Social wellness company &Soul has unveiled a new wellness and cultural hub called Shoreditch &Soul in Shoreditch, London. &Soul is an urban hospitality operator focused on fostering community and tackling loneliness. It's led by co-founder Reza Merchant, founder of all-inclusive co-living space developer The Collective. Shoreditch &Soul, based in a former Victorian textile warehouse, has 16 private residence apartments for rent, called The Villas, which give access to a 3,252sq

The final countdown is now on for the launch of the UK's first public floating sauna, set to make a splash on 23 November at Liverpool's Princes Dock. Called WYLD Sauna, the Nordic-inspired contrast bathing experience will offer residents, visitors and commuters a serene escape in the heart of the northern UK city. The project was founded by outdoor swimming and sauna enthusiasts inspired by the growing trend of floating

A new Nordic-inspired contrast bathing experience is set to open in Liverpool in Q3, offering residents, visitors and commuters a serene escape in the heart of the Northern UK city. Approved by Liverpool City Council in June, WYLD Sauna will open on the banks of Prince's Dock, consisting of a floating pontoon housing a 30-person Finnish sauna, two ice baths, two cold waterfall showers and four heated outdoor showers equipped

The Silverstone Experience, a journey through the home of British motor racing, is to open in a refurbished WW2 RAF hangar later this month. The £20m (US$24.6m, €22.3m) development has taken seven years to bring to fruition and included the restoration of the 4,000sq m (13,100sq ft) hangar. Led by architect Jane Lock-Smith of Cube Design, the project required more work than was initially expected, with the hangar having to

Architecture firm Purcell will create an extension to the historic home of the University of Manchester - Manchester Museum, after winning planning and listed building consent last week. The design team have imagined a contemporary new entrance and two new galleries, which will double the capacity of the museum – part of a wider development plan as it seeks “to become the UK’s most imaginative, inclusive and caring museum.” Purcell

The winners of The Structural Awards 2017 have been announced, with multiple leisure projects celebrated for their design and engineering excellence. The British Airways i360 in Brighton, UK, was honoured with The Supreme Award for Structural Engineering Excellence – one of the highest accolades in world engineering. In a unanimous decision, the judging panel, made up of industry experts, described the project as “a remarkable feat of engineering” and praised

The British multinational Debenhams is partnering former Virgin Active co-founder Frank Reed to launch in-store gyms as part of the retailer’s strategy to attract more customers and a younger female base. Reed’s Sweat! gyms are set to be trialled in three stores from early 2018 under a membership model. The deal is part of the Debenhams Redesigned strategy, which involves working with strategic partners to deliver its plan of making

Architecture studio Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners (RSHP) have been commissioned to design a major extension to the British Library in London. The design team will build 100,000sq ft (9,300sq m) of new spaces on a 2.8 acre site to the north of the library’s Grade 1 Listed building at St Pancras. Their design will include facilities for learning, exhibitions and public use, in addition to a new northern entrance

Lord’s Cricket Ground has become the first purpose-built cricket stadium in Britain to run on 100 per cent renewable energy. As part of the sustainability strategy devised by Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) – the owner of Lord’s – the ground has met its 2020 emissions target already and reduced its electricity consumption by seven per cent since 2010. The ground’s new Warner Stand – which will be complete in April

The British Film Institute (BFI) has confirmed Thailand’s PACE Development Corporation is its preferred bidder to fund its planned International Centre for Film, TV and the Moving Image on London’s South Bank. A BFI representative told CLAD the organisation is “now in contract negotiations” with the developer, which impressed “following a procurement process for process to test the market for investors.” The institute wants to create a flagship national home

The British government has unveiled details of ambitious plans to deliver more than 48,000 homes across England in 14 new garden villages and three new garden towns. The decision to green light the new settlements expands on the Conservative government’s garden village initiative, revealed by former British chancellor George Osborne last year. Seven garden towns had previously been announced, and the 24 communities will together provide 200,000 new homes. Each

The Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) has awarded £9.1m (US$11.5m, €10.7m) to the Silverstone Heritage Experience, guaranteeing development of a new permanent exhibition at the home of British motor racing. Sitting at the main entrance to the race circuit, the exhibition by Mather & Co will create a series of interactive exhibitions and displays to be housed inside the only remaining Second World War hangar on the Silverstone site. For the

Luxury hospitality group Dukes Collection has appointed design firm AHK to create a “quintessentially British” hotel on the man-made Palm Jumeirah archipelago in Dubai. The five star Dukes Dubai will open in December 2016 within a new tower complex. Inspired by its famous London counterpart, Dukes London, the hotel will contain 279 guestrooms and 227 hotel apartments spread over 15 floors. An outdoor infinity pool will overlook the ocean and,

The British Film Institute (BFI) has unveiled ambitious plans to build a new world-class International Centre for Film, TV and the Moving Image – a move heralded by the great and the good of British cinema. The BFI has revived a long-gestating plan to create a flagship national home for the film industry on the site of an existing car park on London’s South Bank, near its current cinema venue.

Architecture, design and engineering firm BDP have unveiled their plans for a 300,000sq m (3.2m sq ft) leisure extension to the Meadowhall shopping mall in Sheffield, UK. London property company British Land are investing £300m (US$432m, €381m) in the project, which will go for public consultation next month. The extension, called the Leisure Hall, will include a host of dining and entertainment amenities, including a gym, cinema, restaurants, a café

While the Smithsonian is stalling on plans to move to London’s Olympicopolis site, the British Museum is looking at the possibility of a satellite site at the upcoming cultural hub. For the Washington-based Smithsonian, which has 19 affiliates in the US, uncertainty over costs to open a new 3,750sq m (40,300sq ft) satellite facility within the new cultural quarter on the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park has delayed a final decision.

A new art museum, dedicated to the art of the people of British Columbia, is about to open its doors in Whistler, Canada. Opening on 12 March, the CA$30m (US$22.6m, €20.5m, £15.9m) Audain Art Museum, designed by Vancouver-based design firm Patkau Architects, sits within a grove of trees and is designed to blend in with its surroundings, with only a single tree having to be removed to build it. Nestled

The glass viewing pod for a vertical cable car billed as “the world’s tallest moving observation attraction” was completed yesterday (13 January) on the UK’s Brighton beach. The 162m (531ft) tall British Airways i360, conceived and designed by Marks Barfield Architects – creators of the London Eye – has now entered the final construction phase before opening in late Q2 2016. The final piece of glass has now been fixed

The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) has launched an open design competition for a visitor centre at Langley Vale Wood; an ancient forest site in Surrey, England. UK conservation charity the Woodland Trust (WT) has partnered with RIBA to select an “innovative and imaginative” design for the 300sq m (3,200sq ft) structure, which will welcome 180,000 annual visitors to the 640-acre woodland site. “The visitor hub will provide our

London-based Aros Architects have produced early plans to turn World War II sea forts seven miles off the British coast into a luxury hotel and spa. The unused Red Sand Forts in the Thames Estuary near Kent, built in 1943 to defend Britain against a Nazi attack, could become a hotel with executive apartments, where guest can fly in by helicopter. A similar development took place at Spitbank Fort –

Developer British Land has signed an agreement with Plymouth City Council to develop Drake Circus Leisure, a £40m leisure scheme next to its Drake Circus Shopping Centre in Plymouth city centre. The proposed development will include a 12-screen cinema operated by Cineworld, 13 restaurant units and 450 car park spaces, while the site’s current coach station is to be relocated. The move comes as the owners of the Drake Circus

Roger Stirk Harbour + Partners’ have completed their £135m (US$231m, €170m) extension to the British Museum, London. As one of the most popular visitor attractions in the world, the British Museum is a defining institution and its new World Conservation and Exhibition Centre has been a long time coming. Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners (RSHP) won the contract for the extension in 2009 from a shortlist of top architectural practices,

British actor and former Loose Women star Lynda Bellingham opened the Imagine Spa at Hazlewood Castle Hotel near Leeds on 30 April. Hotel owners, Ashdale Hotels, have partnered with the new owners of the Imagine Spa – Mosaic Spa & Health Clubs to create this £200,000 3,500sq ft (325sq m) facility – set within 77 acres of parkland. “We are delighted to have had a national treasure like Lynda launch

London's cultural landmark the British Museum has broken ground on its new multi-million pound capital project, the World Conservation and Exhibitions Centre (WCEC). Designed by Rogers, Stirk, Harbour + Partners (RSHP) and constructed by Mace, the new WCEC is one of the largest redevelopment projects in the museum's 260 year history. The aim of the project is to safeguard and enhance collections, while enabling the museum to store, conserve, study

The British Museum has revealed it is progressing on schedule for the opening of its new £135m exhibition space, due to open in March 2014. Construction on the World Conservation and Exhibitions Centre (WCEC) began in autumn 2011 in the north-west corner of the museum's central London estate. The redevelopment project is one of the largest in the museum's 260-year history and will include a new public exhibition gallery, state-of-the-art

Image: The British Museum's Citi Money Gallery The British Museum has announced the opening of its new Citi Money Gallery, following a major refurbishment of the space housing the institution's extensive money collection. First opened in 1997, the gallery now incorporates two thematic approaches on either side - the first exploring the issuance of money and the second looking at its cultural significance. Among the firms to work on the

Hepworth Wakefield, the David Chipperfield Architects-designed art attraction in Yorkshire, has been crowned Best Architectural Achievement at the British Design Awards 2011. The building held off four other shortlisted projects to pick up the accolade, including work by RHWL and Richard Griffiths Architects at London's St Pancras Renaissance Hotel. Heatherwick Studio's UK Pavilion at the Shanghai Expo 2010; Plasma Studio's Creativity Pavilion; and Alain de Botton's Living Architecture were also