Artist Scott Teplin has created this superb series of 26 letterpress dream-houses, each designed from the letters of the alphabet: Alphabet City.

Architect: Olivier Bourgeois Location: Magdalen Islands, Qc, Canada Visual Artist: Annie Landry Carpenters: Gaston Bourgeois, Cyrice Boudreau Fiberglass specialists: Les Entreprises Leo Leblanc & fils Main partner: Arrimage Project year: 2009 Photographs: Serge Boudreau, Olivier Bourgeois

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Architects: Hoogte Twee Architecten – Arnhem Location: Arnhem, The Netherlands Client: GB family Project team: Peter Groot, Martin-Paul Neys Contractor: Kuijpers Bouw Heteren bv. Structural Engineer: Krekon bv Project year: 2004-2005 Photographs: Hoogte Twee Architecten

The HOC is a schematic design for a small (2,000sf) house in Portland, OR. Architecture W design exploration began with using children’s wood blocks to explore simple concepts of space and light and shade, whilst concurrently thinking of Mies’ experimental Brick and Concrete houses. The project builds upon the modern movement’s legacy of an architecture built on an honest expression of material, structure, and strong ties to the landscape. The House of Cards uses the building blocks of architecture; using plan and section to explore the interplay of volumes and spaces, both inside and out.

Another fresh piece of brazilian architecture thanks to photographer Leonardo Finotti. The store was designed by Marcelo Alvarenga for Coven, a Brazilian brand of knitwear.

The store is based on a refurbishment of an existing 2-story house, wrapped around by a metallic mesh. As you can see on the below photos, the interiors have good lighting, despite the almost hermetic facade.

More photos by Leonardo Finotti and architect’s description after the break:

Another building-related fail. We should make this a series.

Architects: Willy Müller Architects Location: Jeddah, Saudi Arabia Principal in Charge: Willy Müller Associate Architect: Frédéric Guillaud Project Team: Francisco Villeda, Isabella Pintani, Simona Assiero Brá, Mariano Arias-Diez Collaborators: Iris Cantante, Bruno Louzada, Edgardo Arroyo, Claudia Barata, Bart Hooijen, Katrine Kunstz Rendering: Lucas Capelli, Julia Morgado, Daniel Corsi Model: ARRK,s.l., Fabio Castelblanco, Fabian Asunción Structure Consultant: SBP, Schlaich Bergermann und partner Engineering Consultant: GEPRO engineering Model Photographs: Adria Goula Sarda

GRAFT was one of the first practices that started working with Make It Right to redevelop the Lower 9th Ward area in New Orleans. Their single family home design has been picked by 3 homeowners so far, with 2 already finished and 1 in construction phase.

GRAFT’s proposal for the new set of duplex homes we featured yesterday, has LEED Platinum certification and in my opinion proposes an interesting strategy to connect with the street level, mandatory to all MIR projects.

Architect’s description and more images after the break:

Our friends from Fantastic Norway shared with us their project, “Walking Berlin”, an event created as part of their exhibition at the DMY International Design Festival 09 in Germany.

The walking houses are man-sized models of their latest architectural project: a tourist destination located on the northern west coast of Norway. As the project depends on the idea of travelling, they decided it was only fair that the houses got to do some travelling too!

The project consists of a group of narrow high-rise modules welcoming the guests of the Norwegian west coast. The systematic and flexible module-system allows the outdoor spaces, the miniature high-rise modules and the interiors to be designed in collaboration with the future inhabitants and selected artists.

More images after the break.

In times of crisis, hope is what we need. And hope is what the latest issue of Volume magazine explores under the title “Architecture of Hope”.

Once again, Arjen Oosterman writes a short yet provocative editorial, starting by why they choose to only use black&white images on this issue.  He brings back the subject of the welfare society during post-War, and compares the european and american models of sprawl/density which are key aspects of current crisis.

And since hope is the word of the day, “Yes we can” is also mentioned on the editorial and other articles related to Obama.

More about this issue after the break.

But it´s not just maps or directions. For example, 29GPS Architecture (developed by 29GPS) makes a very good use of this feature, featuring a daily selection of contemporary architecture and telling you exactly how far you are from it.

For example, works like the Hollywood House by XTEN or the recently opened Standard hotel in NY are presented with a set of photos (and even a video), with a radar (green,yellow or red, depending how far you are from the building) and a view that allows you to see the building pin pointed over Google Maps.

A very good app if you are traveling around and want to discover new architecture around. And the best of all, is that you can download this app for free (it contain some ads, see screenshoots ). There are two different versions of the app depending which measure system do you use, with the distance in either kilometers (download with iTunes, free) or miles (download with iTunes, free).

Screenshots and more info after the break.

We all know that the Dutch are experts on reclaiming land from the sea. And with all this new land, come new cities. One of these is Almere, a city founded in 1984, which is growing fast into becoming the fifth largest city in the Netherlands. This growing city is now into the process of consolidating a new center, Olympiakwartier, envisioned on a larger master plan for a sustainable city by Mecanoo.

By 2030, Almere expects to grow into a city with a stronger identity and a total of 350,000 inhabitants, which involves the building of 60,000 new homes and the creation of 100,000 new jobs for the expected 150,000 new inhabitants. For this, Amsterdam based housing association Housing Stadgenoot commissioned MVRDV to be planner for 60,000m2 work space, 120,000m2 housing (1,000 homes), 15,000m2 education, 2,000m2 commercial space, 2,640 parking spaces and various public spaces. This total has been split into 93 volumes of which MVRDV will design 45. The plan demands individual development of the buildings: a dense mix of living and working leading to a complex urban condition. Retail, a public square and communal gardens are also part of the comprehensive plan which introduces inner city life to the mostly suburban typology of Almere. Flexibility is a key objective: All ground floors and part of the office and apartment buildings are designed to facilitate future change of use. In this way the owner, Stadgenoot, can adjust the district more and more to the needs of the growing new town and its inhabitants.

The remaining 48 buildings (500m2 to 5,000m2) are going to be designed by a selected group of 24 international practices, including established and emerging offices (see list after the break).

This project is very ambitious, with the potential of becoming a milestone on urban planning, apart from recent mega projects by groups of architects we have seen lately, which can be very innovative in terms of form or solving individual housing problems, but lack of a clear master plan that make all the individual architect’s efforts act as a whole. It sort of reminds me of the Weissenhof Estate, lets hope this one becomes an example for future architects.

Our green friends from Inhabitat had the chance to visit the recently opened High Line project in New York, and interviewed the lead design architect James Corner from Field Operations and Ricardo Scofidio from DS+R at the new elevated park.

Bostjan Gabrijelcic from Arhitektura d.o.o. sent us this rehabilitation of an old apartment’s terrace in Slovenia.

More images and drawings after the break.

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Last week we gave you 5 reasons to follow @archdaily on Twitter. If you are following us, then you already know that we are attending the Pritzker ceremony today, and that we are going to interview an architecture master from Japan in a few weeks.

Capital Gate, the iconic leaning building in Abu Dhabi, reached halfway point. The building, designed by international architects RMJM, will lean 18 degrees westward, 14 degrees more than the Leaning Tower of Pisa.

As promised, the second part of the interview with Cameron Sinclair, Founder and Eternal Optimist of Architecture for Humanity.

Canadian architects Saucier + Perrotte shared with us their finalist proposal for the Planetarium de Monteral competition, a black mantle connecting the different programatic pieces.

Architect’s description, credits and more images after the break: