Imagine standing on a glass platform with Chicago 1300 feet directly below. Suddenly, the glass holding you begins to crack. This actually happened to Alejandro Garibay at the Willis Tower (formerly the Sears Tower) just last week. Luckily, Garibay wasn't hurt, but the occurrence begs the question: how safe is glass - the most common material used in skyscrapers nowadays - really? Karrie Jacobs At Fast Company - Design, asked materials experts to find out "The Truth Behind Building With Glass."

Thanks to state of the art mobile laser scanners, scientists can now document the greatest architecture in history, from The Pyramids to St. Paul's Cathedral, as digital models with pinpoint accuracy. The digital representations take you inside, around and through the buildings, which means researchers can study and analyze sites without being in the field. The technology is already proving its worth - watch the trailer above to see how Petra was constructed and more!

The Brooklyn based firm The Principals are known for their interactive design, industrial design and installation work. The video above hi-lights their latest "bionic" installation, which actually responds and reacts to human movement thanks to myoelectric sensors that pick up voltage increases on the skin when a muscle contracts. To learn more head over to their website - and make sure to check out all of The Principals other installations featured on ArchDaily.

In Kengo Kuma’s work you may see influences of light, transparency and materiality. But when visiting the Woodbury School of Architecture in San Diego, Kengo Kuma shared a few of his not so apparent influences, from Frank Lloyd Wright and Louis Kahn to jazz music. Make sure to view “Knowing Kuma” to see the architect’s definition of architecture, materials and more.

Have you ever wondered where your information goes when you save it to "The Cloud"? The answer is within giant data centers. According to reports, Facebook and Google's data centers resemble something from Science Fiction, while some could come straight from a Bond flick. In a new short film named Internet Machine, Filmmaker and Visual artist Timo Arnall takes us where few have been granted access, showing the world what "The Cloud" really is - a massive architectural space with extreme energy demands. To experience the power surging and hear the deafening hum of a data center, check out the trailer above.

Architects have an eye for design, but do they have an eye for advertising? In Norway, for example, Snøhetta isn't just known for the Oslo Opera House but for branding some of the country's largest companies. In America, Hickok Cole Architects of Washington D.C. are working on brand identity with companies as large as Pfizer. Recently, Hickok Cole Architects launched a new advertising arm to the company -- Hickok Cole Creative. With interdisciplinary practice on the rise, one has to wonder – could the work of the architecture firm of the future not be architecture at all? Read more about Hickok Cole's transition into advertising in this article at the Washington Business Journal.

This Financial Times article describes the Post-Recession paradigm shift occurring in Portuguese architecture -- from construction to landscape, large to small. Pritzker Prize winners Alvaro Siza and Eduardo Souto de Moura have been leading this "micro" trend, designing hotels with exceptional materiality and craft. We've decided to round up some of these extraordinary structures, including: Casa Na Areia and Cabanas no Rio by Aires Mateus, Jorge Sousa Santos’ Rio do Prado, the Ecork Hotel by Jose Carlos Cruz and Villa Extramuros by Jordi Fornells. Last but not least, is ArchDaily’s building of the year for hospitality architecture -- the Tree Snake Houses from father Luís Rebelo de Andrade and son Tiago Rebelo de Andrade.

Since childhood, growing up on a farm outside of Nashville, Wendell Burnette has been inspired by nature; indeed, the amplification of the natural site has highlighted his body of work. In the following question and answer by Guy Horton of Metropolis Magazine, the Pheonix-based architect speaks about memories, inspiration and experience.

Wendell Burnette’s journey through architecture has taken him from Frank Lloyd Wright’s Taliesin to some of the most beautiful landscapes in the world, where he has designed a type of architecture that resonates with the power of natural surroundings. It has also taken him to one of the world’s fastest growing cities, Phoenix, Arizona, where his practice, Wendell Burnette Architects, is based and where he calls home. More recently it has brought him to Los Angeles where he is the current Nancy M. & Edward D. Fox Urban Design Critic at the USC School of Architecture. He is also Professor of Practice at The Design School at Arizona State University's Herberger Institute of Design and the Arts.

I spoke with Burnette about his approach to architecture, the importance of direct experience, and the meaning behind his current USC studio, “Earth Curvature”.

The bowels of a Gasometer may be an unlikely place to stage a light installation, however, URBANSCREEN, a German projection company, has done just that. 320 Licht is a spectacle of light and sound within a cylindrical volume over 300 feet high. With the help of Epson Germany, URBANSCREEN was able to sync 21 separate projectors for a 22 minute loop, documenting the process in the amazing high-definition video above. Enjoy!