As 2018 concludes, we’re revisiting this year’s top stories: from products to drawings, buildings, controversies, and more. Enjoy the selection below, but be sure to find our other “Best of 2018” lists as they come online!
Choosing the best buildings of the year is no easy task. The projects of 2018 all demonstrated varying degrees of technological innovation, structural daring, and material mastery. But if one thing unites our favorite buildings, it is their ability to address and embrace the communities they serve. Take a new library in Helsinki: it is undoubtedly a soaring architectural achievement, yet it also finds new ways to bring in diverse audiences and reinvent the typology in a digital age. Kunlé Adeyemi’s campus for a small school in rural Tanzania achieves much of the same goals, but on a much tighter budget using local materials and labor. All six of the projects below are contextual, beautiful and fundamentally human-centric—architecture at its finest.
Kengo Kuma’s Shiplike V&A Dundee Lands in Scotland: The futuristic, concrete-clad outpost of the London-based design museum is part of a larger effort to attract tourists to Dundee's burgeoning waterfront. Click for more.
Courtesy Hufton + Crow
Kengo Kuma’s Shiplike V&A Dundee Lands in Scotland: The futuristic, concrete-clad outpost of the London-based design museum is part of a larger effort to attract tourists to Dundee's burgeoning waterfront. Click for more.
Helsinki’s Poetic New Central Library Is a Public Space for the Digital Age: The new library, dubbed Oodi and designed by ALA Architects, provides democratic and state-of-the-art facilities for learning, making, playing, and reading. Click for more.
Courtesy Tuomas Uusheimo
Helsinki’s Poetic New Central Library Is a Public Space for the Digital Age: The new library, dubbed Oodi and designed by ALA Architects, provides democratic and state-of-the-art facilities for learning, making, playing, and reading. Click for more.
In Houston, Johnston Marklee’s New Drawing Institute Expands the Dream of the Menil: The new gallery, devoted to works on paper, is a sensitive addition to the Houston art campus's diverse architectural heritage. Click for more.
Courtesy Richard Barnes/ the Menil Collection, Houston
In Houston, Johnston Marklee’s New Drawing Institute Expands the Dream of the Menil: The new gallery, devoted to works on paper, is a sensitive addition to the Houston art campus's diverse architectural heritage. Click for more.
Courtesy Richard Barnes/ the Menil Collection, Houston
With Apartments, Gardens, Plazas, and Restaurants, Singapore Tests a Bold New Model for Intergenerational Housing: Designed by WOHA, the complex is a one-stop hub with 104 senior apartments and a host of connected facilities and amenities, including an embarrassment of outdoor riches. Click for more.
Courtesy Lim Weixiang
With Apartments, Gardens, Plazas, and Restaurants, Singapore Tests a Bold New Model for Intergenerational Housing: Designed by WOHA, the complex is a one-stop hub with 104 senior apartments and a host of connected facilities and amenities, including an embarrassment of outdoor riches. Click for more.
Set Alongside a Lush Crater, Kunlé Adeyemi’s New School Plants Deep Roots in Tanzania: Adeyemi and his team from NLÉ draw from the verdant local landscape and age-old building traditions for the design of the Black Rhino Academy. Click for more.
Courtesy Iwan Baan
Set Alongside a Lush Crater, Kunlé Adeyemi’s New School Plants Deep Roots in Tanzania: Adeyemi and his team from NLÉ draw from the verdant local landscape and age-old building traditions for the design of the Black Rhino Academy. Click for more.
Herzog & de Meuron Transforms a Former Prison Compound Into Stunning New Arts Center in Hong Kong: The Swiss firm brings a contemporary edge to the historic Tai Kwun campus while creating new connections between 16 restored heritage structures. Click for more.
Courtesy Herzog & de Meuron
Herzog & de Meuron Transforms a Former Prison Compound Into Stunning New Arts Center in Hong Kong: The Swiss firm brings a contemporary edge to the historic Tai Kwun campus while creating new connections between 16 restored heritage structures. Click for more.
