The Walled City's gardens and squares are now obscured by illegal shops and businesses, the skyline cluttered by unplanned tenements and bundles of cables. For many of the 200,000 inhabitants crammed into these 4sq km, a fraction of Lahore's 7m population, drinking water is a rarity.

But last month the new Walled City of Lahore Authority met for the first time. The body oversees the ambitious plan to restore the past glory of the city's oldest neighbourhood. — guardian.co.uk

As the person in charge of design for Ford's entire vehicle porfolio, Mays looks at architecture a lot. And he's ever mindful of buildings and how they're designed whenever he sets about creating a new car or truck for Ford.

What he's learned — and what he likes— about architecture, and Chicago architecture in particular, will be his focus when he joins the panel discussion "Big Ideas in Small Places" on Thursday at the Chicago Architecture Foundation. — bizjournals.com

A historian might spend decades undertaking research in archives and writing up discoveries in scholarly journals, but if the work does not have a presence online — and, specifically, a presence that is not behind a paywall — it is all but invisible outside academia. As Ridge states, “If it’s not Googleable, it doesn’t exist.” — Places Journal

When it was built, it held the Guinness World Record for the "tallest fully-rotating tower" - although to be fair, there was not much competition for that particular accolade.

The 127m-tall (416 ft) steel and glass tower, the highest building in Scotland, was the only structure in the world able to rotate fully through 360 degrees from base to top.

Neil Baxter, secretary of the Royal Incorporation of Architects in Scotland says the idea was unique: "Nobody had ever tried to do that." — bbc.co.uk

The Denver Architectural League recently announced the winners of their Micro Housing Ideas Competition as well as seven formal recognitions. Inspired by a concern about the lack of innovation in Denver's existing multi-family housing market where many banal apartment, townhome and condo complexes continue to be built, this competition offered designers an opportunity to engage in reinventing the notion of "responsible affordable housing" with an emphasis on regenerative design. — bustler.net

Donald Judd bought 101 Spring Street, an 1870 cast-iron building, in 1968 for $68,000.
He stripped the dilapidated building down to its plaster walls and wood floors, illegally removing distractions like fire sprinklers.
Then Judd (1928-1994) spent decades turning the spaces into a showcase for his art and a place to rest his head on a bed made of wood planks. It’s carefully related to the colored tubes by Dan Flavin that march across the room, echoing the rhythm of a gorgeous row of windows. — bloomberg.com

After dabbling at the edges for political discourse for several years, the AIA's New York chapter has jumped in with both feet by releasing this week its first-ever mayoral platform.

"We just felt these issues were too important to stand on the sidelines anymore," said Jill Lerner, a principal KPF and the chapter's president. "Whether it's zoning and building codes or sustainability issues or climate change and Sandy, politicians set the agenda for how the city gets built." — crainsnewyork.com

The August Smart Lock is the secure, simple, and social way to manage your home’s lock. Now you can control who can enter and who can’t—without the need for keys or codes. And you can do it all from your smartphone or computer. — august.com

Every city has them. Buildings you walk past a thousand times without noticing. Most are ignored, some are derided, others you might not know exist or are buried underneath your feet. Others are recognised for their beauty but are closed. Lesser Known Architecture, an exhibition at the Design Museum, aims to celebrate these structures. — independent.co.uk

Irony, allegory and dystopia − Patrik Schumacher sees no future for the type of hopelessly unrealistic education lauded by the British architectural establishment — The Architectural Review

By cannibalizing the material and spatial remains of the post-industrial city, a new idea of domesticity is born. The survivalist architecture must address utilities (water, heat), security, varying climatic conditions, food storage, and mental comfort, always adapting itself according to what it has on hand. This method of design and the restriction of material palette remove the extraneous from the work. It addresses economy and sustainability through adaptive reuse of material and space. — dwellingonwaste2.blogspot.com

In contrast to postmodernism – to Krier but also to Tschumi and Koolhaas, who tended more toward approaching architecture through the political issues of that time – we started solely from architectural issues. We also wrote our first book about that, about how architecture itself can again be a source of fascination. — uncubemagazine.com