Luxury brand Porsche Design recently launched a closed invite-only competition to find the architect for their Porsche Design Tower in Frankfurt, Germany. The winning proposal will have the most fitting urban architectural concept along with ideas for the surrounding outdoor spaces. The project will be Porsche's debut in real estate in Europe. — bustler.net

The first blows to bring down the Berlin Wall were struck nearly 25 years ago to the day. This was after almost three decades of the concrete barricade cutting through the heart of Berlin and splitting the city in two. Today, Berlin is once again divided, this time by an 11-foot-tall wall of illuminated balloons.

The Lichtgrenze (translation: “border of light”) will stretch for 10 miles along the same path as the original 96-mile structure. — wired.com

Movies can be great. Art can be great. But put them together in a museum exhibition, and the combination can be not-so-great. [...]

A new exhibition of early 20th-century cinema at the L.A. County Museum of Art (LACMA), however, rethinks that equation. [...]

Designed by Amy Murphy, a professor of architecture at USC, and Michael Maltzan of Michael Maltzan Architecture, the exhibition design is the antithesis of the traditional framed-stuff-on-a-wall model. — latimes.com

The Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat gave their 10 Year Award to JAHN's Post Tower out of seven finalists. The award recognizes a tall building that has best proven successful performance in various criteria over a timespan of at least 10 years since the building's completion. — bustler.net

The world championship for the "72 Hour Interactions" realtime competition is taking place in Witten, Germany later this month! For 72 intense hours starting July 23 at 6 p.m., five international teams will venture out and transform Witten's neglected public sites through nothing other than creativity and architectural design — while having fun in the process. — bustler.net

The most striking Bauhaus designs, such as Marcel Breuer's tubular steel chair or the Wagenfeld table lamp, have been endlessly copied and mass produced.

But the architecture of the design school has left a more complicated legacy in Germany.

[...] reopens two of the art school's most significant houses on Friday, almost 70 years after they were bombed, the move is sure to reignite the old debate about what to do with historic buildings damaged during the second world war. — theguardian.com

A German pensioner has been ordered to demolish her own home - because the house, built at the start of World War II, did not have planning permission. — thelocal.de

The wait is finally over. After a unanimous decision from the jury, Rem Koolhaas of OMA has the winning design for the new Berlin Media Campus of German publishing house Axel Springer. OMA's concept won against those of two notable finalists, Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG) and Buro Ole Scheeren. A contract will be issued once it has been decided if and when the construction project can be implemented. — bustler.net

Two monuments to East Germany's peaceful revolution of 1989 were supposed to be unveiled in time for the 25th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall this autumn. But due to a raft of obstacles, from roosting bats to technical challenges, neither project will be ready on time. — spiegel.de

It's party prep time for the City of Karlsruhe in Germany. Berlin-based architecture firm J. MAYER H. and Rubner Holzbau were recently commissioned by the city to design a temporary pavilion for its 300th anniversary in 2015. The wooden pavilion will be built in Schlosspark and serve as an event venue for the celebration. Construction will begin in March 2015. — bustler.net

Atterwasch is tiny, its single street lined with sturdy brick and stone houses. The village has a single church whose bells peal out at noon each day, a small volunteer fire department, and a cemetery with a special section devoted to German soldiers who died nearby in the closing months of WWII.

Atterwasch may soon be gone.

Vattenfall, a Swedish energy company, hopes to relocate the village and its residents in order to strip-mine the ground underneath for lignite, or "brown coal." — news.nationalgeographic.com

Here comes our first Europan 12 project of this week -- and it's a double whammy. Rotterdam-based Estudio Lunar scored runner-up for both the Gjilan site in E12 Kosovo (which had no declared winner) and for Regionale 2016 in E12 Germany. — bustler.net

The tallest residential block in Germany is to rise up next to Berlin's needle-like TV tower by 2017. Designed by the US architect Frank Gehry and paid for by US real estate firm Hines, the 150-metre (492ft) building on Alexanderplatz will have 39 floors, with about 300 apartments, restaurants, a hotel and a spa. [...]

Nonetheless, the city senate's building director, Regula Lüscher, welcomed the plans for "an extremely striking new landmark". — theguardian.com

"Inverse Boulevard" by Kawahara Krause Architects is our first entry from Europan 12 Germany for the Mannheim competition site.

The Hamburg-based firm received a Special Mention for their proposal, which is based on creating a boulevard that will better connect Mannheim's north and south areas -- and retain their distinct personalities. — bustler.net