News

Ditch ground floors to protect buildings from tsunamis, study suggests Research carried out at the École polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) has suggested that sacrificing the ground floors of buildings may be the best way to protect them from tsunamis. PhD student Davide Wüthrich conducted a number of experiments using the Swiss university’s Laboratory of Hydraulic Constructions (LCH). A small metal box with numerous openings was used to simulate a building with multiple windows and doors. The box was placed in a 15.5m canal that could replicate tsunamis and storm surges. Wüthrich carried out over 350 different experiments in the test...

US firm builds 3D printed house in less than a day US construction technologies firm Icon has demonstrated a method for 3D printing a single storey house in less than 24 hours. The small company – which is hoping to pioneer the use of 3D printing for homebuilding – has unveiled a 650 square foot home in Austin, Texas that was built using its Vulcan 3D printer, which builds structures by depositing layers of specially formulated cement. The firm claims that it can print an entire home for $10,000 but that costs could ultimately be brought as low $4000. It...

Europe’s first 3D printed house Named 3D Housing 05 the prototype one-storey house – which will be showcased at Milan’s design festival, Salone del Mobile in April 2018 – has a living area, bedroom, kitchen and bathroom and covers an area of 100 square meters. It has been designed to be disassembled and relocated and is currently being printed on site, in Milan’s central square, Piazza Cesare Beccaria. The structure is being built using a mobile 3D printing robot supplied by Netherlands firm Cybe Construction. This uses concrete to print the walls; the roof, windows and doors. Italcementi, one of...

Zaha Hadid: A complete list of unbuilt designs Unbuilt, unrealized, and in-progress designs from the late architect's unfolding legacy The tragic loss of Zaha Hadid last year left the architecture world suddenly bereft of her inspiring talent. As many obituaries and remembrances since have noted, perhaps one of the biggest tragedies is that Hadid, who passed away at the top of her profession at the age of 65, had years of creating new buildings in front of her. But that doesn’t mean we’ll never see a new Hadid design take shape. The architects at her firm, Zaha Hadid Architects, played key...

Chicago’s concrete architecture showcased in new map Courtesy of Blue Crow Media, Photos by Jason Woods Concrete is the backbone of many iconic buildings in Chicago and thanks to a new map, design lovers can get to know some of the best examples. Concrete isn’t just for sidewalks or foundations, it defined the Brutalist movement (the name comes from the French term béton brut meaning “raw concrete”) and continues to be used in innovate ways. While not every building is strictly Brutalist in the map, it shows how the material shaped many of the city’s institutional, educational, and government buildings...