The Duke of Edinburgh has officially opened the Indonesian-inspired Tiger Territory at London Zoo, which will be home to endangered Sumatran tigers Jae Jae and Melati. The £3.6m project has seen the tigers' home expand five fold to 27,000sq ft (2,500sq m) and has been designed by the conservationists and the zoo's tiger keepers. It includes towering trees and a custom-built swimming pool and is the zoo's biggest investment since

UK-based architectural firm Caruso St John has unveiled its proposal for the new Zurich Arena, which saw the firm win the design contract. The project will include arenas for both ice hockey club ZSC Lions and volleyball team Volero as well as hockey training facilities. The design proposes a building with qualities between a monument and a tent. Caruso St John said the clarity of its structure and volume suggest

The British government has launched an independent review of architecture and the built environment with aims to better shape policy to achieve high quality design. The report - expected to be complete by the end of the year - will be led by London-based architect Sir Terry Farrell with support provided by an advisory panel. In addition to the government's role in promoting quality design the review will look at

The team behind London's £14.8bn rail project Crossrail has revealed plans to host permanent large-scale public art across eight stations along the 118km route. Crossrail - to be funded entirely through private sponsorship - will work with leading art organisations and commercial galleries to secure international commissions for the project, called The Cultural Line. Crossrail, due to open in 2018, will include 37 stations spanning from Maidenhead and Heathrow in

Concept designs have been revealed for a £10.5m visitor centre and hostel at the Hadrian's Wall World Heritage Site in Northumberland National Park. Newcastle architects Jane Darbyshire and David Kendall (JDDK Architects) have been appointed to explore the initial concepts for The Sill, which will replace existing facilities built in the 1960s. The building will act as a hub for visitors to explore more than 400sq miles of national park,

The Vatican will host a pavilion at the Venice Biennale this year - the first time in its 84-year history as an independent state. The Holy See is one of 10 new participant countries exhibiting at the international avant-garde art exhibition, with others including Tuvalu, Bahrain, the Ivory Coast and Paraguay. The Vatican exhibit will be held in the Arsenale pavilion - a former barracks that is currently being revamped.

West Ham United Football Club (WHU) will be the new anchor tenant of the London Olympic Stadium following the government's agreement to contribute a further £25m towards converting the venue. WHU was chosen as the preferred bidder for the tenancy in December 2012 but the signing of the deal was dependent on a number of financial and commercial terms being agreed upon. It is believed that as part of the

The Royal Institute of British Architects have announced Daniel Madeiros and Jonathan Schwinge as the winners of the Millennium Point Visability Competition. The brief of the RIBA Competition was to enhance the visibility and image of the Birmingham mixed-use development, which opened in 2001 and includes a science museum, 180-seat theatre, cinema, education centres and commercial offices. Philip Singleton, chief executive of Millennium Point said: "The panel was struck by

Ocean Park Hong Kong will likely move ahead with plans to build an all-weather water park at Tai Shue Wan earlier than anticipated, due to a government loan of HK$2.3bn (US$296m, 229m euro, £196m). Announced in the financial secretary's February budget speech, the purpose of the loan is to spur on the project and stimulate Hong Kong's tourism economy - one of the mainstays of its economy. The loan is

Work has started on the first of London's 'pocket parks', which have received £2m of funding to transform neglected urban spaces into mini oases. Twenty-seven 'nooks and crannies' were selected for the first round of funding in 17 boroughs across the city. Benefits of the parks include improving air quality, reducing flood risk, providing shade and offering a haven for wildlife. A £30,000 edible park on dead space behind a

Leading architects, planners and city experts are in London this week to attend Fit Cities-Fit World - a conference organised to look at the role design and planning have in ensuring cities have healthy and active populations. Held at City Hall, the conference will examine and build on what was learned as a result of major infrastructure and urban developments created for the London 2012 Games, including Queen Elizabeth Park

A £2.5m project to transform the visitor experience at Norfolk’s 900-year-old Wymondham Abbey is now able to go ahead due to Heritage Lottery Funding worth £1.5m. Improvements to the Grade I listed site include: two new extensions – including one within a ruined chapel; the removal of inappropriate architectural additions; a recreated medieval herb garden; and public access to county wildlife site Abbey Meadows. A full time learning and events

Birmingham’s £450m regeneration programme for its city centre has taken a step forward with a funding allocation of £63.1m approved for the first phase of the project. The Paradise Circus project was one of the UK’s largest city centre outline planning applications approved last year and will include up to 10 buildings in 17 acres of land between Centenary Square and Chamberlain Square. The funding was approved on 14 March

Hilton Worldwide has announced the expansion of its Waldorf Astoria Hotels & Resorts brand into Latin America with the opening of its latest luxury property featuring a 2,000sq ft (186sq m) branded spa. The Waldorf Astoria Panama is located in the heart of Panama City and features 248 guest rooms, suites and luxury residences. Designed by the Miami-based firm ba-haus/KNF, the new hotel unveils a combination of fresh tones and

Fairmont Hotels & Resorts has unveiled plans for a new development that includes a luxury hotel, spa and branded residences in Istanbul, Turkey that will open in 2016. The 210-room hotel will be joined by branded residences and is part of the Quasar Istanbul complex, a new mixed-use development in the Sisli district. The Quasar Istanbul complex will comprise of two 41-storey towers that will sit above a four-storey office

Construction is now underway on an £11.5m project to create a dramatic new entrance at Glasgow's Theatre Royal and provide more public space at the venue. Earlier this year the Café Royal wing of the theatre was demolished and foundations have now been laid for the oval-shaped entrance, which will include bars, a box office, cloakrooms, toilet facilities and hospitality suites. Lifts will also be installed for the first time

The US National Gallery of Art will construct two new art wings and an outdoor sculpture terrace after securing US$30 (23.2m euro, £19.83m) in private donations. The additional 12,260sq ft (1,139sq m) of exhibition space will be constructed within the current footprint of the East Building on Washington's National Mall. Philanthropists who donated to the cause include: gallery president Victoria P. Sant and her husband Roger W. Sant; Mitchell Rales,

Preston Park Museum and Grounds has hosted an animated 3D film projected on its façade to celebrate its official re-launch following a £7m revamp. Hundreds turned up to view the night time animation, entitled Lustre, which centred around the hall and its hidden secrets. The restored museum now has a complete redisplay of its collections, an interactive Victorian street and a traditional walled kitchen garden and orchard. The Heritage Lottery

Danish design firm Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG) has been announced as the winning team to lead the first phase of the Smithsonian Campus Master Plan, in a US$2.4m (1.85m euro, £1.59m) contract. At 700,000sq ft (65,032sq m) the campus in Washington D.C., US is the world's largest museum and research complex and includes 19 museums, the National Zoological Park and nine research facilities. BIG has already revealed it hopes to

Building work on a new multi-million pound leisure development in Streatham, South London, has reached the topping out phase. The Streatham Hub leisure complex will include a 25m, six-lane swimming pool, a 13m learner pool, a 1,000-capacity ice rink, sports courts and a health and fitness club. Scheduled to open later this year, the mixed-use complex will also feature a Tesco Extra supermarket, 250 new homes, a local transport hub

An £11.6m funding application to regenerate Shrewsbury’s eighteenth-century Flax Mill Maltings for public and commercial use will be submitted to the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) by the end of March. The site comprises seven listed buildings and includes the Main Mill, which was built in 1797 and was the world’s first iron-framed building and the forerunner of the modern skyscraper. Other buildings to be renovated include the Kiln, the Dye,

Details of the UK's first Shangri-La - to occupy levels 34 to 52 of The Shard - have been revealed ahead of its opening this summer. The five-star 202-room property will be London's first elevated luxury hotel and promises panoramic views, including nearby attractions such as the Tate Modern, the Tower of London, St. Paul's Cathedral and Shakespeare's Globe. Room features will include custom-made beds, iPod docking stations, complimentary high-speed

A new interdisciplinary exhibition at New York's Museum of Design examines new design approaches in the post-millennial museum. After the Museum: The Home Front 2013 opened on 12 March and aims to get audiences reconsidering traditional notions of the structure and roles of museums through installations, digital initiatives, lectures and publications. Co-curator and manager of public programmes at the museum, Jake Yuzka, said: "Over the last on hundred years, both

Sunderland College is to undertake a multi-million pound project to improve sports and arts facilities that includes a new three-storey sports centre. The project, which will be developed by Bam Construction, will see the demolition of several buildings at the college's Bede Campus to make way for the new sports centre and a new visual and performing arts building. The 1,205 sq m (12,970sq ft) sports centre will include a

London's first railway hotel - Great Northern Hotel - will re-open in April for the first time in almost 12 years following multi-million-pound renovations. Situated between King's Cross Station and St Pancras International, the privately owned Grade II-listed building has been restored by owner-operator Jeremy Robson of Ram. Originally designed by architect Lewis Cubitt, the Great Northern Hotel opened in 1854 as the first of the new generation of Victorian

Dudley Council has approved plans for three attractions at Castle Hill submitted for planning permission in January. The £10.1m plans for the Dudley Zoological Gardens, the Black Country Living Museum and the Dudley Canal Trust include a shared arrival point for visitors, a new entrance for each attraction and 600 new parking spaces and an upgraded car park. The plans, which had been shared with the public in February, received

The Heritage Lottery Fund has this week awarded £704,500 for the permanent display of the largest and most valuable Anglo-Saxon treasure ever discovered at Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery. The 3,500-piece Staffordshire Hoard, which includes 7th-century gold and silver metalwork, has been on temporary display since September 2009 – two months after its discovery in a field near Lichfield. The proposed gallery will showcase approximately 300 items and interpret the