Shigeru Ban’s €170m (US$189.4m, £145.2m) concert venue for Paris has opened on an island in the Seine. Designed with French architect Jean de Gastines on the site that once belonged to France’s biggest factory, La Seine Musicale has been conceived as a both new cultural symbol for the French capital and a music venue that will host all types of performance, from classical to contemporary. The island of L'île Seguin

AL_A, the architecture practice of Amanda Levete, has completed a striking 37-floor retail, leisure and hotel tower in central Bangkok. Located within the former gardens of the British Embassy, along Ploenchit Road, the Central Embassy project has been developed for Central Group, Thailand’s leading retailer and department store operator. The 1.5m sq ft (139,000sq m) complex has been designed to “bring a distinguishing new silhouette to the city” that “extends

Hospitality group AccorHotels has announced Dubai as the first Middle East location for its Mama Shelter hotel brand. French designer Philippe Starck will craft the interiors of the hotel, following the brand’s “trendy, boutique” image. It is set to open before 2020. AccorHotels announced Mama Shelter’s regional arrival during a panel at the Arabian Hotel Investment Conference at the Madinat Jumeirah centre last month. “The idea is to create something

As the Museum of London formulates plans for its £250m (US$324m, €291m) move to the iconic Smithfield Market, its exhibition team is digging deep to present London’s history in new ways – including opening up the site's underground passages for a glimpse of what the city was like in Victorian times. The museum was given the green light to move to its new home in January 2016, after alternative redevelopment

The Piscina & Wellness Barcelona trade fair has added new spa and wellness architecture prizes to its industry awards. The biannual event – which is dedicated to the residential and public swimming pool and wellness sectors – will this year reward architects and designers for the first time. New prize categories will recognise “the most outstanding facilities specialising in the therapeutic use of water" and celebrate student designers who have developed

Zaha Hadid Architects (ZHA) have designed a host of leisure features for a residential building on Mexico’s Mayan Riviera, including a woodland nature reserve, botanical nursery and a network of footpaths suspended above a lagoon. Located on a site prepared by a previous owner for an unbuilt complex, Alai is a new residential community from developer Pulso Inmobiliario, with the creation being guided by environmental principles. ZHA’s design for Alai

Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava has told CLADglobal how he wants to use technology and advanced engineering “to push the limits of expression.” “From day one, movability has been important to me,” he said, in an exclusive interview. “Today we can create this sense that architecture is no more an aesthetic and firm thing, but rather something that transforms, something alive, something new and poetic.” Calatrava also discussed his controversial reputation,

The co-founder of international architecture practice Snøhetta, Kjetil Trædal Thorsen, has spoken to CLAD about the opportunities and philosophical questions posed by the advent of technology that enables vulnerable heritage sites to be “reprinted.” Advances in 3D scanning, casting and printing are allowing designers and preservationists to create mirror images of both natural and man-made pieces of heritage. Examples include the Institute for Digital Archaeology, which has recreated Syria's Palmyra

Over one thousand architects and interior designers will flock to Canada’s biggest city tomorrow (17 May) to discover a selection of the new industry products deemed most interesting by a special panel of judges. The Architect@Work festival was first developed by design collective Creative Fo(u)r for the Kortrijk Xpo exhibition arena in Belgium. The idea was to “strip down the exhibition model to feature only the most cutting edge innovations”.

Dutch architecture and design studio Concrete have “broken down the walls” of the clubhouse concept to create an open and transformable park on the rooftop of one of Hong Kong’s most exclusive new residential towers. The 26 storey Skypark tower is located among the bustling streets of Mong Kok – one of the densest areas of Hong Kong. Concrete were responsible for designing all the building’s communal areas, from the

The developer of a proposed US$150m (€135.6m, £116.4m) waterpark development in Niagara Falls, New York, is eyeing a 2020 completion date for the long-touted project. A public-private partnership between the Uniland Development Company and the state, the updated Wonderfalls masterplan sees a glass-enclosed waterpark at the heart of a complex surrounded by restaurants and retail to “create a vibrant pedestrian experience”. “We have spent a lot of time with our

A 13m (43ft) bird of prey has found a perch front of the new US$1.5bn (€1.3bn, £1.1bn) home of NFL franchise the Atlanta Falcons. The statue, which represents the team’s signature falcon, is the biggest bird representation in the world and the biggest sculpture ever created by Hungarian artist Gabor Miklos Szoke. It’s wingspan is 20m (66ft) long and it weighs 73,000 pounds (33 tonnes). Millions of people will enter

South Korea’s culture ministry has launched an international design competition for a National Museum of World Writing, to be built in on the side of a vast lake in Incheon city. The 15,650sq m (168,400sq ft) building will dedicated to the collection, conservation, research and exhibition of international writing systems from across the globe. Described by the competition organiser as “an international hub for writing research and policy exchange”, it

An all-star team of architects and urban planners has won the high-profile contract to masterplan the UK’s largest regeneration programme. AECOM, Bjarke Ingels Group, Wilkinson Eyre and Asif Khan are members of the group that will create the strategic vision for Old Oak Common in west London; transforming 140 hectares of industrial and railway land into a new district for culture, leisure and housing. The opening of a super-hub interchange

Britain’s vote to pull out of the European Union has been branded “stupid” and “one of the worst decisions ever made” by renowned architect David Chipperfield. Talking exclusively to CLADglobal, Chipperfield predicted the move was “going to be very bad for British architecture”, and stressed his concern for the European Union nationals working for his practice. In a wide-ranging interview that will be published in the next edition of CLADmag,

The architecture firm of Chilean Pritzker Prize winner Alejandro Aravena have won an international competition to design a “pre-eminent” Art Mill museum on the historic waterfront of Doha, Qatar. An international jury today (15 May) announced the selection of Elemental from an eight-strong shortlist, based on their strategies for the Doha Bay site and its links to the wider city. The museum will be built on a complex that has

Plans to create a US$75m museum in Colorado Springs dedicated to the Olympic movement have moved a step closer to becoming a reality, with the final pieces of essential funding reportedly now in place for the project. According to the Colorado Springs Gazette the US Olympic Museum could break ground in the next few months after the city’s Urban Renewal Authority agreed to issue bonds partly financing construction. The decision

Here are some of the stories that appeared on CLAD this week, from Elon Musk’s latest big idea to a knighthood for David Adjaye. Monday • In an exclusive interview, James Corner, one of the leading figures behind New York’s High Line elevated park, has described landscape architects as “the unsung heroes of the public realm.” Read here. • Architecture and planning studio Ecosistema Urbano have won a design competition

The team behind the development of Guggenheim Abu Dhabi have asked contractors to renew their tender bids, indicating the long-stalled development could be about to splutter back into life after several years on the shelf. Speaking to Arabian Business, a senior executive with one of the bidding companies said the Tourism Development and Investment Company (TDIC) had recently asked them to renew their bid bond. “The commercial bid was submitted

The Los Angeles Planning Commission has officially approved on Star Wars creator George Lucas’ plans to build the long-gestating Lucas Museum of Narrative Art in Exposition Park. The decision was finalised yesterday (11 May), according to news service NBC Los Angeles. New renderings and information released by Lucas and MAD Architects, who have designed the spacecraft-like museum, reveal the latest iteration of the green lit project. The museum will have

A major sports city district with a striking riverside stadium at its heart will be built in Rotterdam, after the city council approved the project following a public meeting yesterday (11 May). Designed by architecture studio OMA, the development will include a new intricately clad 63,000 seat stadium for Dutch Eredivisie club Feyenoord Rotterdam, located on the River Maas. At the core of the masterplan is The Strip, an 800m

A seemingly doomed plan to build a new world-class concert hall in the City of London has been given a new lease of life, with an architecture competition launched to find a concept design team. The Barbican performing arts centre, the London Symphony Orchestra and Guildhall School of Music & Drama have together fired the starting pistol on the competitive process for the venue, called The Centre for Music, calling

US-based Viceroy Hotel Group will operate a flagship luxury hotel at the Cocobay entertainment and hospitality hub, currently under development in Da Nang, Vietnam. Located on the banks of the Coco River, the 700-room Viceroy Da Nang Vietnam will be the group’s first property in Asia and is set to open in 2020. The hotel will have a significant health and wellbeing offer, with a full-service spa, a “wellness oasis”

An international architecture competition has been launched for the renovation of one of Brussels’ modernist masterpieces to create a new satellite for the world-famous Pompidou Center art museum. The Urban Development Corporation of the Brussels-Capital Region is seeking a design team to lead the €125m (US$136m, £104m) Citroën Cultural Centre project. As well as the 15,000sq m (161,500sq ft) Pompidou branch, there will also be a 10,000sq m (107,600sq ft)

Acclaimed interior designer Lyndon Neri has told CLAD that our notions of personal space should be challenged, and urged designers to celebrate the idea of community. “Sometimes our celebration of isolation makes us insular and I think that’s dangerous,” he said in an exclusive interview. “We’re trained to think that we need to be separate. When we come home from work, we close our front door, we make sure we

A hotel, residential apartments and a training academy have been incorporated into Southend United FC’s proposal to build a 22,000-capacity stadium development. The Populous-designed structure will see the hotel and apartments integrated into the stadium, with a number of the latter built along the stadium roofscape. Training academy facilities will be be flanked by community pitches. A full-sized covered pitch and “elite player accommodation” have also been earmarked for the

Architecture studio Scott Brownrigg have unveiled their design for the proposed new home of the Museum of Military Medicine in Cardiff. The museum’s directors want to relocate the attraction from its current home at Keogh Barracks near Aldershot to Cardiff Bay, and the vision for what the planned new building will look like was presented this week for public consultation. The collections of the four corps of the Army Medical