Archi News

Salone del Mobile.Milano has announced the framework for its 64th edition, scheduled to take place from April 21 to 26, 2026, at Fiera Milano, Rho. The upcoming edition will bring together more than 1,900 exhibitors from 32 countries across over 169,000 square meters of exhibition space, highlighting the fair's continued scale and international reach. Beyond its quantitative dimension, the 2026 Salone positions itself as an evolving cultural and economic infrastructure, increasingly structured around long-term strategies rather than isolated events. The program reflects a growing emphasis on accessibility, curatorial depth, and cross-sector dialogue, pointing at the Salone's role not only as a marketplace for the industry but also as a platform where architectural thinking, industrial production, and global dynamics intersect within a single, coordinated framework.

In Friedrichsruhe, where open farmland meets gently wooded hills, a country house has been built as a pair of connected homes. The layout and overall appearance of the buildings — including the main houses, garages, and boundary walls — take inspiration from a nearby historic farmstead. With very simple means, a strong sense of space and atmosphere was created. The main idea was to design a house that works on its own terms, without complex technical systems, without constant regulation, and without the need for ongoing adjustments.

Nearly one week before the start of the Milano Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics, the organizing committee has released official information on the event's Cultural Olympiad: an arts and culture programme accompanying the Olympic and Paralympic Games. The programme is recognized by the IOC as one of the three pillars of the Olympic Movement, alongside sport and education. Conceived as a widespread platform involving territories, institutions, and communities across Italy, the Cultural Olympiad aims to highlight the Italian Alps and Milan's cultural heritage while promoting Olympic values through art, history, and participation beyond the official sports venues.

Cities are warming at roughly twice the global rate, a trend accelerated by rapid urbanization. While rising temperatures are reshaping daily life worldwide, some towns and neighborhoods, often the most vulnerable and least resourced, are warming more than others. The reason comes down to the urban environment. Built infrastructure, such as roads, buildings, sidewalks, and public spaces, determines how heat moves through a city, where it accumulates, and how long it remains trapped. No matter the climate zone or geographical location, shade remains the most effective and immediate way to cool pedestrians and relieve the built environment.

With the completion of Octavia Hill, a bold new residential building now takes its place at the heart of the Hyde Park Hoofddorp development!

Shade House offers a sophisticated resolution to the tension between privacy and natural illumination—two often-conflicting requirements harmonized through precise design. The east facade is enveloped in a veil-like apparatus that serves as a privacy screen for the sunken courtyard and basement "Great Room," while simultaneously orchestrating the entry of filtered daylight. This screening system, composed of interlocking triangular shades, is choreographed to create calculated apertures that allow sunlight to penetrate the outdoor living spaces selectively.

7hills Yard-Hillstation Brand Center is a composite space integrating offices, exhibitions, and social functions. As an experimental ground for exploring new lifestyles, production methods, and economic models, it is dedicated to providing new types of public services for rural industry users.

Nightingale's Nurse Cap – Located in the Shonai region of Yamagata Prefecture, Tsuruoka is a city where the heritage of the Shonai Domain remains deeply woven into the cultural fabric. The new campus for Tsuruoka City Shonai Nursing School was conceived under the theme of a nursing school grounded in Tsuruoka's history and culture, dedicated to cultivating professionals who will sustain regional healthcare. Sitting quietly within a culturally vibrant corner of the city, the building features distinctive white shades inspired by Florence Nightingale's nurse cap. These shades serve a dual purpose: they are functional devices to control solar heat gain and symbolic gestures to the community, expressing a commitment to the future of local medical care.

Ganadería Santillán is located in the heart of the Mexican Bajío, between Tequisquiapan and La Laja, a region with a deep ranching tradition and landscapes reminiscent of the paintings of José María Velasco. The commission consisted of designing a Plaza de Tientas and an Equestrian Training space for the ranch. From the outset, the project was conceived as an intervention integrated into the terrain not as an imposed structure, but as an extension of the landscape itself.

Caronte is the restoration project of a farmhouse in the Salento countryside, completed by Margine in 2025. In the lands between Lecce and Vernole, surrounded by olive trees and just a few kilometers from the sea, stands Masseria Caronte, a rural home where sheep were once raised and wool and yarn were produced. Over the years, after numerous businesses and years of abandonment, the structure underwent a major renovation and conversion into a restaurant in 2024. Commissioned by a group of young local entrepreneurs, Margine proposed a project aimed at eliminating the numerous additions that had occurred over time and restoring the factory's ancient charm.

A key work of Viennese Modernism open to the public for the first time
Villa Beer in Vienna-Hietzing, designed in 1929 by Josef Frank and Oskar Wlach for the Beer family, will be open to visitors for the first time in March 2026. After years of intensive research and restoration work, one of the most important residential buildings of Viennese Modernism can once again be experienced in its original quality.

This article is part of our new Opinion section, a format for argument-driven essays on critical questions shaping our field.

Located in Solapur city on a 355 sqm plot, this house is designed for a small multigenerational family- a couple, their two children, and aging parents. The program reflects the family's belief in Vastu and includes three bedrooms along with essential facilities. An important influence on the design came from the children's deep interest in classical music, leading to a dedicated space for practice and performance.

The OBEL Foundation has announced "Systems' Hack" as the focus of its 2026 cycle, setting the conceptual framework that will guide the foundation's activities and the selection of the next OBEL Award. Founded in 2019, OBEL recognises architecture's potential to act as a tangible agent of positive social and ecological change, supporting approaches that expand how the built environment is defined and shaped. The 2026 theme calls on architecture to critically engage with the systems that underpin contemporary society, including infrastructure, energy, food, water, education, and information, and to examine how these interconnected networks might be reconfigured in response to accelerating global challenges.

Tectoniques' recently completed Dominique Frelaut school group in Colombesis is notable for its verticality. Its staggered upper floors and varied pathways create a close relationship between the architecture and the landscape.

This week's news compilation opens with two international commemorations, the International Day for Clean Energy and the International Day of Education, alongside a major archaeological discovery in Fano, Italy, where excavations have revealed a basilica described by Vitruvius, linking contemporary architectural discourse with deep historical continuity. Across this week's broader architecture news landscape, a central theme emerges around the advancement of civic architecture conceived as open, publicly engaged infrastructure, with cultural and institutional projects increasingly designed to strengthen their relationship with the city and everyday urban life. At the same time, renewed global attention turns toward Africa, where large-scale transport infrastructure and the conservation of modernist landmarks reflect interests in the region and the reassessment of the continent's architectural heritage. Complementing these narratives, this week's highlights also include a new model for car-free urban districts, co-designed public landscapes grounded in indigenous knowledge, and a residential development responding to regional context, reflecting how architecture is negotiating public space, civic responsibility, and territorial identity across diverse geographies.

The project for the Ventura Terra University Residence – University of Lisbon is conditioned by the necessary building density, given the proposed program, and by the limits of the lot and the maximum height defined in the Detailed Plan. Between the residence and the existing cafeteria building, a pedestrian path is created to connect the higher street to the north (near the Faculty of Architecture) and the lower street to the south.

The residence is conceived as an architecture of quiet presence. It unfolds as a quiet architectural composition, shaped by light, proportion, and deliberate restraint. Eschewing overt ornamentation, the design allows space, material, and daylight to take precedence, creating an environment in which architecture gently recedes to support everyday life.

The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) has announced that Irish architect, educator, and writer Níall McLaughlin will receive the 2026 Royal Gold Medal for Architecture. Awarded on behalf of His Majesty the King, the Royal Gold Medal is among the significant international distinctions in architecture, recognizing a sustained contribution to the advancement of the discipline through built work, education, and critical discourse. In announcing the award, RIBA noted McLaughlin's long-standing influence across architectural practice and pedagogy, citing a career that spans more than three decades and reflects a consistent engagement with the cultural, environmental, and social dimensions of architecture.

The site was originally home to the Xinguang Silk Weaving Factory. The renovated Building No. 5 has now been transformed into a versatile theater, seamlessly integrating Suzhou-style stage performances with medium-sized conferences. In architectural renovation, the common approaches typically fall into two categories: completely redesigning parts of the structure or preserving its original form as much as possible. Wutopia Lab seeks to break free from this binary and explore a new path. Inspired by the dramatic life of Tang Bohu, we go beyond merely preserving the historical depth of the old building—we breathe new artistic life into it.