If you want to make the best of your experience on our site, sign-up.
If you want to make the best of your experience on our site, sign-up.
Expo 2025 Osaka has officially opened on April 13, 2025, at Yumeshima, Osaka. Under the overarching theme "Designing Future Society for Our Lives," the Expo set out to explore three pivotal subthemes: Saving Lives, Empowering Lives, and Connecting Lives. These themes aim to unite architectural and design enthusiasts by demonstrating how cutting-edge technology and innovative solutions can address global challenges, foster dialogue inspire collective action.
If there is one book every architecture student must have on their shelf, it must be an architectural history. There is no more comprehensive yet compact alternative than Kenneth Frampton's Modern Architecture: A Critical History, originally published in 1980 by Thames & Hudson. Its much-expanded latest fifth 734-page, 813-illustration edition came out in 2020. In 2023, I discussed the book at length with the author in a video interview, now available on YouTube.
Regarding one compact yet fundamental survey of the evolution of the Modern movement, Modern Architecture: A Critical History is unquestionably the most authoritative, complete, and in-depth chronicle. The most valuable addition to the new book is the introduction of new chapters focusing on regions such as Canada, Mexico, Colombia, Australia, China, India, and Sri Lanka, among others. These chapters shed light on many before-overlooked practices that operated outside of traditional centers of power, namely Western Europe, the United States, and Japan.
As the architectural landscape continues to evolve in response to pressing global challenges, events such as biennales, design weeks, and fairs play an instrumental role in shaping the profession's future. These gatherings facilitate the exchange of innovative ideas, the exploration of sustainable practices, and the fostering of collaboration among architects, designers, and urban planners. They serve not only as platforms for showcasing cutting-edge designs but also as forums for critical dialogue about the built environment's impact on society and the planet.
Happening worldwide from September to December 2024, a variety of significant events hope to engage the architectural community. The World Urban Forum in Cairo focuses on local sustainable actions, while Dubai Design Week showcases innovative design in the Middle East. The World Architecture Festival in Singapore features live project presentations, and the Architecture & Design Film Festival in New York offers compelling narratives critical to contemporary discourse.
Noemí Blager and Tapio Snellman are presenting a new video installation at the Architectural Association (AA) in London. The exhibition titled “A Lot with Little” set out to explore and showcase how architects can employ a more economical use of resources to create architectural works that are both sensible and sustainable. Previously shown in Germany, Switzerland, China, Czechia, the US, and the Venice Architecture Biennale, this London debut aims to highlight the global relevance of resource-efficient architectural practices. The exhibition is now on view at the AA School in London from April 26, until May 30, 2024.
Though born in Tehran and remaining deeply inspired by her native Iran, architect Yasaman Esmaili has worked on projects all around the world. These primarily include humanitarian and crisis intervention works that deeply engage the local communities in which they are situated. A recent article by Metropolis Magazine discusses these projects in depth, as well as Esmaili’s story and inspirations.
As Earth’s population continues to grow, so does car traffic and issues related to climate change. It has been estimated about 30% of urban roadway congestion are drivers searching for a place to park. Car culture puts the pressure on cities to build more parking garages, which usually win out over green parks. Meanwhile, climate change continues to challenge cities to handle a great deal of stormwater. The 2017 Atlantic hurricane season is proof of this - as of Monday, 13 named storms have formed in the Atlantic ocean, costing 210 lives and counting.
THIRD NATURE, a Danish architecture firm, designed a solution for the modern-day urban issues of flooding, parking and lacking green spaces with their project, POP-UP. A stacked green space, car park, and water reservoir, from top to bottom respectively, POP-UP uses Archimedes’ principle to store water and create floating space to store cars.
