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In India's sixth-largest city, lines for water snake around city blocks, restaurants are turning away customers and a man was killed in a brawl over water. Chennai, with a population of almost 10 million, is nearly out of water.
In much of India, municipal water, drawn from reservoirs or groundwater, typically runs for only a couple of hours each day. That's the norm year-round. The affluent fill tanks on their roofs; the poor fill jerrycans and buckets.
— NPR
Chennai, the Indian metropolis with a population estimated to be larger than New York City, is facing a grim water shortage, and residents hope that officials can come up with short- and long-term measures to prevent "Day Zero" — just like Cape Town famously did during its severe water crisis... View full entry
The New York Times' latest Op-Doc—part of their series of short, interactive, and virtual reality documentaries—profiles Julio César Cú Cámara, whose job it is to dive into the sewers and water treatment plants of Mexico City. For the past 36 years, Cámara has been a sewage diver... View full entry
In case you haven't checked out Archinect's Pinterest boards in a while, we have compiled ten recently pinned images from outstanding projects on various Archinect Firm and People profiles. (Tip: use the handy FOLLOW feature to easily keep up-to-date with all your favorite Archinect... View full entry
The Conrad Maldives Rangali Island has opened the world's first-ever underwater hotel residence.
More than just a room or a suite (this is the Maldives, after all, so luxury is the name of the game), the two-story villa is set more than 16 feet below the Indian Ocean. Its name is "Muraka," which means "coral" in the Maldives' local language Dhivehi.
— CNN Travel
Image: Conrad Maldives Rangali IslandWith the cold and gloomy season quickly approaching in the Northern Hemisphere, many wish to escape to warmer, balmier settings. If the idea of sleeping under the water sounds like your kinda thing and a sweet $50,000 a night isn't too much of an obstacle, then... View full entry
A five-tonne, 6m tall model of Le Corbusier’s Villa Savoye has been towed into a fjord in Denmark and subsequently sunk as part of a summer art exhibition.
Created by Danish artist Asmund Havsteen-Mikkelsen, the installation appears as a half-submerged vision of a once visionary future. It’s also a critical comment on the importance of modernity today.
— ICON
"The project is a critical comment on the current status of modernity after the scandals of Cambridge Analytica, the Trump election and Brexit," Danish artist Asmund Havsteen-Mikkelsen tells ICON Magazine. "After these scandals, I think our sense of democracy and the public sphere has been... View full entry
As more skyscrapers rise to fill the skylines of Chinese cities, it’s getting harder to come up with original designs to stand out.
That prompted a novel idea: How about a 350-foot waterfall on one side of the building?
The waterfall was built as part of the Liebian Building in Guiyang, the capital of Guizhou province in southwest China.
— Fortune
Fortune reports that "the waterfall has generated some local controversy because the electricity needed to power its four pumps costs 800 yuan, or about $118, per hour—although the building’s managers say that the waterfall will run only on special occasions and use recycled water from rain or... View full entry
A luxury Maldives resort is about to take the sleeping under-the-sea phenomenon to a whole new level.
Conrad Maldives Rangali Island is building a $15 million two-story hotel villa, part of which will sit 16.4 feet below the surface of the Indian Ocean.
The property, believed to be the world's first undersea residence, is under construction in the South Asian island country and is due to be completed in November.
— CNN Travel
Conrad Maldives Rangali IslandIf you're traveling to the Maldives and just can't get enough of that crystal clear water, then you can soon even sleep beneath the Indian Ocean (and watch the fishies watching you): Conrad Hotels & Resorts, part of the Hilton group, announced plans for the, what... View full entry
Phoenix and its surrounding area is known as the Valley of the Sun, and downtown Phoenix – which in 2017 overtook Philadelphia as America’s fifth-largest city – is easily walkable, with restaurants, bars and an evening buzz. But it is a modern shrine to towering concrete, and gives way to endless sprawl that stretches up to 35 miles away to places like Anthem. The area is still growing – and is dangerously overstretched, experts warn. — The Guardian
With cities in the Desert West, like Las Vegas and Phoenix, rapidly growing in size and population, water is becoming an evermore hot commodity; all while the source of that water, primarily the Colorado River, is becoming increasingly unreliable due to climate change. "And yet despite the federal... View full entry
The announcement of Snøhetta's design plans for a below sea restaurant called "Under" was one of the most discussed projects last year. The project, with an expected completion date of March 2019, will be the world's largest underwater restaurant, and the first of its kind in Europe. Courtesy of... View full entry
Snøhetta has certainly not forgotten its Scandinavian roots — after unveiling a number of smaller projects this year tailored to the Norwegian and Swedish terrain, like a boat tunnel, a treehouse hotel, and a readymade cabin, the architects today presented designs for "Under," Europe's first... View full entry
In case you haven't checked out Archinect's Pinterest boards in a while, we have compiled ten recently pinned images from outstanding projects on various Archinect Firm and People profiles. (Tip: use the handy FOLLOW feature to easily keep up-to-date with all your favorite Archinect profiles!)... View full entry
Anchoring in large cities and small towns, in busy shipping lanes and at public parks, the barge opens like a clamshell to reveal a glittering concert stage. Audiences on shore delight in the music, much of it specially composed for Maestro Boudreau and his American Wind Symphony Orchestra — The NY Review of Books
Louis Kahn was commissioned to design Point Counterpoint II, a unique floating concert hall, by conductor Robert Austin Boudreau in the mid 1960s. Launched in 1976, the 195-foot structure carried an orchestra up and down America's waterways for five decades. Robert Boudreau and his wife... View full entry
American e-commerce giant Amazon has filed a patent with the US patents office for a system for storing and retrieving goods in an underwater facility.
When an item is ordered for delivery, a sonic signal is transmitted from a buoy to the warehouse, which activates an air canister that inflates a balloon, allowing the chosen product to float to the surface where it would be dispatched to the customer.
— globalconstructionreview.com
Just last month, Amazon made headlines when it filed a patent for a drone tower design, essentially a multi-level fulfillment center for unmanned aerial vehicles in densely populated areas. Now a recent Amazon patent for "Aquatic Storage Facilities" has surfaced, allowing us a glimpse into the... View full entry
While no one can claim that they understand where inspiration comes from, most would agree that it doesn't hurt to have an unfettered view of nature in an architecturally inventive setting. Norwegian architects Reiulf Ramstad are among the seven finalists in the Ross Pavilion International Design... View full entry
Marina Bay Sands is set to unveil ‘Spectra’, a new entertainment experience with state-of-the-art light and water show in June.
The city skyline will glimmer with a kaleidoscope of colours and lights each night with Spectra’s free-to-public outdoor light and water show displayed over the water at the Event Plaza along the promenade.
Combining an array of state-of-the-art lasers, lighting, water effects and projections, the show promises to be a multimedia extravaganza [...].
— theurbandeveloper.com
"The show will also boast specially developed underwater LED fixtures that allow lights to show perfect whites and richer colour hues. Other state-of-the-art technology used in Spectra include a synchronisation software called timecode, which enables the soundtrack to trigger, down to the... View full entry