In just over two weeks, Japan will be observing the one-year anniversary of the disastrous magnitude 9.0 earthquake and tsunami that struck its east coast in March of 2011. [...] Photographers documented the many faces of this tragedy and have now returned to give us a look at the difference a year can make, re-shooting places that were photographed during and immediately after the quake. — theatlantic.com

As if Diller Scofidio + Renfro’s giant inflatable balloon set to rise (sometime) from its roof, Up-style, weren’t a sufficiently kinetic addition to the Smithsonian’s Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden in Washington D.C., the institution announced in a press release yesterday that artist Doug Aitken will turn the building’s circular facade into an enormous 360-degreen screen for nearly two months this spring. — blogs.artinfo.com

From patterns in a trail of caterpillars in Spain to the geometry of a whitewashed house on the Greek island of Rhodes, renowned British architect John Pawson’s personal photographs reveal the visual details that intrigue him. Known for a minimalist aesthetic that places emphasis on light, material and proportion, Pawson has lent his modernist sensibility to everything from a Cistercian monastery in the Czech Republic to countless private homes, luxury yachts, and the Calvin Klein store in NYC. — nowness.com

Directed by Ai Weiwei (China, 2012). Official Selection International Film Festival Rotterdam 2012.

Ordos 100 is a construction project curated by Herzog & de Meuron and Ai Weiwei. One hundred architects from 27 countries were chosen to participate and each design a 1000-square-meter villa to be built in a new community in Inner Mongolia. The 100 villas would be designed to fit a master plan designed by Ai Weiwei. — youtube.com

From CBC TV's "The Way It Is" program, circa 1969, urbanist and author Jane Jacobs compares late 1960s Toronto and Montreal on how they have been planned and built, while condemning major highways planned for GTO. — Youtube

Architect and Woodbury School of Architecture professor Barbara Bestor presented an optimistic vision of architecture—one grounded in entrepreneurial practice and creating new opportunities—at the 2011 ACSA Administrators Conference: Old School/New School in November. (Co-chaired by Dean Norman Millar.) — vimeo.com

It sparked a thousand childhood nightmares – now the original workhouse from Oliver Twist has been discovered. But a row has erupted over what to do with the building. — telegraph.co.uk

This film explores how the Metropol Parasol affects the people who live and work around it, as well as the historic area in which it sits.

The Metropol Parasol is one of the largest wooden structures in the world and was completed in April 2011. It has become a new centre for Seville.

The Metropol Parasol was designed by Architect, J. MAYER H., with engineering consulting from Arup. — youtube.com

Can a building ever be compared to Lady Gaga? Most experts may say no, but they obviously haven't seen the New Museum, one of the best looking museums ever made according to Delaine Isaac. — youtube.com

Breaking Out and Breaking In is an exploration of the use and misuse of space in escapes and heists, where architecture is the obstacle between you and what you're looking for. — bldgblog.blogspot.com

Nearly 40 years after its destruction, the people interviewed for the film continue to wrestle with Pruitt-Igoe's legacy and its place in their lives. They love it and hate it, but don't resent it. Despite the piles of trash, mountains of drugs, and preponderance of crime, this was their home. For some, it was their first proper dwelling. — Dante A. Ciampaglia

The truth I’m trying to present is one about site-specific forgetting. If our history is a history of forgetting how to remember the past, as I am arguing, then the city of Detroit is the engine of our conflicted deliverance. It’s the machinery we’ve used for particular acts of forgetting, each connected to the place and time where the forgetting got done. — Places Journal

Following the end of World War II, photographer Hein Gorny took spectacular aerial shots of the ravaged German capital. His son Peter explains how Hein defied a flying ban imposed by the Allies and managed to snap the dramatic shots. — Spiegel