Venice captured all architects' hearts and minds last year, but 2019 —a Venice-less year— will be still a year full of biennials and festivals around the world (many of which we're proud to be official partners of). The excitement is already building. 

From Chicago's new approaches to the traditional practices to Shenzhen's future technology prospect; from Oslo's degrowth agenda to Brazil's focus on everyday architecture, it's time to start saving dates for the following biennials around the world!

As an initiative of the Archiprix Foundation, Archiprix International 2019 recently invited all schools worldwide in Architecture, Urbanism and Landscape Architecture to select and submit their best graduation project. "This graduation work presents a wealth of ideas for a broad range of contemporary and future challenges", explains the organization on its website.

After analyzing all the submissions sent by universities from more than 100 countries, the jury —Francisco Díaz, Rosetta Elkin, Marta Moreira, Martino Tattara, and Sam Jacoby— nominated 22 projects for the awards in a special session held in Santiago, Chile. The winners of the awards will be announced at the Award ceremony on May the 3rd 2019 in the same city.

The complete list (in alphabetical order) of the projects nominated for the awards, below:

The greats of twentieth-century Colombian architecture were regarded for their genuine interest in brick. To this day, many of Colombia's iconic neighborhoods are filled with brick buildings. 

Below, a selection of stunning Colombian brick projects —available in this My ArchDaily public folder as well.

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With the help of Empresa de Desarrollo Urbano/Urban Development Company (EDU) and La Sociedad Colombiana de Arquitectos/the Colombian Architect's Society (SCA), Medellín has launched an international competition to design a space to remember and reflect on the period between 1983 and 1994.

These years were some of the most violent in the Colombian city's history. In January 1988, a car bomb with 80 kilos of dynamite exploded in front of the Monaco Building, the former home of drug lord Pablo Escobar in El Poblado neighborhood. This was the first of a series of attacks between rival drug cartels in Medellin.

It would be hard to associate zen philosophy with Mies van der Rohe, even harder to associate it with the German Pavilion in Barcelona. Nevertheless, the latest work by American artist Spencer Finch, Fifteen stones (Ryōan-ji), precisely establishes that connection with the iconic pavilion.

Spencer Finch was the latest artist invited to intervene the Fundació's pavilion. With the aim of "provok[ing] new looks and reflections through [his] intervention in the Pavilion, [he] enhanced it as a space for inspiration and experimentation for the most innovative artistic and architectural creation." Finch joined a prominent team of artists and architects, including SANAA, Jeff Wall, Ai Wei Wei, Enric Miralles, Andrés Jaque, and Anna & Eugeni Bach, among others.

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Kazuyo Sejima, co-founder of the architecture firm SANAA, shared details of their upcoming project the New National Gallery – Ludwig Museum in Budapest at the Hay Festival Segovia in Spain. The 2010 Pritzker Prize winner linked the underlying premise of this project to three iconic museums: the 21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art in Kanazawa (2004), the New Art Museum in New York (2007), and the Louvre Lens in France (2012).

In this conversation, Laszló Baán, General Director of the National Gallery, Budapest and Ministerial Commissioner of the Liget Budapest Project, explained the details of the 100-hectare (247-acre) masterplan at the heart of Hungary's capital city. The Liget Budapest Project will feature ten museums, including Sou Fujimoto's House of Hungarian Music, the expansion of the Budapest Zoo, and SANAA's New National Gallery for Budapest — a museum that will host 19th, 20th century, and contemporary artworks.

After a series of failed attempts, the Monaco building in Medellín will finally be demolished at the beginning of 2019, according to the Colombian newspaper El Tiempo.

The Monaco building, which was converted into a municipal asset this year, was the residence of the late drug trafficker Pablo Escobar in the El Poblado neighborhood of Medellín. In January of 1988, a car bomb with 80 kilograms of dynamite exploded in front of the building giving rise to a series of attacks between the drug cartels in Medellín.

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If a work can be photographed, drawn, or expressed in words, it can also be the star of a film. This can be seen in Arquitectura en Corto, a Spanish cycle of short films about innovation and trends in contemporary architecture.

"The eruption and widespread availability of social media/mobile videos coupled with the need to illustrate and present innovative projects drives the union between architecture and these mediums," explains Roca Gallery and Technal, the organizers behind Arquitectura en Corto.

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The last five stories of the Torre de David in Caracas have tilted 25 degrees following the largest earthquake to hit Venezuela in 100 years. The well-known building gained infamy as an unprecedented vertical "slum" when its construction was abandoned and squatters began to inhabit the unfinished structure.

The 190-meter skyscraper with 45 stories became Latin America's 8th tallest tower in the 1990s, but it was never completed. Officially known as the Centro Financiero Confinanzas when construction began in 1990, the project succumbed to Venezuela's 1994 banking crisis.   

The World Health Organization (WHO) has advised that countries throughout the world eliminate the use of all types of asbestos, a dangerous carcinogen, to prevent asbestos-related diseases. According to the Asbestos Disease Awareness Organization, it was estimated that 40,000 people in the U.S. die each year from asbestos-related conditions.

Despite the WHO's concerns, Fast Company reported that under Trump's administration, "The [U.S. Environmental Protection Agency] (EPA) has even made it easier for companies to introduce new uses of asbestos-containing products in America." Although Asbestos Nation estimates that 55 countries have outlawed the carcinogen, this issue brings up a common question: Has my country banned asbestos? Below, we have provided a list by International Ban Asbestos Secretariat's Laurie Kazan-Allen on the following 65 countries and regions that have banned asbestos.

Spain-based platform Best Architecture Masters (BAM) has revealed its inaugural ranking of the best postgraduate architecture programs in the world. Based on the QS Ranking by Subjects – Architecture / Built Environment, the rankings were selected by 13 educational-performance indicators, including quality and internationality of faculty, alumni, and postgraduate program.

Harvard's Master in Architecture II has topped the BAM ranking, followed respectively by TU Delft's Berlage Post-master in Architecture and Urban Design, and MIT's Master of Science in Architecture and Urbanism. By region, Tsinghua University's Masters in Architecture was ranked first in Asia (#5); Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile's Magíster en Arquitectura in Latin America (#11), and Sydney University's Master of Architecture in Oceania ranks 17th worldwide.

The best master's degrees in architecture are:

Times Higher Education (THE) revealed its ranking of the best universities in Latin America and the Caribean. The list is based on the same 13 indicators used in their global ranking, but with modifications that "better reflect the characteristics of Latin American universities," explains the organization. 

The 2018 edition of this regional ranking includes 129 universities from 10 countries rated in the following categories: teaching, research, citations, international outlook, industry income. It should be noted that this measurement is global at the university level and does not measure each academic concentration separately, as QS does in its annual ranking.

Dominated by universities in Brazil, we present the 10 best Latin American universities for architecture, according to Times Higher Education (THE).

DSGN (Design Student Global Network) has unveiled the winners of the Innovation Hub Competition, its first international design competition and part of its participation at Fuorisalone Milan Design Week this past April. The winning proposal — an Innovation Hub development scheme for a rural community site in Bali, Indonesia— will be built in a series of international design workshops starting in 2019. The hub will be used by the local Five Pillar Foundation to host classes focusing on community development and social entrepreneurship in the region.

HUBBALI, the winning design by Hanna Haczek & Ewelina Andrecka (Poland), was selected by the Five Pillar Foundation community and DSGN for its focus on participatory design and social development. Based on a 6x6 meter timber construction module, HUBBALI takes up an 18x18 meter area and is flanked by porches on entry sides side for gathering and relaxation. The design will be further developed with the Five Pillar Foundation and the surrounding Pejarakan community in Bali during construction.

Students from South Africa, Belarus, and Germany have been chosen as the winners of the 14th edition MultiComfort House Students Contest, a contest created in 2004 and organized by Saint-Gobain. Entrants were to develop a project based on the principles of the multi-comfort concept, that is, "an optimum indoor environment ensuring the right level of fresh air, thermal, visual and acoustic comfort provided in a sustainable and energy efficient manner," as explained by the organizers.

In close collaboration with the Department of Planning of the Municipality of Dubai and the Dubai Properties Group, Saint-Gobain presented the challenge of designing a cross-cultural community project in the cultural village of Dubai, on the shores of the Al Jaddaf inlet.

Considering Dubai's hot and humid climate, the students had to find a way to reconcile reducing the energy consumption of the refrigeration and ventilation systems without compromising any of the comforts of the inhabitants; while at the same time providing an optimal relationship with the environment.

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Hours before the start of the 2018 FIFA World Cup Russia's opening ceremony, the soccer organization will reveal if the Canada–Mexico–United States or Morocco will be selected to hold 2026 FIFA World Cup.

Ahead of the announcement, Morocco revealed the design of the stadium that would hold the final match if the North African country wins the bid--a new venue with capacity for 80,000 spectators. This stadium has been designed by Spanish architects Cruz y Ortiz Arquitectos, the firm that recently inaugurated the Wanda Metropolitano in Madrid. They are also currently working on the design of the Dalian Yifan Football Club stadium in China and another sports venue in Switzerland.

Dean Amale Andraos of the Columbia GSAPP has announced the appointment of Andrés Jaque as the new Director of the Master of Science in Advanced Architectural Design program (AAD). Jaque is the founder of the Madrid-based Office for Political Innovation and has been teaching advanced design studios at Columbia GSAPP since 2013.

On June, 1, Jaque will succeed Associate Professor Enrique Walker, who directed the program from 2008 to 2018. "I’m very thankful for the rigorous vision and dedication that Walker has brought to the program during his directorship," acknowledged Andraos. "Enrique established a strong legacy of bringing experimental approaches to research and design and built a program that is firmly grounded in forming positions through design," added.