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.

It’s easy to think of Modernism as inseparable from air conditioning, simply because we are surrounded by so much of it that is. A valuable reminder that this wasn’t always the case is provided in University of Pennsylvania architecture professor Daniel A. Barber’s Modern Architecture and Climate: Design Before Air Conditioning (Princeton University Press), which outlines the story of the febrile, flexible, and often-forgotten early experiments in climate control.

This article is a contribution from the Medellín-based firm El Taller de Arquitectos, who share their experience in structuring their practice by understanding and approaching architecture competitions as commissioned projects. Read on to explore their insights.

Houses and Villas are the most researched topics on ArchDaily. Putting together a curated selection of conceptual interventions, this week’s Best Unbuilt Architecture focuses on the residential sector. From all over the world, this group presents proposals submitted by our readers.

This article highlights a floating terraces project from India, a lodge in Ethiopia, a seasonal home for an Iranian family in Germany, and a residential compound in Saudi Arabia. Beach houses in Greece, Croatia, and the U.S. are also featured, showcasing different approaches for the same program. Moreover, more futuristic interventions include the Mountain House on the rocky cliffs of British Columbia, and the blue house, an aquarium-like type of home.

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Why should any 21^st Century architect bother to draw by hand? There is, after all, an abundance of readily available digital tools that make pens and pencils seem little more than primeval artefacts. Fondly regarded, perhaps, yet as charmingly irrelevant to contemporary architecture as heavy horses are to today’s farmers or typewriters are to newspaper journalists.

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One of the most critical factors in architectural design is local climate. While extreme conditions can pose challenges—requiring insulating materials to adapt to changing weather—Mexico's favorable climates work to the designer's advantage, enabling the creation of microclimates and spaces that blur the transition between indoors and outdoors.

The A’ Design Award was "born out of the desire to underline the best designs and well-designed products." It is an international award whose aim is to provide designers, architects, and innovators from all design fields with a platform to showcase their work and products to a global audience. This year's edition is now open for entries; designers can register their submissions here.

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Corals are fundamental to marine life. Sometimes called tropical sea forests, they form some of the most diverse ecosystems on Earth. They serve as a refuge, breeding, and feeding area for dozens of species in the sea, and their absence can negatively affect local biodiversity to a tremendous degree. Yet just as humanity pollutes and destroys, it can also remedy and encourage the creation of more life. This is why shipwrecks of old vessels or the sinking of concrete structures for the creation of artificial reefs are frequently reported as providing immense potential. In Hong Kong, researchers have been developing 3D printed structures using organic materials that can lead to the creation of new opportunities under the sea.

To ensure privacy, windows in bathrooms are typically characterized by their small size and high sills. Yet, natural light, alongside ventilation, plays a crucial role in the health and comfort of these spaces. As a result, seeking a greater incidence of daylight in these interiors expands the design possibilities for their openings.

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Have you ever asked yourself this question? At first, it may seem strange to imagine that we have not always had windows in our buildings, let alone that they were sealed with a transparent material capable of allowing natural light into dark rooms or creating a barrier against the cold: glass.

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Between January and December 2018, addressing the housing demands of Indigenous communities, Grupo ][ Fresta initiated a technical architectural consulting project for the Guarani and Tupi ethnic communities located in the state of São Paulo, in the municipalities of São Paulo, São Bernardo do Campo, Mongaguá, Praia Grande, and Itanhaém.

This work was developed within the framework of a Basic Environmental Plan (PBA), a prerequisite for the environmental licensing of developments located in Indigenous territories.

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ArchDaily has created a list of best articles, news and projects that address everything you need to know about stone.

The polished concrete technique is not only suitable for many different environments, but also harmonizes well with various building materials, and has been the material of choice for many Brazilian architects in housing designs in recent years.

The mixture of sand, cement, and water is prepared on-site and the result is a cost-effective and long-lasting alternative when properly and regularly maintained. This finish has become so popular that you can find porcelain tiles and coatings with a similar texture.

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The facade is the calling card of an architecture project, an often iconic and recognizable element that becomes part of the collective imaginary.

We frequently see them featured in photographs and art—such as Andreas Gursky's work, or as part of movie sets. It is almost impossible to forget the pink symmetrical façade of 'The Budapest Hotel' by director Wes Anderson, or even, in music videos or album covers, like the legendary 'Physical Grafitti' by Led Zeppelin.

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A city is a shared space where individuals seek to realize their desires and goals. Streets, sidewalks, and public spaces foster encounters and connections among diverse groups, strengthening the sense of community. Urban mobility plays a fundamental role in the social and economic development of cities, particularly in citizens' quality of life. It is not just about transportation, but about how people move through the city, impacting the time and energy expended by residents, as well as migration, communication, the formation of personal social networks, traffic flows, housing, health, and the spatial distribution of diverse points of interest. According to Ole B. Jensen, “contemporary cities and places are defined by mobility and their flows.”

With the recent completion of several new stations and tunnels, the Athens underground metro expansion and the development of the Thessaloniki Metro system are on a set course to completion in Greece. The construction of a direct connection between the Athens airport and the Piraeus harbour, as well as the development of Thessaloniki’s first metro line, are underway, and images by photographer Pygmalion Karatzas show the new underground infrastructure coming together in the two Greek cities.

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This article was originally published on Common Edge.

The pandemic has force-fed change into almost every aspect of our lives. What does that mean for architecture? I have been in my office 135 out of the 140 days since Connecticut Governor Ned Lamont declared “construction” (and all its constituent trades, including “design”) essential. For two months I was alone, then one employee for a day or two a month, then others, eventually all, but most still working from home. The office continued to function.

Pop-up architecture makes the most of tiny spaces and intimate experiences. As temporary structures, pop-ups are nothing new, dating back at least to Roman times as temporary stages for festivals called ludi. Pushing the boundaries of architecture, they feature a light-touch for maximum impact, each built to make a statement. Today, they are often designed around the full life-cycle of a project to minimize environmental impact.

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“WHERE DO WE FIND OURSELVES?” is the title of the installation produced by Estúdio Mangava for feverestival 2020 (Campinas International Theater Festival). It was exhibited during the second week of February, about a month before we went into quarantine. The festival's organizers challenged the studio to represent the edition's theme through an interactive installation, which aimed to reaffirm its present, revisit the past, and project the future: what do we want to build from here? What do we want to reinvent? What kind of world project are we seeking? What are our desirable futures?

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International architectural practice Kohn Pedersen Fox (KPF) is constantly striving to improve efficiencies and enable greater creative exploration through the application of the latest technologies. With nine offices worldwide and projects based anywhere from Europe to the US and China, the company takes a global approach to its design process by fostering collaboration; it’s not uncommon for a single project to involve team members based in London, New York, and Singapore, for example, who come together virtually in what Cobus Bothma, Director of Applied Research, calls their “tenth office”.

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At the 2014 Venice Biennale, celebrated architect and curator Rem Koolhaas chose an unusual curatorial theme. Rather than exploring the major issues that plague modern society or their manifestations in the profession of architecture, the event's theme, "Fundamentals," and its main exhibition, "Elements of Architecture," examined in detail the bare fundamentals of buildings, simple elements used by everyday architects for everyday designs. According to Koolhaas, “Architecture is a profession trained to put things together, not to dismantle them. Only by looking at the elements of architecture under a microscope can we recognize cultural preferences, technological advances, changes triggered by the intensification of global exchange, climatic adaptations, local norms and, somewhere in the mix, the architect's ideas that constitute the practice of architecture today.”

If you wandered down Novinsky Boulevard in central Moscow five years ago looking for the Narkomfin building, you’d have been greeted by a sorry sight. The Narkomfin, the poster child for Constructivist architecture designed by Moisey Ginzburg and Ignaty Milinis in 1928, had been slowly falling into a state of dereliction after being left unloved for 45 years. Paint peeling, concrete crumbling, and windows broken—not to mention the numerous, muddling alterations made to the block of flats, including a completely new ground floor.

Within the scope of the innovative SPLACES concept, INTERSTUHL offers planners and architects the opportunity to collaborate directly with experts on the design of creative and future-oriented new work scenarios.

The New York firm Diller Scofidio + Renfro (DS+R) gained worldwide attention in 2002 with the Blur Building, designed for that year's Swiss Expo. The volume was formed by 35,000 high-pressure nozzles that sprayed water from the lake below, creating a massive artificial cloud. Its shape, boundaries, colors, and translucency shifted with the sun and wind, offering visitors an immersive experience as they entered a fully permeable volume. Ten years later, Carla Juaçaba and Bia Lessa designed Humanidade2012 for the Rio+20 United Nations Conference, where several programmatic volumes were arranged within a massive scaffolding structure. With more voids than solids, its edges dematerialized into the sky, and at night the volumes appeared to float. According to the architects, “the very movement of people through the building turned visitors into exhibits when seen from afar.” Despite differences in scale and context, both temporary projects succeed in working with notions of translucency, lightness, the dissolution of boundaries, and movement.

The Un-Habitat or the United Nations agency for human settlements and sustainable urban development, whose primary focus is to deal with the challenges of rapid urbanization, has been developing innovative approaches in the urban design field, centered on the active participation of the community. ArchDaily has teamed up with UN-Habitat to bring you weekly news, article, and interviews that highlight this work, with content straight from the source, developed by our editors.

In this second collaboration with UN-Habitat, discover different examples on how to design with and for kids in marginalized areas. In fact, child-responsive planning leads to a vibrant and animated inclusive city. Focusing on spaces for children, this feature highlights cases in Bangladesh, Niger, and Vietnam. These public spaces implementation projects seek to promote environment-friendly livable cities, taking on participatory approaches and involving the youngsters from the beginning of the process. In the end, no one knows the needs of kids, more than the kids themselves.

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