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Spurred by concerns over climate change and the negative impacts of concrete manufacturing, architects and developers in France are increasingly turning to wood for their office towers and apartment complexes.
Concrete was praised through much of the 20th century for its flexibility, functionality, and relative affordability. [...] Today, however, wood is lauded for its smaller environmental footprint and the speed with which buildings can be assembled.
— Citylab
[...] prototypes for President Donald Trump’s proposed border wall with Mexico have been completed and will be subjected to punishment to test their mettle — by workers wielding sledgehammers, torches, pickaxes and battery-operated tools.
The testing lasting up to two months could lead to officials concluding that elements of several designs should be merged to create effective walls [...]. That raises the possibility of no winner or winners.
— Associated Press
The six companies that were awarded contracts to build prototypes of Trump's border wall with Mexico earlier this year have completed their full-scale models on a site near San Diego and will see their creations undergo rigorous testing for nonclimbability, nonunderdiggability, and resistance to... View full entry
Ten years after a Dundee V&A museum was first considered, the finishing touches are being applied to the exterior of the £80.1m building ahead of its opening next summer. [...]
No amount of artist's impressions and computer-generated fly-throughs could have prepared the city for the true size and scale of the imposing design of Japanese architect Kengo Kuma, who will inspect the building on Wednesday.
— BBC
Kengo Kuma was in Scotland today to inspect construction progress on the impressive V&A Museum of Design Dundee he designed. Video via V&A Dundee on YouTube He seemed very pleased, stating: "As an architect, seeing a completed building can be stressful, as some times the quality isn’t... View full entry
Beijing will suspend construction of major public projects in the city this winter in an effort to improve the capital’s notorious air quality, official media said on Sunday, citing the municipal commission of housing and urban-rural development.
All construction of road and water projects, as well as demolition of housing, will be banned from Nov. 15 to March 15 within the city’s six major districts and surrounding suburbs, said the Xinhua report.
— Reuters
"China is in the fourth year of a 'war on pollution,'" Reuters reports, "designed to reverse the damage done by decades of untrammelled economic growth and allay concerns that hazardous smog and widespread water and soil contamination are causing hundreds of thousands of early deaths every year." View full entry
The wildly swinging booms of three cranes at under-construction residential buildings in South Florida bent and collapsed in Hurricane Irma’s heavy winds Sunday. [...]
The cranes are a symbol of the luxury real estate development that drives South Florida’s economy, attracting millions of dollars in foreign investment, even as home prices soar out of reach for locals. The construction industry has fought against stricter regulation of the towering cranes.
— Miami Herald
While the whole extent of destruction that Hurricane Irma caused throughout Florida, Georgia, and various islands of the northern Caribbean in the past few days is still not entirely clear, the strength of the storm can be adumbrated by the three construction cranes that collapsed in the greater... View full entry
Today, the Glasgow School of Art unveiled a full-size prototype of a section of the Mackintosh Library bay that is based on the original 1910 design, marking another step forward for the building's restoration after the devastating 2014 fire. Following two years of meticulous research and six... View full entry
Design Topology Lab founder Joseph Choma continues to put his fiberglass hand-folding technique to the test in a new larger scale structure called “Chakrasana”, which is currently on display at Clemson University, where Choma is an architecture professor. Weighing in at only 400 pounds, the... View full entry
The program was tested in states like New York, California, Texas, Illinois and Pennsylvania and involved viaduct construction, pavement rehabilitation and highway development projects. The study was extended for five years in January, just before President Trump took office.
Advocates of local employment allowances say hiring from the neighborhood helps offset longstanding racial and gender imbalances in the construction industry.
— The New York Times
The Trump administration is relinquishing another Obama-era regulatory provision, which was proposed in 2015 aiming to allow cities to set aside work for local residents on federally funded public works projects. No reason has been given for the Department of Transportation termination of the... View full entry
With an expected completion date of March 2019, the 18-story, 80-meter-tall-plus building in Brumunddal, Norway known as the Mjøsa Tower will soon become the world's tallest wooden structure, a coveted title among those designers who favor wood over more traditional tall building materials... View full entry
Rain continues to fall in Houston, Texas, a city which may see up to 50 inches of precipitation over a span of five days thanks to the aftereffects of Hurricane Harvey. Unfortunately, the continued flooding has been exacerbated due to some decades-long, head-in-the-sand urban planning, the history... View full entry
Facades using the product, called Solar Squared, will be able to generate electricity while allowing greater amounts of daylight. The blocks also provide improved thermal insulation, developers say.
Solar Squared’s design consists of an array of optical elements that focus sunlight on small-sized solar cells. These are incorporated within the glass bricks during manufacture and they collect diffuse components of sunlight, making it useful for capturing solar energy in urban areas.
— Global Construction Review
Academics from the Engineering, Mathematics and Physical Science department of England's University of Exter have developed a solar power technology that fits into glass bricks. Its modular design is scalable, allowing for flexible structural integration. We now have the capability to build... View full entry
The panic was kicked off by photos posted to social media tagging traffic news organization JS100. The posts said the under-construction building across from Mahatun Plaza near BTS Phloen Chit looked in danger of collapse.
Concerned citizens gathered Tuesday at the construction site on Phloen Chit Road where the building’s angled appearance sparked concern about its structural integrity to hear district officials and site management say it was part of the design.
— Khaoso English
“The building isn’t crooked or leaning over, it’s part of the architectural design,” Morakot Sanitthangkul, Pathum Wan district director, said.”Let me confirm for everyone again, for the fourth time: It’s part of the 3D design.” The 32-floor hotel was designed by Tandem Architects... View full entry
Herzog & de Meuron, the Swiss architecture firm behind the ambitious Tate Modern extension, took a reduced fee for work on the building project after costs went £45m over budget.
According to documents obtained by the Architect’s Journal under the Freedom of Information act, Herzog & de Meuron was asked not to take its full fee for extra work on the 10-storey building, which went from costing £215m in 2012 to £260m in 2015.
— theartnewspaper.com
The Art Newspaper cites the minutes from a 2015 Tate board of trustees meeting: "Conversation at a senior level indicates that [Herzog & de Meuron] will look sympathetically on this position, but that costs have already been incurred to a certain level, which will require some recompense... View full entry
The Frank Gehry-designed project has taken a smaller, but important step forward this summer, by filing for building permits with the City of Los Angeles...The latest iteration of the Grand Avenue Project, which has been proposed for well over a decade, calls for the construction of two high-rise buildings at 100 S. Grand Avenue, replacing an infamous "tinker-toy" parking structure...Related has set a 2018 groundbreaking date for the project, with completion targeted in 2022. — urbanize.la
Construction of the Zaha Hadid Architects-designed Leeza SOHO mixed-use tower in Beijing is making progress as newly released photographs document. Once the 46-story structure reaches its final height of 207 meters (679 feet) in September of this year, it will be home to the world's tallest... View full entry
