This guide covers a workflow that moves from project parameters to generated floor plans, 3D perspective views, exterior design exploration, and site context visualization, using AI tools in place of preliminary CAD and rendering work.

Railings play two roles in architectural projects, both as a support and safety component in a building, which involves a great deal of technical detailing and accessibility standards, and as an accent element in the design. In this article, we will explore the different ways in which these elements can be used in a project.

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SLT- STUDIOLITE is a design consulting firm specializing in the evolution of commercial spaces. Founded in the United States in 2013 by Chen Ling, it is currently headquartered in Shanghai, with branch offices in Hong Kong and Seattle. SLT’s services encompass commercial interior design, dynamic retail SI iteration, strategic commercial complex upgrades, and brand identity renewal. The firm is dedicated to championing avant-garde ideologies and innovative business thinking, while actively fostering integrated collaborations with avant-garde artists, cutting-edge technology providers, and innovative material R&D laboratories.

Warsaw Home & Contract is a welcome opportunity for architects and interior designers to re-establish business relationships, establish new ones and discover the latest ideas generated by Poland’s burgeoning design community.

The latest addition to Empa and Eawag's NEST research building in Duebendorf, Switzerland has officially opened. The innovative HiLo unit illustrates nearly a decade of formative ETH Zurich research in architecture and sustainable technologies, and features an intricate, doubly curved concrete roof, lightweight funicular floors, and self-learning building technology.

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In a post-Covid period of reinvention, Porto-based furniture brand Hamilton Conte is embracing modularity, new shapes and above all, comfort.

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“Designing a house for trees”, as he puts it, Stefano Boeri is working across the planet, exporting his approach with trees from Mexico to Shenzhen. Building a whole ecosystem, rather than just a green facade, the architect understands the need to redefine our relationship with nature, especially in cities.

ArchDaily’s Christele Harrouk had the chance to interview the architect in Eindhoven, during the inauguration of the Trudo Tower, Stefano Boeri’s first social housing project, in collaboration with Francesca Cesa Bianchi, his partner at Stefano Boeri Architetti, Laura Gatti, botanist and plantation consultant, and Paolo Russo, Project leader. Discussing mainly his approach with nature, the environmental quality, and his exported perspective around the world, the conversation also tackled the 4 ongoing vertical forests in West Europe: A first that has just started in Utrecht, a second in Brussels, a ready to go building in Eindhoven and a last one in Antwerp.

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Videos

Climate and resource protection are some of the most pressing issues in regards to our future world. This is not a singular issue, but a complex one that affects every sector of humanity including mobility, architecture, sustainable living, and learning. There is a common misconception that building materials - such as polycarbonate translucent panels - cannot be sustainable. Plastic as a material has such an enormous impact on the world, and has drawn negative attention which makes it difficult to break away from the generalization that plastic is fundamentally "bad." Companies such as Rodeca, for example, in the plastics production space have engineered translucent building materials that are capable of enduring for many years as an integral construction material, and do not have to be quickly disposed of. As a producer of polycarbonate panels, Rodeca is always looking ahead to the future of sustainability.

The concept of equity is different from equality; equity means everyone needs support, but not necessarily in the same way. Therefore, the concept of urban equity allows us to preserve the uniqueness of each region of a municipality, protecting diversity and richness without overlooking infrastructure needs, which directly affect the quality of public space and the basic services required for a private residence - it allows us to design and invest in the city fairly, regardless of the region.

This week’s curated selection of Best Unbuilt Architecture highlights competition-winning projects submitted by the ArchDaily Community. From art museums to memorials, this article explores cultural functions and commercial spaces, and presents projects submitted to us from all over the world.

Featuring commercial spaces that honor the historic architectures of Ukraine and Romania, and a public plaza inspired by the topography between the coastal line and the urban square of Usküdar, this roundup explores how architects have designed monumental structures that cater to the needs of the public while respecting the surrounding topography. This round up also includes a collection of competition-winning proposals in Spain, China, Thailand, India, Israel, Iran, Kosovo, and Hungary, each responding to different contexts, spatial needs, and geographies.

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Choosing the fixtures and finishes for bathrooms, kitchens, and laundry rooms is always a design challenge. Whether dealing with wall coverings, fittings, or sanitaryware, gathering as much information as possible is crucial to designing a functional and harmonious space. Among these components, we highlight here the essential details for choosing the best type of sink and its applications. 

Polyvinyl Butyral (PVB) is a resin known for its strength, flexibility, and optical clarity. When inserted and bonded between two panes of glass, the combination —known as laminated glass— provides a tough, acoustic, glare-, UV- and solar-protective barrier with no loss of transparency. So much so, that its main use is in car windscreens.

By inserting and layering various sheets of colored PVB, glass can be transformed with a kaleidoscope of color and a range of opacity. The whole effect gives interiors specifiers a palette of light and color tools when adding personalities to interior environments. Here are six examples of projects that use PVB-laminated glass to great effect:

Lendager Group was founded with the explicit goal of becoming the leading sustainable architectural office in Denmark. Exploring the concept of Design for Disassembly (DfD for short), their recent project in Milan is grounded in the growing concern around resource consumption and low recycling rates within the construction industry. Expanding on themes of the circular economy, their work was designed utilizing chairs made of ocean plastic and the pavilion was designed for disassembly.

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Belmont (Monty) Freeman (b. 1951) founded his New York-based, currently eight-person practice, Belmont Freeman Architects in 1986. Its active projects are half institutional and half residential, with a special focus on adaptive reuse, predominantly in New York and nearby states. Among the firm’s most exemplary projects are the LGBT Carriage House on the University of Pennsylvania campus, a series of restorations at the Four Seasons restaurant in the Seagram Building, renovations at the Yale Club in Manhattan, and the renovation of the Ezra and Cecile Zilkha Gallery at Wesleyan University in Connecticut, designed by Kevin Roche. Current projects include an expansive but minimalist residential compound on Martha’s Vineyard, branch library renovations in New York City, and redevelopment of a former meatpacking building into a new Innovation Hub for Columbia University’s Business School.

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The new Kaijo and Canyon surfaces by designer Markus Bischof for Agrob Buchtal may differ significantly in form, but both create striking, geometric facades.

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As part of a new initiative accompanying the launch of the 2021 collection, Studio David Pompa has transformed its Mexico City showroom into a space showcasing the "Palma" project—an experimental body of work comprising a series of interior design and lighting pieces centered on the craftsmanship and origins of palm in Mexico.

Celebrated on the first Monday of every October, World Architecture Day was set up by the Union International des Architects (UIA) back in 2005 to “remind the world of its collective responsibility for the future of the human habitat”, coinciding with UN-Habitat's World Habitat Day.

This year both organizations have defined themes related to improving the quality of life and reducing the effects of the climate crisis by taking action in the built environment. While the International Union of Architects' 2021 World Architecture Day theme is "Clean Environment for a Healthy World", UN-Habitat's World Habitat Day has announced "Accelerating Urban Action for a Carbon-Free World" as their topic.

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There are several reasons why the Estado de Mexico (a state, not the country) is important not only at the national level but also because of its intrinsic relationship with Mexico City since 59 of its municipalities are considered part of the Metropolitan Area of the Valley of Mexico. In this area, there are a large number of industrial plants. In addition, it houses some of the most visited archaeological sites such as Teotihuacán, Tetzuco, Azcapotzalco, Chalco, and Amaquemecan.

Videos

The Second Studio (formerly The Midnight Charette) is an explicit podcast about design, architecture, and the everyday. Hosted by Architects David Lee and Marina Bourderonnet, it features different creative professionals in unscripted conversations that allow for thoughtful takes and personal discussions.

A variety of subjects are covered with honesty and humor: some episodes are interviews, while others are tips for fellow designers, reviews of buildings and other projects, or casual explorations of everyday life and design. The Second Studio is also available on iTunes, Spotify, and YouTube.

This week David and Marina are joined by Jacob van Rijs, Founding Partner of MVRDV, Architect and Urban Planner to discuss the beginnings of MVRDV, working internationally, the office's structure and growing from 3 people to 300, creating a positive office environment (the MVRDV house), design process, having fun in design, MVRDV's diagrams, why clients hire MVRDV.

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Numerous houses with platibanda (parapet) facades can be seen across urban and rural areas in the sertões of Bahia. Many of these are clad in porcelain tiles and feature iron grates alongside metal doors and windows. This recurring pattern can be understood as a cultural phenomenon: the constructions discussed here were documented in towns, districts, and villages across the municipalities of Monte Santo, Uauá, and Curaçá in 2019.

These facades feature graphic compositions created by those who build them in dialogue with the residents themselves. Bricklayers and owner-builders¹ arrange printed visual elements on the ceramic tiles laid across the surface. Additionally, iron grates are fixed onto the front plane, outlining the openings of most of the residences and commercial establishments studied.

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Planning cities and the way that we comfortably live in them is often a pull between many things. From creating affordable housing for all, enhancing community facilities and amenities, and designing walkable neighborhoods, all aspects of urban design have trade-offs, or do they? While there are many reasons why cities are becoming increasingly more expensive, dense, and less pedestrian-friendly, one of the key drivers behind the increase in unaffordability has to do with the way that outdated zoning codes drive the lack of available housing that they regulate.

Peter Cook’s text ‘Some Notes on the Archigram Syndrome’ is a symbol of architecture at the beginning of the era of mass reproducibility. First published in *Perspecta 11: Yale Architectural Journal* in 1967 and republished in the 1999 book *Textos de Arquitectura de la Modernidad*, the text revisits, through the author's eyes, the chronology and consequences of the way of thinking and making architecture proposed by the Archigram group—an annual publication that gave rise to the architecture collective of the same name.

The group stands out as a milestone in the transformation of thinking about the city, representation, architecture, and the limitless application of technological knowledge within their production. Consequently, their work was not produced in isolation but was closely linked to major artistic movements in England and the United States, such as the Independent Group and the waves of counterculture.

Organized by the Cultural Department of the Abrigo do Marinheiro (DCAMN), in partnership with the Brazilian Navy and the Rio de Janeiro Department of the Institute of Architects of Brazil (IAB/RJ), the national competition for the Maritime Museum of Brazil was won by the team comprising the offices messina | rivas (São Paulo, Brazil) and Ben-Avid (Córdoba, Argentina). The binational group presented a project that seeks to "reclaim proximity to the water and what it can represent as a common space amidst difference." Explore the proposal below.

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The urban metropolises of our planet are home to an abundance of stories. They are home to stories of wealth, of innovation, and of architectural marvels. They are home, too, to stories of inequality, inequity and of urban divides – places where one’s income determines the quality of the spatial environment around them. Within these stories has developed an increasing advocation for making cities “smarter”, the goal being to use data and digital technology to build more efficient and convenient urban environments.

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