Architectural and fine art photographer Pygmalion Karatzas is presenting a number of free online architectural photography resources for readers to explore in the period of the COVID-19 pandemic. The selected resources include e-books, numerous interviews with renowned photographers from around the world, educational presentations (academic papers, lectures, workshops), and videos.
As author Jeremy Lent points out in a recent article, the phrase “social distancing” is helpfully being recast as “physical distancing” since this pandemic is bringing people closer together in solidarity than ever before, and we are witnessing a heartwarming rediscovery of the value of community, and humanity’s prosocial impulses like altruism and compassion manifesting across sectors and boundaries.
Hassell has approached health and wellness differently in the newest healthcare facility in Western Australia. With innovation at the core of the architectural concept, the Murdoch Knowledge Health Precinct puts people first, creating a state-of-the-art intervention, a hub for activities and interconnected public spaces.
Located in Kunming, the city of “Three Mountains, One Lake”, the National Botanical Museum designed by THAD and Sutherland Hussey Harris, embodies the fusion and integration with nature on many different levels.
The Australian Institute of Architects has announced it will no longer participate in the 2020 Venice Biennale. Last month, organizers postponed the event's opening until August in light of the recent COVID-19 pandemic. Australia’s exhibition, titled In Between, was to be curated by creative directors Tristan Wong and Jefa Greenaway, and it aimed to explore connections between indigenous cultures across Australia and the South Pacific.
What size is this room? What is the view from the meeting room like? What would you see if you looked from the outside in? These are all recognizable examples of questions designers are asked. Is there any better answer than immediately showing the view in question? XUVER provides a user-friendly way to share an online-rendered visualization of your design within a minute. No additional software is required; all you need is a link and a web browser. A voice module also enables you to discuss your design simultaneously.
As cities around the world go on lockdown in response to the COVID-19 outbreak, most individuals have been asked to stay at home, leaving only essential workers - EMTs and other healthcare professionals, grocery workers, bus drivers, deliverymen, and more - continuing to go out to keep the world running. Other families and individuals have found themselves spending most of their time at home, permitted to leave only to buy groceries or exercise for limited periods of time. With many no doubt searching for ways to pass the time in replacement of social interaction, we suggest several ways to brighten up your home while practicing social distancing, both improving the space you’re in and giving possible activities to pass the time.
Following an exciting week of nominations, ArchDaily’s readers have evaluated over 800 projects and selected 10 finalists of the Building of the Year Award. Over 20,000 architects and enthusiasts participated in the nomination process, choosing projects that exemplify what it means to push architecture forward. These finalists are the buildings that have inspired ArchDaily readers the most.
Big Data refers to data that, due to its quantity and complexity, requires specific applications in order to be processed. New trends in urbanism, data collection, and management, not to mention the development of new platforms and tools, have given rise to a new era in urban analysis, creating new resources to understand, evaluate, and manage the evolution of cities.
While an overwhelming majority of the world is still fighting against COVID-19, the economic and social situation in China has shown beginning signs of a return to a new normal way of life in recent weeks. In another sign of good news, the Chinese government recently announced that the two hospitals in Wuhan that were built from ground up within 10 days would close on April 15th and the remaining 30 patients will be transferred to other hospitals in Wuhan to receive further treatment. Other regions of China have followed similar steps, also announcing the closure of temporary hospitals, showing a positive sign that the COVID-19 pandemic is finally being defeated where it first began.
We've compiled a list with the temporary hospitals constructed in the first two months of 2020, designed specifically to treat patients with COVID-19 symptoms. In total, China constructed more than 30 temporary hospitals built across the country. The speed at which these medical facilities were built was achieved through the hard work of tens of thousands of people working around the clock.
https://www.archdaily.com/937579/a-closer-look-at-the-chinese-hospitals-built-to-control-the-covid-19-pandemicMilly Mo
American architect, educator, critic, historian, curator and co-founder of The Architect’s Newspaper has passed away after a long battle with cancer in Manhattan at 72 years old.
The American Institute of Architects (AIA) have released the Architect’s Guide to Business Continuity, an effort to assist architecture firms with navigating adverse business conditions. The guide provides firm leaders with insights into managing staff, premises, technology, information, supply chains, stakeholders, and reputation. It aims to help firms continue providing services, generating revenue, and reducing the consequences of business interruption.
Given the sheer magnitude and influence of its recorded history, Italy as we know it is a surprisingly young country. For centuries, the region was divided between powerful (and sometimes warring) city-states, each with their own identity, culture, and, fortunes, and influence. Some are eternally famous. Rome is a cradle of history and heart of religion; cool Milan is a hub of contemporary fashion and design; Florence is synonymous with the Renaissance and all the epoch’s relationship to the arts.
Turin’s history is arguably less romantic. The small city in Savoy, a north-Italian region bordering France, has established an identity as an industrial powerhouse. It is home to FIAT and some of Italy’s finest universities; the streets are dotted with works by Nervi, Botta, and Rossi. But despite the design pedigree, perhaps nothing better illustrates the region’s faceted history better than Castello di Rivoli.
We are increasingly accustomed to relying on technologies to read and process data referring to the past, in order to interpret the present and predict the future. At the same time, a growing number of studies show that the number and types of variables governing our societies is in constant change. As the natural world reacts to change by experimenting with the evolution of new species that are not necessarily destined to survive, so we should take momentary distances from the deterministic application of data-driven predictions. Viktor Mayer-Schönberger and Karl-Heinz Machat propose a number of possible scenarios in which the Eyes of the City are made to blink from time to time, allowing for alternative modes of urbanity to be tried and tested. Half strategy, half tactic, these glitches offer the space in which to measure the agency of the unpredictable at various scales.
For the 2019 Shenzhen Biennale of Urbanism\Architecture (UABB), titled "Urban Interactions," (21 December 2019-8 March 2020) ArchDaily is working with the curators of the "Eyes of the City" section to stimulate a discussion on how new technologies might impact architecture and urban life. The contribution below is part of a series of scientific essays selected through the “Eyes of the City” call for papers, launched in preparation of the exhibitions: international scholars were asked to send their reflection in reaction to the statement by the curators Carlo Ratti Associati, Politecnico di Torino and SCUT, which you can read here.
Context defines both how we design and what we build. This holds especially true when designing contemporary architecture for Indigenous communities. For Andrew Frontini, Design Director of Perkins and Will’s Ontario practice, architecture should be driven by a strong social agenda. As the lead designer on the Seneca CITE project, Frontini and his team created contextual spaces informed by the local community and its needs.
As hospitals around the world are reaching their capacity, the architecture and design community is developing new alternatives to fight COVID-19. In order to build 60 Emergency Quarantine Facilities (EQF), WTA was inspired by their pavilion developed last year, part of the Anthology Festival. A viable quarantine structure, the Boysen Pavilion “embodied speed, scalability and simplicity in its structure”.
White Arkitekter, in collaboration with Silicon Valley-based ReGen Villages, have joined forces to create fully circular, self-sufficient and resilient communities in Sweden. Inspired by computer games, the project puts in place organic food production, locally produced and stored energy, comprehensive recycling, and climate positive buildings.
Architecture firm ODA has designed a 700,000 square foot, tiered development as a gathering spot for Chengdu. The team was invited to participate in a new master plan for the city in China, and their design includes a diverse program, from four residential towers to a commercial park of retail and green spaces. As ODA states, the plan is an urban experiment in rearranging priorities for the public realm.
The outbreak of COVID-19 has caused an estimated 900 million people around the world to remain at home. Among them are architects and designers who have been asked to work remotely to prevent the virus from spreading through the workplace. For many architects, this is undoubtedly a new territory. However, for ArchDaily, it is not, and we can assure you that it is possible not only to work from home, but to use this time to greatly enhance your skills, knowledge, and development as an architect.
https://www.archdaily.com/936082/tips-for-architects-working-at-home-during-covid-19Niall Patrick Walsh
If asked to name buildings by German architect and designer Peter Behrens (14 April 1868 – 27 February 1940), few people would be able to answer with anything other than his AEG Turbine Factory in Berlin. His style was not one that lends itself easily to canonization; indeed, even the Turbine Factory itself is difficult to appreciate without an understanding of its historical context. Despite this, Behrens' achievements are not to be underestimated, and his importance to the development of architecture might best be understood by looking at three young architects who worked in his studio around 1910: Le Corbusier, Mies van der Rohe, and Walter Gropius.
Design, branding and innovation are the most important factors in the success of entrepreneurial strategy, especially in times of change and crisis like the present. Receiving a renowned award is an efficient opportunity to draw attention to the recipient’s work with precise, positive messages. The German Design Awards – the international premium prize of the German Design Council – are entering the call-for-entries stage and offering winners the best-possible opportunity for publicity. They are proof of innovation capability and design expertise and demonstrate that the winners are well positioned and able to differentiate themselves through outstanding design.
Father of Iraqi architecture Rifat Chadirji has passed away at 93, on April 10 in London, after contracting the novel coronavirus. Born in 1926 in Baghdad, he is responsible for more than 100 buildings across Iraq.
Some of his most iconic works include the Tahrir Square's Freedom Monument, the Tobacco Monopoly Headquarters in 1965, the Central Post Office in Baghdad in 1975 and the Unknown Soldier Monument, one of his most culturally significant intervention designed in 1959, demolished in 1982 and then replaced by a statue of Saddam Hussein in 2003.
Adelaide-based practice Intro Architecture has designed a sweeping tower for the Oscar Seppeltsfield hotel in the Barossa Valley of Australia. Rising twelve stories with around 70 rooms, the hotel's shape was derived from the art of barrel-making, particularly the process of the curvature and manipulation of the stave. The tower was formed to seemingly grow from the vineyard, with its "staves" emerging then twisting to create the curving form.
As the world's healthcare systems struggle to meet the exponential surge in demands from COVID-19, architects and designers are generating a variety of responses and proposals, from large field hospitals to 3D printed clinical masks. In Italy, where the coronavirus outbreak has been among the world's most damaging, a collaborative team led by architect and MIT professor Carlo Rattihas unveiled CURA, a modular intensive care unit made from repurposed shipping containers. CURA, whose name stands for Connected Units for Respiratory Ailments (and also “cure” in Latin), can be quickly deployed in cities around the world and replicated through an open-source design, promptly responding to the shortage of ICU space in hospitals and the spread of the disease.
https://www.archdaily.com/936911/interview-carlo-ratti-on-architecture-that-fights-covid-19Niall Patrick Walsh
When you live in a small New England town, a cemetery is never far away. If I take an hour’s walk through local streets, I will easily pass by or through two or three. They’ve long been places of solace, peace, tranquility—even ironic hubris.
https://www.archdaily.com/937318/in-praise-of-cemeteriesMichael J. Crosbie