The National Museum of African American History and Culture opened on September 24th, 2016. In celebration of recently reaching their one year anniversary, the U.S. Postal Service is commemorating the occasion with the museum's very own "forever stamp." Announced on Septemeber 26th, the... View full entry
Clearly, Goldhagen is not a writer who approaches her subject with a sense of tentativeness. But once you get a little deeper into this book, it becomes clear that her hubris (if we can call it that) coexists with a sense of earnestness and civilizing intentions. Goldhagen is an engaging and generous writer, alert to the subtleties of human experience, and she has written Welcome to Your World with a desire to genuinely reveal something new to us about how cities, buildings, and places affect us — The Nation
Paul Goldberger dissects Sarah Williams Goldhagen's book, Welcome to Your World: How the Built Environment Shapes Our Lives, itself a dissection of the human mind and how neuroscience can explain our ability to detect when architecture is merely good — and when it is awe-inspiring. Click here... View full entry
The mysterious images of the physical manifestations of military power hover between abstraction and information, between the inscrutable and the mundane. They are at once compelling as visual compositions and chilling as photographic documentation of activities that are otherwise based on speculation. — MacArthur Foundation
The 2017 MacArthur fellows have been revealed. Artist and geographer, Trevor Paglen, won the award for his work on surveillance infrastructures. Twelve years ago, we followed Paglen on his field work and spoke with him about experimental geography. The full feature by Bryan Finoki is... View full entry
Frances Bronet, senior vice president and provost at Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT) and a distinguished educator at the forefront of interdisciplinary curricula and collaboration, has been selected as the 12th president of Pratt Institute, announced Bruce Gitlin, Chair of the Institute’s Board of Trustees and Co-Chair of the Presidential Search Committee [...].
She will be the first woman president to lead Pratt Institute, one of the world’s most renowned art and design colleges.
— pratt.edu
Frances Bronet will officially commence her presidency on January 2, 2018, succeeding President Thomas F. Schutte who — after more than two decades at the helm — stepped down on June 30 this year. Pratt Institute Provost Kirk E. Pillow has served as the school's interim President since then. View full entry
The anticipated 2017 World Architecture Festival is a couple weeks away, and competition is already heating up. A shortlist of the competitors was revealed earlier this year, and now the winners of the inaugural WAFX Prize have been announced. As part of the WAF's 10th... View full entry
Swiss francs, like most world currencies, have long featured notable faces from the past. But now, each beautiful note is designed around an abstract theme related to Switzerland. For the 10-franc note, instead of the retired portrait of the controversial genius Le Corbusier, the theme focuses on Switzerland’s organizational talent – expressed by time. — Le News
Le Corbusier and his plan for Chandigarh won't be featured on the new 10-Franc bill anymore. The new bill is inspired by Switzerland’s "organizational talent" and punctuality; it represents a pair of hands conducting time, the country's longest railway tunnels, and a map of the country and of... View full entry
The United States plans to withdraw from UNESCO, citing financial reasons, as well as what it said was anti-Israel bias at the U.N.’s educational, cultural and science organization. — the Washington Post
This morning, the U.S. notified the organization of their intention to withdraw at the end of 2018. Unesco, the United Nations cultural organization, supports a variety of programs promoting education, natural sciences, social/human sciences, culture and information around the world, but is... View full entry
A new set of photographs of the recently opened Canadian National Holocaust Monument have been released and help give a better understanding of the Daniel Libeskind-designed space: how it sits in its surrounding landscape created by Claude Cormier, and what atmosphere the large-scale... View full entry
Often underlooked, if not ignored, scaffolding populates our cities and offer a flexible, modular, accessible and fast method to build structures. Curated by independent researcher Greg Barton, the exhibition Scaffolding at the Center for Architecture in New York (October... View full entry
East Taiheng Glasswalk in China is different from other glass-bottomed walkways; it cracks under your feet as you walk on it. But don't worry too much, the cracking is just a special effect to scare visitors, and it works! Watch the video below: View full entry
The Sustainable Green Initiative Forum's “Bhungroo” project has won the 2017 Buckminster Fuller Challenge! Based in Gujarat, India, the Bhungroo initiative (meaning "straw" or "hollow pipe" in Gujarati) is a low-tech irrigation system that can filter, inject, and... View full entry
While headlines are dominated by escalating hostility between North Korea and the US, it has emerged that the Democratic People’s Republic has recently hatched plans to lure international tourists to a swanky new resort.
The isolated regime of Kim Jong-un wants to turn the east coast city of Wonsan into “the Pearl of the East” to boost tourism, and hopes to attract $1.5bn in international investment for hotels, offices, apartments and an exhibition centre.
— Global Construction Review
A different kind of logic applies to North Korean leader Kim Jong Un's planning strategy of turning the seaside city, and summer retreat, of Wonsan into a hot spot of international tourism — with luxury hotels, golf courses, sand beaches — AND maintain it as frequent launch site for the... View full entry
The 2017 MacArthur fellows have been revealed, and among the honorees are landscape architect Kate Orff and urban planner Damon Rich. In total, 24 creative thinkers, each at the top of their respective fields ranging from math and science to anthropology and fine arts, have been... View full entry
Archinect's Architecture School Lecture Guide for Fall 2017 Ready or not, it's the start of a new school year. Back for Fall 2017 is Archinect's Get Lectured, an ongoing series where we feature a school's lecture series—and their snazzy posters—for the current term. Check back regularly to... View full entry
On 7 October 2017, almost exactly three years after the ground-breaking ceremony, the visitors‘ platform at the thyssenkrupp test tower in Rottweil will be open to the public for the first time. Located on the top floor of the artfully constructed building, it is Germany’s highest viewing platform. — Thyssenkrupp
Image courtesy of Thyssenkrupp Engineers were using the Rottweil Test Tower to test the Thyssenkrupp elevator, a rope-less high-speed elevator, going up and down but also sideways. The tower was completed three years ago and is now open to the public. The viewing platform and elevator... View full entry
