Construction spending posted modest gains in April, driven by an uptick in home building and government construction that lifted total activity to the highest level since March 2009.

Spending rose 0.2 percent in April to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $953.5 billion [...]. — nytimes.com

The owners of the tallest tower at the World Trade Center are cutting office rents just months before it opens because of slow leasing activity.

Only one private tenant has signed a lease at One World Trade Center in nearly three years: a one-floor deal with advertising firm Kids Creative that was signed last week. The 3.1-million-square-foot skyscraper, formerly named the Freedom Tower, is 55% leased. — online.wsj.com

Yet uniqueness is the goal of city branding, which during the past few years has grown into a global industry connected to tourism and the media-sports-and-entertainment complex. Originally a promotional scheme meant to lure new residents, city branding is now a slogan tied to a public relations campaign to make the places where we live into “destinations”. As always with branding, image is everything. — theguardian.com

“[...] data show the construction sector and many related industries are among the fastest growing private-company industries,” said Sageworks analyst Libby Bierman. “In the last year or so, the housing market really started to pick back up, which means more people employed real estate agents and construction firms for new or existing homes and buildings. [...] started to refresh the exteriors of residences and commercial real estate, using the services of professional landscapers.” — forbes.com

China’s economic boom has enriched many of the country’s largest real estate entrepreneurs.[...]

Yet China’s building surge in recent years has also helped overseas architects to prosper in the world’s most populous nation. One U.S. firm to find success is Altoon Partners of Los Angeles. Although relatively small compared with the largest global architecture firms, Altoon was “unfazed by the muscle of (its) competitors” when it entered the market, and has focused tightly on its strengths[...] — forbes.com

We’re supposedly in the midst of a design renaissance, where beyond the cliché Steve Jobs and Apple ecosystem example, we see a design-centric focus in everything from soap (Method) and thermostats (Nest) to email (Mailbox) and even baby food (Plum Organics).

And yet, there’s a dearth of designer founders. — wired.com

Shopping malls around the country are dropping like flies. Roughly a third have trouble keeping the lights on. And estimates from Green Street Advisors suggest 10 percent of indoor malls will go dark within a decade, due to changing consumer tastes.

But some malls are putting up a fight, even with one foot in the grave. — marketplace.org

“When one office was doing well, another was not doing as well,” says the source. “But we always managed it so that there was the see-saw effect – one office would be profitable and another would be in the doldrums. But we managed to keep the group afloat.”

“What people are worried about now is that the people who ran the company down are still the ones in charge.” — scotsman.com

In February, the American Institute of Architects’ Architecture Billings Index marked its seventh consecutive month of growth in the demand for architectural design services. With a national score of 54.9, up from January’s score of 54.2, the architecture industry is seeing continued strength and a higher rate of growth of billings than it has seen since the bubble burst five years ago. (A score above 50.0 in the index means that demand is increasing.) — architectmagazine.com

vado retro summed up the design "a box within a box and one box the one inside, the inside box is at an angle. oh and there are trees" but Alex Gomez added "Although the facade is superficial, I feel it will succeed in attracting ‘qualitative and quantitative tourist flows in the area,’

Manchester Airports Group (MAG) has outlined redevelopment plans worth £650 million to create Airport City Manchester, a future ‘aerotropolis’, close to Manchester Airport, the UK’s third busiest airport. — DesignBuild Source

When architect Wang Shu accepts his field’s richest prize in a ceremony Friday at the seat of China’s legislature, a symbolic second winner will be waiting in the background — Hyatt Hotels.

The Pritzker Architecture Prize has special resonance for communist leaders who want to promote China as a global cultural power. Receiving it made Wang a celebrity in China. Until now, the 49-year-old had been little known outside architecture circles. — washingtonpost.com

MASS Design Group is one of a handful of nonprofits showing that design isn’t just for the wealthy, nor is it just image-making. The challenge, for MASS and others trying to do public service design work, is to make their operations financially sustainable. As students, MASS provided much of their work on the Butaro Hospital pro bono, but they are not students anymore. The staff of MASS eclipsed 20 in the past year... — blog.sfgate.com

You've heard of popup stores, right? Companies setting up storefronts that might only be around for a week or a day or even just a couple of hours. [...]

In Oakland, Calif., they've taken it to the next level. A handful of stores have popped up all at the same time -- with no plans to close. It's called a popup hood. And Andrew Stelzer reports, it may be coming soon to a hood near you. — marketplace.org