Articles by Eric Baldwin

Dutch design practice Mecanoo has created a proposal to reimagine a railway zone in Dordrecht, Holland’s oldest city. As the first place in the country to receive city rights in 1220, Dordrecht has an extensive history at the heart of the Dutch Delta. The vision for Spoorzone Dordrecht outlines a future vision for the city in 2040. It explores the urban possibilities of accessibility, climate adaptation, socio-economic developments and housing.

Studio Gang and Denver-based real estate firm Urban Villages have revealed a new mixed-use, 13-story hotel in Denver, Colorado. The 145,000-sf building is called ‘Populus’ and will be located next to Civic Center Park. Opening to the city and the Rocky Mountains beyond, the hotel aims to become a new social center in downtown. On it’s prominent corner site, the building was made to connect Denver’s civic, arts, and commercial districts.

Ealing Council has approved HOK’s masterplan for redeveloping a half-mile-long, narrow stretch of land along Bollo Lane in West London. The team’s proposal includes 852 new homes with 50 per cent affordable housing ranging from 4 to 24 floors in height. Delivered by Transport for London (TfL), the scheme culminates in a mixed-use tower near Chiswick Business Park and the Piccadilly line tracks.

Perkins&Will and the American Institute of Architects (AIA) have released a handbook for best practices to create and implement comprehensive diversity programs for U.S. firms. Entitled “Creating a Culture of Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion in Your Architectural Practice,” authors Gabrielle Bullock, FAIA and Bill Schmalz, FAIA outline how firms must uphold J.E.D.I. principles now and into the future.

Zaha Hadid Architects has won the design competition to build Phase II of the International Exhibition Centre in Beijing. Drawing from the cultural, academic and civic center of China, the International Exhibition Centre is located next to the city’s Capital International Airport as a site for conferences, trade fairs and industry expos. Now, Phase II will significantly expand exhibition space for knowledge and exchange.

Extreme weather and conditions call for contextual architectural approaches. From sandy deserts to cold, icy climates, how we build is intimately tied to location. Drawing from diverse project sites around the world, architects and designers create proposals that construct and organize new ways to live, work and play. These unbuilt projects rethink traditional forms while addressing a wide range of landscape conditions.

OMA and GMP have been selected as the winners of the Chengdu Future Science and Technology City Masterplan and Design competition in China. The team will develop the first phase of the overall masterplan, which will include an International Educational Park in the west, and a Transit Oriented Development (TOD) in the southeast led by GMP. The pilot project is one part of the innovation industry driving the development of the city around the new airport east of Chengdu.

The Weyerhaeuser Corporate Headquarters in Federal Way, Washington is one of the most iconic projects bringing architecture and landscape together. The current owners of the site, Los Angeles-based Industrial Realty Group (IRG), have shared plans to clear-cut 132 largely forested acres on the 425-acre campus to build 1.5 million square feet of warehouses. Now the group is facing pushback from architects, preservationists and landscape architects across the country.

Slovak designer Lenka Petráková has won the 2020 Grand Prix Award for an ocean-cleaning research facility in the Pacific. The “8th Continent” project is a floating station that restores the marine environment by collecting plastic debris from the surface and breaking it down to recyclable material. The plastic recycling center connects with a research and education facility to create an interdisciplinary and sustainable platform for the future.

Diller Scofidio + Renfro and Woods Bagot have unveiled their design for the new Aboriginal Art and Cultures Centre (AACC) in Adelaide, Australia. Designed around a “deep Aboriginal connection to Country, place and kin” as the project’s foundation, the cultural project aims to become a platform for honoring and developing Australian culture. The AACC concept originates from the Aboriginal conception of the elements linking people to place: earth, land and sky.