The MARABAR stone project by American sculptor Elyn Zimmerman is slated to be demolished at the National Geographic headquarters. Located in Washington D.C., it includes more than a million pounds of placed granite. Sited within buildings by Edward Durell Stone and Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, the publicly accessible plaza would be demolished to accommodate a new pavilion.
With New York's skyline on the rise, Fast Company says that there will no longer be sunlight on the streets of Manhattan by 2020 (unless you can afford a rooftop penthouse). Thirty-four skyscrapers 700-feet and taller are currently in-progress or being proposed, adding to 41 that already exist. This may seem like a lot, but as Fast Company also points out London has 230 new towers over 20 stories planned. See National Geographic's "The New New York Skyline" illustration for a closer look.
Preservationists are in a race to document and preserve some of Yangon’s most admired cultural icons. Myanmar’s largest city, Yangon is experiencing an all to familiar story: rapid development taking precedence over preservation. As the National Geographic reports, “Hulking monoliths of concrete and blue-plated glass are replacing fine old residential and government buildings…Although much has already been lost, many architecturally or esthetically significant structures have hung on. The question now is how long they will last.” Read the complete story, here.
More than 500 years after it was built, Filippo Brunelleschi's dome of Santa Maria del Fiore in Florence, Italy, remains the largest masonry dome ever built. Leaving no plans or sketches behind, some of the secrets of its construction that Brunelleschi pioneered are still an enigma today. This short animation, presented by National Geographic and created by Fernando Baptista and Matthew Twombly, gives an idea of how the dome of the Duomo might have been built. Demonstrating the complexity of the task, made harder due to poor construction prior to Brunelleschi's commission, this film serves as a reminder of just how long it can take to create something timeless.