Edmund Sumner

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HUMAN HOTEL / Jorge Hernández de la Garza

HUMAN HOTEL / Jorge Hernández de la Garza - More Images+ 26

From Passages to Shared Spaces: The Social Life of Circulation

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Most people rarely remember a passage. They remember the classroom, the apartment, the gallery, or the plaza at the end of it. Passages are usually designed to disappear into the background, guiding movement from one destination to the next. Yet some of architecture's most memorable experiences happen while moving through a place rather than arriving at it.

Circulation is often treated as one of architecture's most practical elements. Corridors connect rooms, galleries provide access, and walkways organize movement through a building. Their purpose seems straightforward: to help people get from one point to another. Because of this, circulation spaces have long been considered secondary to the programs they serve. Attention tends to focus on destinations, while the spaces in between remain largely unnoticed.

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The Brick House / Studio VDGA

The Brick House / Studio VDGA - More Images+ 28

Pune, India
  • Architects: Studio VDGA
  • Area Area of this architecture project Area:  4500
  • Year Completion year of this architecture project Year:  2025
  • Manufacturers Brands with products used in this architecture project
    Manufacturers:  Grohe, Daikin

Jali House / Studio VDGA

Jali House / Studio VDGA - More Images+ 13

Pune, India
  • Architects: Studio VDGA
  • Year Completion year of this architecture project Year:  2025

Rethinking Architecture at the Scale of Planetary Systems

Architecture has traditionally been described as a discipline concerned with space, form, and material presence. Yet this understanding becomes increasingly limited when confronted with the conditions that shape contemporary construction. Buildings no longer emerge from a stable relationship between site, program, and material. Instead, they are produced within a dense web of technological systems that operate across territorial, ecological, and temporal scales. Energy networks, data infrastructures, extraction processes, and global logistics shape architecture as decisively as climate or urban context.

Seen from this angle, architecture is less a discrete object than a moment within a larger technical field. Supply chains, data systems, automated maintenance, and energy grids do not sit "behind" the built environment. In a certain way, they influence what can be built, what is affordable, how buildings perform over time, and what kinds of waste they produce. When architecture is assessed primarily through form, it risks overlooking the systems that condition its production and afterlife.

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Shiv Nadar School / Vastushilpa Sangath

Shiv Nadar School / Vastushilpa Sangath - More Images+ 29

Unearthing the Ground: Architecture and the Politics of the Subterranean

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Beneath the visible surface of cities lies an invisible architecture. Subways, tunnels, water systems, data cables, and bunkers form a dense network that sustains urban life while remaining largely unseen. The ground beneath our feet is not a void but a complex territory that holds the infrastructures, memories, and anxieties of our age. In recent years, as land becomes scarce and climate pressures intensify, architects and urbanists have turned their gaze downward, rediscovering the subterranean as both a physical and conceptual frontier. To design underground is to engage with the unseen mechanisms that shape the world above.

The subterranean has long been a site where architecture intersects with politics, technology, and belief. From the catacombs of Rome to the industrial subways of modernity, descent has symbolized both protection and exposure. Twentieth-century urbanism transformed this gesture into a system: metros, shelters, and utilities redefined the city section as an instrument of governance. Beneath the promise of efficiency and progress, the underground absorbed the anxieties of an era of war, surveillance, and collapse. Its evolution reveals not only how societies build, but also how they fear.

Today, the ground has become the new frontier of urban expansion and ecological adaptation. As digital infrastructures, energy systems, and climatic buffers migrate below grade, architecture confronts a space both technical and metaphysical — essential yet marginal, invisible yet decisive. To think in sections rather than in plan is to recognise that contemporary cities no longer exist solely in their skylines but also in their depths. The challenge for architecture is not only to occupy that space, but to render it legible, to turn the unseen into knowledge, and the hidden into a new terrain of design.

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Integrating Creative Spaces: Designing Art Studio Additions at Home

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The home carries multiple identities as shelter, sanctuary, workplace, and stage for daily rituals. In recent years, its role has expanded in unprecedented ways. The pandemic, notably, coerced the home to act as a site of extraordinary adaptability to absorb functions once delegated to schools, offices, gyms, and studios. This transformation has shifted how we imagine domestic life, urging us to think of the home not simply as a backdrop for activity but as a dynamic framework for living, producing, and creating. Within this expanded understanding, artists find themselves asking a renewed question: how can the home allow the flexibility needed for creative practice?

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Cut Bend Fold Play House / Matharoo Associates

Cut Bend Fold Play House / Matharoo Associates - More Images+ 19

Chennai, India

The STREET / Studio VDGA

The STREET / Studio VDGA - More Images+ 19

  • Architects: Studio VDGA
  • Area Area of this architecture project Area:  1500
  • Year Completion year of this architecture project Year:  2024

Beyond Manufactured Landscapes: Quarries as Sites for Interdisciplinary Collaboration

Quarries can be seen as indelible abandoned scars of human resource extraction. Man-made spaces, perceived as voids, and material gain, have fundamentally shaped our accelerating built environment. All the while, the earth stands still as a silent witness. For decades, these open-pit mines have been viewed as a necessary consequence of consumerism and urban growth, their raw, imposing forms a testament to the large-scale extraction of materials essential for building our cities. However, a global architectural movement is now emerging to engage with these existing forms, transforming these subtractive spaces into sites of innovation, collaboration, and renewed purpose.

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Tradition, Innovation and Experimentation: Contemporary Mexican House Through the Lens of Edmund Sumner

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Blending vernacular techniques with contemporary experimentation, Mexico's architectural landscape is shaped by a continuous dialogue between tradition, materiality, and modernity. As the fifth most biodiverse country in the world, Mexican architecture seeks to respond to its vast range of natural environments, climates, and cultural traditions, all within a territory marked by striking contrasts. Reflecting a visible duality, it can embody both exclusivity and act as a catalyst for social transformation.

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Of a Feather: The Hidden Architecture of Bird Watching

Around the world, a passionate community of bird watchers, from novice observers to seasoned ornithologists, is drawn to the subtle movements, distinct calls, and remarkable migrations of birds. This global fascination has led to the creation of thoughtfully designed spaces by architects and designers, enhancing the bird-watching experience while respecting the ecological landscapes in which they are placed.

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National Gallery Sainsbury Wing / Selldorf Architects

National Gallery Sainsbury Wing / Selldorf Architects - More Images+ 27

  • Area Area of this architecture project Area:  4500
  • Year Completion year of this architecture project Year:  2025
  • Manufacturers Brands with products used in this architecture project
    Manufacturers:  Knauf, Schüco, Thrislington Cubicles, Wicona

Atlas Academia Sport Facility / Sordo Madaleno Arquitectos

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Earth Day 2025: Our Agency in Rethinking Sustainability Across Cities, Scales, and Sectors

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On Earth Day 2025, observed annually on April 22, we are once again reminded of the urgent environmental and sustainability challenges that face our planet—challenges that continue to evolve alongside global economic, political, and cultural shifts. The building and construction industry remains one of the most critical sectors in the effort to manage and reduce global carbon emissions. This year, these issues are being addressed through increasingly diverse lenses, calling for more holistic and integrated approaches. It's vital that we view sustainability not as a one-size-fits-all solution, but as a multi-scalar effort—one that spans from large-scale urban development and strategic planning, to the advancement of sustainable materials, and even to temporary, thought-provoking interventions like exhibitions and installations. In doing so, we reaffirm our commitment to reducing our collective carbon footprint, while shaping a built environment that promotes human well-being and planetary health.

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From Design Movements to Materials: Reflecting on Architectural Exhibitions in 2024

Reflecting on 2024, numerous architectural exhibitions have opened worldwide, addressing various themes, exhibition formats, and featured architects. Architectural design and architecture practice influence our daily lives in subtle and often unnoticed ways, where the end-users embrace built environments as they are. This reaction may arise from a combination of factors, such as a sense of powerlessness to enact significant change after a building is constructed or the experience of growing up in environments over which individuals had little or no agency in shaping. For these reasons, architectural exhibitions serve an essential purpose, offering society a chance to pause, reflect, and critically examine the myriad issues that surface during designing and building. These issues are often overlooked or need to be acknowledged, as practitioners may prioritize delivering projects within strict timelines over exploring more profound reflections.

In 2024, museums, galleries, and curators responded to the evolving challenges within the built environment with various approaches. Some exhibitions questioned the ethics of building materials and the practices behind supply chains, drawing attention to the broader implications of material choices. Others focused on documenting architectural movements worldwide, emphasizing their cultural and historical significance and the urgent need to preserve and adapt rather than replace them with entirely new builds. These efforts highlight the role of exhibitions in raising awareness about pressing issues while fostering a more critical dialogue about the architectural discipline.

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Mega-cities, Mega-projects, and Mega-slums: Exploring Urbanization in India

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As a result of the nation’s ardent aspirations for growth and development, the social, economic, and physical landscape of India has transformed. A significant portion of the region’s population is of working age and comprises a massive market size, making India a land of opportunity especially in the eyes of foreign investors.

Reflecting this context, multiple mega-cities and mega-projects characterize the built environment and push the nation toward superpower status. On the flip side of the coin, these visionary projects along with the trend of rapid urbanization also bring in a range of side effects - the spread of informal settlements and in turn, the challenges to equitable development.

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