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In a symposium to be held this week at the Manchester School of Architecture, Contextualism: Dead or Alive? will explore the importance of contextualism in contemporary architecture. Five key speakers will be featured, presenting papers discussing context both in its purest theoretical form and how it might be addressed in practice. From debating the significance of building traditions (Jonathan Foyle) to how Mecanoo, who recently completed the Library of Birmingham, have approached contextualism in the UK (Ernst ter Horst), the symposium will endeavor to uncover the ties between architecture and the wider urban realm.

In a symposium at the AIA New York Chapter, seismologists, earthquake engineers, seismic code experts, emergency response managers, and architects conversant in seismic design will assemble for a conversation on available technologies and testing capabilities that, surprisingly, are located in New York State. They will "clarify the evolving role of design professionals, the building industry, and municipal and federal agencies in safeguarding our local communities", as well as "educate the audience about the earthquakes, subsurface conditions, and construction approaches."

On view at La Galerie D'Architecture until April 9, Jarmund / Vigsnæs Architects, Constructing Views 2011-2014, will exhibit 16 projects completed by the Norwegian architects in the last three years.

Porto Poetic, an exhibition covering the career and work of notable portuguese architects, started March 6 and will keep on going until April 13. The exhibition, which includes the work of Pritzker Prize winners Álvaro Siza and Eduardo Souto de Moura, will show sketches, plans, models and photographs of their most important work.

Maggie’s Cancer Caring Centres are for anyone affected by cancer. Built on the grounds of cancer hospitals, they are designed to be warm, welcoming places that provide practical, emotional, and social support. Conceived by the late Maggie Keswick Jencks, along with her husband Charles Jencks, as a direct response to her own experience with cancer, the first Maggie’s Centre in Edinburgh opened its doors to the public in 1996. Since then, Maggie’s has grown to 17 centers across the United Kingdom and beyond, with many more to follow.

Architects, Sociologists and Environmentalists explore the intersection between design and the social sciences at large by explicating the concept of “city” and “citizen” in parallel. 

In the early years of COOP HIMMELB(L)AU, Raimund Abraham was a role model - later on a friend. On the occasion of the Austrian government "Staatspreis" awarded to Raimund Abraham, Wolf D. Prix held the speech of honor, and characterized him as one of the main representatives of the Austrian architectural approach of celebrating space.

Architectural photographer Agnese Sanvito will be exhibiting a selection from her portfolio at The Building Centre in London. Her works, which include photographs of buildings by Renzo Piano, Jean Nouvel, Santiago Calatrava, Wilkinson Eyre, and Sou Fujimoto, focuses on the ways color shapes our sense of buildings.

What unites contemporary design? What is the through line that connects designers between continents and across decades? This spring, The MA program in Design Studies at Parsons The New School for Design presents a two-day symposium that will bring together a rare interdisciplinary group of professionals and academics to explore narratives surrounding the field of design, and attempt to answer these questions. The conference, Narratives and Design Studies: A Task of Translation, will be held March 7 – 8.

In celebration of its 5th anniversary, the Architecture & Design Film Festival will make its Los Angeles debut, presenting 30 feature-length and short films from eight countries that explore the human elements of art, fashion, architecture, and design in our everyday lives. In addition, the festival will offer panel discussions, Q&As with filmmakers, a pop-up bookshop by Hennessey + Ingalls and more that are all open to the public!

Videos

Taking place April 11-12 in New York, the Facades+ Performance Symposium will focus on cutting through the jargon to consider the heart of high performance building envelopes. Presented by The Architect's Newspaper and enclos, they recently announced that an additional workshop will take place on Friday, April 12. This workshop will focus on the fundamental concepts and workflows for creating performance-based design models with the parametric design tool, Grasshopper for Rhino3D. Using Grasshopper, participants will be guided through a series of exercises designed to emphasize the relevant applications of parametric design for professional practice. To sign up, and for more information on the two-day event, please visit here. A video can be viewed after the break.

Currently taking place at the Art Tower Mito's Contemporary Art Gallery and Plaza until May 12, the 'Shigeru Ban – Architecture and Humanitarian Activities' exhibition is the architect's largest exhibition and encourages visitors to think about the architect's role in society. From his early works and a pioneering new architectural material to an ongoing disaster project, the exhibition explores the diverse activities and achievements of the architect as well as his vision and spirit to challenge social issues and disasters. Featuring architectural models, mock-ups, photographs, videos of his major and important works, and furniture, Ban is known for his innovative work constructed by developing or applying building materials from objects already existing in our everyday lives. For more information, please visit here.

The Chicago Architectural Club and Chicago Architecture Foundation, in partnership with the Chicago Department of Transportation, the Chicago Transit Authority, and the Chicago Bus Rapid Transit Steering Committee, recently launched the 2013 Burnham Prize Competition: NEXT STOP: Designing Chicago BRT Stations. Intended to catalyze iconic, sustainable, and functional design for representative corridors in Chicago’s planned Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) system, they are seeking entries that integrate innovative and compelling transportation design into Chicago’s urban fabric. Each design team must submit designs for three different prototype sites and demonstrate how BRT station design can be adapted to each context. Submissions are due by May 13. For more information, please visit here.

Organized by ORLI (Operation Resilient Long Island), a student-led grassroots committee of architecture, interior design, and construction management students from New York Institute of Technology, the 3C Comprehensive Coastal Communities Competition aims to catalyze the discussion of rezoning towns that are vulnerable to coastal storms. The post-Sandy rebuilding process has already begun, yet there are no strategies on how rebuilding communities can accommodate transforming coastal housing typologies. In effort to help local communities preserve the value of their neighborhoods, the challenge is to create a vision for a specific northeastern coastal community. Participants should design a resilient housing typology and integrate it into the community master plan. Submissions are due no later than July 25. To register, and for more information, please visit here.

Organized by New York Chapter of the National Organization of Minority Architects (nycobaNOMA), lighting designer Abhay Wadhwa, founder and design principal of AWA Lighting Designers, will speak about Contextualizing Light: The Impact of Culture and Climate on Lighting Design at the 2013 Design Talk. AWA Lighting Designers are known for their architectural lighting designs nationally and internationally and were just featured in the Index Furniture Journal's January-February 2013 issue. The event will take place at the Mohawk Showroom in New York City on April 18th from 6:30pm to 8:30pm. For more information, please visit here.