Articles by Eric Baldwin

Slovak designer Lenka Petráková has won the 2020 Grand Prix Award for an ocean-cleaning research facility in the Pacific. The “8th Continent” project is a floating station that restores the marine environment by collecting plastic debris from the surface and breaking it down to recyclable material. The plastic recycling center connects with a research and education facility to create an interdisciplinary and sustainable platform for the future.

Diller Scofidio + Renfro and Woods Bagot have unveiled their design for the new Aboriginal Art and Cultures Centre (AACC) in Adelaide, Australia. Designed around a “deep Aboriginal connection to Country, place and kin” as the project’s foundation, the cultural project aims to become a platform for honoring and developing Australian culture. The AACC concept originates from the Aboriginal conception of the elements linking people to place: earth, land and sky.

Few architectural typologies are as timeless as bakeries. A practice spanning thousands of years, the art of baking has diverse roots. Today, bakeries combine areas to gather, socialize, shop, and work. While industrialization and commercialization transformed the art of baking and baked goods, bakeries remain important community spaces for gathering and defining neighborhood identity.

SPRESSER and Peter Besley have won the Sydney Pier Design Competition and will create a pavilion made of recycled oyster shells. As the team explains, the Pavilion references human gathering by the sea; it is designed as a democratic gathering space under a landscape canopy for meetings and events. The Pavilion aims to celebrate elements that compose the site: land, sea and sky.

The World Architecture Festival has announced the winners of the Architecture Drawing Prize 2020. Entries were chosen in the Digital, Hand-drawn and Hybrid categories. The contest included 165 entries from 30 countries, and the 2020 competition also introduced the ‘Lockdown Prize’ focusing on the global pandemic, awarded to a drawing related to the architectural changes brought by the coronavirus.

Jennifer Luce, principal and founder of LUCE et Studio Architects has shared her vision for the Mingei International Museum renovation in San Diego. The design is featured in a video by Jeff Durkin of Breadtruck Films. The Mingei is a nonprofit that collects, conserves and exhibits folk art, craft, and design objects in Balboa Park. During the building’s centennial, a $37 million campaign began to renovate the structure.

Heatherwick Studio has shared plans for a pair of residential towers in Vancouver, Canada. The “curvaceous” skyscrapers were designed for Kingswood Properties and Bosa Properties in the city’s West End neighborhood. Inspired by tree-like forms, the towers aspire to create a “new level of global design excellence” that emerges from a ground level plaza. The two towers would rise between 30 and 34 stories tall in height, and would feature views across the city and Vancouver Harbor.

Architecture practice Bey Arquitectura has shared details of the firm’s Punta Cana Bey Garden project in the Dominican Republic. The 28 loft-type villas were designed to connect with the surrounding natural context and support the implementation of renewable energy. Located in the heart of Bávaro, the project is sited near shopping malls, restaurants, schools, the Punta Cana Airport and the beach.

Celebrating community, three interdisciplinary leaders of design firm Sasaki are building space for change. Defining the future through collective, contextual, and values-driven projects, they are showing how working together produces greater impact. Following the belief that better design comes through open exchange and deep engagement, each of these women are creating more sustainable and inclusive futures.

Scott Brownrigg have been appointed to design the 44 hectare masterplan for The Barony, a wellbeing and cultural visitor facility in East Ayrshire, Scotland. Made to transform the site of an ex-coal mine, the project will include 344 villas, a reception, spa and visitor center, as well as ecological sites for produce and research. Led by Board Director Neil MacOmish, the team developed the concept to embrace the site’s topography.