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Beirut has seen an influx of wealth into the area ever since the end of the Lebanese Civil War in 1990. Large-scale developments and designer architecture from Herzog & de Meuron, Snøhetta and David Adjaye have been popping up throughout the capital, much like its Middle Eastern neighbors. Retro67 by Andrea Vattovani Architecture, together with local architects Plan Bee Architecture, will celebrate the appearance of the old town of Beirut and reinterpret the traditional stylistic elements with the modern flair that is becoming the city’s favored style.

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SPF:a has revealed their design for the new Anaheim Performing Arts Center (APAC) to be located adjacent to Angels Stadium in Anaheim’s Platinum Triangle District. The $500 million, 500,000-square-foot cultural campus will contain three theaters and a range of culture and entertainment program elements, housed within striking buildings inspired by the orange tree.

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An international team of young architects based in Copenhagen have won first prize for their proposal ‘Finnskogens Hus’ in a competition for a new Museum of Forest Finn Culture in Svullrya, Norway.

The fourth largest architectural competition in Norway, the new museum aims to inform and educate visitors about the Forest Finns, Finnish migrants who settled in Swedish and Norwegian forests in the late 16th to 17th centuries.

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Clément Blanchet Architecture has been selected as the winner of an international competition for the design of a new cultural center to be located in the Paris suburb of Gonesse, France, beating out proposals from Bernard Tschumi & Moreau Kusunoki.

Named Circus³, the facility features a unique tensile roof evocative of a circus pavilion, and will house a 1,500 seat theater for a variety of cultural performances and events.

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FaulknerBrowns Architects have recently submitted a planning application for a new major indoor snow and leisure center in Swindon, marked as a priority by Swindon Borough Council. The scheme is set the help regenerate the previously industrial area into a vibrant shopping district, located opposite the existing Oasis Leisure Centre. Russ Davenport, Partner at FaulknerBrowns Architects, said:

It is fantastic to be able to bring our experience and expertise in indoor snow and leisure destinations to Swindon for this exciting development. The complex—our fifth indoor snow scheme—will bring a neglected site back into use and provide visitors with a memorable experience, both on and off the slopes.

Bjarke Ingels Group and Carlo Ratti Associati have broken ground on 88 Market Street, a new skyscraper at the heart of Singapore's business district. Transforming a site which was previously occupied by a parking structure from the 1980s, the 280-meter-tall building will include plentiful greenery both on its facades and internally. Inside, the building will include offices, 299 serviced residential units, and ancillary retail space.

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Viennese firm Zechner & Zechner has been announced as the winners of the competition for the new landmark complex NeuBau3—a mixed-use district at Peter-Behrens-Platz in Linz, Austria—after a unanimous decision by the jury. The proposed structure will complete the existing site of German architect and designer Peter Behrens' modernist Tabakfabrik Linz, a tobacco factory built between 1929 and 1935.

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The Vietnamese government has approved Chapman Taylor's Mui Dinh Ecopark for the east coast of Vietnam. Covering 1.4 million square meters, the extensive site contains 6 resort hotels and a boutique hotel, 500 ocean-facing villas, a theme park, casino, beach club and mountain clubhouse.

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Following recent natural disasters including the Northern California wildfires, the HASSELL + team have been inspired to reimagine the San Francisco Bay Area as a vibrant community hub, equipped to provide temporary facilities in an emergency. As part of the competition Resilient by Design, the ten teams were asked to provide solutions for the waterfront through site-specific conceptual design and collaborative research projects.

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An adaptive reuse project by P-A-T-T-E-R-N-S is currently under construction in North Hollywood, California. The project transforms an existing warehouse into a dynamic medical campus with Urgent Care, Elderly Daycare, Surgical Centre, Physical Therapy, Imaging Centre, Medical offices, café and a small shop.

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The 24-m wide crossing, located near the historical town of Zhujiajiao, will feature spaces for gatherings and scenic views. MVRDV's competition-winning design for a pedestrian bridge is scheduled to be completed by 2019. 

UNStudio has revealed new renderings of their massive development and master plan for FOUR Frankfurt, as the firm joins forces with HPP Architects (UNS + HPP) to carry out the next stages of the project.

Located on a 16,000 square meter site in the Frankfurt financial district formerly housing offices for Deutsche Bank, Frankfurt FOUR will consist of a multi-story, mixed-use plinth and four skyline-changing high-rise towers, the tallest of which will cap out at 748 feet (228 meters).

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J. Mayer H. Architects has revealed their design for the new Kärcher Musuem that took 3rd prize in a recent closed competition. Designed for international cleaner manufacturer Kärcher, the museum will feature exhibits on the company’s 80+ year legacy and the history of cleaning technologies.

Located on a 2,500 square meter site in Winnenden, Germany, J. Mayer H. Architects’ proposal takes the form of a large, sawtooth cut volume inspired by the surrounding commercial and industrial structures. This monolithic form is cut into at the entrance, revealing the hollowed out interior within. Additional cuts into the body offer views to neighboring company buildings, toward the city and to the surrounding landscape.

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MVRDV has revealed the design of The Milestone, a new mixed-use office building to be built in the city of Esslingen, Germany. Featuring a distinct, part-reflective “crystal rock” facade and a hollowed-out pixelated core, the building will become a standout new landmark and public amenity for the city.

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In our modern day society where every minute counts, Danish architecture firm COBE, in collaboration with Danish automotive technology company, CLEVER, has designed a new modular ultra-fast charging station for electric vehicles. These stations will not only aim to reduce the typical 45-minute charging time but also serve as a place where drivers can relax.

Finland based Futudesign has been announced as the winner of a competition which invited firms to repurpose part of the Helsinki Central Railway Station. The design, which will transform the station’s underutilized eastern wing into a hotel, both reinterprets and modernizes Eliel Saarinen's original architectural intent.

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Steven Holl Architects, in collaboration with Art-group Kamen, has been selected as the winners of an international competition to design a new mixed-use residential development in the Tushino district of Moscow, Russia, beating out proposals from Fuksas Architecture, Zaha Hadid Architects, Mad Global, and Tsimailo, Lyashenko & Partners.

Comprising housing, social spaces and educational facilities, the design of the complex draws inspiration from its historic site, a former paratrooper airfield. In response, Steven Holl Architects proposed a completely new building typology, “Parachute Hybrids,” which “combines residential bar and slab structures with supplemental programming suspended in sections above, like parachutes frozen in the sky.”

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In response to the tropical climate of Vietnam, this proposed office building uses a "tropical double skin" to moderate heat gain while improving acoustic resistance from the noisy streets of Ho Chi Minh City. This design comes from Inrestudio and proposes the use of the "tropical double skin" as an "alternative office design for tropical urban environments." The facade consists of modules, each approximately 400 cubic millimeters, made up of six steel rings. The system of modules on the facade support planters filled with various plants and trees, casting kinetic shadows on the interior of the building.

MVRDV has been selected as the winner of an international competition for a new mixed-use complex to be located near several important historic buildings in the city center of Moscow, Russia. Known as Silhouette, the complex will pack 52,000 square meters (560,000 square feet) of commercial, retail and residential space into its pixelated, geometric volume.

BIG has unveiled an updated vision for the new Campus Master Plan for the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C., after taking into account over 3 years of community input and collaboration with the storied museum and research institution. The revised proposal pays particular attention to the preservation of unique character of the Enid A. Haupt Garden while still addressing the existing and future needs of the Smithsonian at one of the nation’s most historically significant sites.

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Zaha Hadid Architects has unveiled the design of a new mixed-use development to be located on the Vauxhall Cross Island site adjacent to Vauxhall Station in London. Aiming toward becoming a new public square for the neighborhood, the complex will consist of two towers connected by a street level podium, offering a variety of programmatic uses including a hotel, offices, residences, retail and public amenities.

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