Inspiration

Like a bridge over troubled water? Controversy surrounding a proposed Thames crossing.

The best retreats on the planet have the capability to make you feel you have been flung down Alice’ s proverbial rabbit hole, as though you’ve been sucked into another universe entirely. Now, architect Espen Folgerø has taken this sensation to whole new level, compelling anyone who wishes to take in the incredible views from his…

Together, the images imagine "how London could be transformed by giant statues of positive female ro le models." They include an asteroid, a tech incubator, a control tower at Heathrow, and a colossal sewing machine, honoring Wollstonecraft, Lovelace, Earhart, and the Dagenham sewing machinists.

LEED is great, but the real green fun comes when intricate energy-saving design features are achieve d by committing to some early-process design decisions that make your building more fundamentally eco-friendly. This includes southern orientation, integration of heat stacks, thermal masses, and exterior solar shading that doubles as ornament. Here are some of our favorite passive…

If you are anything like me, you spent an unhealthy amount of time as a child playing SimCity — ther e was no greater satisfaction than assuming the role of all-powerful mayor, conjuring up the ultimate pixelated metropolis and watching it expand in all its axonometric glory. Now though, you can hold those objects of municipal…

At its best, we generally regard our built environment as a source of comfort, protection, and inspi ration. But at its worst, can it also foster destructive habits? Manhattan-based urbanism thinktank The Van Alen Institute, wondering just that, plans to launch “Ecologies of Addiction,” an interdisciplinary investigation on the impact of our surroundings on our impulsive…

Now in its 62nd edition, the iF Design Awards has a long history in the world of products and commun ications but has only recently expanded to include other design disciplines — a trend that it will extend into the coming year, with the notable introduction of the Architecture category. Indeed, this year sees a shift…

A global competition where winners' thesis books will be promoted on Design observer and Blurb and d iscussed by a design jury.

In architecture school, impressionable students are taught to reach for the stars in their mission t o create the greatest buildings of their generation. Thomas Wong, partner and Design Principal at Ennead Architects, has taken this advice to heart, channeling all manner of heavenly influence in his proposal for Shanghai’s latest civic landmark, a 38,000 square-meter…