Housing: The Latest Architecture and News

The first award winners of the 2024 World Architecture Festival have been announced, following Day One of live presentations at Marina Bay Sands in Singapore, in which hundreds of shortlisted projects were presented by practices from around the world. Amongst today's category award winners in the Completed Buildings section of the world's largest international live-judged architectural event are 5468796 Architecture, Renzo Piano Building Workshop, and Wallflower Architecture + Design.

Videos

The Second Studio (formerly The Midnight Charette) is an explicit podcast about design, architecture, and the everyday. Hosted by Architects David Lee and Marina Bourderonnet, it features different creative professionals in unscripted conversations that allow for thoughtful takes and personal discussions.

A variety of subjects are covered with honesty and humor: some episodes are interviews, while others are tips for fellow designers, reviews of buildings and other projects, or casual explorations of everyday life and design. The Second Studio is also available on iTunes, Spotify, and YouTube.

This week David and Marina of FAME Architecture & Design discuss the Design-Build model of home construction. They cover the definition of the Design-Build model; lack of licensed architects in Design-Build companies; efficiency and economy; quality of construction; how costs are lowered; lack of transparency; who should / shouldn't engage with Design-Build companies; and more.

MVRDV, in collaboration with JGE Architects, landscape architects Copley Wolff, and Langan Engineering, has developed a masterplan for the redevelopment of Faneuil Gardens, a public housing site in the Brighton neighborhood of Boston. This project, commissioned by The Community Builders in partnership with the Boston Housing Authority, aims to replace the outdated 1940s apartment complex with five contemporary buildings that incorporate mixed-income affordable housing, artist live-work spaces, and significant green spaces. At the center of the redevelopment is a new community center, located along a public boulevard that runs through the heart of the site.

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Buildner has announced the results of its second annual Home of Shadows international architecture ideas competition. This competition series is designed to focus on the vital interplay between light and shadow in creating functional and inviting living spaces, highlighting the importance of natural light in home design, which is essential for creating comfortable, welcoming, and practical environments.

Urban expansion and increasing population density have fuelled a growing demand for outdoor areas in multi-story apartments, as residents seek to stay connected with nature without leaving home. This trend reflects the challenges of modern urban life, where access to nature is often limited, and public green spaces are increasingly scarce. In this context, features like balconies, loggias, and winter gardens stand out as attractive solutions, offering private spaces for relaxation and enjoyment amidst the hustle of city life. In addition to enriching the urban experience, these spaces enhance the quality of life, providing a personal refuge amidst the urban landscape.

Copenhagen-based multidisciplinary studio BIOSIS has revealed the design for a new housing complex in Nuuk, Greenland. The project aims to create a minimal-impact and climate-driven design by integrating the intervention in the area's natural terrain and adapting the solutions to the local conditions. The Qullilerfik housing project consists of five prism-shaped residences created to complement the sloped site, initially considered unsuitable.

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This article was originally published on Common Edge.

"O beautiful, for spacious skies, for amber waves of grain, has there ever been another place on earth where so many people of wealth and power have paid for and put up with so much architecture they detested as within thy blessed borders today?"

Tom Wolfe wrote this in his 1981 book From Bauhaus to Our House. The conflict between modern and traditional design has barely abated since, as is evident in this recent article. In the U.S., modern buildings are often met with community aversion, for familiar reasons: their perceived coldness and lack of contextual sensitivity, the impact on local character, and the loss of historical continuity. But on another level, the critique against modern design finds even more purchase on the larger scale: the city. Modern U.S. cities reek of traffic congestion and pollution, social inequality and gentrification, a loss of community and cultural spaces, and a lack of usable open space.

This article was originally published on Common Edge.

I was inspired to write this essay by a fascinating post on the social dynamic of porches by Patrick Deneen entitled A Republic of Front Porches. Sustainable places must be acccessible by a variety of means, especially walking. Neighborhoods where people walk to numerous destinations are more likely to be securable, because people tend to know more of their neighbors and therefore are likelier to know when a stranger is in the area. Walkability is essential to a serviceable place, because people won’t walk to those services as often if the pedestrian experience is bad. So walking is a fundamental aspect of a place’s sustainability. Porches can serve a crucial role in the walkability of residential streets in a neighborhood, and therefore in the ultimate sustainability of the neighborhood.

CityMakers, The Global Community of Architects Who Learn from Exemplary Cities and Their Makers, is working with ArchDaily to publish a series of articles about Barcelona, Medellin, and Rotterdam. The authors are the architects, urban planners, and/or strategists of the projects that have transformed these three cities, which are visited in the "Schools of Cities" and studied in the "Documentary-Courses" made by CityMakers. On this occasion, Alejandro Restrepo Montoya, Director of Urban Planning and Architecture of Medellín, presents his article "Environmental Urbanism and Urban Geographies, Medellín 2024-2027"

Medellín's urban plan focuses on answering how urban planning can improve people's quality of life. By developing its proposal, the city is promoting the social benefits that these urban planning practices can generate. Medellín emphasizes the use of natural and environmental conditions, such as valleys, streams, rivers, mountains, and hills, to develop urban planning criteria that address social needs.

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The Massachusetts administration, under Governor Maura Healey, has unveiled a new housing-centric proposal for the controversial Boston Government Service Center designed by Paul Rudolph and opened in 1971. Previously proposed to be redeveloped by the architecture office NBBJ with offices and commercial spaces, the updated vision aims to transform the Erich Lindemann and Charles F. Hurley buildings into housing facilities as part of the state’s goal to address the housing crisis while allowing for the historic preservation of the Brutalist structure.

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World War II was pivotal in human history, leaving a profound political and social impact. Its conclusion marked a significant turning point, leading to post-war suburbanization and the baby boom. These phenomena resulted in rapid urban growth and a surge in housing construction, which peaked in the 1960s and continued to flourish throughout the following decades, gradually slowing down until the present day. Currently, we are facing a very different scenario in which a backlog of affordable housing, combined with a challenging economic outlook and a climate agenda, have led to the need for a transformation of the built environment into a cleaner and more resource-efficient one, in line with the Paris Agreement.

Thus, with the ever-increasing demand for housing, combined with policy initiatives such as the European Green Deal, the post-war model of hyper-production is becoming unsustainable. Consequently, refurbishing derelict or redundant buildings has emerged as a viable alternative. Unlike the scheme of demolition and new construction, this approach offers opportunities for energetic retrofitting, which helps mitigate environmental obsolescence, extend the lifespan of buildings, and revitalize the existing and dilapidated stock—including postwar housing—while improving people's quality of life.

His work – more than 250 buildings in the span of 30 years – was lauded by critics and colleagues, cited for international design awards, and landed the architect on the cover of Time. But today, even practitioners and aficionados might be challenged to name one of Minoru Yamasaki's buildings beyond his two most infamous creations that no longer exist: the Pruitt-Igoe housing project in St. Louis and New York’s World Trade Center towers. Paul Kidder explores this complex architect and his work in a new book, Minoru Yamasaki and the Fragility of Architecture (Routledge).

Kidder, a professor of philosophy at Seattle University, provides a fresh, sobering assessment not only of Yamasaki's architecture but the man himself: his challenges, triumphs, and contradictions, as well as the fragility of architectural achievement. The loss of this architect’s most famous buildings suggests the growing scope of architecture’s fragility, especially today, when real-estate investment often augers against preservation of even late-modern works. Yet, paradoxically, Yamasaki believed that fragility could be a desirable architectural quality—the source of its refinement, beauty, and humanity.

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