"How do we revitalize a neighborhood? Put a train station there!" he questions. Yet he cautions that design can't fix social problems. "Infrastructure has fallen out and we expect public spaces to pick up the slack." — Oakland Local

In Archinect's latest feature Color in Architecture — More Than Just Decoration, Frank H. Mahnke (author of COLOR, Environment, & Human Response) explores the links between color, space and human neuropsychology. anf thought it was a "Great article... fits in well with the themes and topics being explored over at the Architectural Association's Research Cluster on Colour in Architecture and Urbanism,

Even by the generous standards of Kinect hacking, that’s mighty weird. — IDEAbuilder @ Youtube.com

Less than a fifth know architects prepare construction drawings, and only nine per cent understand that they control site budgets; 15 per cent don’t even know that architects design buildings. — architectsjournal.co.uk

Seung, who is the third Korean architect ever selected and the only one to get invited twice, says he hesitated to participate in the Biennale. This is because of the 64 star architects invited, there were only two from Asia: Seung and Japanese architect Kazuyo Sejima. “I thought the European architecture world doesn’t respect Asian architecture. After hesitating, I decided to go and discuss Asian architectural values that aren’t found in Western architecture.” — english.hani.co.kr

Constructed on Sydney’s Harbour’s Cockatoo Island, the interactive 42 meter-long landscape installation, entitled Dune, is composed of hundreds of fibres that brighten according to human sounds in what Roosegaarde describes as “techno-poetry”. — Vogue

The $3.5 billion development covers 12,355 acres and was built to house about 500,000 people, and this is one of "several satellite cities being constructed by Chinese firms around Angola," writes Redvers. — businessinsider.com

On October 22, 1953, Sixty Years of Living Architecture: The Work of Frank Lloyd Wright opened in New York on the site where the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum would eventually be built. Two Frank Lloyd Wright-designed buildings were constructed specifically to house the exhibition: a temporary pavilion made of glass, fiberboard, and pipe columns; and a 1,700-square-foot, fully furnished, two-bedroom, model Usonian house representing Wright’s organic solution for modest, middle-class dwellings. — bustler.net

The building has two colossal, uneven leaning towers (the highest rises 768 feet) that are conjoined at the top by an enormous angular bridge. Conservative estimates put the cost at nearly $900 million; Koolhaas, for his part, says he has “no idea” of the price. What is certain is that the CCTV building now dominates the skyline of Beijing, just as it dominates the airwaves of the country. — thedailybeast.com

Rusty Shackleford quipped "I wonder what the realtor spin will be with these units... ‘Japan style luxury!’ ‘MINI COOPER with plumbing! Going fast!’ ...I lived once in 275sg.ft. place in NYC. A more appropriate name for this housing type would be JAIL." KarjaCH countered "if properly designed with great attention paid to detail, 300 sf can be the most amazing place to live". Meanwhile hanque helpfully pointed out "if you look at the RFP they've already been designed."

As Britain's housing shortage deepens, we asked top architects for their solutions to the affordable living dilemma — guardian.co.uk

The developer David W. Levinson could have set for himself the simple task of commissioning a better-designed tower for 425 Park Avenue than the one that’s been there since 1957.

But that would have been a very low bar.

He has engaged four of the world’s leading architects to compete for the job: Norman Foster of Foster & Partners, Zaha Hadid of Zaha Hadid Architects, Rem Koolhaas of OMA, and Richard Rogers of Rogers Stirk Harbour & Partners. — cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com