Category Archives: Urban

The Piazza Gae Aulenti located in Milan, Italy was designed by the architectural practice of AECOM and it was opened in December 2012. Named after Gae Aulenti, the Italian architect who designed the Musee d’Orsay in Paris, the piazza is adjacent to the main train station in Milan. The project contest was won by the architect Cesar Pelli and the landscape designers Land who created a new gateway to the city and one of the parts of the regeneration projects…

Penn Station is the busiest train station in USA and its current aspect is one that seems out of date and even unwelcoming. The Municipal Art Society of New York issued a design challenge to re-imagine the station and the architectural practice of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill wish to change the impression that the station created through a re-conceptualization that encompasses Penn Station and Madison Square Garden and transforms them into a new civic and travel center of New York…

Parklife is a housing project that integrates different housing styles with a modern design that is located on the area where the Mercedes Benz garage used to be, in the region of Lehen, Salzburg, Austria. Designed by the architectural practice of Touzimsky Herold & Mehlem the project combines different elements that have been proven to work for some requirements such as a home for a young family, an old-aged person or a house for a person in need of assistance…

The Nova Scotia Power Corporate Headquarters were designed by the practice of WMZH Architects and it is located in the city of Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. The construction cost reached 46 million dollars and the project spreads over 5 acres at the south of the city on the waterfront. The site was initially occupied by a decommissioned power plant build with a concrete clad steel structure enclosing several high volume spaces which housed the equipment for generating electricity. The project…

The Rainbow Gate is a pavilion located in the market town of Burnley, England, which was designed by the architectural practice of Tonkin Liu based in London. The town of Burnley was the first one in UK to record the rainfalls since during its industrial history there were days when rain used to fill the rivers which powered the mills and the moist air used to maintain the cotton supple for its weaving. Once the milling interest decreased the area…

Designed by the practice of Zaha Hadid Architects, the new King Abdullah Financial District Metro Station located in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia will be built in the next four years offering a new public transportation system to the fast growing population of Riyadh which has already reached five million. The station will spread over a surface of over 20000 square meters and it will be the key interchange on the network for three of the main lines. It will feature six…

Designed by the practice of Kokaistudios Architecture in collaboration with Vanke and located in the city of Yantian, Shenzhen, China, this project is next to the Dapeng Bay waterfront and opposite the new tourist port which is being built at the moment thus being a part of a large development project with mix uses which includes residential and commercial areas. The Marina spreads over 2300 square meters and has four floors which will host the Vanke sales office to promote…

Designed by Hiroshi Nakamura & NAP Co. Ltd. this roof garden is located on the top of the Plaza Omotesando at Harajuku, Tokyo, Japan and it is a public space designed for the shoppers who wish to relax. The terrace features a lot of trees, tables and steps where the visitors can take a break or enjoy a meal and the escalator entrance to it is designed as a kaleidoscope made from tilted mirrors that is meant to dazzle the…

The Dutch architectural practice OMA offered a proposal to transform the Miami Beach Convention Center into an urban landmark through a massive project spreading over 52 acres. The new convention center will also host a hotel on its top and OMA will work along with the property developers Tishman and UIA, with the architects from TVSdesign and the landscape architects MMVA and Raymond Jungles who form the South Beach ACE team. The current convention center is quite obsolete and spreads…

The architect Paolo Venturella proposed this wonderfully modern project for the city of Prishtina, Serbia as a mosque with the sun as its main source of energy. The Kiblah Wall Done indicates the appropriate prayer direction and it also hosts the community, while the mosque is oriented towards the Mecca which can be clearly seen through the sphere extruding from the wall to point in its direction. There are two separate rooms dividing the prayer hall, with a smaller area…