Construction work is set to get underway on a major £3m expansion of the conference and exhibition facilities at the Ricoh Arena in Coventry. Three new halls will be created as part of the scheme, which will result in an additional 2,500sq m (26,910sq ft) of exhibition space and a 650-seat auditorium to complement the existing 6,000sq m (64,583sq ft) Jaguar Exhibition Hall. A new entrance stairway will also be

Loughborough University has taken possession of SportPark, a bespoke sports administration hub which will host a number of UK sports bodies. Designed and built by Baggaley Construction, the £15m landmark building at the west entrance of the University campus will be home to sports organisations including British Swimming, the Amateur Swimming Association, Volleyball England, the Great Britain Wheelchair Basketball Association, UK Sport and the Youth Sports Trust. The sports

An international architectural competition is being launched to deliver a landmark building for The V&A at Dundee, a new centre of 21st century design for Scotland. The structure will occupy a site at the centre of Dundee's redeveloped waterfront area, sitting just to the south of Craig Harbour on a site to be created projecting out into the River Tay. Mike Galloway, Dundee City Council's director of city development said:

Westminster City Council has granted permission for the construction of a 'pod' style hotel as part of the redevelopment of the Trocadero tourist spot off London's Piccadilly Circus. The development - by Criterion Capital - will see the creation of 495 en-suite rooms measuring between 12-17sq m (129-183sq ft) and occupying the second to the seventh floors of the Grade II-listed structure. The first and ground floors will house retail

The Natural History Museum (NHM) in London has launched a new 270-seat restaurant. Designed by a partnership involving architects RWCA and interior designers Path Design, the 6,500sq ft restaurant is the third of the Museum's visitor catering zones to be re-vamped in the space of 12 months. To create the eatery, the museum had to obtain a listed building consent as plans included breaking through the original building fabric to

Hyatt Hotels and Suning Real Estate Development have signed agreements for Hyatt subsidiaries to provide management services to three hotels in China's Jiangsu province. Grand Hyatt Nanjing is currently scheduled to open in 2013 and Hyatt Regency Wuxi and Hyatt Regency Xuzhou are planned to debut in 2012. The 400-room Grand Hyatt Nanjing is to be part of the Suning Plaza mixed-use development, which will feature luxury serviced residences, a

The Sheraton Grand Hotel & Spa in Edinburgh is set to undergo a multi-million pound refurbishment as part of its 25th birthday celebrations. All of the hotels bedrooms and suites will be redesigned and more rooms will be created, increasing the hotel's bedroom count to 268. A new, opulent Grand Suite will also be added as part of a new, exclusive Club floor on the top floor of the hotel.

Emirates Golf Club has appointed London-based architects Thomson Perrett & Lobb (TPL) to modernise its flagship Majlis Course, home of the Dubai Desert Classic. TPL will carry out an audit of the course's bunkering as part of a wider modernisation programme, overseeing the repositioning and reconstruction of bunkers to upgrade the course for professional events as well as day-to-day club and visitor play. The 7,301-yard, par-72 layout, which opened in

ReardonSmith architects have revealed designs to build a luxury, subterranean hotel and spa at the Hersham Golf Club in Surrey. Plans for the hotel include 200 underground bedrooms located in three rings, each built around 800sq m garden courtyards. There will also be a luxury spa and restaurants and the total area of the hotel and new golf club will be approximately 16,500 sq m. Both hotel and spa have

The Saint Louis Art Museum in Missouri, US is to undergo its first major expansion in more than 20 years. Designed by London-based architect David Chipperfield, the expansion - in excess of 200,000sq ft - will provide new galleries, public space and a 300-space underground car park, as well as a new, fully accessible entrance on Fine Arts Drive. The project will result in a 30 percent increase in the

Construction has begun on a new £2.6m sports science centre at the University of Glamorgan in Pontypridd. The centre, which has been designed by London-based Holder Mathias Architects, is being built on the existing playing fields at the university and includes a new multi-purpose sports hall with six courts and an ancillary support block. The centre will also act as a high-tech teaching facility with a monitoring room enabling teaching

The US$1.6bn (£1bn, €1.3bn) Burj Dubai will officially open its doors today (4 January) in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Owned by real estate company Emaar Properties, the structure is the tallest building ever to be built at more than half a mile tall (2,690ft, 823m). Burj Dubai was designed by Chicago-based architects Skidmore, Owings and Merrill (SOM) and built by South Korean Samsung C&T. Samsung’s previous projects include the Taipei

Cherwell District Council (CDC) has announced the opening of the new £15m Spiceball Leisure Centre in Banbury, Oxfordshire, which has been completed on budget ahead of schedule. Initially due to open in January 2010, the new centre replaces the former Spiceball Park Leisure Centre and forms part of a wider sports centre modernisation programme in the local area, which is being led by Cherwell Community Leisure (CLL) - a wholly

Plans for the next stage of a scheme to regenerate the City Waterside area in Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire, have moved forward after a funding package worth nearly £6m was secured. On 9 December, Stoke-on-Trent City Council's (STCC) cabinet agreed to match funding worth £2.9m from housing market renewal pathfinder, RENEW North Staffordshire. The Homes and Communities Agency (HCA) has also contributed £2.9m towards the scheme. The £6m funding package will be

A new masterplan for the regeneration of Chard, Somerset, which has been drawn up by LDA Design, has received the backing of South Somerset District Council (SSDC) and Chard Town Council (CTC). London-based LDA Design, CTC and SSDC have worked on the plans alongside the South West Regional Development Agency and Somerset County Council, as well as consulting with local residents and stakeholders. The proposals include the creation of a

Camden Council has awarded planning permission to the £135m expansion of the British Museum. The plans received the green light at the second time of trying, after the council turned down an initial application in June 2009. The previous, rejected plans had angered a local conservation group, Bloomsbury Conservation Area Advisory Committee (BCAAC), which claimed the development would block daylight from the existing buildings and "diminish the museum's existing architectural

Developer Qatari Diar has appointed a new team to draw up a masterplan for the mixed-use redevelopment of the 12.8-acre (5.2-hectare) Chelsea Barracks site in Westminster, London. Dixon Jones, the London-based architects behind the refurbishment of the Royal Opera House, have been selected along with Squire and Partners and Kim Wilkie Associates to create a design framework for the scheme. The firms were chosen from a shortlist of 10 teams

An outline planning application for the transformation of East Float, which forms the main section of the £4.5bn Wirral Waters regeneration project at Birkenhead Docks, have been submitted to Wirral Council. Manchester-based developer Peel is leading the mixed-use scheme, which covers a 1.4 million sq m (15 million sq ft) area and will boast a range of restaurants, cafés and bars, a hotel and conference centre and cultural attractions. More

An énergie-branded health club has opened in a property which formerly housed a McDonald's fast food restaurant. The club in Forest Hill, south London, is owned and operated on a franchise by David Waugh and Andrew Grossett. The pair have invested £260,000 in the venture and facilities at the club include a range of cv stations and 11 pieces of resistance kit supplied by Precor as well as a large

Demolition work has started on the Mary Rose Ship Hall in Portsmouth, Hampshire, which is making way for the development of a new £35m museum dedicated to the historic Tudor warship. The ship itself at Portsmouth Historic Dockyard was withdrawn from public view on 20 September to allow work to start, which will see a boat-shaped museum building built over the dry dock containing the Mary Rose. A team including

A new museum in Abu Dhabi, being built under advisement from the British Museum, is to open 2013. The Zayed National Museum, which is being developed by the Tourism Development & Investment Company (TDIC), is to be the cornerstone of the Saadiyat Island Cultural District. Designed by London's Foster + Partners, the 12,000sq m (130,000sq ft) museum is named after Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan, the late founder and

The North Carolina Museum of Art in Raleigh, US, is to open its new 127,000sq ft expansion in April next year. Work began on the building, which was designed by New York-based Thomas Phifer and Partners, in December 2006. The new building will be home to the museum's permanent collection of 5,000 objects. The existing building will have its lobby renovated and will become a centre for temporary exhibitions, collections

Work has begun on a £7m redevelopment project on the Museum of Science and Industry (MOSI) in Manchester. The project is being led by architects Buttress Fuller Alsop Williams and funded jointly by the European Regional Development Fund, North West Development Agency (NWDA), DCMS, Garfield Weston and a number of other trusts and foundations. The improvement works will include the removal of the metal ramps at the heart of the

Northern Ireland tourism minister Arlene Foster has welcomed the "good progress" being made on the new £97m visitor attraction, which will be located in the centre of Belfast's Titanic Quarter. The Titanic Signature Building, which was designed by a team of international firms, including Eric Kuhn Associates, RFR and Event Communications, will tell the story of the city's association with the ill-fated luxury liner. Located at the head of the

The Neues Museum in Berlin, Germany has officially opened its doors for the first time in 70 years after a 212m euro (£192m) redevelopment project. The museum, which originally opened in 1855, was closed at the outbreak of World War II in 1939 and was subsequently damaged by bombing raids. British architect David Chipperfield’s refurbishment involved the reworking of the exhibition spaces, with modern design replacing the parts of the

Work has begun on the US$12m (£7.36m) Louisiana State Sports Hall of Fame and Regional History Museum in Natchitoches, US. The Sports Hall of Fame will feature a collection of memorabilia donated by 250 Louisiana sports figures, while the history museum will operate as part of the Louisiana State Museum system and will focus on the contributions of the diverse cultures that have shaped the state. The 28,000sq ft building

Plans for the transformation of the disused London Street Cathedral School in Derry, Northern Ireland, into a new social enterprise centre have been handed a £832,000 boost by the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF). The B1-listed Victorian schoolhouse, which was built in 1891 as the primary school attached to the St Columb's Church of Ireland Cathedral, is to be restored to provide a new venue for cultural and heritage tourism. London-based