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.

Online Launch | A Small Guide to Modernist Botany, by Ana Carolina Carmona Ribeiro

One hundred and twenty civil society organizations (NGOs, institutes, foundations, collectives, and social movements) advocating for the right to the city sent an open letter to the Mayor of São Paulo, Bruno Covas, demanding that the Strategic Master Plan (PDE) review process be conducted by the Municipal Government in a way that guarantees full public participation, respecting the principles of democracy, popular sovereignty, and transparency, even amid the pandemic.

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Procurement of a specialized firm for the development of executive architectural and engineering designs for a socio-educational detention facility in the municipality of Niterói, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

On March 24 (Wed) at 7:00 PM, {CURA} will host its first Open Class of 2021. This time, the guest studio is Superlimão!

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Videos

We have curated a selection of online exhibitions on urbanism—available for free on Google Arts & Culture—exploring the history of development in major cities around the world. Discover them below:

Imagining and experiencing alternative ways to understand the relationship between the human body, space, and the ideas that connect it to the world was one of the central themes that Hundertwasser brought to light. The Austrian artist and architect, born in 1928, dedicated much of his work to environmental issues, expressing his perspective through the theory of the five skins: the epidermis, clothing, the home, social identity, and the world. Due to its universality, this concept retains a contemporary relevance.

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More than just software, BIM (Building Information Modeling) represents an entire approach to representing, modeling, and managing a project, factoring in different dimensions and quality parameters throughout a building's design and subsequent operation—such as architectural design, budgeting, process management, thermal performance, and the environmental impact of materials and their application. Design thinking through BIM must be implemented from the very initial ideas and is most effective when it influences the entire decision-making chain that shapes the project, including post-occupancy evaluations. 

Pier Luigi Nervi is a curious case in architectural history. He designed large reinforced concrete buildings—and was even responsible for technical developments related to this material—defined by their bold, expressive, and heroic structural concepts. His design method was similar to Le Corbusier's during his so-called "Brutalist phase," which "(...) approached the architectural program starting from general principles, subsequently adapting them to the real situation. The project was defined by the structural concept [partido], which was organized from the general to the particular" (Acayaba, 1985). This is evident in the Italian's buildings, which are largely pavilion-like structures in which a massive structural roof spans the specificities of the program.

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The construction of streets throughout the twentieth century was largely based on the premise that more infrastructure eases traffic. Evidence shows, however, that instead of reducing congestion, building more roads actually increases traffic. Reducing drive times makes driving more convenient; consequently, coupled with the status-symbol appeal of private vehicles, people tend to make more trips by car. A recent study by researchers at the University of Barcelona analyzed data from 545 European cities between 1985 and 2005, confirming that two decades of efforts to expand road capacity led to an increase—rather than a decrease—in vehicle traffic, failing to alleviate congestion.

Videos

The book “The High Cost of Free Parking,” by retired University of California professor Donald Shoup, demonstrates that parking can impose a significant social cost. Shoup argues that the car-centric city model is irrational, allocating increasingly more resources and space to a machine that goes unused 95% of the time.

Madrid will demolish the M-30 highway overpass, located between the Puente de Vallecas and Retiro neighborhoods. This was the unanimous decision of the councilors of the Plenary of the Ayuntamiento de Madrid—the city's elected municipal council—who met on March 30. According to the author of the proposal, councilor and member of the Más Madrid party Francisco Pérez Ramos, the decision is crucial because the overpass has turned “into a wall.”

The 6th edition of the Lisbon Architecture Triennale, taking place in 2022, is themed Terra. Carrying different meanings depending on the scale and the observer, Terra expresses territory, the city, the landscape, the place where we belong, or a continent seen from the sea. It can be a habitable planet or matter for cultivation. It can be in excess or lacking, and it can be an obstacle or an element in building communities. Driven by a sense of urgency, the Triennale 2022 calls for reflection on all these dimensions, which are closely related to architecture.

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Arquigrafias. Guido Guidi and Álvaro Siza is the exhibition marking the public reopening of Casa da Arquitectura after the lockdown. Curated by Paula Pinto and Joaquim Moreno, the exhibition of photographs by Italian photographer Guido Guidi of the work of architect Álvaro Siza is on display at the Casa Gallery from April 17 to October 3, 2021.

The curators selected eight projects located in Lisbon, Porto, and Matosinhos, represented through 97 images captured by Guido Guidi's lens. Arquigrafias thus offers a “dialogue between the photographic work of Guido Guidi (Cesena, 1941) and the architectural work of Álvaro Siza (Matosinhos, 1933), constituting a unique encounter between two singular figures in their respective fields.”

The Ordem dos Arquitectos proposes a dialogue regarding current challenges for a post-pandemic future, intersecting architecture, art, the city, and politics in response to the European Commission President’s call for a New European Bauhaus. The event serves as a debate on new ways of inhabiting space, grounded in the premise of sustainability.

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