This month, UNESCO has announced a series of decisions concerning important heritage sites, giving rise to conversations around preservation and urban development. Last week, the World Heritage Committee decided to strip Liverpool of its heritage status, as the new developments are considered detrimental to the waterfront's integrity. These projects placed the city on the List of World Heritage in Danger in 2012, a designation which Venice managed to avoid earlier this week, due in great part to the recent ban on cruise ships.
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Historically, industrialization means a process of economic change that transforms an agrarian society, with mostly handicraft techniques, into an industrial society to increase productivity and economic growth. This mechanization and mass production leads to deep social transformations, but the most significant consequence is an enormous change in the urban landscape.
Adjaye Associates has unveiled the design of The Africa Institute, the first center of its kind dedicated to the advanced study and research of Africa and the African diaspora living in the Arab world. The 31,882-square-meter campus will be built in downtown Sharjah, UAE, and will "introduce an entirely new type of thinking and mission into the global academic arena".
SANLIURFA, TURKEY - February 19, 2014: Aerial view of Akcakale Refugee Camp. Approximately 28.000 Syrian people reside in Akcakale Tent Camp in Urfa.. Image via Shutterstock/ By answer5
With more than 70 million forcibly displaced people worldwide, according to the UNHCR, and nearly 25.9 million refugees, the time has come to reconsider the traditional emergency camp approach. Although the concept is temporary by definition, in real life the lifespan of these refugee camps exceeds the planned and the expected.
Ranging from seven to seventeen years, most of these settlements surpass their expiry dates. Actually, on average, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in Kenya, "many displaced persons spend more than 16 years living as refugees in temporary shelter."
A room, a life. Nowadays we spend most of our time in closed spaces. Ideally, they should suit us and be conducive to our well-being. Furniture, décor, lighting, colors, patterns, and fabrics all have an effect on us, albeit an unconscious one. Be it playful elegance, rekindled tradition, or simple functionality, what mainly counts where interior architecture is concerned is the purpose for which a room is to be used. The iF DESIGN AWARD 2021 winners’ designs create totally new styles for very different needs and carry conviction with a great sense of detail.
Association Cap Moderne have announced that the restoration of Eileen Gray’s modernist villa E-1027, along with other projects on the Cap Moderne site, such as Le Corbusier’s Cabanon and Unités de Camping, and l’Etoile de Mer restaurant, have been completed and are now open to visitors. The site is listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and is considered as one of the must-see places to discover in the region, welcoming more than 10,000 visitors a year.
Echoing New York’s High Line, Manchester’s Castlefield Viaduct, a disused railway viaduct dating back to the Victorian, will be transformed into a public park. The design developed by Twelve Architects pays homage to the city’s industrial heritage while bringing new life to the structure and establishing a new vibrant public space within the city centre. The two-stage design process creates a temporary park, enlisting the public’s feedback before implementing the new urban design.
This week's curated selection of Best Unbuilt Architecture highlights different competition-winning designs submitted by the ArchDaily Community. From large scale urban developments to small interventions in the landscape, from commercial projects to public spaces and urban planning strategies with an environmental focus, this article showcases a variety of design approaches, programs and scales. The proposals featured are the results of local and international competitions, either creative concepts or projects currently in progress.
The award-winning entries include a range of different projects, designed by both young architects and established firms. An adaptive reuse project for office towers in New York, the redevelopment of an industrial site in China, an abstract installation for a Russian festival, or a masterplan focused on climate resilience and ecosystems protection are a few of this week's highlights.
NanShan B&B Hotel / Priestman Architects. Image Courtesy of Luyi Photograph
A border city can be classified as an urban agglomeration close to the boundary of two countries, states, or regions. Nowadays, as our cities are rapidly expanding and our transportation modes continually upgrading, the boundary between cities and rural areas has been constantly pushed and redefined.
Architecture is a long-standing profession, one that has produced the iconic landmarks we admire around the world, monuments which we revere around the world, and played a part in establishing the organisation of the cities we live in today. This description, however, is architecture in the traditional sense - and there are numerous examples of individuals and firms who have strayed away from traditional architectural practice, either through delving into adjacent fields or 'disrupting' the field with the harnessing of new technologies.
Today, worldbuilding is an important part of creative thinking in a wide array of activites. From successful film franchises, to video games, and to comics, worldbuilding is what draws in audiences and allows multi-part productions to cohere around a shared setting. Of course, architecture factors into this too, it is the creative and technical discipline concerned with building the world, after all. This video breaks down how worldbuilding applies to architecture and focuses on comics as a case study to explore the opportunities in its consideration. Lastly, the video includes an interview with the designer of the exhibition ‘Chicago Comics’ currently on display at the Museum of Contemporary Art. Thomas Kelley discusses how worldbuilding factored into the relationship between architecture and comics in the design of the show with regards to scale, entry sequences, and color.
The development of cities has historically been a slow-moving process. In the everchanging urban landscape that faces the pushes and pulls of a variety of social, economic, and financial factors, it’s been hard to pinpoint just one main reason over another why each city has evolved over time into the way that we experience it today. And as designers and planners speculate about what the future of our cities should be, sometimes the reason that our cities look and operate in the way that they do has come down to a few famous battles between individuals with competing schools of thought.
The Moroccan Pavilion at the 2020 Expo in Dubai explores traditional Moroccan architecture and how it can be reimagined in contemporary construction techniques and urban developments. The pavilion is designed by architects OUALALOU+CHOI, and will display a first-of-its-kind structure with a 4000 m² rammed earth facade, pushing the boundaries of the material and exploring its full potential.
Following Rio de Janeiro’s inaugural hold of the title, Copenhagen has been named World Capital of Architecture for 2023 by UNESCO and will host the International Union of Architect’s World Congress 2 years from now. At its second edition, the initiative supported by UNESCO in partnership with UIA is meant to highlight the role of architecture and urban planning in shaping a sustainable future and tackling global challenges. Designated triennially, the city World Capital of Architecture will become an international forum for debate around issues related to the urban environment.
The renowned Mexican architect Miguel Ángel Aragonés presented ten years of research materialized in his most recent project entitled "Casa PI" whose acronym translates to a new "intelligent prefabricated" construction project. Patented in Switzerland, this system seeks to break the housing paradigm from an integral design that combines the structure of the house with the furniture and new automation technologies in architecture.
https://www.archdaily.com/965480/mexican-architect-miguel-angel-aragones-patents-construction-system-with-intelligent-prefabricated-technologyArchDaily Team
Benthem Crouwel Architects and West 8 have won the international competition to design the new multimodal hub of Brno. The city announced the winning Dutch teams known for the Rotterdam Central station, and the designers were selected out of a total of 46 applications. It was the largest architectural competition in the history of the Czech Republic.
In this week's reprint, author Jacob DiCrescenzo explores the Emotional Experience of architecture, after having tackled in a previous article the so-called "feeling architecture", focusing on the psychology and emotion of the built environment. Arguing that "architecture is a deeply emotional experience", DiCrescenzo talks also about the benefits of neuroscience-informed design.
The Italian government has announced the permanent ban of large cruise ships in the Venetian lagoon, after several years of protests, petitions, and threats of being put on UNESCO’s endangered list. The ban will be effective as of August 1st, 2021, and will prohibit ships exceeding 180 meters in length or weighing 25,000 tons from entering the lagoon, hoping to sustain Venice's historic canals, waterways, and public squares.
The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) has today revealed the 16 winners of the RIBA International Awards for Excellence 2021. The Awards, which take place every two years, recognize the most significant and inspirational projects around the world.
UNStudio has won the competition to redesign Sochi Waterfront with a masterplan that creates the framework for a vibrant urban environment for the local community while shaping a new identity for the notorious leisure resort on the Black Sea coast. Dubbed SoCo, the proposal seeks to create a year-round destination that would provide visitors with new attractions within Russia’s most important holiday destination, building on existing natural and cultural resources. At the same time, the design strategy focuses on shaping a close connection to the landscape and natural environment, building the foundation for inclusive neighbourhoods that would bring together various social groups.
The ceiling is an important element in architecture and interior design, combining functionality with aesthetics through different materials that add layers of texture and color, providing quality and comfort in interior spaces as well as a protective surface for other building systems.
Stillman House II, courtyard with view into living area, 1966. Joseph W. Molitor. . Image Courtesy of Summitridge Pictures & Monacelli Press
Now that we are halfway through the year, what better time to prioritize your reading list? Whether you’re interested in the history of interior design, the relationship between architecture and health, or learning more about the 20th century’s forgotten architects, Metropolis editors have selected a variety of current and forthcoming titles that will be sure to get you through 2021.
Looking through interior images of houses, we often see grand bedrooms with an influx of natural lighting. We see inviting open-space living rooms, lush terraces, and kitchens with high-end equipment and refined finishes. But what we don't see is that behind these sleek walls are small neglected bedrooms without proper ventilation, natural lighting, or space to move around, dedicated to those who cater to the entire household.
The disparate spatial configuration and "colonial" approach to the living conditions of servants and foreign laborers have existed long before the rise of congested cities and micro-apartments. Household owners, or at least a good sum of them, have always felt that domestic workers needed and deserved less space to reside in, not just in terms of spatial area, but in terms of necessary living conditions for a better, more comfortable life.
ODA New York have released images of their newest project "Era", Manhattan's largest residential cantilever building. Located in the Upper West Side, the 20-storey condo features a striking 50-foot cantilever structure and the neighborhood's only rooftop pool. The project’s unique cantilever design allows for more expansive views as it ascends, wide common spaces, grand residences, and a rooftop recreational space.
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.jpg?1626777875 "Drawing by Tings Chak for the How to Make Space exhibition (2016). Image © Tings Chak")
