Montparnasse Commercial Centre and CIT Tower redevelopment project, 2026. Image Courtesy of RPBW
This week's news compilation opens with two international commemorations, the International Day for Clean Energy and the International Day of Education, alongside a major archaeological discovery in Fano, Italy, where excavations have revealed a basilica described by Vitruvius, linking contemporary architectural discourse with deep historical continuity. Across this week's broader architecture news landscape, a central theme emerges around the advancement of civic architecture conceived as open, publicly engaged infrastructure, with cultural and institutional projects increasingly designed to strengthen their relationship with the city and everyday urban life. At the same time, renewed global attention turns toward Africa, where large-scale transport infrastructure and the conservation of modernist landmarks reflect interests in the region and the reassessment of the continent's architectural heritage. Complementing these narratives, this week's highlights also include a new model for car-free urban districts, co-designed public landscapes grounded in indigenous knowledge, and a residential development responding to regional context, reflecting how architecture is negotiating public space, civic responsibility, and territorial identity across diverse geographies.
The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) has announced that Irish architect, educator, and writer Níall McLaughlin will receive the 2026 Royal Gold Medal for Architecture. Awarded on behalf of His Majesty the King, the Royal Gold Medal is among the significant international distinctions in architecture, recognizing a sustained contribution to the advancement of the discipline through built work, education, and critical discourse. In announcing the award, RIBA noted McLaughlin's long-standing influence across architectural practice and pedagogy, citing a career that spans more than three decades and reflects a consistent engagement with the cultural, environmental, and social dimensions of architecture.
Foster + Partners, in collaboration with Angola's Ministry of Transport, has unveiled the master plan for the Icolo e Bengo Aerotropolis, a large-scale development planned around the recently completed Dr. Antonio Agostinho Neto International Airport. The proposal organizes business, research, residential, and hospitality programs within a landscape-led framework structured around the airport. Development is planned to proceed in phases, beginning with the business and cultural district located to the north of the site.
David Chipperfield Architects has released new images of the Ice Hockey Arena in Milan, one of the host sports venues for the 2026 Milano Cortina Winter Olympics. The project, currently in its testing phase, was commissioned to Arup and David Chipperfield Architects in 2021. The first images of the elliptical amphitheatre arena were released in 2022, ahead of the start of construction in 2023, which was scheduled for completion in 2025. The new sports and cultural events venue has a capacity of 16,000 spectators, 12,000 seated and 4,000 standing, and is a centrepiece of a broader urban redevelopment project originally designed by Foster + Partners for Milano Santa Giulia, a district in the south-east of Milan, just a few kilometres from the city centre and connected to the high-speed rail network and motorway.
WORKac is a New York-based firm founded in 2003 by Amale Andraos and Dan Wood. The firm has always believed in "the power of architecture and design to engage in environmental and social concerns, and to create new possibilities for the future." In that sense, the firm's principals define their approach to architecture as a constant evolution. For them, it is a continuous process of learning, questioning, and relearning, which is nurtured through the firm's engagement in local culture, climates, and histories, as well as discourse in the fields of ecology, landscape, and urbanism. In this way, they are able to bring these topics together with a focus on public, cultural, and civic projects that aim to reinvent how people live, work, and experience the world.
A new year has begun, and with it, a new edition of the ArchDaily Building of the Year Awards. For 17 years, we have handed over the reins to you, our readers, to choose the best architectural projects of the year, and you have consistently delivered. With a brand new set of over 3,000 projects from around the globe, it is now time to get lost in our projects library and start making your selection.
From a tiny library in rural Myanmar, awarded in the first ever edition of the Building of the Year in 2009, to an innovative waste-to-energy plant in 2025, the winners of the Awards have always been surprising, inspiring and, most importantly, a reflection of the current architectural landscape. Anyone can register for a free ArchDaily account and vote, and we invite you to delve into the catalog of projects published in 2025—all of which are eligible to participate under one or more of the 15 available categories—to choose your favorites.
https://www.archdaily.com/1037980/the-archdaily-2026-building-of-the-year-awardsDaniela Porto
By operating with only five notes, the pentatonic scale establishes a stable and intuitive musical system in which structural clarity allows for variation without the risk of excessive dissonance. From this consolidated structure, which forms the basis of countless musical styles, especially popular music, the blues introduced a decisive inflection by incorporating additional notes into the scale. Without delving into excessive technicalities, these are subtle tonal deviations, small dissonances often associated with a more melancholic sound, known as blue notes. Played fleetingly rather than as emphatic accents, they briefly tension the system, adding expressiveness and depth while keeping the underlying structure intact.
If in music the blues scale operates through a subtle deviation that "seasons" the underlying structure, a similar principle can be identified in architecture. Although comparisons between different artistic languages are always delicate, it is possible to recognize projects that find their expressive strength not in rupture, but in localized inflections introduced within clear systems, whether of modulation, subtraction, materiality, or typology. Localized displacements and asymmetries function as internal tensions that do not compromise the coherence of the whole, revealing how expressiveness can emerge from controlled deviation rather than from permanent exception.
When developing an architectural project, there are multiple possible points of departure. Some architects begin with volume, gradually carving form in dialogue with its context. Others start from the longitudinal section, while some organize the project around the functional layout of the plan. There is no right or wrong method, but rather distinct approaches that reflect different ways of thinking about and making architecture. Since the widespread adoption of solar panels and photovoltaic energy, however, a recurring pattern has emerged: these systems are almost always introduced later in the process, framed as technical optimizations or responses to regulatory and energy-efficiency requirements. As a result, they tend to be treated as secondary elements, often relegated to rooftops or less visible areas and detached from the architectural language of the building.
Lampegiet Theatre in Veenendaal, Netherlands. Image Courtesy of MVRDV
Designed by MVRDV in collaboration with Buro Happold, the new Lampegiet Theatre in Veenendaal, the Netherlands, is scheduled to replace the existing theatre building from 1988. Approved by the Veenendaal City Council in January 2026, the project is expected to begin construction in 2027 and reach completion in 2029. Conceived as a contemporarycultural venue that responds to both current performance requirements and the city's historical identity, the new theatre introduces a compact, multi-volume composition wrapped in a porous ceramic facade that allows the building to act as an illuminated urban landmark.
Pritzker Prize-winning architecture firm Herzog & de Meuron has released new images showing construction progress on the Memphis Art Museum, set to open in December 2026. Currently operating as the Memphis Brooks Museum of Art, the institution is both the oldest and largest art museum in Tennessee, United States, with a collection of more than 10,000 works spanning from ancient to contemporary art. Commissioned in 2019, the project marks the museum's relocation to a new site in Downtown Memphis along the Mississippi River bluff. The first images of the new cultural campus, designed by Herzog & de Meuron with architect of record archimania and landscape design by OLIN, were released in 2021. The 123,500-square-foot museum will expand gallery space by 50 percent and introduce extensive free, publicly accessible areas conceived as an open invitation to the city.
Residential architecture remains one of the most active fields for unbuilt architectural exploration, offering a lens through which architects rethink how domestic space can respond to landscape, climate, and contemporary patterns of living. In this Unbuilt edition, submitted by the ArchDaily community, the selected proposals bring together a range of residential projects that engage with houses, villas, and retreats as sites of withdrawal, mediation, and everyday inhabitation. Rather than treating the home as a fixed or isolated object, these projects approach it as a spatial framework that negotiates exposure, privacy, and connection to place.
How the "Espacios de Paz" project is transforming community spaces in Venezuela. Pinto Salinas -- Oficina Lúdica + PKMN. Image Courtesy of PICO Estudio.
In Latin America, encounters do not necessarily arise from grand architectural gestures or monumental urban plans. They emerge from the in-between, from intermediate spaces: the courtyard, the veranda, the sidewalk, the shared corridor. These areas, often considered residual or informal by the traditional architectural discipline, are precisely where everyday life builds bonds.
From this Latin American culture comes a spatial logic in which daily life is organized in a relational and expansive way. Practices such as sitting at the front door, occupying the sidewalk, and playing in the street produce a lived city that extends beyond the formal limits of design.
Archaeological excavations in Fano, Italy, have revealed the basilica described by Vitruvius in De Architectura, a finding of major architectural significance, as it represents the only structure that can be attributed with certainty to the Roman architect. Identified during redevelopment works in Piazza Andrea Costa, the discovery provides rare physical evidence of Vitruvian theory translated into built form and offers new insights into Roman architectural design, proportions, and construction practices. The announcement was made during a press conference at the Montanari Media Library, attended by representatives of local, regional, and national institutions, including Italy's Minister of Culture Alessandro Giuli.
January 26 marks the International Day for Clean Energy, an initiative aimed at raising awareness and mobilizing action for an inclusive transition from fossil fuels, such as coal, oil, and natural gas, to power generation systems with lower greenhouse gas emissions and fewer pollutants. The term "clean" signals a fundamental shift away from extractive, finite, and exhaustible energy sources toward systems based on renewable resources or on capturing energy embedded in natural processes. In a world grappling with climate change, clean energy plays an important role in reducing emissions and expanding access to reliable power. However, being labeled "clean" does not exempt these systems from the impacts associated with their production, deployment, and commercialization. In this context, architectural knowledge related to space, materiality, and habitation becomes relevant for supporting a transition toward energy systems that are sustainable over time. As stated by the United Nations, the science is clear: to limit climate change, reliance on fossil fuels must end, and buildings must be heated, lit, and electrified through clean, accessible, affordable, sustainable, and reliable power sources.
Architecture is increasingly asked to do less, not more. In environments shaped by constant movement, noise, and expectation, spaces that allow people to stay, pause, and be present have become both rarer and more necessary. Many public and semi-public places are designed to keep people moving, consuming, or reacting, leaving little room for lingering, observation, or simply being without a reason.
In response, a growing body of work is shifting attention away from activation and toward presence. Rather than asking users to interact or participate, these spaces create conditions that support staying. Comfort, continuity, and openness allow people to remain without pressure or obligation, making presence a spatial quality rather than an activity.
Launched in September 2024, the Rediscovering Modernism in Africa series joined a growing worldwide interest in this topic. Previously underrepresented in architectural discussions, the work of architects and researchers on the continent and abroad has continued to tell the story of these high-quality modern works of architecture. These buildings represent designers striving to create locally suited architecture using global concepts and technologies, coinciding with huge political changes as most African countries gained their independence.
Unlike most popular sports, the origin of basketball has a precise year and creator: it was invented in 1891 in the United States by Canadian physical education instructor James Naismith as an indoor sport for athletes at Springfield College during the winter, after the end of the football season. The sport quickly expanded beyond U.S. borders, being included in the Olympic Games in 1936 and achieving international popularity after the Second World War. As basketball became more widespread, it also left the controlled environment of gymnasiums and began occupying a wide range of locations: playgrounds, public plazas, school courtyards, driveways, and backyard patios became informal courts for play and community life, reinforcing the role of physical activity as a catalyst for social interaction and neighborhood regeneration.
Education has long been understood as a cornerstone of social development, shaping not only individual futures but also the collective capacity of societies to respond to change. Observed annually on 24 January, the International Day of Education invites reflection on the role education plays in addressing global challenges and sustaining social progress. As the world confronts overlapping challenges, from technological transformation to deepening inequalities, the question of how education is imagined, governed, and experienced has become increasingly urgent.
Montparnasse Commercial Centre and CIT Tower redevelopment project, 2026. Aerial view. Image Courtesy of RPBW
During a presentation to the press held at Paris City Hall on January 7, 2026, architect and Pritzker Prize laureate Renzo Piano released the first images of the transformation of Montparnasse's emblematic shopping center and CIT Tower into a pedestrian-focused district in Paris, France. The project, commissioned to Renzo Piano Building Workshop (RPBW) in 2022 by the co-owners of the commercial complex, proposes both a visual and functional transformation of the 1970s low-rise retail development into a more traversable space characterized by transparency and openness. The design was developed in parallel with the redevelopment of the Montparnasse Tower, led by Nouvelle AOM, to reshape the broader tertiary complex into a contemporary Parisian block oriented toward public life, environmental performance, and everyday use. The project reopens the site to the city, reconnecting streets and restoring continuity between Montparnasse and its surrounding neighborhoods through new public spaces.
World Monuments Fund (WMF) is an independent organization dedicated to safeguarding significant places that enrich people's lives and foster mutual understanding across cultures and communities. Since 2008, the World Monuments Fund/Knoll Modernism Prize has been a biennial award recognizing outstanding achievements in the conservation of buildings emblematic of the modernist architectural movement. The prize honors individuals and organizations that revitalize modern built heritage through innovative and sensitive architectural interventions.
On January 22, 2026, WMF and Knoll announced the Australia-based architecture firm Architectus as the recipient of the 2026 World Monuments Fund/Knoll Modernism Prize for its conservation of the United Nations' Historic Africa Hall in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. The jury recognized the project for reestablishing a significant work of African modernism as an active venue for diplomacy and cultural exchange. In addition to the main prize, the jury also awarded Paul Rudolph's Umbrella House in Sarasota, Florida, United States, with the Stewardship Award for Modernist Homes.
Sunset panorama of a large residential gated community (Aparna’s Elixir) viewed from Khajaguda hills, India. Photo by iMahesh. License Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International
You learn how to behave long before you arrive home. At the gate, you slow down and wait. You are watched, then waved through. A badge is checked, a barrier lifts, a camera blinks. Nothing dramatic happens, and that is precisely the point. The most consequential work of gated communities is not done by their walls, but by the choreography of entry that quietly teaches residents what to expect, whom to trust, and where they belong.
Lu Wenyu—co-founder of Amateur Architecture Studio with Pritzker laureate Wang Shu—has shaped many of the practice's most emblematic works across China, including the Ningbo History Museum and the Xiangshan Campus of the China Academy of Art in Hangzhou. Often working outside the spotlight, her leadership is unmistakable in the discipline of execution and the roles she has assumed: in 2003, together with Wang Shu, she established the Architecture Department at the China Academy of Art, where she also serves as Director of the Sustainable Construction Center. Her practice and teaching form a reciprocal loop: research conducted in studios at the China Academy of Art continually folds back into construction strategies on site, while lessons learned in the field return to the classroom as material intelligence rather than abstract theory.
Founded by Oliver Thomas, the ATN Summit is the first flagship conference of the Archi-Tech Network, marking five years since the platform began as a grassroots initiative to share real-world architectural knowledge. Taking place on March 18–19, 2026, in London, the ATN Summit brings together architects, technologists, and industry innovators to explore how emerging technologies are reshaping architectural practice. Designed as a high-production, ideas-driven event, the Summit reflects ATN's evolution from an informal online conversation into a global platform actively engaging with the future of the built environment.
