The Danish Architecture Center (DAC) in Copenhagen has launched a free podcast series called Let’s Talk Architecture. The series is in English, with nine episodes available on iTunes and Spotify. Though the center is currently closed for the time being due to the world-wide coronavirus pandemic, the institution is still working to share knowledge about architecture, cities, engineering, and design with the public.
Let’s Talk Architecture introduces you to the creative and innovative minds behind the future of our buildings and cities. Check out an overview of two of the recent episodes:
Episode: Architecture on Mars?: BIG’s Jakob Lange with Tor Nørretranders
Bjarke Ingels Group has been working with the Dubai Future Foundation to imagine a 2117 city on Mars. BIG Partner Jakob Lange and popular science author Tor Nørretranders sat down with DAC’s Jen Masengarb. What is the role of architects in creating a sustainable Martian environment? And what could this exploration teach us about Earth?
Episode: Life on our planet not centered around us: Bruce Mau
“Everything we are doing right now, we don’t know how to do. That’s the magical thing about design.” Designer Bruce Mau joined DAC’s Jen Masengarb to discuss Massive Change Network’s current projects and his ground-breaking collaborations with leading architects, museums, and companies. Mau speaks about caring for our planet and argues this is the best time in human history to be alive.
Opposite Office has proposed to transform the new Berlin airport, under construction since 2006, into a “Superhospital” for coronavirus patients. In an attempt to prepare the healthcare system and increase its capabilities, Opposite Office presented an adaptive reuse alternative, drawing contextual solutions to fight the pandemic.
Suggested to the Ministry of Health, the “Superhospital” concept can be implemented in any airport in the world since traffic is restricted or limited nowadays. Before the pandemic gets out of control in Germany, Benedikt Hartl from Opposite Office has proposed to anticipate the problem and redesign the controversial new Berlin airport in order to prepare for a higher number of infected people.
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Courtesy of Opposite Office
We have had time to prepare for the pandemic even better since the Wuhan outbreak. There, the Huoshenshan Clinic with a capacity of around 1000 beds was literally “stomped” out of the ground within 10 days. At that time, joking comparisons were made regarding the construction of the new Berlin Airport, which has been under construction since 2006. And today? Today this airport can help us! — Benedikt Hartl, Opposite Office
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Courtesy of Opposite Office
Benedikt Hartl considers that, because of the coronavirus situation, the new Berlin airport will not be needed in the near future. Therefore, he imagined converting the structure into a project that can hold a large number of infected people. With the advantage of space and complete isolation, the airport, spread on 1470 ha can guarantee that patients would be completely secluded and would not come into contact with others. Moreover, the main building alone, with an area of 220,000m2, can offer plenty of space for emergency medical care.
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Courtesy of Opposite Office
Entitled “COVID-19 Superhospital BER”, the building will be equipped with round modular cabins, located at each gate, consisting of simple elements made of steel profiles with planking, put together by booth builders. In order to generate a more pleasant space, a curved round spatial structure creates personal confined spaces for recovery. The fast construction process can allow the facility to be open within a few days.
Highlighting and promoting architecture and design that impacts the educational field, the Design that Educates Awards revealed its list of winners for 2020. A collaboration between Laka Foundation and Solarlux GmbH, this year’s competition theme was inspired by the “Educating Buildings” research paper of Dr. Peter Kuczia.
Laureates of the Design that Educates 2020 have been selected in 4 categories: architectural design, product design, universal design, and responsive design, a newly introduced section that is the outcome of a collaboration between the Design that Educates Awards and Architecture that Reacts Competition. The main winners of this year are:
“The project – also known as ‘Amager Bakke’ – is a waste-to-energy plant with an urban recreation center comprising a lush nature park, ski slope, hiking trail, the world’s tallest climbing wall as well as an environmental education hub. Copenhill is a 41,000 m 2 waste-to-energy plant that turns social infrastructure into an architectural landmark with new nature activities and high biodiversity. Copenhill is conceived as a public infrastructure with intended social side-effects from day one.”
Gold Prize in architectural design + Emerging Designers
Guga S’Thebe Theater – Georgia Institute of Technology; RWTH; PBSA; CS Studio
“While the Guga S’Thebe Children’s Theatre is located in Langa, the oldest township in Cape Town, South Africa, its design roots span three continents, a multitude of universities and countless hands. […] Focused on sustainability, this self-initiated design + build project was developed alongside the local community to meet their diverse needs for a place to hold theatric productions, concerts, church services, marriages and most importantly festivals with a focus on impacting the younger members of the community; in the aim of preparing and nourishing the community for the future.”
“The book house is located in an ancient village in Wuyi and was developed by a local tourism real estate company as a part of the development and construction. Before the development, only a few elderly residents lived in this empty village. It was hoped that this book house could change the situation by bringing more visitors to it. […] As an icon for culture, the book house also invites people in and brings vigor and value to the old village.”
“The Ecohouse V01 Prototype showcases many inclusive, innovative, environmentally aware and self-sufficient solutions, including an integrative design synthesizing inputs; a fully traceable primary structure fabricated of 0km pine; translation of a low-tech, universal shingling system into a morphologically responsive, materially optimized envelope; entirely off-grid metabolic utilities; a water system which captures rain and re-uses grey-water to irrigate a small garden; and a toilet that obviates any septic installations.”
The annual QS- Quacquarelli Symonds ranking for top universities has been unveiled. Based on academic reputation, employer reputation, and research impact, the ranking highlights every year the best universities for each profession. In the 2020 Architecture/ Built Environment division, the list reveals that the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is back on top.
While last year, the first position was granted to the Bartlett School of Architecture at UCL (University College London), after four-year complete domination of the ranking by MIT, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology tops again the charts. Moreover, in this edition, the Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands took the second position, while UCL took third, ETH Zurich came in fourth position and Harvard in fifth.
Read on for the complete list of the world’s top universities for Architecture/ Built Environment studies in 2020.
1-Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) – USA
2-Delft University of Technology – Netherlands
3-UCL – UK
4-ETH Zurich – Swiss Federal Institute of Technology – Switzerland
5-Harvard University – USA
6-University of California, Berkeley (UCB) – USA
7-Politecnico di Milano – Italy
8-Manchester School of Architecture – UK
9-University of Cambridge – UK
10-EPFL – Switzerland
11-Tsinghua University – China
12-National University of Singapore (NUS) – Singapore
13-Columbia University – USA
14-The University of Hong Kong – Hong Kong SAR
15-University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) – USA
16-The University of Tokyo – Japan
17-The University of Melbourne – Australia
18-The University of Sydney – Australia
18-Tongji University – China
20-KTH Royal Institute of Technology – Sweden
21-Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya · BarcelonaTech – Spain
22-The Hong Kong Polytechnic University – Hong Kong
23-The University of Sheffield – UK
24-Technische Universität Berlin (TU Berlin) – Germany
25-RMIT University – Australia
26-Technical University of Munich – Germany
27-The University of New South Wales (UNSW Sydney) – Australia
28-Cornell University – USA
29-Georgia Institute of Technology – USA
29-Stanford University – USA
31-Seoul National University – South Korea
32-University of British Columbia – Canada
33-Politecnico di Torino – Italy
34-University of Michigan-Ann Arbor – USA
35-Universidad Politécnica de Madrid – Spain
36-Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile (UC) – Chile
37-Chalmers University of Technology – Sweden
38-Cardiff University – UK
38-University of Texas at Austin – USA
38-University of Toronto – Canada
41-Aalto University – Finland
41-McGill University – Canada
43-Universidade de São Paulo – Brazil
44-University of Pennsylvania – USA
45-KU Leuven – Belgium
46-Eindhoven University of Technology – Netherlands
47-Shanghai Jiao Tong University – China
48-Kyoto University – Japan
49-Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM) – Mexico
50-University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign – USA
51-100 -Carnegie Mellon University – USA
51-100 -City University of Hong Kong – Hong Kong
51-100 -Curtin University – Australia
51-100 -Hanyang University – South Korea
51-100 -Harbin Institute of Technology –
51-100 -Illinois Institute of Technology – USA
51-100 -KIT, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology – Germany
51-100 -Korea University – Korea
51-100 -Loughborough University – UK
51-100 -Lund University – Sweden
51-100 -Monash University – Australia
51-100 -National Technical University of Athens – Greece
51-100 -New York University (NYU) – USA
51-100 -Newcastle University – UK
51-100 -Norwegian University of Science And Technology – Norway
51-100 -Oxford Brookes University – UK
51-100 -Pennsylvania State University – USA
51-100 -Princeton University – USA
51-100 -Queensland University of Technology (QUT) – Australia
51-100 -RWTH Aachen University – Germany
51-100 -Sapienza University of Rome – Italy
51-100 -Southeast University – China
51-100 -Vienna University of Technology – Austria
51-100 -Texas A&M University – USA
51-100 -The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) – Hong Kong
51-100 -The University of Auckland – New Zealand
51-100 -The University of Queensland – Australia
51-100 -Tianjin University – China
51-100 -Universidad de Buenos Aires (UBA) – Argentina
51-100 -Universidad de Chile – Chile
51-100 -Universidad Nacional de Colombia – Colombia
51-100 -Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro – Brazil
51-100 -Università Iuav di Venezia – Italy
51-100 -Universität Stuttgart – Germany
51-100 -Universiti Malaya (UM) – Malaysia
51-100 -Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM) – Malaysia
51-100 -Universiti Teknologi Malaysia – Malaysia
51-100 -University of Bath – UK
51-100 -UCT Graduate School of Business – South Africa
51-100 -The University of Edinburgh – UK
51-100 -University of Lisbon – Portugal
51-100 -University of Porto – Portugal
51-100 -University of Reading – UK
51-100 -University of Southern California – USA
51-100 -University of Technology Sydney – Australia
51-100 -Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University – USA
51-100 -Waseda University – Japan
51-100 -Yale University– USA
51-100 -Yonsei University – South Korea
51-100 -Zhejiang University – China
China’s latest landmark, the National Maritime Museum is now open to the public. 6 years in the making, the project is first of its kind. Designed by COX Architecture, after winning the international design competition back in 2013, the museum is located in the recently developed Binhai New Area, in the city district of Tianjin.
With a distinctive form, reaching out into the bay from a large waterfront parkland, China’s first National Maritime Museum is a monumental intervention. Comprising four wings, focusing on the themes of “the ancient ocean,” “ocean today,” “journey of discovery” and “the age of the dragon”, the project aims to highlight China’s maritime evolution. Covering 80,000 square meters, the three-story museum includes six display areas and 15 interconnected exhibition halls.
A series of interconnected pavilions cantilever out over the water from a central reception hall, a space for transition that provides access to the upper of the two exhibition levels. The interconnected halls “provide a constant connection between inside and out”. In fact, the landscape orients visitors and organizes their experience.
The National Maritime Museum of China is justified in its ‘landmark’ status…it is a remarkable building borne of a remarkable process. It is a project that’s totally at home on the global stage. It is a testament to the commitment of our open-minded and collaborative client and to our team, whose talent and tenacity in equal measure ensured this building stayed true to its vision in every possible detail. — Brendan Gaffney, National Director for COX.
Fully operational now, the museum held its soft opening in May 2019. 150,000m2 of site, 80,000 GFA and 39,000m2 of exhibition space, the museum is two and a half times larger, in terms of both length and site area, than the Sydney Opera House the NMMC. Granted the World Architecture Festival Future Project of the Year, Future Cultural Project of the Year and the Competition Project of the Year in 2013, the project is a cultural phenomenon on the global stage.
The process was innovative – especially for a project of this size, scale, complexity, and location – in its deployment of parametric computer modeling that allowed both scale and detail to be resolved concurrently. Physical models focused on human scale and interaction while complex geometric algorithms resolved the doubly curved building ‘shell’ and its related cladding system. — COX Architecture
Expected to open in autumn 2022, construction works began on Santander’s landmark new workplace in Milton Keynes. The campus entitled Unity Place, designed by LOM architecture and design, is a hub for digital banking innovation, bringing together, in one space, the 6,000 employees of Santander.
Developed by Osborne+Co for Santander and created by LOM architecture and design, the project aims to attract future talent in the banking sector. Designed around the wellbeing of the employees, the workspace is envisioned as the focal point for Santander’s UK business and the local community.
We have worked closely with Santander to understand its long-term aspirations for a scheme that will become one of the principal components in the bank’s UK estate. Some 5,000 workstations will be accommodated across 37,000sqm of open-plan workspace. […] Given the significant number of employees to be supported under one roof, we’ve designed a variety of work settings to support both desk-based and more agile working. Spaces are planned as ‘neighborhoods’ of around 100-125 people who share common facilities to give them a sense of belonging and opportunities to collaborate. — Richard Hutchinson, Director, LOM architecture and design.
The eight-story building comprises four blocks connected by three atria. The project also includes co-working spaces for small businesses and start-ups on the first floor, while upper floors hold the workspace for Santander staff. Easily adaptable, the co-working area can expand to accommodate future changes in Santander’s space demands. Moreover, the scheme generates a dynamic ground floor, with an open urban market, retail outlets, health facilities, a community hall, and an auditorium.
Placemaking and ensuring that the building is welcoming to the local community is a key part of the brief. We have responded to this by designing active glazed frontages that look out to newly landscaped public space surrounding the building and by creating a lively internal street and ‘urban market’ on the ground floor. — Richard Hutchinson, Director, LOM architecture and design.
LOM, whose on-going works include two other company campuses, the RocketSpace co-working campus in Central London and the Heart Building at Tesco’s head office campus in Welwyn Garden City, imagined a sustainable environment for Santander. Aiming for a WELL ‘Gold’ Certification and a BREEAM ‘Excellent’ rating, the building has solar panels on the roof and uses brise soleil on the building façade to help maximize natural daylight, while reducing solar heat gain.
Architects around the world are constantly striving to explore new ways of using materials that are both more environmentally friendly, and can create impactful designs that demonstrate new abilities of creativity. For 2020 Pritzker Prize winners Yvonne Farrell and Shelley McNamara of Grafton Architects, these ideas are at the forefront of every project they design, but became especially meaningful when they visited their completed “carved mountain” project, University Campus UTEC, in Lima, Peru for the first time.
In a new video released by The Pritzker Architecture Prize, the Irish duo discuss how their rigorous in-depth exploration of using material resources and sunlight has help them develop their craft into creating powerful contemporary architecture across the globe.
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