A new multi-sensory restaurant, theatre and dance venue, created by Cirque du Soleil founder Guy Laliberté and renowned culinary masters Ferran and Albert Adrià of elBulli fame, has opened in Ibiza, Spain, with a gastronomic concept designed to merge food, music and art. Heart Ibiza, located inside the Ibiza Gran Hotel, is divided into three spaces – the terrace, supper and club. The restaurant and entertainment complex has a capacity

Planning permission has been granted for a major mixed-use development in Edinburgh, UK, which will see a luxury hotel, 30 restaurants and a multi-screen cinema created. Allan Murray Architects and BDP masterplanned the £850m ($1.3bn, €1.2bn) Edinburgh St James scheme which is located in a World Heritage Site at the Scottish city’s St James Quarter. The five-star hotel, designed by London-based Jestico & Whiles as the centrepiece of the project,

The Vucedol Culture Museum by Radionica Arhitekture has opened its doors to the public after more than a decade of development. It was completed in 2013 but only opened on 30 June. The museum has set up shop at Vucedol on the bank of the river Danube in eastern Croatia, one of Europe’s most important archaeological sites. The HRK179m (US$26.2m, €23.6m, £16.7m) building is made up of a series of

A twisted temporary pavilion from J. Mayer H. is helping the German city of Karlsruhe celebrate the 300th anniversary of its founding. The KA300 pavilion features a large auditorium with a stage and its design is a nod to the strictly geometric, radial layout of the Baroque planned city of Karlsruhe, with the palace as its focal point. Erected in the city's castle gardens, the event pavilion will host concerts,

Following a six-year US$25m (€22.5m, £16m) renovation by Ennead Architects, the New York Hall of Science in Queens is celebrating the reopening of its Great Hall. Originally designed by Harrison and Abramovitz Architects for the 1964/1965 World’s Fair, the Great Hall’s cobalt blue dalle-de-verre glass and concrete walls are designed to give the illusion of being in deep space. In its original format, visitors to the World’s Fair could see

The Mi Xun Spa opens this month in a restored monastery at Swire Hotels' The Temple House – an urban hotel in Chengdu, China. The spa includes 11 treatment areas, a gentleman’s barbershop, and a teahouse, as well as a retail spa shop. This is the third in Swire’s House Collective portfolio, following The Opposite House in Beijing and The Upper House in Hong Kong. The hotel is located in

Herzog and De Meuron’s Triangle Tower – which features a 120-room four-star hotel and panoramic restaurant – is to become Paris’ first skyscraper for more than 40 years after getting the green light from the city council. The controversial pyramid-shaped structure was initially rejected by councillors, but the November 2014 vote was annulled by Paris mayor Anne Hidalgo. In the re-run, the project was approved after receiving 87 votes in

Renzo Piano’s designs for the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures are to be realised, after Los Angeles City Council gave the final stamp of approval for the US$300m (€263.5m, £190.4m) development. With planning permission now granted, museum representatives hope to open the facility to the public by 2017. The council voted unanimously 13-0 in the development’s favour, with construction potentially starting by the of this summer. The Academy Museum's architectural

The Museum of London has been awarded £200,000 ($314,453, €281,571) to set up an architectural competition to choose a practice to design its new home at nearby Smithfield Market. The Greater London Authority (GLA) designated the funds as part of its backing for the proposed relocation, on behalf of London’s mayor, Boris Johnson. The museum will now appoint an architect and other consultants to develop the design of the new

New Mexico’s Spaceport America – the first purpose-built commercial spaceport in the world – has launched a new experience tour and exhibition for its visitors as it looks to offset operational costs for the US$219m (€195m, £139m) facility. A new US$7m (€6.2m, £4.4m) visitor centre, which sits in the hot-springs district of the city of Truth or Consequences, is located inside a historic 1930s adobe building. The visitor centre offers

The Hyatt Place hotel brand has made its long-awaited entrance into the African market with the launch of the 152-bedroom Hyatt Place Taghazout Bay in Morocco. Designed by Moroccan firm Karim Chakor Architecte, the 152-bed hotel is located 10 miles (17 kilometers) north of the Moroccan coastal town of Agadir. Hyatt Place Taghazout Bay is part of Morocco’s Taghazout Bay Resort, a sustainable development in the foothills of the Atlas

Construction is to begin on a Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG)-designed office building adjacent to a newly-opened public park in Philadelphia, US. Developer Liberty Property Trust and joint venture partner Synterra Partners broke ground on the 94,000sq ft (8,733sq m) building, 1200 Intrepid Avenue, yesterday (30 June) at The Navy Yard waterfront campus. The four-storey structure curves inward on one side to connect to the new park. Its double curved surface

At least fifteen world class architecture projects shortlisted for the Inside Awards 2015 World Interior of the Year are for leisure venues. I n the bars and restaurants category is Mecha Uma in the Philippines, designed by Jorge Yulo Architects & Associates. The project uses concrete, steel, copper, glass and wood using a ‘raw approach’ The kitchen counter is clad in copper and an installation of squares is suspended above

Chelsea Football Club (CFC) plans to replace its current stadium in south London with a 60,000-capacity landmark venue celebrating the heritage of sport in and around Stamford Bridge. The club has launched a three-day public consultation on the stadium plans, during which local residents will be able to view and offer their views on the proposals. The conceptual designs, which have been put on display at Stamford Bridge, pay homage

The team behind an ambitious New York design project to create the ‘world's first underground park’ have turned to Kickstarter to raise US$200,000 (€179,000, £127,000) for technical development for the complex scheme. The US$60m (€53.8m, £38.2m) Lowline project, designed by James Ramsey of Raad Studio, would see the transformation of an abandoned, underground trolley terminal in Manhattan's Lower East Side. It would harness solar power to become a fully-lit public

Willmott Dixon Interiors have been named winners of a £20m (US$31.5m, €28.2m) contract to fit out London’s Design Museum, which is planning an £80m (US$126m, €113m) move to the former Commonwealth Institute building in Kensington. The Grade II-listed building will become the new home for the Design Museum, which is dedicated to contemporary design and architecture. The interior vision, imagined by British architect John Pawson, will include provision of new

US private equity firm KSL Capital Partners has sold the Malmaison and Hotel du Vin UK hospitality chains to Singaporean serviced apartments group Frasers Hospitality for US$570m (£363m, €511m). The sale marks a tidy profit for KSL, which bought the hotels in 2013 for a reported US$314m (£200m, €282m) and then spent money renovating existing properties and expanding into new locations. Malmaison and Hotel du Vin are a collection of

Seven-time Wimbledon tennis champion Roger Federer pitched up in South London, UK over the weekend to help launch sports goods giant Nike’s legacy project for this year’s Wimbledon tennis tournament. Nike has taken over four community tennis courts in Tanner Street Park, Bermondsey, investing £17,500 in resurfacing the ageing courts with a designer touch in pink and blue and setting up a branded tennis and activity hub. The NikeCourt Club

Teams from some of the world’s leading architectural practices swapped CAD for cakes on Saturday (27 June), as they locked horns in the Great Architectural Cake Bake-Off. Teams from Zaha Hadid Architects, Rogers Stirk Harbour and Partners, Squire + Partners, ARUP, HOK, BDP and Foster + Partners gathered for one of the more light-hearted events to feature during the London Festival of Architecture. The competition was conceived and hosted by

Austrian architects Elmar Ludescher and Philip Lutz have created a modern winery to embody the ‘fine art of wine production in the abstract’. The new winery at the 50-year-old Högl family vineyard in Lower Austria will house some of the winemaking processes and give visitors a space to sample the wines. The seven hectare vineyard, which produces dry and sweet white wines, sits on the border of the Wachau UNESCO

Officials at Seattle Aquarium are looking into the possibility of a grand expansion, adding at least 40 per cent more exhibit space to the visitor attraction at a cost of up to US$200m (€178.5m, £127.1m) No plans have been drawn up yet, but Marc L’Italien of San Francisco-based architecture firm EHDD has been named as masterplanner for the development. L'Italien was the architect responsible the development of a stunning new

Designed by Philippe Pastre of Atelier d’Architecture and Patrice Gardera of Gardera-D, the 250sq m (2,691sq ft) Alaena Spa in Biarritz, France, has opened its doors with a contemporary Japanese architectural influence and a focus on both relaxation and aesthetic medicine. The spa development includes four treatment rooms, one skin exfoliation room, Japanese baths by Nendo Designs, an Experience shower and a Hammam by Effegibi. “We want to offer a

Architect Shigeru Ban’s newly-opened art museum in Japan has been designed to serve as an outside space to be freely used by all – connecting the interior galleries to the surrounding city area. Oita Prefectural Art Museum (OPAM) features a collection of more than 5,000 works by Japanese painters and sculptors, and is touted as a museum of encounters and of the five senses. It is located in the city

Disney is considering a US$1bn (€892m, £635m) investment into its Disneyland Resort in California, with the investment dependent on the city of Anaheim waiving tax on park admission tickets for a further 30-year period. The ticket-tax ban could again be extended a further 15 years after that if Disney embarks on a separate US$500m (€446m, £317m) expansion. Disneyland California currently holds tax exempt status from an agreement made with the

Leisure architecture projects from the likes of Foster + Partners, Zaha Hadid Architects, BIG and Populous have made the 2015 shortlist for the World Building of the Year. Organised by the World Architecture Festival, 338 projects in total have made the shortlist in a variety of categories, with both major international firms and smaller companies taking their place. There are entries included from 46 countries. Aside from the overall World

Investor, developer and operator, Shangri-La Hotels & Resorts, is on site with Shangri-la at the Fort, a mixed-use development in Manila, the Philippines which will open in Q4 this year. The building will be one of the tallest in the country at 250m (820ft) and one of the first luxury lifestyle developments in the Philippines. Shangri-la at the Fort will include a Shangri-La hotel and residences, as well as Horizon

Edutainment provider KidZania has launched what the company's founder and president, Xavier López Ancona, says is the company's global flagship inside London’s high-end Westfield Shopping Centre. Targeted at children aged 4-14, the £30m (US$47.2m, €42.1m) KidZania London is offering a one-of-a-kind experience to the UK, with the recreation of a pint-sized city for children to experience real-world jobs in the ultimate role-play activity. Designed to educate and empower children, KidZania