Tag: schmidt-hammer-lassen | ArchDaily

James Turrell's Skyspace and the Opening of the Obama Presidential Center: This Week’s Review

Antonia Piñeiro — Thu, 25 Jun 2026 05:30:00 +0000

From projects and institutions that reinforce the relationship between art and architecture to initiatives seeking new approaches to persistent urban and ecological challenges, this week's developments reflect a broader effort to reconsider established frameworks and expand the role of design in contemporary society. Whether through adaptive reuse, policy innovation, artistic experimentation, or critical research, architects and cultural organizations are exploring how existing systems can be transformed to address emerging realities. These questions resonate across new architectural projects that translate environmental conditions and civic aspirations into built form. In Chicago, the completion of the Obama Presidential Center positions architecture as a vehicle for public memory, while in Albania, OODA's Lighthouse reinterprets local landscapes and traditions through a tower overlooking the Adriatic coast. Meanwhile, Heatherwick Studio's proposed AlUla Manara visitor centre responds to the conditions of Saudi Arabia's desert landscape, combining scientific research and tourism within a destination dedicated to observing the night sky.

Schmidt Hammer Lassen Completes ARoS Expansion with James Turrell's As Seen Below – The Dome

Reyyan Dogan — Fri, 19 Jun 2026 06:30:00 +0000

Denmark's ARoS Aarhus Art Museum has unveiled As Seen Below – The Dome, a new Skyspace by American artist James Turrell that completes The Next Level, the museum's approximately 4,000-square-metre underground expansion designed by Schmidt Hammer Lassen. Opened to the public on 19 June 2026, the project marks the culmination of more than two decades of collaboration between the City of Aarhus, ARoS, and the Danish architecture practice, following the completion of the museum building in 2004 and the addition of Olafur Eliasson's Your Rainbow Panorama in 2011. Located beneath the redesigned Musikhusparken in central Aarhus, the installation forms the centerpiece of the museum's latest expansion and adds a new large-scale work by Turrell to its collection.

How to Design with the Rain: Architectural Strategies for Rainwater Collection across Climates

Olivia Poston — Thu, 26 Feb 2026 07:30:00 +0000

As climate variability intensifies, extreme storms are becoming more frequent in some regions while water scarcity deepens in others. Architects are increasingly pressed to reconsider how buildings engage with rainfall as an environmental force and a design resource. How can architecture move beyond shedding the excess water to actively collect, store, and reuse it? What would it mean to treat rainwater as a material that shapes resilient and meaningful spaces?

From Patina to Purpose: 15 Projects that Explore Corten Steel as a Design Element

Diogo Borges Ferreira — Fri, 03 Jan 2025 04:00:00 +0000

In architectural design, materials convey narratives, shaping how spaces are perceived and experienced. Weathering steel, often known by its genericized trademark name, Corten steel, stands out for its ability to evolve, transforming into a medium that tells its own story. It represents a group of steel alloys that form a stable external layer of rust that replaces the need for paint to protect the steel while allowing it to develop in time. Its weathered patina serves as more than a functional shield; it becomes an aesthetic language, a testament to the interplay between architecture and nature. This ever-changing surface bridges the ephemeral and the enduring, offering architects a material that grows richer with age.

ArchDaily's Best Architectural Projects of 2024

Hana Abdel — Mon, 16 Dec 2024 05:00:00 +0000

Throughout the year, ArchDaily's team of curators works on expanding and populating our project library. Located all around the world, each curator carefully considers the best works emanating from their respective regions in an effort to have a diverse representation of the most inspiring and innovative built works. The team looks to new rising practices, new technologies, and the vernacular revival of traditional construction techniques. Seeking socially driven initiatives, as well as major works by renowned architects, the overall offers a holistic view of the built world today and is relayed through the yearly project review.

Schmidt Hammer Lassen Wins Competition to Revitalize Former Industrial Urban Neighbourhood in Luxembourg

Nour Fakharany — Mon, 22 Jul 2024 05:30:00 +0000

Schmidt Hammer Lassen (SHL) from Denmark and Assar Universum Architects from Luxembourg have collaborated to design a new urban hub for Hollerich in Luxembourg. The new development aims to create a green, vibrant space with mixed uses, transforming the area into an urban destination. Harnessing the city’s distinctive topography, the design integrates a dynamic program of residential, commercial, cultural, and public spaces. The hub, named “NEI HOLLERICH,” is also envisioned as one that addresses the need for affordable housing.

Revitalizing Shanghai's Waterfront: MVRDV's West Bund Dream Center Transforms Industrial Buildings into Cultural Hub

Nour Fakharany — Mon, 12 Feb 2024 05:30:00 +0000

MVRDV has just introduced its comprehensive plan and architectural vision for the construction of the Gate M West Bund Dream Center in Shanghai. Formerly home to a cement plant factory, the design uses the existing structures for cultural programs and combines them with new structures to house new functions. The Dream Center aims to revitalize the riverbank area into a thriving cultural and recreational district.

The Restored Ruin of a Monastery in Italy and an Innovation Campus in Stockholm: 10 Unbuilt Projects from Established Firms

Maria-Cristina Florian — Thu, 10 Aug 2023 07:30:00 +0000

Exploring unbuilt projects can offer insights into the design process and leading strategies employed by contemporary architecture practices, revealing unexpected solutions, experimental approaches and innovative design concepts. This week’s curated selection of Best Unbuilt Architecture highlights designs submitted by established architecture practices. From a fjord-side regeneration project and oceanography research center to a headquarters building shaped to reflect company’s main focus or a restaurant adapted to extreme conditions, the compilation of unbuilt projects presents the variety of concepts, design philosophies and programs put forward by prominent global architecture studios.

Schmidt Hammer Lassen Designs World's Tallest Residential Timber Building

Andreea Cutieru — Wed, 20 Apr 2022 05:30:00 +0000

Danish architecture practice Schmidt Hammer Lassen revealed the winning design of an international competition for the world’s tallest residential timber building. Located in the Swiss city of Winterthur, the 100-metre tall Rocket&Tigerli tower developed in close corporation with the local Swiss architecture studio Cometti Truffer Hodel echoes the 19th-century industrial architecture of the surrounding area through its facades of dark red and yellow terracotta bricks. The project proposes a variety of residential typologies and amenities that are set to create a vibrant neighbourhood.

Sacred Light: New Cathedrals Rethinking Modern Worship

Eric Baldwin — Thu, 20 Jan 2022 07:30:00 +0000

Architecture has long been designed to symbolize and venerate shared values and beliefs. This is especially true in cathedrals and places of worship, structures that exists across environmental, economic and cultural boundaries. These buildings encompass ritual and gathering as they explore the relationship between human experience and the divine. Today, cathedrals are being reimagined for contemporary life and new building traditions.

Schmidt Hammer Lassen and BOGL to Transform a Former Prison Site in Denmark

Christele Harrouk — Fri, 04 Dec 2020 06:30:00 +0000

Schmidt Hammer Lassen Architects and BOGL were selected by the municipality of Albertslund and Freja Ejendomme to re-imagine Vridsløselille, a facility that housed once a state prison, and transform the site into an attractive, green district with a distinct identity derived from its unique heritage. The scheme was chosen alongside another project by COBE to create a combined vision for the future development of the area.

Schmidt Hammer Lassen's Mixed-Use K8 Tower in Norway Moves Forward

Christele Harrouk — Tue, 29 Sep 2020 05:30:00 +0000

The sustainable mixed-use K8 tower, designed by Schmidt Hammer Lassen moves forward with final approval from the Stavanger City Council in Norway. The proposal aims to encourage future urban developments in the city and generates a new benchmark for sustainable and creative work environments.

On Recycled Architecture: 12 Proposals to Promote Adaptive Reuse

Christele Harrouk — Wed, 15 Jul 2020 05:30:00 +0000

When reflecting on recycling, sustainability, measures to take, and innovative technological solutions, one cannot help but think that there are also familiar approaches that should be taken into consideration. In fact, when examining the impact of the built environment on the climate, one notes that in many countries, 80% of the buildings that will exist in 2050 have already been built. The most effective form of sustainability may, therefore, be saving energy by eliminating or minimizing new constructions, and by avoiding the demolition of existing structures.

3 Major Architecture Firms Propose School Buses and Shipping Containers for Accessible Testing Labs

Matt Hickman — Mon, 22 Jun 2020 03:30:00 +0000

Despite all the news of re-openings, lifted restrictions, al fresco options dining, and a return to something more closely resembling “normal,” COVID-19 is still very much with us. And despite the defeatist/downplayed/nothing to see here stance embraced by the current presidential administration, the United States is still in the midst of an unprecedented public health crisis. In some states, both new reported cases and hospitalizations have now reached record highs.

Schmidt Hammer Lassen, Hawkins\Brown and BuroHappold Design New Library for The University of Bristol

Christele Harrouk — Mon, 10 Feb 2020 06:30:00 +0000

Planning application has just been submitted for a new landmark library, for the University of Bristol. The latest addition, designed by a collaborative team formed by Schmidt Hammer Lassen, Hawkins\Brown and BuroHappold, is set to transform the heart of the campus.

Schmidt Hammer Lassen to Transform Curtin University Library in Australia

Eric Baldwin — Tue, 05 Mar 2019 13:00:00 +0000

Danish design firm Schmidt Hammer Lassen is partnering with Australia-based Hames Sharley to transform the existing Curtin University Library in Australia. At the center of Western Australia’s largest university, the landmark library building will be transformed into an open, light-filled building to meet the needs of future users. The team aims to create a “living library” with new pathways for visual and physical connectivity throughout the building site.

Schmidt Hammer Lassen Revitalizes Boston's Commonwealth Pier through Adaptive Reuse

Niall Patrick Walsh — Thu, 14 Feb 2019 09:00:00 +0000

Schmidt Hammer Lassen has announced details of their second U.S. project: the Seaport World Trade Center in Boston, Massachusetts. An adaptive reuse project that will bring new life to Boston’s Commonwealth Pier, the 68,500-square-meter mixed-use project seeks to reactivate a historic maritime hub to create a new waterfront destination.

World's Largest Waste-to-Energy Plant Set to Open Next Year in Shenzhen

Eric Baldwin — Mon, 21 Jan 2019 13:00:00 +0000

The world's largest waste-to-energy plant by Schmidt Hammer Lassen and Gottlieb Paludan is set to open next year on the outskirts of Shenzhen, China. The new plant is made to handle 5000 tons of waste per day within a simple, clean, and iconic structure. It will incinerate waste and generate power while teaching residents about the waste-energy cycle. The project aims to showcase new developments in China's waste-to-energy sector and share them with the world.