Studio Libeskind has won an international competition for the design of a mixed-use tower and complex in the heart of Vilnius, Lithuania. The 20,000 square meter building will feature offices, a luxury hotel, restaurants and public amenities and will be located at the intersection of the White Bridge, the Neris River and Old Town.
Patrick Lynch
Patrick is ArchDaily's News Editor. Prior to this position, he was an editorial intern for ArchDaily while working full time as an assistant for a watercolor artist. Patrick holds a B. Arch degree from Penn State University and has spent time studying under architect Paolo Soleri. He is currently based in New York City.
Studio Libeskind's Faceted Tower Wins Competition for Mixed-Use Complex in Lithuania
"The Hills" by West 8 Set to Open on Governors Island
The latest stage of the Governors Island Park project, “The Hills,” is set to officially open to the public on this Tuesday July 19th – nearly a year ahead of schedule. Designed by internationally acclaimed urban design and landscape firm West 8, the park will feature ten acres of sloping landscapes that will provide residents and visitors with slides, art and unparalleled views of the New York Harbor.
Video: Daily Life, Daily Tao – Jingyu Liang Discusses the Chinese Pavilion at the 2016 Venice Biennale
In this interview, curator Jingyu Liang of Approach Architecture Studio discusses the concept behind "Daily Design, Daily Tao – Back to the Ignored Front," the theme of the Chinese Pavilion at the 2016 Venice Biennale. Responding to 2016 Biennale director Alejandro Aravena's overall theme of "Reporting From the Front," the pavilion takes an introspective look at China's own architectural front, and the impact that the country's ongoing development boom has had on Chinese architecture.
Federico Babina's ARCHIPLAN Illustrations Analyze the Floorplans of Master Architects
“The architectural plan is a formula to order the anarchy of space.”
In these latest images from Federico Babina, the artist explores the design styles of 25 of history's greatest architects, abstracting the plans of some of their most famous creations onto simple geometric backgrounds. The resulting illustrations resemble dynamic labyrinths or abstract symbols, and are what Babina refers to as “Planimetric graphologies.”
“Analyzing an architectural plan is how to make a graphology study,” explains Babina. “The plans are like the signatures of architects and can reveal conceptual details about the artistic and aesthetic personalities of their authors.”
See the entire set of ARCHIPLAN illustrations, including takes on Le Corbusier, Frank Lloyd Wright, Rem Koolhaas and Zaha Hadid, after the break.
Four Outstanding Housing Projects Win 2016 AIA/HUD Secretary Awards
Four housing projects have been awarded the 2016 AIA/HUD Secretary Awards. Given by The American Institute of Architects’ (AIA) Housing Knowledge Community, in conjunction with the Office of the Secretary of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), the award is given to projects that “offer examples of important developments in the housing industry.”
“Each of these developments are innovative housing opportunities offering seniors and families alike a place to thrive,” said HUD Secretary Julián Castro. “These winners prove that affordable and accessible housing can become part of the fabric of any neighborhood and reinforce the principles of inclusiveness and opportunity.”
The prize is given to projects in four categories: Excellence in Affordable Housing Design; Creating Community Connection Award; Community-Informed Design Award; and Housing Accessibility - Alan J. Rothman Award. Read on for a brief description from each of the winners.
City of London Building Award 2016 Winners Announced
New Ludgate, a retail and commercial development located two blocks east of St. Paul’s Cathedral in downtown London, has been named the City of London Building of the Year 2016. The complex consists of two new buildings, One New Ludgate by Fletcher Priest Architects and Two New Ludgate by Sauerbruch Hutton. The award was given in recognition of “the buildings that support the ambitions of the City of London in delivering a world-class working environment, by evaluating both the quality of the architectural design and the impact the building has had on the city street scene.”
BIG-Designed Inflatable Pavilion Lights Up Roskilde Festival
BIG Architects has designed an inflatable mobile pavilion to be displayed at three Danish events, including its original site at the Roskilde Festival 2016. Known as SKUM (Danish for foam), the structure met the challenge of creating an installation that has the ability to be both permanent and fully transportable by creating a whimsical, bubble-like form that can be blown up in just 7 minutes.
BIG and Heatherwick's Futuristic Google HQ Back on the Table After Massive Land Deal with LinkedIn
The “Googleplex” is back on. After the Mountain View City Council announced last year that they would be awarding the majority of the land needed to construct the futurist masterplan designed for Google by BIG and Thomas Heatherwick to fellow tech giant LinkedIn, the future of the ambitious glass-canopied corporate campus seemed to be dead in the water, with the architects even releasing images of a pared down design that would occupy a much smaller footprint. But all of that has now changed thanks to a surprising property swap between the two companies that will see over three million square feet of real estate switch hands.
Richard Meier's Douglas House Added to National Register of Historic Places
Today, one of Richard Meier’s most notable and acclaimed residences, the 1973 Douglas House, has been named to the National Register of Historic Places, the federal list of cultural resources worthy of preservation across the United States. The announcement comes after an extensive renovation to the property was completed in 2011, and will grant the home the legal status to help ensure the building is maintained for generations to come.
James Corner Field Operations' ICEBERGS Brings the Chill to the National Building Museum
This year’s installment of the National Building Museum’s Summer Block Party Series, James Corner Field Operations’ ICEBERGS, is now open to the public. On display until September 5th, ICEBERGS takes the form of a shimmering, underwater world of glacial ice fields located in the museum’s expansive Great Hall to provide the public with an escape from the hot Washington, D.C. summer.
This Ecological Cultural Center is Designed to Celebrate the Tradition of Marimba Music
The offices of Caá Porá, Siete86 and Ingeniera Alternativa have released designs for “Palenque Cultural Tambillo,” a cultural center dedicated to the artistic tradition of marimba music in the Afroecuadorean town of Tambillo, Ecuador. Consisting of a performance and meeting hall, two multi-use classrooms, rehearsal spaces, an artisanal instrument workshop and ecologically friendly public bathrooms, the project is planned to become one piece of a network of cultural centers to be built in the UNESCO heritage province of Esmeraldas.
Watch as James Corner Field Operation's "Icebergs" Comes Together at the National Building Museum
Building on the popularity of Snarkitecture's popular BEACH last year and BIG's massive Labyrinth in 2014, the National Building Museum's 2016 Summer Block Party installation has returned this year with "ICEBERGS," designed by James Corner Field Operations. ICEBERGS is an interactive underwater environment of glacial ice spanning the museum's Great Hall, and invites in the public to escape the hot Washington D.C. summer by exploring climbable bergs, ice chutes, caves, grottos and more.
Take a look at this time lapse video to see how the project came together.
Food Ink. is the World's First 3D Printing Restaurant
Bringing together architects, artists, chefs, designers and engineers, pop-up restaurant Food Ink. has laid claim to the title of "world's first 3D-printing restaurant." The restaurant utilizes 3D printers produced by Dutch company byFlow to create dishes out of hummus, chocolate mousse, smashed peas, goat cheese or pizza dough – essentially anything that can take the form of a paste. The paste can then be fed through the extruder to create culinary sculptures.
C.F. Møller Designs New Headquarters for LEGO
Danish firm CF Møller have been tapped by the LEGO Group to design a 52,000 square meter (560,000 square foot) global hub for the company’s headquarters in Billund, Denmark. The design, which draws inspiration from the colored modular bricks for which LEGO is known, will provide new flexible work arrangements and community spaces centered around a brightly lit 4-story atrium, as well as a new public park for the campus.
Winners of the European Prize for Urban Public Space 2016 Announced
From a list of 25 finalists released in May, the Centre de Cultura Contemporània de Barcelona (CCCB) has announced the winners of the 2016 European Prize for Urban Public Space. Awarded since 2000 to recognize “transformations and improvements in the public spaces of Europe,” this year’s prize names two joint winners along with four special mentions. All 25 finalists will have their work featured in an exhibition that will tour Europe over the next two years, and also will be published in an online archive that features past finalists.
Continue after the break for images and descriptions of the winning projects.
Francis Kéré Creates Installation from Brightly Colored Thread for First U.S. Retrospective
Currently on display at the Philadelphia Museum of Modern Art, Award-winning African architect Diébédo Francis Kéré has created Colorscape, a installation made from steel and brightly-colored fiber, to accompany his first solo show in the United States. The exhibition is titled The Architecture of Francis Kéré: Building with Community, and features of a retrospective of the architect’s career that includes material artifacts, tools and scale-models created for stand-out projects in both Africa and Europe.
AIA Announces Winners of the 2016 Small Project Awards
The American Institute of Architects (AIA) has selected seven recipients of the 2016 Small Project Awards. This is the 13th edition of the program, which was established to recognize firms for their excellence in small-project design. This year the winners have been placed into two categories: Category 1, which awards “a small project construction, object, work of environmental art or architectural design element up to $150,000 in construction cost,” and Category 2, given to “A small project construction, up to $1,500,000 in construction cost.”
This year’s winners include a wide variety of program types and sites. Continue after the break for the list and descriptions of the projects.
Benthem Crouwel Architects to Design Addition to Arnhem Museum
Dutch firm Benthem Crouwel Architects have won a competition to renovate and expand Museum Arnhem, a museum located in Arnhem, Netherlands housing a collection of modern and contemporary art. The winning proposal was selected by the jury from its “clarity and simplicity, the preservation of the centuries-old lateral moraine, and the brilliant idea of incorporating a publicly open veranda into the new extension.”