This week, we revisited the ideas currently shaping the design of 21st-century cities, with a view toward a longer timeframe than that which characterised modern design. These examples of today's urban design point toward the cities of tomorrow, seeking to reflect collective memory and social identity while addressing the climate challenges we face today. From a new museum in Panama drawing on Latin American architectural tradition to an inflatable installation on Paris's oldest bridge over the Seine, built and not-yet-built projects rescue architecture as a repository of collective memory, while others explore its transformative potential through the lens of contemporary well-being. In this weekly news compilation, we present ongoing projects from Panama, numerous African countries, France, Canada, Italy, Australia, and the United States.
Following an international design competition launched in January 2026, the Museum of Contemporary Art of Panama (MAC Panamá) announced the selection of Mexican architects Palma + Taller TO to design its new building. The museum is described as "a new cultural infrastructure open to the city, conceived from the identity, climate, and landscape of Panama." The future museum headquarters will be located in the corregimiento of San Francisco, to consolidate the area as a hub of cultural activity. The selection criteria involved the relationship between the museum and the city, prioritizing proposals with integrated elements for community engagement and framing the building as a cultural infrastructure, enriching the contemporary urban environment of Panama City.
With over 100,000 votes cast during the last three weeks, we are happy to present the winners of the 2022 ArchDaily Building of the Year Awards. This peer-based, crowdsourced architecture award showcases projects chosen by ArchDaily readers who filtered thousands of projects down to the 15 best works featured on ArchDaily in 2021.
As in previous years, the winners showcase a wide spectrum of different types of building, giving an insight into how diverse the profession has become in recent decades. High-profile practices take their place as ever, with winners such as MVRDV's Housing project in Bordeaux and Kengo Kuma's Casa Batllo's installation, showing that establishment firms are still able to make their mark, as in more traditional award systems. Alongside these are previously unsung heroes, such as PALMA and HANGHAR with their project, Types of Spaces. Among the winners, we also find Ca'n Terra House by ENSAMBLE STUDIO and Plaza of Kanagawa Institute of Technology by Junya Ishigami + Associates, extremely creative projects that today challenge their typologies.
But for all their many beautiful differences, the winners share a crucial element in common: they represent the values of our mission, to bring inspiration, knowledge, and tools to architects everywhere. Neither ArchDaily nor the Building of the Year Awards would be possible without the continued generosity of the firms that choose to publish their projects with ArchDaily every year, or without the engaged readers who take part in the voting process.
The 2022 Building of the Year Awards is brought to you thanks to Dornbracht, renowned for leading designs for architecture, which can be found internationally in bathrooms and kitchens.
Architecture in Mexico has a vast history that is made up of various aspects that touch astrological, political, spiritual and economic issues. Although today there are only ruins of some of the most important pre-Hispanic complexes, thanks to the in-depth research that has been carried out, we can have some representations of what those buildings that laid the foundations of what makes us today were like. In these representations, it is possible to notice the presence of natural materials that were a response to their environment such as basalt stone, stucco and some vegetable paintings whose remains persist to this day.
The 7th edition of the International Architecture and Design Festival Concéntrico proposed new readings of public space through a series of temporary installations that re-imagined various places throughout the Spanish city of Logroño. Emerging architecture practices and artists from around the world shared their perspectives on the public realm and the spaces of social interaction by exploring various themes and experimenting with new ways of understanding urban spaces.
St. Bartholomew hut by Paradigma Ariadné. Image Courtesy of Concéntrico
The International Architecture and Design Festival Concéntrico, now at its 7th edition, prompts an exploration of the urban environment through temporary installations inhabiting the public spaces of the city of Logroño, Spain. From September 2nd to 5th, the festival brings together an array of emerging architects and artists from all over the world to share their perspectives on urban spaces and communities.
