Architecture: The Latest Architecture and News

Twenty years after the Frank Gehry–designed Guggenheim Abu Dhabi was first announced in 2006, the museum may finally have its grand opening.

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OMA New York has designed a new 145-meter pedestrian bridge over the Apatlaco River in Jojutla de Juárez, Mexico, as part of a larger reconstruction effort by Infonavit (National Workers’ Housing Fund Institute) following the 2017 earthquakes.

Zaha Hadid Architects has ranked first in a design competition for the redevelopment of the Vilnius railway station complex and surrounding area in Lithuania, with its ‘Green Connect’ proposal. Generating an integrated transportation hub for the 21st century with new civic spaces enveloped by nature, ZHA’s project is aligned to the city’s ongoing sustainability agenda.

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After being awarded with the top prize at the Munch Museum Competition in 2009, Spanish architecture firm Estudio Herreros has finally completed the construction of the museum and will open its doors on October 22, 2021. The long-awaited museum will showcase a rich collection of Norwegian heritage and culture and thousands of artworks by artist Edvard Munch, as well as present a contemporary museum concept that highlights architecture's urban role and historical responsibility of Oslo and the nation as a whole.

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In 2019, Chile launched an open call for the design of its national pavilion at Expo 2020 Dubai. Among 24 submissions, the jury chose the proposal presented by Chilean architects Smiljan Radic, Cecilia Puga, and Paula Velasco.

The proposal consisted of traveling a modular oak lamella shed to Dubai, originally built in Chile back in the mid-twentieth century. At the time of its official presentation in 2019, the architects defined the project as "a primitive mark on the ground, as nomadic tribes have done for centuries in this now globalized desert [Dubai]. This physical and cultural dimension is necessary to adapt the pavilion as a friendly and austere space."

This article was originally published on Common Edge.

In this week's reprint, author Mark Alan Hewitt talks about models and their importance. "For those of us lucky enough to have grown up during the 1950s and ’60s, models were hot stuff—and not just the kind that statement may bring to mind", he states. Going back to the realistic models of the 70s, similar to today's virtual renderings, this essay retraces their history and the artists that produced them.

The old structure called Playa Gigena, in honor of the equestrian of the same name, located between the hippodrome and the Rosedal de Palermo in Buenos Aires, will now be converted by ODA into a Class A office building and a public park including cafes, restaurants, shops, and a covered parking lot. The partial demolition of the old parking lot has begun on June 28th.

Designed by the American architecture office ODA, the next Paseo Gigena will be the firm's first mixed-use project in the city of Buenos Aires city. The team involved in the process also includes the participation of Aisenson studio, Inscape Landscape, Coinsa, and the developer BSD Investments, to which the government has granted the concession of the property known as Ámbito Gigena, for a period of 15 years.

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The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) has announced that Pritzker Laureate Lord Norman Foster will chair the 2021 Stirling Prize jury. The jury will also include Simon Allford, RIBA President, architect Annalie Riches, 2019 RIBA Stirling Prize winner, and artist Dame Phyllida Barlow, advised by architect and sustainability expert Mina Hasman.

In Mendoza, Argentina, the digital fabrication research lab Node 39 FabLab created a frame loom structure made of digitally cut wood to help indigenous people in the central region of the country weave and create their traditional patterns. In the state of Ceará, northeast Brazil, a study entitled "Artífices Digitais" (Digital Artisans) by the Federal University of the State of Ceará used digital fabrication tools, namely 3D printing, to produce digital models, like digital prosthetics, to restore the damaged parts of an altarpiece of the high altar of the Mother Church in the city of Russas.

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Brisbane-based architecture firm bureau^proberts has unveiled its design for the Australian Pavilion at Expo 2020 in Dubai, UAE. The pavilion serves as a cultural contribution with large social space that translates Australia’s distinctive landscape and skies through a cloud-like form suspended over folding timber. The structure "captures the local sensibility" by highlighting the welcoming and warm nature of the Australians through the central and sheltered gathering area.

3XN has recently completed the Grognon exhibition space dedicated to the history of digital technologies. Located in Namur, Belgium, at the confluence of two rivers and neighbouring the Roman citadel, as well as the Wallonian Parliament, the project inserts itself within the protected historical setting as a new topography, a landscape that flows along the site weaving together the context and the new programme.

In honor of World Photography Day (August 19 ), Chilean architect Francisco Ibáñez Hantke offers a a perspective of urban transformation and the resulting instability caused by the regenerative processes and the constant real estate speculation that drive it. The photographs center on London, and reveal an exhausting array of construction and demolition and highlight the often blurry line between architecture and urban decay.

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After a year-long absence, Milan Design Week has wrapped up yet another year of creativity and innovation. From the 5th to the 10th of September, thousands of design companies displayed their creations to more than 200,000 visitors hailing from different countries, demographics, and industries. And while the design fair gravitated towards the world of interior design, many renowned architects such as Bjarke Ingels, Foster + Partners, and Herzon & de Meuron participated in the week-long exhibition and joined forces with interior and furniture design brands to create signature pieces.

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Led by Iyad Alsaka, Adrianne Fisher, and Wael Sleiman, OMA’s latest project, the Prestige Liberty Towers, breaks ground in Mumbai, India. Expected to be completed in 2025, the mixed-used complex is the firm’s first venture in India, located in the historic textile mills at the heart of the city.

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Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (SOM) has collaborated with University of Michigan Taubman College to create the SPLAM [SPatial LAMinated timber], a robotically-fabricated timber pavilion for the 2021 Chicago Architecture Biennial. The pavilion employs prefabricated framing panels manufactured using robotic technology, and will serve as an open-air education facility and gathering space for a school in Chicago. The pavilion was inaugurated on September 17, with the opening of the Chicago Biennial, and will remain on display until December 18th.

Sex Day is an unofficial holiday created by marketers celebrated on September 6th in Brazil, highlighting one of the greatest taboos in modern society: sexuality. From an architectural and urban point of view, the immorality associated with sexual activities, especially in exchange for payment, deeply impacts our society and also affects the territory.

While sometimes considered morally wrong, sinful, forbidden, and impure, sex, sexuality, and pleasure are all inherent to human physiology. Prostitution is sometimes referred to as "the world's oldest profession," playing a fundamental role in our societies, as well as in our territory, in the spatial organization and dynamics of cities. This practice is at the margins of modern society and therefore has ended up occupying segregated spaces in the cities.

MAD Architects has announced "The Star", a new landmark that will foster culture, creativity, and inspiration in Los Angeles, California. Nestled in the heart of Hollywood, the Star's reflective architecture nods the neighborhood's glamorous characteristics and embeds nature within its structure with natural lighting, greenery, and workplaces that cater to the employees' mental and physical wellbeing.