The Switzerland-based firm Manuel Herz Architect has been selected to design an important new expansion for a rural hospital in the Tambacounda region of Senegal. Conceived and funded by the Josef and Anni Albers Foundation and Le Korsa, the facility's expansion will help alleviate a current... View full entry
For too long, the issues of gender, disability, and user-centeredness have been relegated to the far margins of architectural history. — Places Journal
Places columnist Barbara Penner uncovers a parallel narrative to the rise of flexible home design — often attributed to a handful of progressive postwar designers — in the history of home economics. She explores the flexible domestic spaces created by designers such as Lillian Moller... View full entry
After months of hard work reviewing submissions, selecting content, editing, designing and working with the best printers in the industry, we're excited to announce the second issue of Ed, "Architecture of Disaster," is now available for purchase. If you're an annual subscriber, your copy has... View full entry
On the bustling streets of Broadway Boulevard in New York City, two multi-colored huts are trying to get the public excited about hyper efficient buildings. Part of the Ice Box Challenge, the environmental public art installation has been touring the world, demonstrating the merits of Passive... View full entry
California just sent the clearest signal yet that rooftop power is moving beyond a niche market and becoming the norm.
On Wednesday, the Golden State became the first in the U.S. to require solar panels on almost all new homes. Most new units built after Jan. 1, 2020, will be required to include solar systems [...]. While that’s a boost for the solar industry, critics warned that it will also drive up the cost of buying a house by almost $10,000.
— Bloomberg
Rooftop solar panels are finally becoming an integral part of most new California homes beginning in 2020, however skeptics say that the move will further worsen the state's housing crisis. View full entry
Architecture studio KieranTimberlake used passive strategies to cool their new Philadelphia office building and installed 300 sensors to record data on how it was performing. Along with their network of sensors, the firm also developed an app called Roast for their employees to rate how they... View full entry
Mid- or second-tier cities, loosely defined as those under a million people that aren’t regional powerhouses like Austin or Seattle, are increasingly seen as not just places to find a lower cost of living, easier commute, and closer connections with family, but also a more approachable, neighborhood-oriented version of the urban lifestyle that sent many to the larger cities in the first place. — curbed.com
Census data shows that smaller metros are seeing more migration from millennials while larger cities are experiencing slower growth. These smaller cities have been attracting new growth in part due to investing in green spaces and parks, upswings in local tech hubs, and downtown redevelopment. View full entry
Nearly two months after a brand-new South Florida bridge collapsed onto a busy roadway — killing six people — the Florida Department of Transportation is still refusing to release documents that could shed light on the tragic accident.
Now, the Miami Herald is taking the state to court. On Wednesday, the Herald filed suit against FDOT in Tallahassee's Leon County Circuit Court to compel the release of emails, meeting minutes and other records relating to the bridge's design and construction.
— miamiherald.com
Just days before the FIU bridge collapsed, cracks had been observed on the structure. A meeting was held by the university and the FDOT the morning of the collapse on whether these cracks were a safety risk. The Miami Herald requested records from that meeting and other documents, which have been... View full entry
Google provides open access to 3D digital archives of historic sites around the globe, which have been recorded by CyArk for preservation purposes. CyArk, a non profit organization founded in 2003, has been working to digitally record, archive, and share immersive sites with people online. Through... View full entry
Aerial Rapid Transit Technologies, LLC has announced plans to construct a gondola system that could ferry passengers between Union Station and Dodger Stadium in a five-minute end-to-end ride. Each cabin would be capable of accommodating 30 to 40 passengers, according to an official website, with capacity for up to 5,000 passengers per hour at peak frequencies. — urbanize.la
Currently, the only transit service to Dodger Stadium is a bus line operated by the Metro. The new gondola system would be cheaper than stadium parking and would help alleviate traffic congestion in Los Angeles on game days. Rendering of proposed gondola system. Image: ARTT LLC.The next steps... View full entry
Hyperloop Transportation Technologies (HyperloopTT) recently signed an agreement with Aldar Properties PJSC, a leading real estate developer in Abu Dhabi, to begin construction on the first commercial Hyperloop system in the United Arab Emirates. Rendering of HyperloopTT station in UAE, in... View full entry
Marcel Breuer's iconic Pirelli Building, once a symbol of New Haven's mid-century embrace of urban renewal and modern architecture, has spent the past two decades completely vacant, save for a recent art show. Known for its Brutalist design featuring a 2-story gap, the mid-century masterpiece... View full entry
San Francisco lives with the certainty that the Big One will come. But the city is also putting up taller and taller buildings clustered closer and closer together because of the state’s severe housing shortage. Now those competing pressures have prompted an anxious rethinking of building regulations. Experts are sending this message: The building code does not protect cities from earthquakes nearly as much as you might think. — New York Times
Taking a hard look at San Francisco's building codes, this NY Times piece goes in depth on what it means for city high rises if the next big earthquake hit. From the 1906 earthquake and fire to current seismic safety, concerns revolve around the number of skyscrapers built on liquefaction zones... View full entry
The tinted world of tomorrow is coming, and airports—mini-cities of steel, concrete and lots and lots of glass—are interested. In a test last fall, Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport outfitted one of its gates with a new type of “smart glass” that can adjust for sunlight exposure. The obvious point is to keep travelers from getting overheated—but the exercise also brought a more lucrative benefit. — Bloomberg
A Cornell-led study at Dallas-Fort Worth Airport found that implementing a new type of electrochromatic 'smart glass' at one of its gates not only led to cooler, more pleasant surface temperatures in the waiting area, but the tinted glass, and the resulting dimmer light in the neighboring bars and... View full entry
In honor of Earth Day today, we look at the latest in sustainable architecture revealed in 2018 so far. Working with our natural environment, upcoming green projects range from sculptural electric charging stations to the world's largest single-domed tropical greenhouse. Our future is being shaped... View full entry
