Designed by ETB Studio, the multifunctional center, which won the first prize in a competition, is part of the eastern edge of the village Bach, in the the ancient village of Sappada, Italy. Combined with the ratio measured with the scale of the village, and the relationship with the valley and mountain ranges, a powerful scenery of the intervention is created. More images and architects’ description after the break.

The MAS Summit for New York City, which occurs at 9:15am on October 14th, will bring together four icons of urban planning, design and architecture to explore today’s challenges and opportunities in creating a well-planned and well-designed city.

Delivering keynote speeches will be Amanda M. Burden, FAICP, an urban planner and civic activist, who serves as the New York City Planning Commissioner and Chair of the New York City Planning Commission, and Witold Rybczynski best-selling author, Martin and Margy Meyerson Professor of Urbanism at the University of Pennsylvania and architecture critic at Slate. More information on the event after the break.

If you are in the Phoenix area this weekend be sure to take in the AIA Phoenix Metro Home Tour tomorrow from 10am to 5pm. The tour will feature seven designs within the Phoenix area that vary in scale and range from contemporary to traditional styles, so there is omething for everyone. Included within this year’s tour is colab studio’s Cedar Street Residence which has been featured here on ArchDaily. After the home tour you may be inspired to take a look at some of the other great architecture in the city. Check out our Architecture City Guide Phoenix for ideas.

It was with much enthusiasm that Denver International Airport officials announced Santiago Calatrava as the architect for the new $650 million expansion that included a hotel, public plaza, and commuter-rail station. However, Calatrava is now withdrawing himself from the project only a year later. Numerous concerns have been cited as the reason for his departure including “financial constraints, unnecessary time delays, and deep divisions” between his design team, DIA, and Parsons International Group as quoted by his wife and business manager Robertina in a letter to DIA manager Kim Day.

No walls, no columns, no ground, no boundaries, no limits…just pure space, and the never-ending possibilities that nature’s man linked to man’s nature offer to the whole world of living experience. The Global House, designed by Daniel Corsi, André Biselli Sauaia, Daniel Fonseca, Reinaldo Nishimura, and Victor Paixão, reveals itself as a living being, related to man through the most fluid way, where neither one is a stranger to each other and new forms of spatial relations are generated: a house as an interface that interacts with the human – physical/mental – necessities and desires, as it also acts by its own condition of a vital organism. More images and the team’s description after the break.

Movements and gestures of dancers are full of expression and tension. Dancers bring the fascinated viewer into an internal world of experience and emotion through the swinging movement of their hips, decorative arrangement of their fingers and smooth vibration of the ornamental frills. Rhythmic and dynamic music transmits the spectator into a world of incredible aesthetic feelings awakening all senses and inflaming the imagination. This is how architecture dedicated to the culture of feisty flamenco should look like as demonstrated in the proposal by MUS Architects. More images and architects’ description after the break.

Architect Jorge Mealha shared with us the winning design of the public tender of ideas for the architecture of the central buildings and exterior of the Technological Park of Óbidos in Portugal. The proposal tries to suggest the memory of existing and relevant structures in the territory of the region. From the outside only, a long and narrow textured strip is perceived over the natural landscape, evoking those long external walls seen in a few farms, convents and monasteries who punctuate this territory. More images and architects’ description after the break.

Endorsed by Icsid and part of World Design Capital2012 Helsinki, the Bullhorn – Cembrit Design Competition challenges participants to design and develop Malmi Station, one of Helsinki’s biggest suburban transit areas, into an outstanding and experimental landmark that will improve the quality of life for thousands of urban commuters each day. Participants will do so through the innovative use of fibre-cement.

Modern urban living, commerce and tourism are a part of the new multi-district redevelopment plans for Nanjing’s Yangtze Redevelopment. Selected by Beijing based MCC Real Estate Company, SOM has imagined a scheme that will create a new area of neighborhoods, shopping districts and corporate skyscrapers embodying a new identity for Nanjing and a mixed-use cityscape for its people.

SOM Director Douglas Voigt said, “The core concept of the SOM plan for Nanjing Xiaguan is making connections. Connecting the city to the river. Connecting the best of urban living to nature. Connecting under–utilized land to value creation that will increase growth, tourism and prosperity. Connecting Nanjing’s rich heritage with China’s rising economy.”

Architect Andrea Palladio’s (1508–1580) influence can be found throughout the world in monumental architectural works on both sides of the Atlantic. His Four Books on Architecture (1570) are some of the most famous and influential writings on architectural theory. The Royal Institute of British Architects Trust in conjunction with the Centro Internazionale di Studi di Architettura Andrea Palladio, Vicenza, has organized a traveling exhibition called Palladio and His Legacy: A Transatlantic Journey. This display will offer up a unique opportunity to view the numerous works, drawings, and models of one of the most influential architects of the last 500 years. Hosted by the Carnegie Museum of Art in their Heinz Architectural Center, the exhibition will run from September 3-December 31, 2011.

Our Flickr Pool has nearly 60,000 photos! Keep them coming! As always, 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 Chimay Bleue in Beverly Hills, USA. Check the other four after the break.

Ever wanted to get a behind the scenes look at some of the most interesting buildings in Chicago? If you are an architecture enthusiast, student, or just curious about what all the hype is about, this weekend is your opportunity to experience the best that Chicago has to offer. From October 15-16, 2011, the Chicago Architecture Foundation will be hosting openhousechicago 2011 – which is free and open to the public. The primary themes for OHC are sustainability and community, with an emphasis on how buildings can achieve energy efficiency, and how design brings people and places together in a holistic manner.

Eriksen Skajaa Architects, Pushak Architects, and Bjørbekk & Lindheim Landscape Architects shared with us their 1st prize winning design in a competition for new gateways to the Sjunkhatten National Park in Nordland, Norway. The park has a focus on children and the jury found the proposal’s focus on the mythical fit to enrichen children’s experience of nature. It is a dramatic and beautiful landscape close to Bodø in northern norway between fjords and snow covered mountain peaks. More images and architects’ description after the break.

Built in 1861, the Park Avenue Armory Park functioned as both a military facility and a social club for the prestigious Seventh Regiment of the National Guard of President Lincoln’s volunteer militia. Now, the 210,000 sqf five story building (which occupies an entire city block) serves as the home for a not-for-profit cultural institution where visual and performing arts can take place within a not so traditional setting. In 2007, the building began a comprehensive revitalization project as it had fallen into a state of disrepair with Herzog & de Meuron as the lead designers (by the way, have you seen their new website?). Herzog & de Meuron have embraced the history, craftsmanship, and the inherent contrast of the Armory’s spaces to restore the interiors to their original elegance. “Park Avenue Armory is a richly layered building of outstanding historical significance that we are treating like a monument, revealing the physical traces produced over time, preserving it for the future and above all reinventing it,” explained Herzog & de Meuron.

More about the restoration after the break.

Designed for the ShangHai Industrial Pavilion, UnSangDong Architects imagined the Korean Corporate Pavilion coinciding along the subjects of green city and green life. It is named Communi-Imagination and it holds the introspection of environment together with innovation of technology. Korea got over the unfortunate situation of the Korean War which didn’t seem to be possible and has achieved unimaginable development and innovation. This space represents technology and spirit of Korean enterprises which is the main agent of these accomplishments. More images and architects’ description after the break.

Hamar’s Kommune decided to take a pioneer approach to the construction of the new Stortorget Square, now just a parking lot. In an effort to bring democracy back to public spaces, citizens are invited to join the free on-site workshops that will take place from September to November, to question themselves about their city and work together to improve it. The workshops follow a horizontal and participative methodology, led by Ecosistema Urbano that will determine Stortorget’s new configuration, which is known as Dreamhamar. More images and project description after the break.

Composed of works by Reiulf Ramstad Architects, the exhibition, “Transforming Landscapes”, opened at Sint-Lucas School of Architecture in Gent, Belgium on October 12th and will be up until November 4th. A collaboration with the Norwegian Embassy in Brussels/ L’Ambassade Royale de Norvège en Belgique, the event kicks off with a lecture by Reiulf Ramstad followed by the official opening and Vernissage.

He was becoming increasingly alarmed at the material achievements of his friends. What was also alarming and unsettling about this was that he once believed he was above such pettiness, such base feelings of jealously. Even though the middle-class was supposed to be dead, houses were being bought and Facebook postings were conveying a seemingly neat, linear, and rationally-planned ascendancy through what appeared to be the accepted stages of middle-class respectability. People were not getting divorced. They were not seeking exotic hardships in Third World post-colonies. They had stopped wearing backpacks after their undergraduate years and were succeeding at everything. He would console himself with the thought that, in fact, most of them had stopped at their undergraduate degrees, period, and, without any sense of regret or irony, started working, building families, settling down. They had stopped acting like life was summer. How boring that must all be.

Thinking of going out to dinner tonight? Maybe the 8th part of our previously featured restaurants selection will help you decide. Check them all after the break!

Spectacles Jeux Restaurant / Malcotti Roussey Architectes This project is located in the space that was left free in the ancient saline, a place that was partially destroyed. It is situated in Salins-les-Bains near the museum, which is being restored (see the museum fact sheet). In March 2007, a fire took place in the former and major building of the saline called « pardessus ». It included a restaurant, an auditorium and a gambling room (read more…)

Earlier this week Marion Weiss and Michael Manfredi, founding principals of Weiss/Manfredi Architecture/Landscape/Urbanism, lectured at Harvard GSD about Evolutionary Infrastructures. The multidisciplinary firm has distinguished themselves with their holistic design approach, successfully integrating the disciplines of architecture, art, infrastructure, and landscape design.

Dear Mr. Architect,

I would like to clarify a few things that you may have misunderstood during the design process. Please don’t get me wrong. In general we are very pleased with the house, ummm, I mean… “living-experiment”, (Did I get that right?) We’re just a little concerned about our marriage.

Granted, we said we wanted an “open” and “airy” bathroom, however, my husband and I do not enjoy showering in full view of our neighbors. The guy next door will not stop calling me. He also seems to have purchased a telescope. We would like to install blinds. Could you recommend a manufacturer? Would some kind of curtains work? Please advise.

Women – what’s up now? Architecture is Barbie’s profession for 2011. AIA San Francisco and Mattel partnered on an architect Barbie Doll as well as a Barbie Doll dream house competition.

Representing different paths in the design profession, architects Cathy Simon, FAIA (Perkins + Will), Ila Berman (California College of the Arts), EB Min (Min|Day) and Anne M. Torney (Daniel Solomon Design Partners) will discuss their careers and share their perspectives on women in the profession. More information on the event after the break.

Jon Piasecki recently received a 2011 Honor Award from ASLA for his Stone River project. The magic of this project lies in the details. You need to watch the video (after the break) to appreciate the painstaking effort and attention to detail that went into this project.

Video, project description, and more photographs after the break.

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Landscape Artist: Jon Piasecki Location: New York Collaborators: Rob Davis Text: Jon Piasecki Photographs: Jon Piasecki, John Dolan, David Borden

In keeping with our coverage of the Solar Decathlon, we are happy to share Victoria University’s Meridian First Light House third place finish. Finishing a few point shy of the University of Maryland’s 951 points, the New Zealand university received 919 points with high standings in several categories, including winning the Engineering contest, gaining first equal in Hot Water and Energy Balance, second for Architecture and third for Market Appeal. Plus, over the course of the competition, the house managed to produce more energy than it consumed – achieving net zero energy consumption, despite 10 days of undesirable weather. Team member Nick Officer exclaimed, “While we may not have won overall we are incredibly proud to have represented New Zealand on the world stage. We had such and amazing response from the US public here along with supporters back home.” Be sure to check out our previous coverage of the house to learn more about the traditional Kiwi bach – a New Zealand holiday home – inspired residence.

More photos of the residence after the break.