In March 2024, BIG and HNTB were announced as the winners of the competition to design the ballpark for the Athletics Major League Baseball team in Las Vegas. A year later, the two firms have released a new collection of renderings for the Las Vegas A's Ballpark, showcasing the envisioned interior design. Earlier releases revealed the stadium's exterior, shaped like an armadillo positioned between Tropicana Avenue and Reno Avenue on Las Vegas Boulevard. The open-air stadium, spanning nine acres, promises to have a notable presence on the Las Vegas skyline and is set for completion in spring 2028.
Aerial render. Image Courtesy of Foster + Partners
In September 2024, Foster + Partners announced its appointment by Manchester United for the development of a master plan for the Old Trafford Stadium District. The centerpiece of the master plan is a new stadium, set to become the largest football venue in the United Kingdom with a capacity of 100,000 seats. This week, the firm unveiled images of the stadium design along with surrounding public spaces, including parks, mixed-use developments, an open-air cinema, and a renovated train station. These images contain the illustrative concepts that will become the basis for more detailed feasibility, consultation, and planning work as the project enters new stages.
"Living Scaffolding" is the name of the proposal selected to represent Peru at the 19th International Architecture Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia. Curated by architects Alex Hudtwalcker, Sebastián Cillóniz, and Gianfranco Morales, along with historian José Ignacio Beteta, the exhibition tells the story of a totora reed raft that, in 1988, embarked on a sea journey to other ports in South America and Polynesia. Its unprecedented expedition began on the Peruvian coast south of Lima and lasted 54 days at sea. The raft was the result of a collective, handcrafted effort and a significant structural challenge. The exhibition aims to highlight the importance of ancestral knowledge in addressing such challenges, celebrate materials essential to Peruvian cultural heritage, and expose the value of collective intelligence.
Desert X is a site-specific international art exhibition taking place this year across the Coachella Valley, California. Its fifth edition, curated by Artistic Director Neville Wakefield and co-curator Kaitlin Garcia Maestas, opened on March 10, 2025, featuring eleven installations by international artists integrated into the desert landscape. Artists were invited to propose alternative ways of perceiving a world "increasingly encircled by the transformational effects of nature and humanity," through physical installations in specific locations within the California desert. In this context, architecture is understood as the most visible evidence of human transformation, while immaterial elements, such as wind and light, highlight the transformative effects not only of human activity but also of nature itself. The exhibition is free and open to all, running through May 11, 2025. Below are images and descriptions of the eleven art installations featured in this year's Desert X exhibition.
Overall Framework Render. Image Courtesy of Sasaki
Salalah is Oman's largest logistics port and its second-largest city. Located within a two-hour flight from Dubai and a 90-minute flight from Muscat, the city attracted over one million tourists in 2024. As part of the Oman Vision 2040 investment plan, Oman's Ministry of Housing and Urban Planning has commissioned Sasaki to develop a master plan for redesigning the city's waterfront. The plan includes renovating the city's coastal public spaces and constructing new housing and infrastructure to accommodate projected growth. The project is part of a broader initiative to double tourism's contribution to the nation's GDP by 2030, with on-site construction set to begin later this year, in 2025.
In the autumn of 2024, the Kistefos Museum Foundation invited 28 architectural firms to participate in a prequalification process to design a new site-specific standalone gallery. Scheduled to open in 2031, the new museum building will house the art collection of the museum's founder, Christen Sveaas. The gallery will join Kistefos' sculpture park, which features 55 works by international artists such as Yayoi Kusama, Olafur Eliasson, Fernando Botero, and Anish Kapoor, as well as an industrial museum and BIG's award-winning art gallery, The Twist. Additionally, a new visitor center, designed by the Oslo-based architectural firm Lund Hagem, is set to open in 2026.
The Luxembourg pavilion at the 19th Venice Architecture Biennale will offer visitors an experience focused entirely on sound. Sonic Investigations, curated by architects Valentin Bansac, Mike Fritsch, and Alice Loumeau, is an immersive invitation to shift focus from the visual to the sonic. The sound installation, located in the Arsenale's Sale d'Armi, is based on a practical and theoretical investigation that re-examines the country's territory through field recordings capturing a range of sounds from biological, geological, and anthropogenic sources woven into the landscape. The installation creates an embodied experience of space, emphasizing the value of sensorial approaches in spatial practices and exploring the question: How can we reveal the entangled character of specific contemporary situations in Luxembourg?
The United Center arena in Chicago, designed by HOK Sport (now Populous), Marmon Mok, and W.E. Simpson Company, was built between 1992 and 1994. With a capacity of over 20,000 seats for sports and general events, it includes more than 6,000 parking spaces in lots surrounding the arena. These parking lots span approximately 55 acres (over 22 hectares) in Chicago's West Side (1901 W. Madison Street). A new master plan, named the 1901 Project, aims to transform this space into a mixed-use neighborhood. Led by design collective RIOS, with contributions from landscape architecture studio Field Operations, this long-term, multi-phase project aims to connect neighborhoods by creating new public spaces and infrastructure on a metropolitan scale. The proposal recently received approval from the Chicago Plan Commission.
Following an international competition, Polish American architect Daniel Libeskind's firm, Studio Libeskind, in collaboration with La Compagnie de Phalsbourg, has been selected to design the flagship building for the Léon Blum district, adjacent to the future Line 15 station of the Grand Paris Express. The competition featured eight teams, including Snøhetta, Valode et Pistre, Stefano Boeri, Sou Fujimoto, and Jean-Paul Viguier. The winning project is a mixed-use building of over 20,000m², featuring a green wall and incorporating bio-sourced materials. The project is part of a broader urban development strategy for Issy-les-Moulineaux, an extra-wall area of Paris currently undergoing significant transformation.
Renzo Piano Building Workshop (RPBW), in collaboration with Holger Meyer Architekten, has won the competition for the new Midstad project in Frankfurt. Led by Joost Moolhuijzen and Erik Volz, the design reimagines the future of European city centers as resourceful and multifunctional. The project involves a 35,000 m² rehabilitation of an existing department store on the Zeil in Frankfurt's city center, integrating a six-story mass timber extension and a mixed-use, community-driven program. The project involves reconstruction during ongoing operation, partial demolition, and the expansion of the existing department store.
Germany's contribution to the 19th Venice Architecture Biennale 2025 will expose visitors physically and psychologically to the future urban climate: a STRESSTEST that makes the need for immediate action palpable. The exhibition takes a clear stance: climate change is an unstoppable reality, and the measures taken so far are inadequate. It presents a scenario in which climate change manifests globally through rising temperatures, extreme weather, and sea level rise, with its effects directly felt at a local level: urban spaces suffering from heat stress. Curators Nicola Borgmann, Elisabeth Endres, Gabriele G. Kiefer, and Daniele Santucci have designed an exhibition to highlight the impacts of global warming on urban life in an urgent call to action, emphasizing that this reality threatens urban social life, productivity, and the health and survival of citizens.
Zaha Hadid Architects have announced the breaking ground for the Centre of Mediterranean Culture in Reggio Calabria, Italy. The 24,000 square-meter structure houses diverse spaces, including a network of exhibition galleries, both permanent and temporary, capable of showcasing a wide range of displays. An integrated aquarium is a key feature, offering visitors a glimpse into the marine life of the Strait. The building also provides conference facilities, including a large auditorium suitable for performances, presentations, and industry events. Dedicated educational spaces are incorporated to support the region's schools, and visitor amenities include a bookshop and a restaurant and bar overlooking the port.
Nieuwe Instituut, the national museum and institute for architecture, design, and digital culture in The Netherlands, has announced the theme for the Dutch Pavilion at the 2025 Venice Architecture Biennale. This year, the Giardini pavilion designed by Gerrit Rietveld in 1953 will be transformed into a sports bar. Titled "SIDELINED: A Space to Rethink Togetherness", the exhibition was curated by Amanda Pinatih, Design & Contemporary Art Curator at the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam, in collaboration with social designer Gabriel Fontana. Through a queer lens, the project examines sport as an architectural system that regulates spaces, bodies, and behavior, offering an alternative perspective on societal norms related to gender, identity, and group dynamics.
A year after the Viña del Mar mega-fire in Chile and with reconstruction efforts progressing at just 26%, the architecture firm ELEMENTAL and local authorities have begun construction on a prefabricated housing project in one of the residential neighborhoods most affected by the disaster. The project consists of a mid-density residential building with a modular steel structure, intended as a starting point for similar initiatives in response to what is now considered one of the most catastrophic events in Chile's recent history. As stated by Alejandro Aravena and the city's mayor, Macarena Ripamonti, the goal is for the technology and management model behind this project to set a precedent for delivering rapid and permanent housing solutions in emergency situations.
Archinfo, the Information Centre for Finnish Architecture, has announced the theme, curator, and exhibition team for the Pavilion of Finland at the 19th International Architecture Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia. The exhibition, titled "The Pavilion – Architecture of Stewardship", will focus on the diverse labor involved in constructing and maintaining architecture, from design contributions by architectural workers and engineers to the efforts of construction workers, restoration architects, maintenance staff, and cleaners, all of whom play vital roles in the creation and upkeep of the built environment. Curated by Ella Kaira and Matti Jänkälä from the Helsinki-based architecture practice Vokal, it will use Alvar and Elissa Aalto's Pavilion of Finland to explore architecture as a collaborative endeavor.
Red Sol Resort in Dhërmi. Image Courtesy of Ricardo Bofill Taller de Arquitectura
Architecture has been at the center of a transformation process in Albania, particularly significant in Tirana, its capital city. In 2017, the winning project for the Tirana 2030 Masterplan was unveiled, designed by Stefano Boeri Architetti, UNLAB, and IND [Inter.National.Design] as part of a competition organized by the Ministry of Urban Development. Aiming to give Tirana a new metropolitan dimension while promoting and preserving green spaces, the strategy integrates a system of open spaces, natural elements, and strategic projects at key points in the city. The multidisciplinary Catalan firm Bofill Taller de Arquitectura has contributed to this transformation with two mixed-use towers in Tirana and a resort project in the coastal town of Dhërmi, reflecting the distinctive aesthetic of Ricardo Bofill's work.
Foster + Partners has developed a masterplan for a 38-hectare former industrial site in the heart of Constanța, a port city in Romania's Dobrogea region. The design transforms the site into a "city within a city," incorporating cultural and educational buildings, retail, entertainment, sports and leisure facilities, public parks, and botanical gardens. The project aims to reconnect the urban landscape and enhance the city's experience. The proposal is rooted in Constanța's history, from its Greek and Roman origins to its more recent industrial heritage.
