The new academic building was glamorous...a statement about just how far the Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art had come, from its 19th-century origins as a charity for the poor to one of the most selective colleges in the nation. But that was before market convulsions shook the school’s finances, and before the truth about its dire budgetary situation came to light — New York Times

London’s Serpentine Gallery has selected Japanese architect Sou Fujimoto to design the 2013 Serpentine Pavilion, a temporary structure open for four months starting in June. Fujimoto’s proposal for the Kensington Gardens site continues the architect’s exploration of transparent and organically generated forms with a cloud-like structure composed of 20-mm steel poles that intersect and form a delicate linear latticework to shelter a cafe and events space below. — blogs.artinfo.com

Another way to phrase it is that hard decisions need to be made to cope with rising waters and severe weather. Notwithstanding the obvious difference between a group of farmers on a Dutch polder and communities in the Rockaways or Coney Island, good government makes those decisions while giving affected residents adequate knowledge and agency: the ability to make choices, and the responsibility to live by them. — New York Times

32BNY, in collaboration with Spirit of Space, re-launches a website dedicated to the potential of cinematic architectural discourse. Current technology allows the possibility of “a revolution in architectural discourse.” Architecture is an art experienced in space, as well as the haptic realm of material and detail. With a video, one can argue with more than polemical words—a sense of the tactile, a sense of the spatial sequence can be a part of the argument. — 32bny.com

The Three Grand Prize winners and thirteen Special Mentions were released for d3's Unbuilt Visions 2012 competition. The program promotes critical debate about architecture and design by acknowledging excellence in unbuilt projects. The Grand Prize: went to The Emperor's Castle, designed by Thomas Hillier, UK. In response homme_du_jura applauded "I'm very glad to see Thomas Hillier's work recognized...A beautiful piece!"

In its most far-reaching aspects, container urbanism proposes to take the fundamental organic/architectural condition of containment further by exploring how a boundary might be better coordinated, even merged with the flow of material/ideas. Can containment equate more closely with transmission and, in so doing, position architecture and urbanism more in line with societal mobility and change? — Places Journal

Treasured for its storied collection of Frank Lloyd Wright buildings, esplanades and soaring fountain, Florida Southern College is making room for six more structures inspired by the famed architect.

These new structures will be small — only about 5 feet high and 3 feet wide. Unlike other Wright designs, they are not meant for humans.

Rather, the six domiciles built mostly of custom-made concrete blocks will provide shelter for almost 100 feral cats living on the Lakeland campus. — theledger.com

Nestled in the flatlands of rural Bangladesh near the River Brahma-Jamuna, coursing down from Tibet, flush with the silts and melted snows of the Himalayas, the Friendship Centre is one of those new buildings which feels as though it may have been there for a very long time. Whilst the simple, graphic forms of its brick construction present a slightly archaic aspect, its enclosure by a bund or embankment lends the whole site an inward-looking inverted feel, almost like an excavation. T — uncubemagazine.com

Interdisciplinary teams will focus on the planning, design, construction and retrofitting of urban environments for the 21st century. — cau.mit.edu

The global engineering firm envisions a "smart" building that will plug into "smart" urban infrastructure and cater to an increasingly dense and technology-savvy urban population. — planetizen.com

Thom Mayne of the Los Angeles firm Morphosis Architects wants to inspire curiosity about science, the natural world and technology. And he succeeds. The Perot’s architecture evokes wonder, the way ancient ruins, animal skeletons or petroglyphs do.

A lot of people wish wilfully spectacular architecture like the Perot’s would die off. Mayne, who recently received the American Institute of Architects’ Gold Medal, shows us what it can do at its best. — bloomberg.com

Contrary to the unfortunately all too typical scenario that finds large western companies exploiting the inexpensive, and often unethical, labor practices in China, at Lafayette 148 the architects are dependent upon but also develop the local tradition. The product is not, however, exported for profit but rather stays on site. In fact, this mode of fabrication could only occur in a situation such as the one in Shantou. — Domus