Author: Rene Submissions

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Lumion 9 Lumion has always set out to define what rendering should be: fast and stress-free with exceptional results. Now, with the latest version of its 3D rendering software, Lumion 9, it’s easier than ever to show off your 3D models in a living environment, with beautiful, real-life skies, an endless variety of landscapes, and exceptional lighting and materials. Oh, and rendering takes minutes, not hours. Add the new, one-touch Real Skies to cast a new light on your model and instantly create a beautiful, unique setting for your designs. Let realistic rain communicate cozy spaces, which you can now decorate with furry rugs and fluffy blankets. For the true-to-life garden shot, apply the new Customizable 3D Grass materials and you’ll almost feel the freshly cut lawn beneath your feet. New streamlined scene-building tools help you create complex environments in minutes. Add to the improved workflow, Lumion’s jaw-dropping rendering Continue reading "Lumion 9: Rendering Living Environments for Real Beauty"

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It’s no secret that in many parts of the country, indoor-outdoor living actually gets better when summer turns to fall. The bugs buzz off, the humidity lifts, and the cooler nights beg for the warmth of a fire. Here are five of our favorite indoor-outdoor living spaces for the fall of 2018.

A Modern Farmhouse in Phoenix Opens Up for Fall

Four months of triple-digit temperatures in Phoenix are giving way to perfect weather, so it’s time to open up the house to the outdoors. This home in the upscale suburb of Paradise Valley is a mashup of traditional and modern design. Architect Tom Knutson, principal at K2 Signature Homes, stated that “We incorporated a large covered patio with the interior tile flooring continuing to the exterior so as to blur the line between inside and outside.”

A Renovated 1960s Track Home Maximizes Outdoor Living

Day or night,

Continue reading "5 Incredible Indoor-Outdoor Spaces for Fall"

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Emily Allchurch, Grand Tour: In Search of Soane (after Gandy), 2012. The engine of contemporary architectural production, and the basis of societies around the world, is economic growth. Global political orthodoxy declares GDP growth is always good; that more is more. Throughout the last two centuries increased economic growth brought with it many measures of prosperity, but for many decades now the limits to growth have been visible on the horizon. Social equity, health and wellbeing, quality of life, happiness and other non-monetary measures of success are faltering while resource extraction, greenhouse gas emissions, waste and toxicity, temperatures, sea levels, extreme weather, and many such indicators of climate breakdown make clear daily that the time of this worldview is running out. The next Oslo Architecture Triennale will challenge the supremacy of economic growth and investigate the architecture of alternatives. The festival will explore the buildings, spaces and institutions of a Continue reading "OAT 2019 Open call: The Architecture of Degrowth"

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YAC YAC - Young Architects Competitions and Mothe Chandeniers launched “Common Ruins”, a competition of ideas aiming to breath a new life into an astonishing castle in France. A cash prize of € 20,000 will be awarded to winners selected by a well-renowned jury made of, among the others, Anish Kapoor, Rudy Ricciotti, Edoardo Tresoldi, Dagur Eggertsson, Alfonso Femia, Aldo Cibic, Marco Amosso (Lombardini 22), Luca Dolmetta (LD+SR architetti).

YAC

Brief There is a special fascination in ruins. There is a sublime hint in dissolved architectures. There is something moving in the pulverizing of time. Silence takes over the architecture. In the long sunset that follows abandonment and preludes destruction, nature completes the design of mankind by taking space back according to its own pace. In that moment, something magical happens. In that moment, architecture gives way to ruins. The

Continue reading "Common Ruins"

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About the Competition

Turkistan Architect Awards is an international architectural competition for the conceptual development of objects located in the historical city of Kazakhstan — Turkistan, initiated by the Governor of the Turkestan region. The main objective of the competition is to give a new impetus to the development of the Turkestan region: as a touristic hub with the unique architecture. The competition is aimed at creating equal conditions for creative competition between the participants in order to determine the most interesting and progressive solutions, both architectural and engineering, taking into account the use of innovative technologies, materials, design and methods of building structures in the project.

Participants

Architects from all over the world can take part in the competition. The competition provides equal opportunities for the participation of both experienced and novice architects, as well as the participation of architectural bureaus.

The competition is held in several categories, and

Continue reading "Call for Entries: Turkistan Architect Awards"

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HOUSING: WHAT’S NEXT? FROM THINKING THE UNIT TO BUILDING THE CITY During the twentieth century the world population increased at a higher rate than at any other period in time, from around 1.5 billion people in 1900 to nearly 7 billion today. Facing these figures, it is impossible not to think about what we have done to accommodate this population, or rather, what all these people have done to obtain housing. Figures indicate that although we have been able to build large quantities of houses, and have begun to cover the quantitative deficit, today the great challenge is to improve the quality of the existing housing stock. At a time in which this effervescent population growth persists–particularly in the geographical regions of the Global South and in emerging economies–the question is how do we change the paradigm and start thinking about housing in relation to the quality of the Continue reading "Housing, What’s Next? Challenges and Innovation in the Global South"

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Audain Art Museum (Whistler, British Columbia) / Patkau Architects The design and construction community is revolutionizing the way we think about wood in construction. Growing pressure to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, coupled with a desire for aesthetically appealing designs, have resulted in a wood momentum that is being celebrated by architects and engineers around the world.

Courtyard House on a River (Greenwater, Washington) / Robert Hutchison Architecture

The Wood Design & Building Awards program is an opportunity to recognize the inroads that design and construction teams have achieved for wood applications in their projects. Inspiring submissions push the boundaries of innovation and challenge conventional ways of thinking about wood in construction. As wood science technologies and research advance, so too must the perception of wood’s capabilities within the built environment. As architects and engineers look to duplication examples in other parts of the world, there is a push for taller

Continue reading "Call for Submissions: 2018 Wood Design & Building Awards"

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Are architects really turning to real-time rendering for visualization? Epic Games, the creators of Unreal Engine, decided to find out with an independent survey. The results confirmed what many of us have suspected—real-time rendering is on the rise in architecture, media and entertainment, and manufacturing. But the survey also revealed a few surprising details about real-time rendering and its uses.

What is Real-Time Rendering, Exactly?

Maybe you’ve heard about real-time rendering but aren’t sure how it relates to what you do. Real-time rendering is the process of using the same techniques you’ve been using for years for visualization—modeling, materials, lighting, and animation—but with the traditional rendering process replaced with a render engine that has the capability to render on the fly, in real time. Real-time rendering gives you the ability to see what the final result will look like right away. Even special effects like fog and depth-of-field can Continue reading "Trends in Real-Time Rendering"

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Terrazzo & Marble Supply Companies transformed the Duke Ellington School of the Arts in DC with poured-in-place epoxy terrazzo. [Photo: Courtesy of Terrazzo & Marble Supply Companies] Terrazzo flooring, with its mosaic style of pieces of marble or granite set in polished concrete or epoxy resin, is known for its flexibility and remarkable durability. So it’s no wonder the method has been around for centuries. With proper care during installation and use, it’s also possible for terrazzo floors to last a number of decades. “There are terrazzo floors that were installed in the early 1900s that are still nice looking jobs,” says James Bateman, terrazzo division manager of Terrazzo & Marble Supply Companies. Indeed, the style is known to some as ‘forever floors,’ a nod to its history and longevity.

[Photo: Courtesy of Terrazzo & Marble Supply Companies]

A Colorful History

References to terrazzo date all the way back

Continue reading "Terrazzo Floors Bring History to Life"

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Courtesy of Alcon Lighting Walk into a room bathed in cozy, inviting light and you’ll feel instantly at ease. Walk into the same room buzzing with harsh fluorescents, and your teeth may start to grind. Why? In 2014, a Journal of Consumer Psychology study found that the more intense the lighting, the more affected and intense the participants’ emotions were — both positive and negative. The study included six experiments that examined the link between emotion and ambient brightness. Feelings of warmth increased when participants were exposed to bright light with hints of reddish hues. A sensation of angst increased when bluer light dominated. And the brighter the light, the more intense the participants’ emotions became. Both the intensity and the color of the light affected people’s moods. 

How Does This Affect Your Next Remodel?

When designing a space, lighting needs to be addressed as soon as the space itself, and how it will Continue reading "Mood Changers: Lighting Design 101 – Why Lighting Is The Most Important Design Feature"

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"250 soles entering the humanitarian respite center in downtown McAllen, Texas" Photo Credit: Verónica Cárdenas The Humanitarian Respite Center in downtown McAllen, Texas was born as a response to families in crisis. Through its services and the work of volunteers, it successfully restores dignity to people in need, particularly Central American immigrants seeking refuge crossing the border from Mexico to the US. Since its setup in 2014, it has operated in the borrowed space of a Parish Hall and is currently reduced to limited rental space. It has served nearly 100,000 immigrants to date. Hundreds of volunteers, coming from cities in the Rio Grande Valley and arriving from all 50 states and abroad have come together to offer a helping hand, sharing inspirational stories of their connection with immigrants. Tons of goods have been donated, thanks to the contributions and solidarity of individuals and organizations alike. Sister Norma Pimentel, Executive Continue reading "Open Call: Design a Humanitarian Respite Center - Restoring Human Dignity on the Border"

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Courtesy of Enscape In a world where autonomous vehicles, artificial intelligence (AI,) Internet of Things (IoT,) virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) are becoming commonplace terms across the globe, the average AEC client will soon expect consistently high-quality presentations and renderings throughout the design process. Many people are already anticipating future demand for these technologies, but few are prepared to integrate them with each other. Enscape has developed a system combining several of these features to create lively, immersive, and unforgettable experiences for clients.

1. Know Your Lighting

Errors in rendering daylight are immediately apparent to even the untrained eye. Given this and the importance of daylighting in energy-efficient buildings, the importance of accurately rendering daylight cannot be overstated. The first step with Enscape is to select the project Location on earth and specify True North to ensure accurate conditions

Accurate daylight for exterior. Image Courtesy of Enscape

Accurate

Continue reading "9 Ways to Make Your Renderings More Realistic"

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Fairy Tales 2018: Architecture Storytelling Competition Blank Space is thrilled to announce the 2019 Fairy Tales competition in partnership with ArchDaily, Archinect, Bustler, and the AIAS. The winners will be selected by a jury that includes Tatiana Bilbao, Mark Foster Gage, Jürgen Mayer and Moshe Safdie. For the last 5 years, the Fairy Tales competition has captured the imagination of designers and architects around the world. Last year's record breaking competition drew entries from over 60 countries, making the competition once again the largest annual architecture competition in the world. For the sixth year of the competition, Blank Space is proud to partner with ArchDaily, Archinect, Bustler, and the AIAS. “My personal little theory is that we’re all constantly reworking our childhoods. For me, creativity has a lot to do with recovering lost innocence,” says jury member Jürgen Mayer, “As a society, we’re definitely looking at the future again, but Continue reading "Calling All Storytellers: Blank Space Launches Sixth Annual Fairy Tales Competition"

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competition, contest, architecture, design, student

Kid's Factory

YAC – Young Architects Competitions – and Urban Up l Unipol launched “Kid’s Factory,” an architectural competition to transform the former pottery of Laveno Mombello into the largest and most innovative campus for children in the world. A cash prize of €20,000 will be awarded to winners selected by a renowned jury comprised of Ben van Berkel (UNstudio), Keiichiro Sako (Sako Architects), Peter Wilson (Bolles+Wilson), Arne Emerson (Morphosis), Emmanuelle Moureaux, Mario Cucinella, Stefano Boeri, among the others.

Brief

“All grown-ups were once children, although few of them remember it.”- Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, The Little Prince Barrie’s Peter Pan and Saint-Exupéry’s Little Prince are two examples of the countless attempts to catch the shy handful of years that childhood comprises. Childhood is a time when reality is complementary to imagination. It is a Continue reading "Kid’s Factory: Call for Submissions"

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CALLING ALL ARCHITECTS & ENGINEERS: DESIGN RESILIENT HOMES​ FOR PEOPLE IN VULNERABLE REGIONS The World Bank, Build Academy, Airbnb and GFDRR ​ are looking for building professionals like you from across the globe to generate designs for cost-effective, sustainable, small homes​ for people living in underdeveloped areas that both reduce the risk of damage and enable rapid reconstruction following a natural disaster​. Winning designs will be published and winners will be invited to exhibit at the World Bank in Washington DC, USA and other select global venues. Winning designs could also eventually inform resilient housing or reconstruction work for World-Bank-funded projects in places like the Caribbean, South and East Asia, etc.​ Register now for FREE on www.ResilientHomesChallenge.Com to participate in this prestigious, global crowd-solving challenge​! WHAT IS THE CHALLENGE? Natural disasters are on the rise. Since 1990, natural disasters have affected 217 million people every single year. Continue reading "Resilient Homes Design Challenge"

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Courtesy of BOXX Lanmar Services’ CTO Larry Kleinkemper, AIA, creates 3D laser scans and BIM project files for some of the world’s leading architecture firms and their high-profile projects. Because of these massive data sets, Lanmar demands the best CAD computer workstations available. In this must-see video, Kleinkemper compares two workstations recommended by their respective manufacturers as optimal Autodesk Revit solutions. The BOXX APEXX S3 and the DELL PRECISION 7920 battle it out in a side-by-side comparison to determine which workstation runs CAD applications better. After watching the video, click here to learn how to customize a CAD workstation and why an optimized system accelerates your workflow—saving you both time and money.

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Courtesy of Bricsys It is 2018, and it should be clear to everyone in the AEC industry that BIM is the future of building, infrastructure design, construction, and maintenance. There are millions of marketing dollars spent by BIM software companies each year trying to convince you that Building Information Modeling can’t happen without their product. They will try to convince you that their product is the “real BIM.” Of course, we live in an open, capitalist society where this behavior is expected. However, if you and your firm are making the move to BIM, this background noise may be concerning... and if it’s not, it should be. In the first paragraph of Wikipedia's entry on Building Information Modeling, the statement is made that building information models are files that are “...often but not always in proprietary formats and containing proprietary data…” This is troubling to some, however, Continue reading "Building Information Modeling is More than Software"

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Bauhaus Dessau © Nate Robert via Flickr License Under CC BY-SA 2.0. Image The Bauhaus in Germany was a dynamic think tank and its ideals were spread worldwide. Next year, all of Germany will be celebrating the centenary of the Bauhaus with a colorful festival program. To impress in conversations about next year’s big event, we have compiled 10 surprising facts.

1. The Faculty of Architecture was not set up until eight years after the school opened.

Despite the fact that Walter Gropius was an architect, the school lacked a Faculty of Architecture when it opened its doors in 1919. Yet, the “Haus am Horn” in Weimar and the “Master Houses” in Dessau are evidence that construction was of great importance right from the start. The “Neues Bauen am Horn” project in Weimar is a must-see showcasing contemporary modernity.

The Master Houses in Dessau (© Stiftung Bauhaus Dessau (SBD))

Continue reading "100 Years of Bauhaus: 10 Facts That Will Make You Look Like an Expert"

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Human-machine collaboration during the assembly of lightweight metal structures. (c) Gramazio Kohler Research, ETH Zurich The advent of robotics in the creative and construction industries has led to an amazing revolution, changing not just how things are designed and made, but also transforming knowledge cultures, politics and economics that surround them. As such, the ROB|ARCH 2018 conference – hosted by the NCCR Digital Fabrication and ETH Zurich – will continue this path, developing and revealing novel insights, applications and impacts of this transformation within the scientific, creative, and entrepreneurial domains, including, for example, architecture, structural design, civil and process engineering, art and design, and robotics. A particular focus lies upon cross-disciplinary approaches and applications, providing state-of-the-art knowledge, techniques and methods of robotics not just in individual areas of exploration, but also beyond. These ideals aspire to complement the transformation processes of emerging robotic research and applications, and to redefine cross-disciplinary Continue reading "ROB|ARCH 2018: Robotic Fabrication in Architecture, Art, and Design"

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Call for entries: Baghdad Design Centre Tamayouz Excellence Award launched the “Baghdad Design Centre,” an international architectural competition to transform the current unused site of the Old Governorate Building into the Baghdad Design Centre in the city's Cultural District; Al-Rusafa. This year’s competition has been under the spotlight as stakeholders and the architectural community in the country urged the local authorities to halt implementation of their own scheme for the site and wait for the results and recommendations of the competition.

Courtesy of Tamayouz Excellence Award

The competition hopes to see a new architectural approach that helps Baghdad celebrate its architecture and heritage. The transformation of the site into a Design Centre that showcases the best of contemporary design and is also a space for creative collaboration forms the basis of the brief. Whilst creating a new and optimistic vision for the future of design within Iraq the

Continue reading "Call For Entries: Baghdad Design Centre"