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NPO Aoyama Design Forum (ADF), a non-profit organization, has announced the ADF Design Award 2026, celebrating architecture that does more than please the eye—it aims to make a meaningful impact on society, culture, and the environment. The award aims to recognize outstanding works that challenge existing conventions, demonstrate innovative thinking, and enrich people's lives through visionary, responsible design. Architects and designers around the world are invited to submit their proposals on a unique platform that fosters connections, promotes the exchange of ideas, and encourages meaningful cross-cultural collaboration.

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Frankfurt is often recognised for its distinctive skyline, a rare feature in European cities. Towering glass skyscrapers mark its role as a global financial hub, yet beneath this vertical image lies a city layered with centuries of history, destruction, and reconstruction. From medieval timber-framed houses to post-war modernism and contemporary high-rises, Frankfurt has consistently reinvented itself through architecture, producing a built environment where different periods coexist in dialogue.

The city's transformation accelerated after World War II, when much of its historic core was destroyed and planners sought to balance rapid economic growth with the need for cultural reconstruction. Landmarks such as the Römerberg square were meticulously rebuilt, while modernist interventions and infrastructural projects introduced new scales and languages. More recently, projects by internationally renowned offices have reshaped the riverfront and business districts, adding architectural icons that express Frankfurt's global role.

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Marginalized in architectural discourse and often dismissed as purely functional, parking garages remain among the most ubiquitous structures in the urban landscape. Designed to accommodate the needs of private vehicles, they occupy central locations, shape skylines, and consume considerable resources, yet rarely receive the same attention — or architectural care — as cultural institutions, schools, or housing. Despite their prevalence, these buildings tend to fade into the background of daily life, treated as infrastructural necessities rather than as design opportunities.

This is beginning to change. As urban mobility undergoes profound transformations — from the decline of car ownership to the rise of electric vehicles and shared transport systems — the role of parking infrastructure is being redefined. Architects and planners are reimagining garages as adaptable frameworks that integrate public space, ecological functions, and mixed-use programs. These new approaches challenge the perception of parking as a residual typology and instead position it as a civic structure with the potential to support more inclusive, flexible, and sustainable urban models.

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The French pavilion exhibition, entitled "Vivre avec / Living with," was developed by the agency Jakob+Macfarlane, formed by architects Dominique Jakob and Brendan MacFarlane, in collaboration with Martin Duplantier Architects and Eric Daniel Lacombe EDL. France's project for the 2025 Venice Biennale was selected through a two-phase competition, involving an initial pre-selection of five teams from forty-five applicants, followed by a detailed project presentation. The winning proposal focuses on architecture's capacity to address global challenges such as climate change, conflict, and instability, utilizing a combination of natural, human, and artificial intelligence.

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Under Carlo Ratti's curatorship, the Venice Biennale's 19th International Architecture Exhibition delves into the theme "Intelligens. Natural. Artificial. Collective," with the explicit aim of transforming the city of Venice into a "Living Laboratory." In addition to the 65 national participations and a wide range of educational and collateral events, the exhibition features independent projects that directly respond to the overarching theme. With most of the exhibits showcased in the historic Corderie building, stretching along the south side of the Arsenale, the event offers a dynamic exploration of emerging architectural ideas and urban strategies.

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In recent years, architecture has increasingly embraced adaptability, flexibility, and responsiveness as core design principles. This evolution reflects a shift from traditional notions of static, permanent structures to dynamic environments that can adjust to changing needs and conditions. Central to this transformation is the concept of "soft architecture", which leverages pliable materials and innovative systems to create spaces that are functional, sustainable, and user-centric. Soft architecture takes shape through membranes that breathe, façades that move, structures that inflate or fold, and surfaces that bend rather than break. It involves designing for transformation — not only in how a building performs environmentally, but also in how it can accommodate shifting functions, user interactions, or temporary occupations. This approach to building challenges traditional notions of durability and control, proposing instead a more responsive and open-ended architecture. It reflects a growing awareness that buildings, like the societies they serve, must be able to evolve.

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There is a particular kind of architecture that does not begin with a blank page. It begins in silence, in ruins, in walls shaped by time. It begins by listening. Rather than imposing itself, it draws near, slowly, choosing to touch rather than overwrite. This is an architecture that engages with the past through the lens of the present, not to erase it or mimic it, but to offer it continuity.

Contemporary architecture increasingly recognizes that to build with the past is not to be held back by it. Heritage is no longer seen as a constraint but as an active ground for design. Within this shift, pre-existence becomes more than a physical condition — it becomes a narrative thread, a structural and symbolic presence that invites care. Rather than asserting dominance, many architects today choose to respond with gestures that are deliberate, quiet, and precise. These interventions frame rather than replace, protect rather than obscure. In doing so, they allow history to remain visible, not as a backdrop, but as a living layer of the architectural experience.

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Videos

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Videos

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