Olympics venue wins public building award

October 27, 2011  |  Exteriors

Hopkins Architects won the Prime Minister’s Better Public Building Award from the British Construction Industry Association in mid-October for their design of the London 2012 Velodrome. The Prime Minister’s Award takes into account a particularly wide range of criteria including whole-li…
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Tensioned-fabric city of the future

September 1, 2011  |  Exteriors

Conceived as part of an imaginary Paris with its arteries connected to a metropolis of the future, la “Ville Intelligente”, designed by Jakob + MacFarlane architects, opened this June in Paris’ Park de la Villette like a vision of an orange spacecraft. The ephemeral Ville Intellige…
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Steel mesh bridge in Madrid

September 1, 2011  |  Exteriors

French architect Dominique Perrault’s design of a footbridge (“Pasarela del Arganzuela”) links two banks of the Rio Manzanares in the heart of Madrid’s Manzanares lineal park and adjacent to his megastructure complex Caja Magica (2009). The 250m-long bridge’s helical fo…
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Fabric-roofed sports court

September 1, 2011  |  Exteriors

Emmanuel Catholic College in Beeliar, Western Australia, liked an existing conic, tensile fabric-roofed sports court, so when funding allowed development of an additional recreational and sports facility, the college preferred a similar design with a central post. Greenline Shade & Shelter Pty. …
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Geometric awning for carport

September 1, 2011  |  Exteriors, Features

A complex carport adds functionality and beauty to a Florida residence What could easily have been a recipe for failure ended up an example of success through perseverance. Consider: a client with strong convictions to the point of fanaticism for a preconceived design idea, a Greek chorus of consult…
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Fabric provides shade at Arizona zoo

September 1, 2011  |  Case Studies, Exteriors, Features

An Arizona zoo embraces the landscape; a fabric shade structure is key to its reinvigorated success At Tucson’s Reid Park Zoo, the entryway was redeveloped in 2003 to enhance facilities, demonstrate “green” building considerations and create a more significant identity for the zoo.…
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Shade structure in the Caribbean

September 1, 2011  |  Case Studies, Exteriors, Features

Taking full advantage of natural trade winds, a responsive shade system improves the micro climate of this streetscape on Grand Cayman Island With a planning and design team that reads like a who’s who of the planning movement called New Urbanism, the design of Camana Bay Town Centre on the we…
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Opening soon…

July 20, 2011  |  Exteriors

The largest composite building in the world sees first panels put in place on the new façade of the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam As reported in Fabric Architecture, July 2010, the museum façade redesign by Benthem Crouwel Architects consists of a single surface of Teijin Twaron and To…
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Mobilizarte: Mobile art pavilion

July 1, 2011  |  Exteriors

Riding on a cloud, promoting Brazil and art By Mason Riddle In reality, art and sports are not such odd bedfellows. And Mobilizarte proves it. The 500m2 mobile art pavilion will tour Brazil for four years beginning in the summer of 2012, making stops at the 2014 FIFA World Cup match sites, and concl…
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Interactive environment is up in the air

July 1, 2011  |  Exteriors

Rachely Rotem Studio and Phu Hoang Office together have won the SHIFTboston Barge 2011 competition to design an interactive environment on a barge in Boston’s Fort Point Channel. Entitled “Lighter than Air”, the winning design is comprised of 3-D camouflage netting held up by heliu…
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