Hospitality group Taj Safaris has opened its first lodge outside of India; a traditionally designed retreat within a national park once used as a hunting ground by Nepal’s royal family. Leopards, rhinos and Bengal tigers roam the UNESCO World Heritage listed Chitwan National Park located near the city of Bharatpur. The thick grasslands, meandering water bodies and abundant wildlife – including 68 species of mammal and 550 native bird species

The annual Build Earth Live ideas competition – which challenges teams to create a design in just 48 hours – will return in September with entrants tasked to imagine a Hyperloop network for the United Arab Emirates (UAE). Dubai’s Future Foundation and Road & Transport Authority will provide government sponsorship for the competition, which will call on designers, architects and engineers to plan the station terminuses for a Hyperloop route

A new museum and memorial in Montgomery, Alabama has been designed by MASS Design Group and the Equal Justice Initiative (EJI) to confront America’s history of slavery. The Memorial to Peace and Justice, which is scheduled to open in 2017, is planned as a space of remembrance “that embraces truth and inspires reflection and change.” It will be the country’s first national memorial to victims of lynching. In a joint

Ground has been broken on the US$250m (£188.7m, €222m) stadium being built for future Major League Soccer (MLS) franchise Los Angeles FC. The Gensler-designed arena – which will seat up to 22,000 spectators – is expected to be completed in time for the 2018 MLS season, when the team will join. According to Los Angeles FC, the stadium will “bring more than US$350m (£264.3m, €310.7m) in private investment" to the

Exhibition designers Casson Mann have designed a colourful story-filled restaurant for five-star London hotel One Aldwych. The restaurant, called Eneko, opens on 1 September in the hotel’s former basement. Museum interior specialists Casson Mann were selected to work on the project, their first restaurant design, because of their storytelling expertise. The brief called for the design to tconvey the story of its Michelin starred chef, Eneko Atxa, and his Basque

One day in the not-too distant future, glass windows may be a thing of the past. Researchers in the US have revealed a surprising window material that could be stronger, more energy-efficient and have less glare – transparent wood. Engineers at the A. James Clark School of Engineering at the University of Maryland have demonstrated through a study how wood could one day provide shatterproof, thermally-insulated alternative to glass for

Hotel, train and river-cruise operator Belmond will launch “Ireland’s first luxury rail experience” on 30 August, with 10 sleeper carriages designed by James Park Associates to evoke Dublin’s Georgian architecture. The Belmond Grand Hibernian – which can carry up to 40 passengers in 20 en-suite cabins - will transport guests on three-day journeys across the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland, stopping in Dublin, Belfast and Cork. Belmond purchased the

A new US$8m (€7.1m, £6.1m) science centre telling the story of the Colorado Plateau and encouraging exploration of the wider area – which is home to the Grand Canyon – has opened its doors to the public in Utah. Located in the city of Monticello, the 16,200sq ft (1,500sq m) Canyon Country Discovery Center looks at the Four Corners region – the quadripoint in the Southwest US where the states

A museum celebrating the successes of Jim Clark is on the cards after plans were unveiled by the Scottish Borders Council to celebrate the life of the two-time Formula One world champion. To be financed in-part by the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) pending approval, the £1.65m (US$2.2m, €1.9m) project would see the existing Jim Clark Room in Duns expanded and redeveloped to allow a selection of cars and trophies to

Two architecture studios hope to show how remote heritage sites can be served by ‘satellite’ visitor centres through their own design for a tourist hub which celebrates an uninhabited Scottish archipelago from a location on a nearby island. Scottish studio Dualchas Architects and Norway’s Reiulf Ramstad Architects, who are working in the UK for the first time, have unveiled their masterplan for the St Kilda Visitor Centre. They propose the

The 1,400sq m (15,069sq ft) Resense Spa at Kempinski Hotel Summerland Beirut in Lebanon is set to open on 5 September with a visually impressive circular building in the resort garden. The standalone day resort spa, which is spread over two floors, will house one double spa suite, six single treatment rooms and two scrub rooms, as well as separate male and female relaxation lounges and a spa cafe. “This

Work is nearing completion on a new Four Seasons hotel sat in an 800 year old garden in Japan’s ancient imperial capital Kyoto. The Four Seasons Kyoto, which will open on 15 October 2016, has been designed by architecture studio Kume Sekkei and interior design firm Hirsch Bedner Associates to reflect a “contemporary evolution of traditional Japanese style”. Inspired by traditional design elements and motifs, the guest rooms will feature

Architecture studio Hassell have unveiled their design to revamp the Geelong Performing Arts Centre; one of the leading cultural venues outside of Australia’s main cities. The studio – fresh from winning a competition to design the Western Australian Museum in Perth – have been commissioned by the Victoria state government to oversee a major upgrade of the 35-year-old building’s facade and interior facilities. The result is a contemporary exterior with

Kanye West fans around the world queued for hours to get into one of the 21 pop-up fashion stores opened by the musician and designer over the weekend. West announced the location of the temporary stores – which sold merchandise linked to his latest studio album The Life of Pablo – on Friday, prompting a surge of interest in cities as varied as New York, San Francisco, Singapore, London, Berlin,

Construction has begun on a 200,000sq ft (18,600sq m) entertainment complex devoted to Elvis Presley, located across the street from his famous Graceland Mansion in Memphis. The project is the most significant expansion in the history of Graceland, which has been open to the public as a museum since 1982. Called Elvis: Past, Present & Future, the US$45m (€40m, £34.3m) complex will explore Elvis’ personal interests and activities throughout his

A pop-up preview of James Corner Field Operations’ Miami Underline will open on Tuesday (23 August) to showcase how the landscape architects plan to transform the land beneath the city’s MetroRail into a 10 mile linear park. The pop-up will take place at the Underline’s ‘Brickell Backyard’ fitness area, located at the north end of the Miami River, at 10.30am EDT. Event-goers – who are being encouraged to come to

Architects Höweler + Yoon have proposed an interactive ‘Living Lab’ for the Dubai 2020 Expo, which would creatively explore human empathy. The Empathy Pavilion, designed like a giant elevated cave, would house a 300-person capacity exhibition gallery on the ground floor, several workshop spaces on the second floor and a black box theatre on the top floor. The architects have partnered with the MIT Media Lab’s Opera of the Future

The largest and highest observation wheel in the world is taking shape on Dubai’s Bluewaters Island, with the structure’s hub and spindle safely placed on top of its 126m (413ft) high legs. Two of the world’s largest cranes have assembled the key components of the wheel, which will be called Ain Dubai. The current weight of the structure is 1,805 tonnes – equivalent to four Airbus A380 aircraft. The hub

The next generation of buildings could be created by wall-crawling robots. That’s the view of robotics researcher Maria Yablonina, a graduate of the University of Stuttgart who has unveiled a way of using robot builders to create complex structures quickly, cheaply and efficiently. Yablonina’s project, Mobile Robotic Fabrication System for Filament Structures, has been developed with the university's Institute for Computational Design (ICD). Semi-autonomous wall climbing robots are programmed to

Here are some of the most popular stories that appeared on CLAD this week, from Elon Musk’s proposed solar roof to three new football stadium designs. Monday • A “smart” self-shading window has been developed that can switch from transparent to opaque in a matter of seconds. Read here. • Two alternative designs have been proposed for Sir Peter Jackson’s Wellington Movie Museum. Read here. • GOCO Hospitality is developing

Hollywood star Robert De Niro will build his planned luxury hotel in London’s Covent Garden after the deputy leader of the local council hailed the design as “one of the finest schemes we have considered in years”. Permission for the The Wellington Hotel has been granted, enabling the star of Taxi Driver and Raging Bull to increase his burgeoning hospitality portfolio. Architects Kohn Pedersen Fox have designed the 83-room hotel,

Transport officials in New York are considering expanding the city’s historic Brooklyn Bridge due to the congestion caused by swathes of pedestrians, tourists, vendors and cyclists. Global engineering consultancy AECOM have been commissioned to begin a seven-month engineering study assessing how much weight the 133-year old bridge can carry and considering options for expansion. Mooted suggestions include widening the promenade. The bridge contains a crossing for cars at a lower

Miami’s Faena Forum is nearing completion, with architects OMA revealing new construction images of the culturally-inspired real-estate initiative. The 50,000sq ft (4,600sq m) project, which is central to the development of Miami Beach, is made up of a connected cylindrical and cubic structure. The first of these offers flexible spaces for dance, theatre, arts and debate space. The second will house a hotel and condominiums. A central assembly hall on

More than a decade on from its conception, the National Museum of Oman has opened its doors to the public, showcasing the cultural heritage of the sultanate from prehistoric times to the modern day. The 13,700sq m (148,000sq ft) development in Muscat includes 4,000sq m (43,000sq ft) of space allocated for 14 exhibition halls, each covering different part of the history of Oman, with an additional 376sq m (4,000sq ft)

British designer Thomas Heatherwick has launched an impassioned defence of his Garden Bridge project in London, arguing that the project has been used as a political football by “people with an agenda” and those “who love to sneer.” The scheme – a 367m (1,200ft) planted River Thames crossing linking South Bank and Temple – has attracted controversy and negative headlines over the allegedly opaque procurement process and the public funding

A forthcoming Fairmont hotel in Austin, Texas will be filled with trees, plants and landscape design features to form an extension to a neighbouring park. San Francisco studio Warren Sheets Design have designed the interiors of the 37-storey hotel, which will include two 24ft (7m) high Heritage Oak trees and a geometric topiary garden. The close proximity of the Fairmont Austin to the city’s Palm Park inspired designer Warren Sheets

Northern Irish architects have been given the opportunity to follow in the footsteps of Bjarke Ingels and design an architectural pavilion that “uplifts the soul and impacts on wellbeing.” Inspired by the annual Serpentine Pavilion in London’s Hyde Park – which has been created this year by Ingels and his studio BIG – the Royal Society of Ulster Architects (RSUA) have launched a design competition for a temporary public structure