Juneteenth, observed annually on June 19th, commemorates the emancipation of enslaved African Americans in the United States, marking a moment of liberation and reflection on a complex and often overlooked history. Originally celebrated in Texas, Juneteenth has grown to symbolize broader themes of freedom, resilience, and cultural identity, fostering conversations about justice and representation. This day also presents an opportunity to highlight the ways in which architecture can serve as a medium for preserving and presenting African American history and cultural values.
Architecture, beyond its functional and aesthetic qualities, can reflect and collect narratives, values, and hidden histories, giving a tangible and visual presence to communities often underrepresented in cityscapes. Buildings dedicated to African American history and culture become physical landmarks that anchor these stories within the daily life of cities. They serve as places of learning, reflection, and celebration, creating meaningful spaces that engage the public and foster a sense of communal identity.
Designed by David Chipperfield Architects, Muzej Lah, a new contemporaryart museum, is set to open in the summer of 2026 in Bled, Slovenia. Located at the foothills of the Julian Alps, the museum will house the Fundacija Lah art collection, developed over more than three decades by Slovenian philanthropists Igor and Mojca Lah. The collection will be made publicly accessible for the first time with the opening of the institution.
Architectural competitions have long offered a space for experimentation: platforms where ideas can be tested, typologies reimagined, and critical questions addressed through design. Freed from some of the constraints of commercial commissions, competition entries often reflect ambitious visions for how architecture can respond to environmental, cultural, and social challenges. Whether focused on future habitats, public institutions, or small-scale community infrastructure, these proposals give shape to the values and priorities driving architectural thinking today.
This month's Unbuilt selection brings together eight competition-winning projects submitted by the ArchDaily community. Each received first, second, or third place in recent local and international competitions. The featured proposals span a wide range of programs and geographies: a sustainable library in Lima, a Martian habitat exploring closed-loop systems, an adult orphanage designed for empowerment in India, a new French school in Athens, and a placemaking initiative in Singapore rooted in local folklore. While varied in scale and scope, they all highlight architecture's capacity to engage context, foster inclusion, and propose new ways of inhabiting space.
Cafés in museums and galleries do more than provide convenience — they have become an essential part of today’s cultural experience. As Claire Bishop explains in her idea of the “expanded aesthetic experience,” cultural spaces now include hybrid environments that encourage new ways of engaging, socializing, and reflecting. In this context, cafés are not just places to rest; they extend the visit on both sensory and symbolic levels, offering moments of interaction and contemplation in carefully designed settings. By blending architecture, art, and hospitality, they help create immersive and welcoming atmospheres — a concept already hinted at by Brian O’Doherty, who viewed exhibition spaces as an integral part of the artwork itself.
Founded in 1870, The Metropolitan Museum of Art — affectionately known as The Met — is one of the world's most important and visited museums, housing over two million works that span five millennia of human history. Located in the heart of New York City, alongside Central Park, the museum is celebrated for its vast and diverse collections, ranging from ancient Egyptian art to European masters and contemporary works. Paintings, sculptures, documents, historical artifacts, and multimedia pieces make up an ensemble that demands meticulously planned exhibition solutions to ensure both preservation and the effective communication of their historical and artistic value.
In 2021, The Met launched one of its most ambitious projects: the renovation of The Michael C. Rockefeller Wing, dedicated to the Arts of Africa, the Ancient Americas, and Oceania. With a $70 million investment, the initiative encompasses curatorial reorganization, oriented by a more regional and historical approach, as well as architectural interventions. The modernization of the galleries includes enhancements to natural lighting, accessibility improvements, and the incorporation of contemporary museographic systems, designed to optimize conservation and the interpretive experience for visitors.
The V&A East Storehouse will open to the public for the first time on Saturday, 31 May 2025. Located in the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, the project is part of East Bank, a new cultural quarter supported by the Mayor of London. Designed by the internationally recognized architecture firm Diller, Scofidio + Renfro, the new facility serves as both a working store and a visitor destination. Following a decade of planning and extensive audience consultation, V&A East Storehouse is the first of V&A East's two new cultural destinations to open in East London. The second, V&A East Museum, is scheduled to open in spring 2026 and will explore the role of making and creativity as agents of change.
Asaan Museum, Render by Specto-Digital. Image Courtesy of ZHA
Designed by Zaha Hadid Architects, construction works for the Asaan Museum have recently begun. Located in the historic At-Turaif district of Diriyah, Saudi Arabia, the Asaan Museum aims to be a new cultural institution designed to preserve and celebrate the nation's heritage. Deriving its name from the Arabic word meaning "inheritance passed down through generations," Asaan underscores its role in connecting past and present. Situated within a site renowned for its mud-brick architecture and centuries-old urban fabric, the museum draws inspiration from traditional Najdi building techniques. Planned to be constructed using locally sourced clay mud-bricks, Asaan Museum will mark Zaha Hadid Architects' first project to employ adobe construction.
Fenix is a new museum in Rotterdam's City Harbour, dedicated to the collection of historic and contemporary objects that explore migration through art. It is located on the Katendrecht peninsula on the south bank of the River Maas, in a 100-year-old former warehouse recently renovated by MAD Architects and Bureau Polderman. This marks MAD Architects' first commission for a public cultural building in Europe. Recently completed, the building is set to open this Friday, May 16, showcasing three exhibitions: All Directions, featuring over 150 artworks and objects from the Fenix collections; The Family of Migrants, a photographic exhibition by Edward Steichen; and The Suitcase Labyrinth, an interactive installation made up of 2,000 donated suitcases.
On April 23-24, 2025, at the ACCIONA Campus, the second edition of the NEXT IN Summit, hosted by ACCIONA Living & Culture, brought together global leaders in museology, architecture and art. Inaugurated in the presence of Madrid's mayor, José Luis Martínez Almeida, the event highlighted best practices in cultural space design, management, and innovation. Esteemed figures such as architect David Chipperfield, Glenn D. Lowry, director of MoMA, digital artist Rafael Lozano-Hemmer, and Mariët Westermann, director and CEO of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, led discussions on the future of cultural institutions.
Zaha Hadid Architects has just revealed that the Shenzhen Science & Technology Museum, located in the Guangming District, has officially opened. Designed as a platform to highlight scientific research and technological innovation, the institution will explore the role of science in shaping the future. Adjacent to Guangming Station on Shenzhen's metro network, the design responds to its location as a solid, spherical volume facing the city, defining the southeast corner of the new Science Park. The museum aims to provide a space for public engagement with current developments in science and technology.
In recent weeks, a number of architecture firms have unveiled new projects that reflect an ongoing shift toward integrated, environmentally responsive urban planning. From Europe to the Middle East and North America, these proposals balance spatial innovation with long-term sustainability, whether through car-free living, passive performance strategies, or adaptive modular construction. While some projects reimagine infrastructure and public institutions, others explore how urban density can coexist with natural ecosystems. This edition of Architecture Now highlights a selection of recently announced masterplans, cultural buildings, and residential communities that offer new models for ecological and social resilience in the built environment.
Throughout their relatively recent history, museums have evolved to condense particular aspects of a culture and present them in a coherent and unified manner. This makes the connection between the architecture and the exhibit a crucial matter, as the architect is tasked with designing not only the framework and background of the exhibited arts or artifacts but also taking charge of the journey undertaken by the visitor, harmonizing the cultural gain with the lived spatial experience of walking the exhibition halls. However, not all museums have been purposely built for this task.
Across Europe, museums are being organized within or expanding upon historical monuments and buildings that have lost their original purpose. Then in a state of decay, this decision to reorganize them as cultural venues stops the decay and preserves the historical material, adding a new layer of complexity to the intended exhibits. The architect's role becomes that of introducing order and a system that can balance the heritage of the place with the needs of modern functionality, ensuring that the essence of the original structure is preserved while meeting the needs of contemporary exhibitions and public engagement.
BIG, Bjarke Ingels Group, has been selected to design the new Hungarian Natural History Museum in Debrecen. Located on a former sports ground at the northern edge of the city's Great Forest, Nagyerdő, the 23,000 m² museum is being developed in collaboration with Vikár és Lukács Építés Stúdió, Museum Studio, and TYPSA. The new institution will replace the existing museum in Budapest, supporting the government's vision to establish Debrecen as a regional hub for education and culture by 2030. Commissioned by the Museum and the Ministry of Culture and Innovation, the new building will house permanent and temporary exhibition halls, educational and research facilities, public amenities, and back-of-house spaces.
A previous exploration of cultural landmarks in the Middle East designed by international architects highlighted recurring themes such as architecture as an extension of the landscape, climate-responsive design, and abstraction of traditional forms. These projects often introduced high-tech environmental solutions, used monumental forms to reinterpret local identity, or positioned themselves as landmarks within the broader urban or desert landscape. While these approaches have defined many of the region's most recognizable cultural institutions, they represent just one side of the architectural discourse. An equally significant yet distinct trajectory emerges from local architects, who work within existing structures, historical contexts, and lived environments to create institutions that feel deeply embedded in their surroundings. This approach prioritizes continuity, transformation, and accessibility, ensuring that architecture remains an evolving part of the cultural fabric rather than a self-contained object.
Creating an atmosphere that enhances exhibitions and enriches the visitor and user experience requires a thoughtful balance between preserving a space's unique character and adapting it to meet the needs of artistic and cultural production. The challenge lies in maintaining a building's industrial atmosphere while accommodating the specific requirements of exhibition design or the various uses the new building will require. This delicate task involves careful consideration of spatial layout, material choices, and lighting solutions, all of which play a significant role in shaping the new environment.
In the autumn of 2024, the Kistefos Museum Foundation invited 28 architectural firms to participate in a prequalification process to design a new site-specific standalone gallery. Scheduled to open in 2031, the new museum building will house the art collection of the museum's founder, Christen Sveaas. The gallery will join Kistefos' sculpture park, which features 55 works by international artists such as Yayoi Kusama, Olafur Eliasson, Fernando Botero, and Anish Kapoor, as well as an industrial museum and BIG's award-winning art gallery, The Twist. Additionally, a new visitor center, designed by the Oslo-based architectural firm Lund Hagem, is set to open in 2026.
The 2025 Pritzker Prize has been awarded this year to Chinese Architect Liu Jiakun. Born in Chengdu in 1956, he grew up in the densifying city, before attending and graduating from the Chongqing Architecture and Engineering College (Chongqing University) in 1982 with a Bachelor of Engineering degree in Architecture, and becoming one of the first college graduates to be tasked with rebuilding the country during the Chinese transition period. However, it wasn't until many years later that the architect understood that "the built environment could be used as a medium for personal expression". It was then that his endeavors and career took off, with Liu Jiakun starting his practice in 1999, and participating in more collaborative works across China and Europe. Based on his experiences, his works are anchored in his understanding of reality and a respect towards China's multi-traditional history and internal diversity; all while achieving a seamless balance between architecture and nature, tradition and modernity.
These concepts do not obstruct his consciousness of human needs and the importance of community spaces. Through his projects, Liu Jiakun proves that spaces can affect human behavior and become positively evocative. A public space such as those he's created can be conducive to a benevolent atmosphere that provides rest and collaboration. "such as my pursuit of narrative and poetry in design." The comprehensiveness of Liu Jiakun's works makes it easy not to be constrained by stylistic or aesthetic limitations or requirements. He just follows what the site, natural landscape, pre-existing urban frame, and citizen needs might require. The physical result is a mix of all of these with the predominant vernacular traditions.
