Why Designers and Engineers is a Match Made in Heaven – post about the benefits of designers and engineers collaborating on projects from their inception. Designers and engineers depend on each other to create innovative, trendsetting and sustainable solutions for humanity. Only a few decades ago, the …
How the Dutch are Helping New Orleans Stay Dry – excellent 8-min audio interview with New Orleans architect David Waggonner and Netherlands Honorary Consul General Connie Willems about water management and flood mitigation in New Orleans and in the Netherlands. Even with substantial differences between the two locations – the amount …
Connected China: Explaining the Players and Networks within China – post on the always-interesting blog information aesthetics about a “beautifully crafted” app developed collaboratively by Thomson Reuters and Fathom Information Design. Here’s a direct link to the Connected China app. [It] tracks and visualizes the people, institutions and relationships that form China’s elite power …
How to make a city great – about a new report from McKinsey&Company on how cities manage growth to make them great places to live and work. Besides a summary of the 44-p PDF report, there are four short video clips – Why cities matter, Achieving smart growth, Do …
Toynbee tiles – If you’re in the mood for a real-life mystery that involves imagination, single-mindedness over spans of time, great ingenuity, a fair amount of what many might describe as wackiness and that remains, despite knowing who the person behind the tiles is, at its heart still an enigma, …
Americans continue to use more renewable energy sources – press release from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory about their 2012 flow chart of energy use in the U.S. The “Rejected Energy” figure (upper right, in grey) has generated comment. Once again, wind power saw the highest gains, going from 1.17 …
Agritourismo Santa Maria – I recently had the good fortune to spend nearly a week at this working farm and tourist facility in the rolling hills of Umbria just north of Rome. It’s the perfect place for a large group – say an extended family ranging from 30 to …
A Monochrome Lego Set To Teach Tomorrow’s Architects – six architectural firms contributed to the 268-page books that accompanies Lego Architecture Studio, a completely white set of Lego bricks designed to highlight major architectural principles. Each of the firms – REX Architecture, Sou Fujimoto, SOM, MAD Architects, Tham & Videgård, and Safdie Architects – gets up to …
Announcing the AZ Awards of Merit – annual design awards in residential architecture (shown here), furniture design, residential interiors, temporary architecture, furniture systems, commercial architecture over and under 1,000 square meters, landscape architecture, commercial interiors, concepts, and student work. Images for all the finalists are here.
Slow Ideas – an article from The New Yorker written by Atul Gawande, tag line is Some innovations spread fast. How do you speed the ones that don’t? Offers great insight into the process of changing behavior, how an idea becomes the new normal, and how the trust to …
RE-Powering Mapper – the U.S. EPA recently updated its RE-Powering Mapper, a map-based tool showing renewable energy potential on 66,000 contaminated lands, landfills, and mine sites across the country. Features include: Screening results for over 66,000 sites for solar, wind, biomass, and geothermal energy Search options by renewable energy …
Best Practices for Sustainable Construction – post on SustainableCitiesCollective has good links, especially for those working in the UK. Increased flood risk, increased risk of drought and more severe storms means making greater use of sustainable drainage systems such as: green roofs; rainwater harvesting; permeable pavements; infiltration …
The Cool Hunter – Offices – check out post category ‘offices’ on the design website The Cool Hunter for some unusual workplace design from around the world. Shown here are Belgo Seeds Offices in Kortrijk, Belgium / Hybrid Office in Los Angeles / Dtac Headquarters Bangkok …
Opinion: Bright Nights, Big Problems – recent opinion piece in National Geographic on the growing rarity of true darkness, due primarily to our unthinking use of artificial light. Because of the rapid growth of light pollution over recent decades, most Americans under 40 have never known real …
More Discussion About Evidence-Based Design – post by healthcare design consultant Sara Marberry is a recap of a discussion among design experts about what it means for architects to be involved in design research. In addition to encouraging schools to prepare students for working in an evidence-based design environment, they …
18 building resiliency proposals at city council – New York’s Urban Green Council, a chapter of USGBC (U.S. Green Building Council), has recently released their Building Resiliency Task Force Report. It consists of 18 post-Hurricane Sandy proposals for “making New York buildings and residents safer and better prepared for …
The Codes Project – website is “an anthology of the codes, laws and related documents that have created, or sought to create, particular urban forms.” This project, funded by the National Endowment for the Arts, covers codes from “around the world, and from all time periods.” The Directory section …
July travel news: editor’s picks – take a break with this slideshow of 20 hotels and restaurants from around the world selected by Wallpaper for both design and quality of food or drink. 55 slides in all.