venue will be rebranded as “The Arena at Seattle Center.”

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Brazilian planner, preservationist and modernist thinker Lúcio Costa (27 Feburary 1902 – 13 June 1998) is best known for his 1957 plan of Brasília that shaped the Brazilian capital into a monument to utopian modernism. A resolute and often controversial figure in the Brazilian establishment, Costa’s contributions to Brazilian architecture helped to shape the distinctive modernism that was practically Brazil’s official style until the 1980s.

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Last week, Boise City Council unanimously approved world-renowned Safdie Architects to lead the local design team for the new cultural and civic center in downtown Boise. The center will expand the main library and bring it into the 21st century as well as becoming the new home for Boise Department of Arts & History that will house a performing arts venue for 400 capacity, gallery, and retail space.

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Zaha Hadid Architects has revealed a proposal for the pedestrianization of their home city, London, that would gradually transform the city into an interconnected system of walkable roads.

Named Walkable London, the research proposal has identified the arteries and areas of the city that would most benefit from pedestrianization. The transformation would be implemented over three phases: primary avenues, secondary avenues, and finally, entire districts.  Notable avenues marked for alteration include Upper Street, Oxford Street and Regent Street.