A quick glimpse at the upcoming weather for Abu Dhabi will show a week of intense sunshine, temperatures steadily above 100 degrees Fahrenheit with 0% chance of rain. In such extreme weather conditions, even architects listing environmental design as their top priority are up against a tough battle. Never mind that the sand can compromise the structural integrity of the building, the intense heat and glare can render a comfortable indoor environment relatively impossible if not properly addressed. For Abu Dhabi’s newest pair of towers, Aedas Architects have designed a responsive facade which takes cultural cues from the “mashrabiya”, a traditional Islamic lattice shading device.

More about the towers’ shading system after the break.

Mark your calendars – the Lowline is going public! After a great gallery exhibition and tons of international support, the Lowline founders are launching a public exhibition to showcase their innovative technological approach to creating the world’s first underground park on the Lower East Side of New York City. The full scale exhibition will take place in the Essex Market Building D, an abandoned warehouse just above the proposed Lowline Park, from September 15-27.

More after the break.

We found this great short video by London-based illustrator, artist and animator Patrick Vale. The Manhattan perspective is taken from the Empire State Building looking south toward the new development of the Freedom Tower. The Flat Iron building lies in the foreground, while the Brooklyn and Verrazzano Bridges anchor the eastern edge with Jersey City’s Goldman Sachs Tower flank the western edge. After marveling at the final illustration at the end of the time-lapse clip, we were hooked and wanted to see more of Vale! Check out more illustrations by Vale – including great ones of Florence and London – after the break.

Which is your favorite?

Although our digital age allows us to peruse the latest in fashion, furniture and leisure all digitally, sometimes, there’s nothing quite like mindlessly flipping through the pages of a catalogue. Yet, the digital world is quickly penetrating even the tangible pages of furniture magazines, such as IKEA’s latest 200+ million print copies which are replacing labor intensive sets with digital renditions of furniture layouts and color combinations.

As architects who are constantly bombarded with renderings and spend hours perfecting that chosen perspective, can we spot what’s real and what’s not in the catalgoue pages below? Does that glossy kitchen countertop or fluffy blue couch really exist? Or, did IKEA’s digital modelers work their magic and fool us with the renderings – a move that saves IKEA money and still maintains the desired effect.

More after the break. 

As we shared earlier, the world’s 28-year old creative technological master will team with 83-year-old starachitect for Facebook’s newest addition to their Menlo Park campus. The two, although worlds apart in terms of forte, find common ground in the never ending creative process, and the desire to continually push boundaries of the expected and the ordinary. As we noted in our previous piece, the building will offer a equalized sense of status – no private cubicles or showy corner offices – and encourage a collaborative work environment, admix a warm splash of colors, textures and natural lighting.

Gone from the building will be Gehry’s flashy ways of manipulating sheets of metal, and the resulting superfluous sense of affluence often emitted from these grand structures.  Rather, Gehry’s work for Facebook will offer an ”equalizier”, a massive one story warehouse measuring 420,000 sqf, to house the company’s future 2,800 engineers with the underlying intention of fostering a comfortable environment to allow Facebook to keep getting better.

More about the newest headquarters after the break. 

As reported by David W Dunlap for the NYTimes, the safety-restoration applied to Philip Johnson and Richard Foster’s Elmer Holmes Bobst Library on the NYU campus near Washington Square is close to completion. While the library, which was constructed in the early 1970s, remains intact, the tremendous atrium space – a soaring 150 ft void – is proving to be more of a safety hazard than the magnificent architectural experience the architects intended. Since 2003, the library has been marred by claiming the lives of three students who leaped to their deaths (even after the university installed 8ft polycarbonate barriers). Charged with the task of eliminating the possibility for such a future occurrence, Joel Sanders Architect responded with a perforated alumium screen that completely walls off the atrium from the library’s levels.

More after the break.  

In continuing our coverage of the Architecture Billings Index, we share this past month’s score of 48.7 While such a mark still falls in negative territory (any score under 50 indicates a decline in billings), July’s activity was a considerable jump from June’s meager 45.9. And, even better, July’s new projects inquiry index moved up almost two full points to 56.3. Regionally, the South is surprisingly leading the averages with 52.7, followed by the Midwest with 46.7, the West with 45.3, and lastly, the Northeast region capping out at 44.3. In terms of the sector breakdown, multi-family residential remains strong with 51.4 followed by commercial/industrial projects and institutional projects. AIA Chief Economist, Kermit Baker, PhD, Hon. AIA, explained, “Even though architecture firm billings nationally were down again in July, the downturn moderated substantially. As long as overall economic conditions continue to show improvement, modest declines should shift over to growth in design activity over the coming months.”

We love seeing a project through fruition, and after being introduced to the collaborative vision of the Iceberg for Arhus, Denmark, we were anxiously awaiting its construction. As we have previously shared, the Iceberg, or “Isbjerget” in Danish, was designed as an iconic waterfront marker to invigorate the harbor front’s transformation from a sole industrial entity to a residential and commercial hub. Construction is swiftly progressing on the four building block, and earlier this week, the team enjoyed the project’s “topping out” ceremony.

More about the Iceberg after the break.

Recently, we shared ODA’s honorable mention proposal for the National Library of Israel which fosters an open haven for learning and activity. The New-York based firm is also working on projects a bit closer to home in Manhattan that approach zoning restrictions with an air of optimism. ODA explained, “We embrace those parameters (zoning ordinances) and use them as the DNA of our buildings. If carefully studied, NYC’s zoning allows for many interpretations that follows logical principals.”

More about the residences after the break.

Staten Island, arguably New York’s most often forgotten borough, may finally be getting its moment in the spotlight. Talks are in the works of creating a giant 600 ft Ferris wheel near the Staten Island Ferry Terminal to generate activity for the waterfront. To put 600 feet in perspective, think bigger than the Singapore Flyer at 451 feet and the London Eye’s 450 ft marker, and much bigger than Coney Island’s Wonder Wheel at 150 feet. While millions enjoy the free trip across the harbor on the ferry every year, few venture far from the boat. The Ferris Wheel is intended to capitalize on the Island’s amazing views of Manhattan and build up the Island’s visitor flow. “It’s the greatest thing that has been proposed for Staten Island, especially on the waterfront. This could landmark us. We have 2 million tourists a year on the ferry, so we have a built-in audience to use it, and it’s a different audience every day. Once you can attract them off that boat, you got them here,” James Molinaro, the borough president, stated.

More after the break. 

While perusing the internet, I re-discovered talk about Architect Barbie by Alexandra Lange for Dwell. As part of Mattel’s Barbie I Can Be series, Architect Barbie was added to the company’s list of other arguably atypical professions for women (computer engineer, martial artist, marine biologist, race car driver, etc) in 2011 after partnering with AIA San Francisco. Equipped with a model dream house, hard hat and drawing tube, Mattel boasts that Architect Barbie will empower girls to play out different roles and “try on” fabulous careers. But, this doll was about more than giving young children a new outlet for their imaginations during play time; for, Architect Barbie would serve as a social experiment to generate long term feminine interest in a field where 17% of professionals are women.

More about Architect Barbie after the break.

Last week, we shared LCLAOFFICE‘s conceptual proposal for the Kiev Islands, a proposal which connected the urban with the natural through an activated network of activities. In their shortlisted entry for the Faroe Islands, the firm teamed with Lateral Office to relink the city of Klaksvik with both of its bays. Such a move allows the urban development, which has historically happened along the length of the bay, and the civic and public institutions, which have been concentrated in an urban corridor, to connect people with the water.

More after the break.

The London-based Delfina Foundation, a non-profit foundation dedicated to facilitating cultural exchange with a special focus on the greater Middle East and North Africa, will expand from their townhouse at 29 Catherine Place, near Buckingham Palace, to an adjacent building at 31 Catherine Place. The expansion will double the Foundation’s residency to offer at least 32 residencies a year for artists, curators and writers, making it the largest international artist residency provider in London when it reopens in Autumn 2013. In keeping with the Foundation’s beliefs to promote collaborative understanding across cultures, London-based Studio Octopi and Cairo-based Shahira Fahmy Architects have been awarded first prize for their expansion proposal which will retain the domesticity of the two houses and explore the notion of the hearth in a home.

More about the expansion after the break. 

Check out these new renderings of One World Trade Center from the Port Authority and the Durst Organization. The images were released to illustrate recent design modifications – such as a treatment for the tower’s first 20 stories and the elimination of the casing around the antenna. These fresh thirteen visuals offer a look at the tower from perspectives taken around the boroughs and New Jersey. While these renderings offer a taste of what can be expected, it is great to physical progress being made and how close we are to a completed tower.

More after the break.

Yesterday, we shared the appointment of Wiel Arets as the new dean of the IIT College of Architecture. And, to continue with news in the academic realm, the UNStudio pair of Caroline Bos and Ben van Berkel have been awarded Honorary Professorships at two leading international universities, the University of Melbourne and Harvard University Graduate School of Design, respectively.

In a conceptual master plan, Luis Callejas, Melissa Naranjo and Manon Mollard of LCLAOFFICE have created a series of operational clusters that can be inserted onto the Kiev Islands to preserve the natural essence of the islands, while providing outlets for experiences. The Kiev Islands represent the unique opportunity to allow those in an urban center to balance urban life with the offerings of these natural places.

More info, plus great diagrams, after the break.

In our final segment of Thinking Past Day 17 – our series examining the larger implications of hosting the Olympic Games – we conclude with ideas for the future host cities that involve dividing the Games across 7 permanent sites, complete with reusable architecture and a focus on sustainability at the urban level.

The effects of urban displacement coupled with post-Games housing concerns for the Athletes’ Village in Olympic Park – which we addressed in Part II - will definitely test the future viability of the Olympic Committee’s planning strategies. It is interesting to note that in relation to the entirety of the Olympic map, the area designated for the Village represents only a minuscule portion of the land that must be reintegrated post-Olympics. So, if we zoom out from the Athletes’ Village, what will become of the vast expanses of land currently supporting the major sporting facilities?