The West Kowloon Cultural District Authority (WKCDA) has announced five design teams invited to submit proposals for the Xiqu Center, which will be the first landmark building within Hong Kong’s West Kowloon Cultural District. Serving as the main theatre and Team House, the Xiqu Center will form the gateway into the £1.7bn, Foster-designed masterplan once it is complete towards the end of 2015.

Mr. Louis Yu, Executive Director, Performing Arts stated, “There has been a fantastic response to our plans for the Xiqu Centre from design teams from across the world. We are working hard to find the right team to work with to fulfill our ambitions. The shortlisted teams will meet with representatives of the Chinese opera artform, engaging with stakeholders so we can conceive together a world-class building for Hong Kong and for the development and promotion of this important form of Chinese cultural heritage.”

The five shortlisted teams are:

We come back to the 1950s to remember one of the great masters of modern film making, Alfred Hitchcock. In Rear Window, most of the scenes are recorded from the limited view of one single room. Things within a housing complex seems to work fine for everyone but not for this photographer that is forced to see the world from the same perspective every day.

Let us know what are your thoughts about this classic Hitchcock’s work and we wait for any recommendation for keep going with the list!

The expansion project for the Radio Museum in Ponferrada, Spain is built around a new courtyard, which houses the entrance to the building and provides support for “sound” connection with the old museum. Designed by VAUMM arkitekturak and Taperstudio, the piece is inserted in the historic center offering a renewed image from the traditional imaginary. The connection of the volumes at the end of the courtyard and the inner spatial distribution, organizing servant and served spaces, enable a clear and easy travel throughout the building. More images and architects’ description after the break.

Designed by MIRO architects, the starting point for their Klaksvik City Center proposal kept with the language of the genesis of urban nuclei: the form is inherited from the land, shaped by the surroundings as well as the needs and functions that are to be hosted in its nest. This also involved morphing to fit its context as well as accommodate for a plenitude of public spaces. The shape of the new core is based off of a landfill on the bottom of the bay. Even if it is possibly a random shape, it represents a fundamental step in the history of the town: the creation of the tunnel to southern islands. More images and architects’ description after the break.

While DETAIL Magazine brings us the insights of buildings in terms of highly detailed drawings, DETAIL Green focuses on sustainability in architecture trough data & analysis.

This special edition brings interesting articles and cases like Sustainability in the London 2012 Olympics buildings or Cities and climate change. Also you can find about Recycling-friendly constructions, Solar technology  in building envelopes, Zero energy concepts for buildings and much more.

Full index after the break.

With the challenge to design a large primary and secondary school in Allscwhil, a low density residential zone in the only free spot in the area, this proposal seeks to maintain the public void by formalizing a close relationship to the environment. By doing so, RaichdelRio estudi d’arquitectura achieves a big scale program in a small town appearance, being both coherent with the environment and with his use. More images and architects’ description after the break.

Through research, discussions and essays from a variety of resources, Parlour: Women, Equity, Architecture is a platform, a coach, and an inspiration that is available to women worldwide in an effort to bridge the gender gap that exist in the historically male dominant profession of architecture. Launched by a team of scholars led by Dr. Naomi Stead from The University of Queensland and developed and edited by Justine Clark from The University of Melbourne, this website is relevant to all members of the profession, women and men, in all parts of the world. It highlights the reasons why gender gaps are felt as in “implicit bias” whether in pay scale or upward mobility, even though discrimination and prejudices may not be explicit. In this regard, the website and its collection of resources, aims to create a forum for a dialogue about the actual and perceived barriers that empowers women to challenge the social structure that fosters this proven under-representation, whether it is due to professional practices and “gendered behavioral practices” or pressures that women feel to leave the profession at a much higher rate than men.

More after the break.

Today’s our 75th selection of the best you’ve submitted through our Flickr Pool. Keep them coming! Remember you can submit your own photo here, and don’t forget to follow us through Twitter and our Facebook Fan Page to find many more features.

The photo above was taken by yushimoto_02 in Beijing, China. Check the other four after the break.

Make It Right is proud to announce the completion of the Frank Gehry-designed, New Orleans’ duplex in the Lower 9th Ward. The colorful, LEED Platinum home is part of an affordable and sustainable community that is currently being developed by Brad Pitt’s Make It Right foundation within the NOLA neighborhood most devastated from Hurricane Katrina.

“I really believe in what Brad is doing for the community and was honored to be included,” said Frank Gehry. “I wanted to make a house that I would like to live in and one that responded to the history, vernacular and climate of New Orleans. I love the colors that the homeowner chose. I could not have done it better.”

Continue after the break for more.

Phototropia is part of an ongoing series on the application of smart materials in an architectural context and was realized in April 2012 by the Master of Advanced Studies class at the Chair for Computer Aided Architectural Design (CAAD). The project combines self-made electro-active polymers, screen-printed electroluminescent displays, eco-friendly bioplastics and thin-film dye-sensitized solar cells into an autonomous installation that produces its required energy from sunlight and – when charged – responds to user presence through moving and illuminating elements.

Find more information at Responsive Design.

Designed by o2a studio, the man-made structure for the Natural History Museum in Jerusalem is designated to celebrate the transcendent force and majesty of nature, which is a contradiction in terms. The paradoxical question that arises when approaching the design of a building that is dedicated as a showcase for the unbuilt, is how does one bridge this conceptual gap between the man-made and the organic – between the artificial and the natural. The proposal aims to highlight this difficulty, while allowing for a composite coexistence between the natural and the artificial – interpreted here as ranging between various degrees of control. More images and architects’ description after the break.

Architecture has become an increasingly interdisciplinary profession, and the language with which architects envision and articulate their ideas has radically diversified in recent years. Architect Jimenez Lai has pioneered an unexpected and wholly unique approach that moves beyond contemporary architectural renderings and models. Citizens of No Place is a groundbreaking graphic novel on architecture and urbanism.

For one week during May this year, during the Detour de France, Collective Etc. was invited by the association “Vivre la rue” to open a construction site in Brest, in the district of Recouvrance, Saint Malo. In this context, they offered to add a contemporary layer to the ruins of the street, resulting in the One:One Theatre. Their intention was to highlight the existence of the access to the new footpath that connects the small garden to the staircase in the back of the street, which was made safe to be open to the public. More images and architects’ description after the break.

CityVision recently announced the winners of the New York CityVision Competition. The competition’s goal was to imagine New York in its future if the manipulation of the urban context and its architectural objects, joined with its inhabitants, is influenced by space and time. With 151 project entries from all five continents and 32 different countries, the jury carefully examined all the entries and then unanimously elected the winners as Eirini Giannakopoulou, Stefano Carera, Hilario Isola, and Matteo Norzi took the first prize. More images and information on the winners after the break.

Designed by Huasen Architects, the winning competition proposal for the Research and Development Center for colorful Guizhou.co is based on the structure of local villages, having full possibilities to grow in all directions. The orientation for each building was defined by the best natural view of the river and surrounding mountains. Located near the new district of Long dong bao, just 15 minutes drive from the airport, the site has an undulating character with differing levels up to 15 meters, and sits along a small river. More images and architects’ description after the break.

The Architectural Association and Foster + Partners have announced AA diploma student Yi Yvonne Weng as winner of the 2012 Foster + Partners Prize for her project, ‘The 6th Layer – Expolorative Canopy Trail’. The prize is awarded annually to the AA Diploma student whose portfolio best addresses the themes of sustainability and infrastructure.

Yvonne Weng stated: “Programmatically, the project is centred on scientific exploration and harvesting medicinal plants, which provides an alternative use of the forest without destroying it. At the same time, the positive occupation of the territory it enables could provide a level of surveillance that helps to protect both the endangered environment and the indigenous population.”

Continue after the break to learn more.

Last November, ArchDaily reported on the new additions to Messe Basel – a multifunctional exhibition building that is designed to become a destination for the public. The project is designed by Basel architecture firm, Herzog & de Meuron and will include additions and relocations of the existing halls of the building. The existing hall will be extended via a three-story addition will replace two existing exhibition halls and include various scales of venues to attract different groups and events. New connections between parts of the building will be bridged with overhead walkways and transparencies between spaces. For a look at the early construction phase, click here.

More updates on the project after the break.

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Klassik Stiftung Weimar, host of the competition for the New Bauhaus Museum in Weimer, has announced that Berlin-based architect with Professor Benedict Tonon, has been selected as the winning proposal. Last March, ArchDaily announced the shortlist for the New Bauhaus Museum in Weimer design competition. The jury had provided the four finalists with recommendations to improve their proposals in preparation for the VOF Procedure (Contracting Regulations for the Awarding of Professional Services).

Thuringian Minister of Culture and Foundation Board Chairman Christoph Matschie congratulated the winner: “The Bauhaus is now finally being provided with a fitting location at its Weimar cradle. Once again, the Bauhaus will become a symbol of reawakening in the time to come. The building of the museum is providing animportant impulse for the entire development of the city of Weimar.”

Follow us after the break for more on the winning proposal.

New York City’s High Line has been such a success – both as an urban renewal project and a money-making tourist attraction – that it’s spawned quite a number of Copy Cats around the world (we found 18 19, listed after the break, but no doubt there’s many more…). Many, however, are more yawn-inducing than awe-inspiring. The following four projects are notably awesome exceptions.

Find out which projects made the cut, after the break…

The project, Cloud, designed by SABAOARCH, responds to the unique needs of the client with the creation of a uniquely shaped room. This room is similar to the clouds which float in the sky and is supported by three trunks which branch off from one tree standing on a hill. In order to make the boundary loose, but still maintaining architectural intensity and a feeling of a substance for the place where the natural environment touches primitive architecture, a global image like a vague floating cloud was imagined. More images and architects’ description after the break.

The winning proposal for the Provincial Government Office, designed by AllesWirdGut, corresponds to the public use of the building and provides the public with an open space for collective appropriation. A cloverleaf-shaped structure defines several entrances, all of which drain into a common center. The development responds to local and regional links and forms a junction of important inter-urban links which are created on all sides of the forecourts and entrances that complement and enhance the quality of public space. More images and architects’ description after the break.

The National Building Museum in Washington DC just opened a one of a kind exhibit featuring a 12-hole mini-golf course, which will be up until Labor Day, September 3. Designed by leading local architects, landscape architects, and contractors, their creations allow visitors to challenge friends and family to a round of mini-golf with air-conditioned comfort in the museum. Games cost $5 for non-members and $3 for members. For more information on the exhibit, please visit here. More images after the break.