Let's face it, 2021 was another downer of a year. After 2020 had shown us how quickly the rug could be pulled out from under the world's collective feet, the current year made no attempts of introducing itself with flowers and small talk but, instead, whacked us with a violent attack on the built embodiment of American democracy, dragged a pandemic-induced global recession well into the first few quarters, drowned any attempt of returning to public life with viral waves and lockdowns, and ensured that intensifying natural disasters kept our worries over the acute climate crisis at the center of our fragile attention span.

While we followed our journalistic duty of informing Archinect's readers about life as it happened, including the bummer stuff, there were bright, inspiring moments of beauty and joy, too, that we had the pleasure of sharing.

Here are only a few highlights that stood out.

Instagrammer designs and draws a new house every day for a year

Who could forget New York architect Andrew Bruno and his One House a Day Instagram account? Nearly 50k followers can't be wrong about this fascinating passion project (and are probably just as jealous of his diligence as we are).

Wes Anderson-inspired short film explores Singapore's diverse built environment

Somewhat coinciding with the launch of Wes Anderson's latest flick, "The French Dispatch," we learned about architectural photographer and filmmaker Kevin Siyuan and his spot-on-twee exploration of the built environment of Asia's famed city-state, titled "A Wes Anderson-ish Singapore."

Oscar Niemeyer’s Communist Party Headquarters showcases a trippy Stella McCartney ready-to-wear show for Paris Fashion Week

During Paris Fashion Week in October, we were blessed to witness another crossover of concepts we enjoy: Stella McCartney's latest collection featuring mushroom-based vegan leather presented inside the Brutalist concrete dome Oscar Niemeyer once designed as the French Communist Party HQ.

Portals in Lithuania and Poland allow people to connect with each other in real-time

Didn't we all dream of this as kids? Thanks to engineers at the Creativity and Innovation Center (LinkMenu fabrikas) at Vilnius Gediminas Technical University, PORTAL allowed residents of the Lithuanian capital of Vilnius and Lublin, Poland to connect in real-time this summer. Next: actual teleportation.

Eames Office and Reebok collaborate to create shoe inspired by Eames House

While initial reactions to the look of the Eames Office x Reebok kicks were pretty mixed overall, everyone agreed that the stellar shoebox mimicking the iconic Case Study House No. 8 was reason alone to buy them.

NFT artwork inspired by Calvino’s 'Invisible Cities' explores visions of urbanism; real and imagined

No 2021 roundup would be complete without mentioning NFTs at least once, right? In April, we wrote about the launch of the digital exhibition Invisible Cities which featured (mostly) imaginary cityscapes inspired by Italo Calvino’s seminal book of the same title.

Can a Building Dream, Learn, and Hallucinate? A Conversation with Refik Anadol

While Refik Anadol made his first foray into the world of NFT this summer as well, our exclusive interview with the Istanbul-born media artist covered so many more aspects of his oeuvre, from the aesthetics of data through machine intelligence to, oh well, architecture.

Watch a timelapse of the 140-year-old Victorian home moving through the streets of San Francisco

Everybody likes timelapse videos of historic buildings being precariously moved through tight city quarters. So here's another one!

Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s wrapped Arc de Triomphe is open to the public

Ever the masters of capturing the public's attention through art spectacles, the L’Arc de Triomphe, Wrapped, Paris, 1961-2021 concept by Christo and Jeanne-Claude finally became a reality in the heart of Paris this September — sadly one year too late for Christo, who passed away in 2020.

Artist JR 'cracks open' Florence's Palazzo Strozzi with monumental optical illusion installation

New artworks by JR made several headlines this year (yes, some NFTs, too), but we especially enjoyed his intervention titled La Ferita, Italian for "The Wound," which 'ripped open' the 16th-century Palazzo Strozzi with a site-specific trompe-l'œil installation standing 28 meters (92 feet) tall.