Month: December 2019

The National Architectural Competition for the Research, Rescue, and Rehabilitation Center for the Sea Turtles in Iztuzu Beach, organized by the Ministry of Environment and Urbanisation of Turkey, selects KÂAT Architects to design the environmentally sensitive facility.

Angola, like many African countries, is experiencing a process of rapid urbanization. For the most part, these changes are happening under little to no regulation, filling cities with spaces that lack the infrastructure to provide a basic quality of life for residents. However, in spite of this unregulated development, it’s worth noting the quality of contemporary architecture being produced in the second-largest Portuguese-speaking country, where projects draw inspiration from the strong local identity and blend with modern materials and technology.

In this article, we highlight 4 current projects in Angola. While it is a small sample, not only from the capital city of Luanda, but from smaller cities as well, it showcases the richness of Angola’s local architecture–an art form that deserves worldwide recognition.

The idea that governs the project is to create a house that transports you to a sensory experience despite being immersed in an urban context, an environment where outdoor spaces coexist and permeate the relationship with the interior. This is achieved through gardens that surround the house and generate routes between nature and the building’s own materials: wood, stone, bare concrete, carbon steel plate and glass, marking a distance from the city.

The Village of return located in the Fairy Mountain of Wulong in Chongqing, hidden in the sea of clouds between the fairies, it is a cultural and creative village restored and transformed from a century-old village. The plan is based on ecological agriculture, creating cultural and creative experiences and new rural lifestyles, injecting fresh vitality into ancient villages.

Krft, a young architecture studio based in Amsterdam, was selected as the winner of the Brighton College competition, for the new performance arts building. Finalists included international firms Haworth Tompkins, Sauerbruch Hutton, Mecanoo, and Morphosis.

3XN and Aspect Studios have been selected to design a new mixed-use tower for the University of New South Wales in Sydney. Made with a focus on resilience and environmental sustainability, the project aims to to create a welcoming campus gateway that will serve as a new entrance point to the UNSW campus.

In a continued effort to deliver tools, inspiration, and knowledge for readers, 2019 saw ArchDaily editors and contributors engage in a wealth of conversations with distinguished individuals from all corners of the design world. Whether this be a discussion with Carlo Ratti and Winy Maas on artificial intelligence or a conversation with Mario Botta on Modernism, these interviews convey the remarkable variety of talent, ideas, and paradigms through which one can engage with architecture and design.