Construction for the Summer International Shopping Mall in Zhuhai, China has begun. The project is a mixed-use, 360,000 sqm development is designed by 10 Design and led by partner Gordon Affleck. The client challenged the design to move beyond the “black box” retail model, resulting in the diverse arrangement of forms and spaces of the final design. Follow us after the break for more on this project.

Steven Holl Architects just celebrated the pre-opening of the Sliced Porosity Block-CapitaLand Raffles City in Chengdu, China with a visit of the Prime Minister of Singapore. Creating a metropolitan public space instead of object-icon skyscrapers, this three million sq ft. project takes its shape from its distribution of natural light. The required minimum sunlight exposures to the surrounding urban fabric prescribe precise geometric angles that slice the exoskeletal concrete frame of the structure. The full expected completion is set for this fall. More images and architects’ description after the break.

The above video is an update to the Department for Architecture Design and Media Technology‘s Aero Pavilion which was completed just last year. An environmental condition of wind combined with the penetration of light through the structure is utilized as means for architectural articulation. Emphasizing the immediate understanding of the airflow, which defines the perceptive characteristics of internal space, the simplicity of the form consists of planar plywood plates in digital parametric models for simple and fast production and assembly.

Designed by Hadi Teherani Office + Design Core , the second prize winning proposal for the Tehran Stock Exchange competition is an elegant and simple two-part structure. While the lower main structure is ten storeys high and hovers above the piazza, the 66-meter high building stands as a dominant design motif in the city. The cubature, as well as the ecological and building services concept, is based on the historic Iranian ‘wind-catcher’ which forms a traditional, Persian architectural element to support the natural ventilation of buildings to convey an optimized state of the art technology. More images and architects’ description after the break.

This year’s Portland State Department of Architecture lecture series, which starts October 4 and runs until May 2, focuses on the theme of ‘Placing’. Six internationally renowned leaders from the fields of architecture, landscape architecture, art, planning, and anthropology will tackle this once-controversial idea and discuss the ways in which the active processes of siting, locating, positioning and placing things and people in the world are conceived and embodied in their work. Dan Wood of WORKac will start off the lecture series, followed by Sheila O’Donnell and John Tuomey of O’Donnell+Tuomey Architects, Kevin Daly of Daly Genik Architects, Fuensanta Nieto and Enrique Sobejano of Nieto Sobejano Arquitectos, Tim Ingold of the Department of Social Anthropology at the University of Aberdeen, and Julie Bargmann of D.I.R.T. Studio. For more information, please visit here.

Part I – Part II – Part III

With Alexander Eisenschmidt as curator, five chicago-based practices presented together “Team Chicago: City Works”. In our age of extreme urbanization, says Eisenschmidt, “architects have been placed in the critical predicament that calls for a new attitude towards the city that highlights its potentials, engages with its problems, and understands itself as a catalyst”.

Team Chicago believes that Chicago has been particularly receptive to this new attitude. In the exhibition, the five practices pursued the concept through the presentation of projects -both real and imagined.

Eisenschmidt itself presents Phantom Chicago Panorama, “where the city is recreated through unbuilt visionary projects across the twentieth century -from Adolf Loos’s Tribune Tower to Griffin’s Plan for a Better Chicago to Greg Lynn’s Stranded Sears Tower.

See more pictures of Team Chicago: City Works exhibition after the break.

Thomas Fisher, Professor in the School of Architecture and Dean of the College of Design at the University of Minnesota, discusses the subject matter of his most recent book, Designing To Avoid Disaster: The Nature of Fracture-Critical Design.

The Israeli pavilion at the 13th Venice Architecture Biennale, titled Aircraft Carrier, deals with the dramatic changes in Israeli architecture since 1973, and the American influences that made them possible.

Curators Erez Ella, Milana Gitzin-Adiram and Dan Handel defined four major architectural phenomena that demonstrate these changes – Signals, Emporiums, Allies and Flotillas – and invited five leading Israeli and international artists and architecture photographers to reflect on them. Participants include Portuguese photographer Fernando Guerra (Check out an interview with Guerra here!), along with Assaf Evron, Florian Holzherr, Nira Pereg and Jan Tichy. Continue after the break for more.

The term “common ground” claims something shared: relationships between people and things. This installation intends to awaken an appropriate sense within the soul of the visitor.

When the Twin Towers came down 11 years ago (almost to the day), the world was struck numb. Even New Yorkers, who felt the trauma rumble through their veins, couldn’t get past the initial disbelief: how can this be happening? How can something so big, so invincible, actually be so vulnerable?

Hundreds of comments have been hurled at Renzo Piano’s “Shard,” the massive, reflective skyscraper that hulks over the London skyline – it’s big, no, huge; it’s out of the context of its Victorian neighborhood; its exclusive price tag could only be footed by Qatar royalty (as it is) – but few, beyond writing off the tower as a symbol of arrogance or hubris, have stopped to consider its impetus.

For that, we must look at the Shard in the context of 9/11. Only then can the Shard be understood for what it is: the amplification and perfection of the glass tower Piano began in post-9/11 New York, a utopian vision that stands defiantly in defense of the city itself.

Yesterday, a good friend of mine wrote “It doesn’t count, unless it’s built.”

I read this, and thought. “I completely agree with this”. And, then my head began to hurt. More.

Because, what does that say about my work? (I don’t mean the obvious reference to my lack of built work the last few years). No, I mean in general, my work isn’t about a built project. It’s about a vision of an unbuilt project. Or more specifically, my work is about visualizing an as yet realized building. My work isn’t a physical thing that you can order from Amazon. My work is not a thing at all. It’s a path to a thing.

I meet with a client. I listen to them describe their idea of this thing that doesn’t exist yet, and then I begin to work. I slowly use the tools of my trade to bring into focus an image of what that idea can become. It’s a poetic endeavor really; making these images of forms and light that point towards someone else’s hopes for their future. It’s a translucent profession, not an opaque craft.

more after the break

In honor of Renzo Piano’s 75th (gasp!) birthday, we offer an update on his latest projects. The septuagenarian has several large-scale works in various stages of construction scattered across the world, and has celebrated the opening of others within this past year. While we have been continuously following the conceptualization, construction and completion of the Shard, Renzo’s talent is sweeping across major cities both in the States and Europe, including: a satellite museum in New York; a cultural hub for Athens; an urban cultural catalyst for Santander, Spain; an interior renovation for Los Angeles; a recently completed museum wing for Boston; plus, a redeveloped brownfield site turned science center for Trento, Italy. No matter the project location, scale, or program, Piano’s ability to craft an architecture with a sense of lightness, strong attention to detail and overall aesthetic elegance sets him in a very particular category of the profession.

So, here’s to a happy 75th and 75 more years of great architecture, Renzo!

More after the break.

Architects: SAOTA – Stefan Antoni Olmesdahl Truen Architects Location: Voelklip, Hermanus, South Africa Project Year: 2009 Photographs: Courtesy of SAOTA

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Located on the Yangzi River to the north-east of Nanjing in Jiangsu Province, the proposal for the Nanjing ecological and technological island, by AAUPC Agence Patrick Chavannes + G.C.A. Design Consulting, consists of a development strategy for the Yangzi delta and Jiangsu province. The aim is to define a new image for the city of Nanjing, transforming it into an open economy, developing eco-technological industries and modern services, innovating with existing mechanisms and putting in place the local development strategy of ‘crossing the Yangzi River’. More images and architects’ description after the break.

Santa Fe University of Art and Design and the Santa Fe Art Institute recently announced the Ricardo Legorreta Tribute event, a weekend of activities across the city honoring Legorreta’s influence on Santa Fe design. Taking place October 19-20, the event will include a series of lectures, films and tours that will honor the legacy of the late Mexican architect whose inspired designs have helped shape the landscape of many residential, academic and corporate buildings in Santa Fe. More information on the event after the break.

The theme of the 13th International Architecture Exhibition, Common Ground, seems particularly apposite in describing the sense of rapport and relationship that is one of Italy’s primary characteristics in the development of cultural research and inquiry. This relationship has always been attained through reference to and an exchange between not only the purview of the contemporary, but also the past and our always compellingly tangible history.

The Austrian Pavilion for the 2012 Venice Biennale is a collaboration of Wolfgang Tschapeller, Rens Veltman and Martin Perktold, a team that consists of interdisciplinary fields of study, thought and action from architecture and art. The contribution, entitled “Hands have no tears to flow. Reports from / without Architecture” invites visitors to comprehend architecture as a social and cultural phenomenon and to experience it from different perspectives and views. It explores this year’s theme, Common Ground, with a discourse on the sociopolitical function of architecture. The exhibit will be on view at the Biennale until November 25th.

The limits of my language mean the limits of my world. - Ludwig Wittgenstein, 1921)

The limits of our minds are reflected by the limiting capacity of our language. All the world we know is shaped by our external circumstances, which can be expressed through thoughts and outward expressions – our voices. The voice is typically regarded as a vocal manifestation; but it can also be visual and literal.

Studio Gang Architects and Kalamazoo College have announced plans to break ground October 9, at 4PM, on a new campus building to house the Arcus Center for Social Justice Leadership in southwest Michigan. The 10,000 square foot, wood masonry center will be the world’s first purpose-built structure for social justice leadership development, integrating a study, meeting, and event space where students, faculty, visiting scholars, social justice leaders, and members of the public will come together to engage in conversation and activities aimed at creating a more just world.

Set to be completed in Fall 2013, the Arcus Center is targeting LEED Gold certification. Continue after the break to learn more.

Architects: Spaceworkers Location: Penafiel, Porto, Portugal Architects In Charge: Henrique Marques, Rui Dinis Collaborators: Sérgio Rocha, Rui Miguel, Rui Rodrigues Project Year: 2012 Photographs: João Morgado Fotografia de Arquitectura

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An international jury has selected Capital Cities Planning Group (CCPG), an Anglo-American team including Gillespies, John Thompson & Partners and Buro Happold, as winners for the design and planning of the new Federal District in Moscow.

Earlier this year, the Russian Federal Government announced that it was doubling the territory of Moscow to enable it to grow into a competitive 21st century world capital. In response, Genplan, Moscow’s city planner, earmarked an area of 155km2 to the south-west of the city for a new Federal Government Centre, aiming to relieve inner-city congestion through the relocation of the capital’s major employer. Ten international teams were invited to develop strategies and designs for the region during a six month, three stage competition. Continue reading to learn more.