SH Hotels & Resorts has revealed it will take its Treehouse boutique hotel brand outside London in 2023, when it opens its second and third sites in Manchester and Miami respectively. Speaking to CLAD the company revealed plans to create a new-concept gym for the Manchester property – the first of its kind – with custom-designed space hoppers and other novel workout concepts as part of a playful new approach to exercise.

OMA have unveiled plans for a new shopping centre in Australia that will integrate public spaces, community amenities and facilities for childcare and education to create a more communal experience. Commissioned for Sandhurst Retail, the Wollert Neighbourhood Centre will be located in the Wollert suburb of Whittlesea, just north of Melbourne. Due to break ground in 2023, the 9,000sq m (97,000sq ft) facility is intended to be a neighbourhood asset

A new urban lagoon and park, designed by MVRDV, has opened in the preserved ruin of a shopping mall in central Tainan, Taiwan. The China-Town Mall was built next to the Tainan Canal in 1983, the rise of online shopping means it no longer serves its purpose. Instead, the Urban Development Bureau of the Tainan City Government commissioned MVRDV to create Tainan Spring as a new public space and as

Amazon has opened its first bricks-and-mortar grocery store, featuring the retailer's Just Walk Out Technology that does away with the need for checkouts and queues. The Amazon Go Grocery shop opened in Seattle at the end of February and brings what was previously an online-only retail service into the real world. Covering 10,400sq ft (966sq m), it is much like any other supermarket, offering fresh produce, meat, seafood, bakery items

Interior architecture specialists Bone have reinterpreted the countryside architecture created for horses to create a coffee shop that is sparse, utilitarian and natural. Located in Ras Al Khaimah, United Arab Emirates, Hoof is run by three friends who share interests in show-jumping and speciality coffee. In developing a concept that would honour those interests, Bone went about reimagining the function and design of a horse stall. The minimalist design and

Fyra have designed a new concept self-service store in Helsinki, Finland, where online shopping customers can have items delivered, collect them, try clothes items on and return items that they don't want to keep. Created for Finnish postal and logistics company Posti and developed in partnership with consulting company Motley, Box is based on the growth of online retail and the recognition that there was a gap to fill in

SHoP Architects has designed an urban farm and cultural hub for Washington, DC, that is aimed at providing an economic driver, a community resource and a space for events. The Well at Oxon Run is being created for local food justice organisation DC Greens, which sourced a new location following the closure of another urban farm it was running in 2018. It will see the transformation of an underutilised 50,000sq

Creative studio Unknown Works has completed a 33sq m (355sq ft) restaurant in China called Scotts TKL based on 3D scans of fish and chip shops from around the UK. The project was based on the concept of 'Shanzai' – the act of copying and imitating that is often ascribed to Chinese businesses – and seeks to ask questions about Sino-British relationships and cultural exchange. Ben Hayes of Unknown Works

Pier 35 – an expansive recreation space taking shape in New York's Lower East Side – will soon be complete. Jointly designed by American architecture practices SHoP and Ken Smith Workshop, the riverside park – part of SHoP's 388-hectare East River Waterfront regeneration project – will feature 28,000 sq ft (2,601 sq m) of public realm, including pedestrian paths, picnic areas, and a screen wall that will be overlaid with

A 10,000 capacity amphitheatre-cum-public park is to provide a “year-round epicentre for live music and entertainment”, according to its architects. New York-based SHoP Architects have been chosen by First Avenue Productions – the developer and offshoot of the legendary Minneapolis music venue First Avenue – to design the Community Performing Arts Center (CPAC) on the Mississippi River waterfront in Minneapolis, Minnesota, US. “We focussed on creating an inclusive venue where

New York-based developer Two Trees Management has opened a disused sugar factory redevelopment in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, turning the site into a waterfront park. With landscaping from James Corner Field Operations and a street extension conceived by Shop Architects, the project aims to keep true to the site’s heritage, with remnants from the former Domino Sugar Factory – the space’s previous occupant – interspersed around the park. Part of the park’s

The Getty Conservation Institute (GCI) has announced it will prioritise the care and conservation of the only three museums designed by the legendary Le Corbusier. As part of its Conserving Modern Architecture Initiative, the CGI will host two workshops in India, where two of the three museums are located – the Sanskar Kendra Museum in Ahmedabad and the Government Museum and Art Gallery in Chandigarh. The third, the National Museum

New York practice SHoP Architects have completed their expansion of SITE Santa Fe, one of the most respected contemporary arts venues in the US. The museum – which runs year-round exhibitions, artistic residencies and educational programmes to foster avant-garde art – has occupied a former warehouse in the Santa Fe Railyard since its opening in 1995. SHoP were brought in to emphasise SITE’s role as “a progressive and dynamic cultural

Weta Workshop – the special effects and prop company behind such epics as The Lord of the Rings and Avatar – have thrown their weight behind a NZ$45m (US$32.5m, €27.5m, £25.3m) redevelopment of the Napier National Aquarium in New Zealand. Napier City Council (NCC) has announced the plans, which will see the aquarium on Marine Parade expanded from 3,400sq m (36,600sq ft) by almost three times to 11,100sq m (120,000sq

The American Copper Buildings – a soaring pair of copper-clad luxury rental towers linked by a three-story skybridge 300ft (91.4m) in the air – have welcomed their first residents in New York. The project – a collaboration between JDS Development Group and SHoP Architects – is located at 626 First Avenue along Manhattan’s East River waterfront. The angled silhouettes maximise views of the river and surrounding landmarks such as the

SHoP Architects have completed an extensive renovation of Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum on New York’s Long Island. The multi-purpose arena, which first opened in 1972, has hosted the likes of Elvis Presley, Led Zeppelin, Madonna and Bruce Springsteen over the years, as well as basketball and ice hockey fixtures, but gradually became outdated and was closed in 2015. SHoP were brought in to re-conceive the look and feel of the

W Hotels Worldwide has announced it is planning to to open a property in Melbourne, Australia, in 2020 as part of an ambitious and controversial mixed-use scheme. The lifestyle hotel brand, now part of Marriott International, has partnered with real estate firms Daisho Development Melbourne and Cbus Property to open the W Melbourne within Collins Arch – the forthcoming mixed-use AU$1bn (US$765.5m, €713m, £613.5m) luxury development designed by SHoP Architects

Leisure amenities and mixed-use building are the future of private developments, according to one of the founding principals of New York studio SHoP Architects. Coren Sharples, whose practice have designed New York’s forthcoming American Copper Towers – a residential project boasting a three-storey skybridge, spa, fitness centre and public realm – told CLAD the addition of leisure spaces, often publicly accessible, to offices and private residences is “now actually seen

Developers of shopping malls and large retail centres can no longer ignore leisure, the director of the International Retail Real Estate Market (MAPIC) has told CLAD. Nathalie Depetro said that “the growth of digital e-commerce has pushed the need to make the physical shopping experience more amazing than ever before to remain relevant.” MAPIC 2016, which takes place from 16 to 18 November in Cannes, is one of the world's

US architecture studio SHoP have announced they will create one of the world’s largest 3D public structures for the Design Miami festival in November. The arching piece, called Flotsam & Jetsom, will create a 1,780sq ft space at the gateway to Miami’s exhibition halls. It is being created by the architects as a response to their triumph in the 2016 Design Miami Visionary Award. In a statement, they said: “This

Jiangnan Global Harbor, one of the world’s largest leisure-led retail schemes, has officially opened near Shanghai. The 500,000sq m (5.3 million sq ft), five-level project is located in the city of Changzhou, within the prosperous Jiangsu province. Designed by architects Chapman Taylor, the scheme has a vast Art Deco-inspired atrium with giant LED screens and musical fountains; 60,000sq m (645,800sq ft) of space dedicated to bars, restaurants and cafés; and

Construction is nearing completion on a pair of “dancing” copper towers in New York, which will be connected by a skybridge with a swimming pool 300ft above the ground. New York studio SHoP Architects have designed the towers, called the American Copper Buildings, by the city’s East River. The upper halves of both structures lean outward, creating a dynamic, musically-inspired interaction between the two which is emphasised by the bridge

The Taiwanese city of Tainan will recapture its maritime past with the creation of a man-made lagoon on the site of a derelict and disused shopping mall. The large outdoor pool will be the central focus of a new green public space linking the city’s downtown with its historic canal network. The competition-winning design is the work of Dutch architects MVRDV, together with The Urbanist Collaborative and LLJ Architects. Tainan’s

SITE Santa Fe, one of the most respected contemporary arts venues in the US, will undergo a radical expansion overseen by New York firm SHoP Architects. The museum – which runs year-round exhibitions, artistic residencies and educational programmes to foster avant-garde art – has occupied a former warehouse in the Santa Fe Railyard since its opening in 1995. SHoP’s planned renovation and expansion will dramatically increase SITE’s size. The studio’s

International design firm PKMN Architectures was selected to lead this year’s edition of a workshop known as Taller del Desierto – which aimed to build a small urban spa at Parque Urueta in the Mexican city of Chihuahua – with the help of local architecture firm Memela and designers Juan Castillo, Miguel Heredia and Miguel García. Based on the consensus of local residents and the council, the project involved the

Foster + Partners’ Crossrail Place development has opened at Canary Wharf in London. A curving timber lattice roof wraps around four levels of leisure and retail facilities and a rooftop public garden. The opening comes three years before Canary Wharf Crossrail Station itself throws open its doors in 2018, serving the new Crossrail railway line. Fosters said the public garden is densely planted with trees and plants and is interspersed

A decommissioned water reservoir turned public park in Colombia has scooped the top prize in a global awards competition for sustainable building and construction. The ‘Articulated Site’ project, designed by Mario Camargo and Luis Tombé of Colectivo720, with Juan Calle and Horacio Valencia of EPM Group, took the US$200,000 (€187,201, £134,517) Gold prize in the 2015 Holcim Awards. Located around a series of water tanks in Medellín, an outdoor auditorium