In 2014, Yasodhara Ashram, a yoga retreat and study centre in Kootenay Bay, B.C., lost its temple in a fire. The blaze was devastating, but it presented an opportunity to build something better. In June 2018, the ashram community celebrated the opening of its new Temple of Light, designed by Vancouver firm Patkau Architects and […]

When designing the Eystur Town Hall – a civic centre in the 2,100-person municipality of Eysturkommuna, in the Faroe Islands – Ósbjørn Jacobsen, of the Danish firm Henning Larsen’s local office, had two influences in mind. First, there was the Republic of Venice, where the bridges drew large numbers of people and consequently became hubs […]

Masa café and bakery in Bogotá, by the Colombian–American practice Studio Cadena, proves – once and for all – that you don’t need opulent materials to build something spectacular. The bakery’s most distinctive feature is its textured concrete shell, which gives way to massive triangular windows as pointy as sharks’ teeth. This accent is every […]

If Bill Gates can drink sewage water purified by the Janicki Omni Processor, perhaps Torontonians are ready for a public bath at their local wastewater treatment plant. University of Waterloo student Liyang Zhang proposes just that in her thesis exploring the cultural understanding of cleanliness, class and citizens’ relationships to human waste in urban spaces. […]

Planar House, a modernist dwelling in the municipality of Porto Feliz, Brazil, near São Paulo, is a study in horizontal design. Architect Marcio Kogan of the Brazilian firm Studio MK27 set the entire building program – playrooms, mechanical rooms, ensuite bedrooms – beneath a flat, low-slung roof. The most private spaces are deep within the […]

The Marfa 10 × 10 house, by San Antonio firm Candid Rogers Studio, is a minimalist dwelling located, appropriately enough, on the outskirts of Marfa, the West Texas city whose most famous resident was the minimalist sculptor Donald Judd. The structure – two stacked, crate-like forms clad in Corten steel – evokes the humble, rust-covered […]

When it comes to residential design in Beijing, there’s no form more iconic than the traditional hutong courtyard house. After Yang Liu of the Chinese firm DL Atelier was commissioned to renovate a century-old example, he pledged to preserve its history – or, rather, histories. Look closely at the Guozijian Hutong House and you’ll see […]

When offered the chance to renovate a heritage house in the storied Roma neighbourhood of Mexico City, Alejandro Tapia Domínguez, of the local firm MANADA Architectural Boundaries, faced a familiar dilemma: The building was too unique to demolish, but also structurally unsound and impossible to renovate on the cheap. So Domínguez opted for neither. His […]

Michael Anastassiades’s Arrangements pendant lights, made for Flos, show just how much a designer can do with a simple concept elegantly realized. The modular system consists of nine forms – circles, squares, lines, teardrops and ovals – made from aluminum, silicone and polycarbonate. The pieces can be suspended from the ceiling in any order, each […]

Instead of the traditional RGB colour model used in televisions and computer screens, the Gople lamp switches between red, white and blue. This colour suite is ideal for plants, since red light enables blossoming, blue assists with vegetation and white aids with overall plant health. Of course, the Gople lamp is for people too, so […]