Plus to DETAIL-Issue 1/2010 | Page 14

The name Nottingham is associated with Robin Hood, the popular folk hero, as well as with lacemaking. And lace, a once significant product of the city, was the inspiration chosen by Caruso St John Architects for their Nottingham Centre for Contemporary Art, also dubbed the Nottingham Contemporary.

The landscape around Stoke-on-Trent in northwestern England is known for its lakes and canals. On Westport Lake, a new Visitors Center (rated BREEAM Excellent) has just been completed by Walker Simpson Architects that combines natural ventilation, natural building materials (such as straw bales) and the natural cooling potential of the lake water.

Plus to DETAIL-Issue 6/2009 | Page 568

Future Systems, the architectural super-brand, has passed away. From the core of the old office a new practice has emerged: Amanda Levete Architects, a firm that seeks to establish its reputation with its recently completed first project, 10 Hills Place.

The young office NORD Architects has won the competition for a new healthcare center for cancer patients. The healthcare center is an independent institution where patients with cancer and their families can get counselling and rehabilitation.

The Long Barn Studio is in the middle of Bedfordshire, on the outskirts of the village of Maulden. The brief was for a creative and demonstrative studio space and site, which would provide a comfortable, healthy and inspiring environment for the architect’s own office.

PLUS to DETAIL-English Edition 3/2009 | Page 242

The decision to build a new High Commission in Colombo was taken by the British Foreign and Commonwealth Office in 2000. The old High Commission building was a dilapidated six-storey slab block which stood, aloof, by the Indian Ocean, with its main facades stoically facing east and west to take the full brunt of the tropical sun and both monsoons.

Riches Hawley Mikhail’s Clay Field project of 26 affordable homes was conceived as a demonstration scheme, to design low-cost, locally-inspired housing in the context of an existing village, and develop exemplary new approaches to sustainability, avoiding “greenwash”.

After the Empire State Building, the nearly completed Bank of America Tower is the second-highest skyscraper in New York. Located close to Times Square, the building is the outcome of many years of collaboration between two powerful instances with common interests.

The European Investment Bank (EIB) in Luxembourg is one of the largest public lending institutions in the world. Recognizing environmental sustainability as a “core priority” of its business, it was only natural for the EIB to stipulate high environmental standards, energy efficiency and a responsible treatment of natural resources as key priorities for its latest extension.

The 19 design models for the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague will be on display in the Atrium of The Hague City Hall until Monday, 8 December. An international jury chaired by Chief Government Architect of The Netherlands, Liesbeth van der Pol, announced the three winning firms of the competition last month.

As part of the lecture series JOUR FIXE 08/09 organised by the architecture and design departments of Stuttgart State Academy of Art and Design, Volker Staab, the founder of Staab Architekten in Berlin, will be giving a lecture on December, 2nd at 7 pm at the Stuttgart State Academy of Art and Design.

The Berlage Institute winter 2008 lecture series, entitled “Forms and Figures: Exploring Architectural Language”, brings together architects, urbanists, designers, and scholars to present languages, thoughts, and representations that contribute to the historical and contemporary principles of architecture culture.

After five years of design and construction work, the Liangzhu Culture Museum has been opened. The scheme is part of a wider project to create a new town, the Liangzhu Cultural Village, and was developed with ZTUDI, the Architectural Design and Research Institute at Zhejiang University of Technology.

The new faculty building for the Luigi Bocconi University in Milan, designed by the Irish practice Grafton Architects, has won the first World Building of the Year Award at the World Architecture Festival in Barcelona. It was selected as from 224 shortlisted buildings and 17 finalists.

The new Curve Theatre in the St. George’s Conservation Area in Leicester, is Rafael Viñoly Architects’ first completed project in the United Kingdom. By exposing the production, construction, and technical components of the theatre to the public, the design turns the traditional theatre configuration “inside out” and blurs the boundaries of performance and audience.

The new Arctic culture centre in Hammerfest, the world’s northernmost town, designed by a-lab architects was completed this month. The building, which is used as a venue for art, cultural events and conferences, is visible from both land and sea and constitutes a total area of approx. 9000 square metres.

An exhibition of drawings and models from David Chipperfield Architects’ Neues Museum project in the Soane Gallery from 20 June to 6 September 2008.

In collaboration with Czech architect Marcela Steinbachová (from Prague-based office Skupina) Steven Holl Architects has realized the interiors for the Franz Kafka Society in the centre of Prague’s former Jewish quarter.

JDS Architects of Copenhagen and Brandsberg-Dahls Arkitekter of Stavanger have won the invited competition for a new hotel building in the Norwegian city of Stavanger. The Two Seasons will house over 200 rooms on 8,500 square metres, that float over an existing parking garage, shops and cafés on ground floor.

On April 11 the world’s largest museum for news and journalism – the Newseum in Washington D.C. - opened its doors to the public.

We are happy that the Eiffel Tower in Paris will keep its original shape and look. After most major media outlets – and we are admittedly included – fell for the hoax that the Eiffel Tower will receive a temporary extension to its top visitor’s platform, plans have now been officially denied.

Did you recognize it? The Eiffel Tower in Paris will change its exterior appearance temporarily by adding a horizontal extension to the top viewing platform. In order to overcome the increased amount of visitors, Parisian-based Serero Architects developed an amazing structure that adds to the famous landmark.

The Bronx County Hall of Justice in New York has finally been completed and opened early this year. The design by Rafael Viñoly Architects, that took 15 years to be fulfilled, is trying to signify the openness of the judicial system by implementing transparent material.

Steven Holl is currently establishing a major presence in China, considering four grand projects that are planned to open between 2008-2010. “Linked Hybrid” is a mixed used building in Beijing, as well as “Chengdu Project” and “Vanke Center” in Shenzen, not to forget the Nanjing Museum of Art & Architecture.

In order to increase livability, Amsterdam is thinking about building an underground city. The plans for the AMFORA project were recently revealed at the International Congress “Underground Space Challenges in Urban Development” in Amsterdam. The architects Zwartz & Jansma supplied interesting renderings of the project.

London-based Buschow Henley Architects have designed the new building for The Waldron Health Centre in Lewisham. The first phase of the £13.5 Million Waldron Health Centre redevelopment was completed in August 2007, the whole building is planned to open in summer 2008.

The American Institute of Architects, AIA named its 10 recipients of the 2008 Young Architects Award. The list of names, along with short biographies were announced at the end of January 2008. The bestowal will take place at the AIA’s National Convention and Design Exposition in Boston this May.

PLUS to DETAIL-Issue 1-2/2006 | Page 26

The specialised congress "Process marketing for Architects" at the ICM / Munich Trade Fairs on 27.01.2006 was a real success! Over 200 visitors followed the lectures and used the opportunity to "network".

Last week was marked by Zaha Hadid’s double win of the design competitions for the Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum in Michigan, and the Lilium Tower in Warsaw. Further, Zaha Hadid Architects has revealed designs for an extension to the Middle East Centre at St. Anthony’s College in Oxford.

Set on the campus of Tsinghua University in Beijing, the Sino-Italian Ecological and Energy-Efficient Building is a collaborative project conceived to demonstrate the potential of energy-efficient construction and to provide a platform for long-term bilateral cooperation in the fields of energy and the environment.

The Bloomsbury area of Central London is home to some of the prestigious colleges of the University of London. Some of the estate is characterized by Georgian terraced houses that have been badly converted into rat runs of corridors and tiny offices subdivided from once elegant reception rooms. One of the colleges, Birkbeck, has taken a brave step to address some of these issues by commissioning Surface Architects to design their Centre for Research in Film and Visual Media.

Thurles Arts Centre and Library by McCullough Mulvin Architects lounges and lingers on the bank of the river Suir, spreading its silver, blue-grey blanket of zinc over the volumes and rooms beneath, finally settling itself and commanding the view. The sheer scale and expectation of a “view” generated by the vast, black aluminium and glass facades suggests a kind of civic-scale optimism for future development along the river, traditionally ignored as an amenity in many Irish towns. The new grey timber plinth is the first part of a plan to develop a river boardwalk. This building seems to be doing just what public buildings should: taking a lead and reminding others of their civic responsibilities.