To subscribe to the free daily newsletter click here

ANN feature: Charles F. Bloszies: Left Coast Reflections #1: The Sustainable Spoon: The idea that humans are able to create sustainable artifacts is here to stay. But as designers of the largest artifacts on the planet, we architects need to be especially vigilant.- ArchNewsNow.com

Nobody Mentioned It, But Do We Stand To Lose Our Best Defence Against Climate Change? Good luck, Australia. We're going to need it: You've probably never heard of the National Climate Change Adaptation Research Facility...indications are we never will again...only government-funded body which takes established climate science, assesses the likely impacts of climate change, then tells us what the heck we should do about it...NCCARF's funding is set to be cut off.- Huffington Post Australia

Jared Green: Reasons to Be Optimistic About the Future of the Environment (Parts 1 & 2): ...Earth Optimism Summit in Washington, D.C...one inspiring environmental success story after another...a concerted effort to change the narrative - from one of relentless anger and despair to one of progress and a cautious optimism...to highlight what is working today and figure out the ways to replicate and scale up successes. [link to Part 2 at bottom of page]- The Dirt/American Society of Landscape Architects (ASLA)

When historic buildings make economic sense: Q&A with Stephanie Meeks/National Trust for Historic Preservation, re: using preservation for economic development: "We're not about casting things in amber and turning everything into a museum." ["The Past and Future City: How Historic Preservation is Reviving America's Communities"]- Marketplace.org / Minnesota Public Radio

Daniel Libeskind urges Durham University to save Dunelm House: ...described proposal...as "planned amnesia...I appreciate the university’s quest to make a sustainable transformation of the building. But that doesn’t mean they have to tear it down. They should be a little bit more creative." -- Architects’ Co-Partnership; Ove Arup (1966) [images]- The Architects' Journal (UK)

Build Toronto announces winning design team for Etobicoke Civic Centre: ...part of the six-hectare (14-acre) Westwood Theatre Lands redevelopment. -- -- Adamson Associates Architects; Henning Larsen Architects; PMA Landscape Architect [images]- Canadian Architect

Take a peek inside the new Tukwila Library: King County Library System’s newly-completed branch includes public art and sustainable design: ...roof is constructed with cross-laminated timber [CLT], a rising star in sustainable building materials..“sequesters the same amount of carbon emitted by 91 cars in one year.” -- Perkins+Will [images]- Curbed Seattle

Q&A: Peter Elliott on the enormous satisfaction of designing for the arts: ...awarded Australian architecture’s highest honour: the 2017 Australian Institute of Architecture Gold Medal...he talks about the importance of creativity in educational design- Architecture & Design (Australia)

ARCHITECT@WORK, Toronto, May 17-18: Spotlighting the most anticipated trends for the architecture and design industry, from breakthroughs in technologies to new material applications; North American debut.- ARCHITECT@WORK

The Worst McMansion Sins, From Useless Pilasters to Hellish Transom Windows: Kate Wagner’s blog McMansion Hell is like a snarky DSM-IV for all that ails contemporary over-building in suburban developments...is at heart an architectural grammar scold.- Hyperallergic

Call for entries: Expression of Interest/EOI (Selection Questionnaire/SQ) (international): Centre for Music in London (partners: Barbican, London Symphony Orchestra, Guildhall School of Music & Drama); deadline: June 9- City of London Corporation

Lidija Grozdanic: Architecture at the Movies: Why Brutalism Is the Real Star in Spy Films: Jonathan Meades...author and narrator of BBC’s documentary “Bunkers, Brutalism and Bloodymindedness: Concrete Poetry"...resurgent fascination with the Cold War era parallels a concurrent fetishization of Brutalism among creatives. [images]- Architizer

"City Now City Future": introducing a season: From May 2017 to April 2018, the Museum of London...hosting over 100 events, exhibitions, creative commissions, talks and debates that explore urban change in London and around the world.- Museum of London

"Alvar Aalto - Art And The Modern Form" at the Ateneum Art Museum, Helsinki: ...also features work by his closest artist friends, including Jean Arp, Alexander Calder, Fernand Léger and László Moholy-Nagy; co-produced by the Vitra Design Museum and the Alvar Aalto Museum; May 11 thru September 24 [images]- Ateneum (Helsinki, Finland)

"Hiroshi Sambuichi: Moving Materials": Sun, wind, and water are the essential elements of Japanese architect Sambuichi's approach...An architecture combining the non-moving materials with the natural phenomena, or in Sambuichi's words "moving materials" of a site; thru June 25, Danish Architecture Centre [images]- ArcSpace

Justin Davidson: Are American Cities in Crisis? ...Richard Florida’s glum new manifesto, "The New Urban Crisis"...a book of lamentations...His pessimism is new..."Climate of Hope: How Cities, Businesses, and Citizens Can Save the Planet" by Michael Bloomberg and Carl Pope...glows with the optimism of levelheaded reason.- New York Magazine

Richard Florida: The New Suburban Crisis: Once the key driver of the American dream, the suburbs have reached the end of a long era of cheap growth...The middle of our suburban geography is being hollowed out... [adapted from "The New Urban Crisis: How Our Cities Are Increasing Inequality, Deepening Segregation, and Failing the Middle Class - and What We Can Do About It"]- CityLab (formerly The Atlantic Cities)

Jared Green: A New Strategy for American Sustainability: "The New Grand Strategy: Restoring America's Prosperity, Security, and Sustainability in the 21st Century" by Mark Mykleby, Patrick Doherty, and Joel Makower: If the U.S. “can get its ass in gear,” focusing on walkable communities, sustainable agriculture, and new housing materials will lead to a resurgence in jobs...and create the “economy of the future.”- The Dirt/American Society of Landscape Architects (ASLA)

In Fast-Changing Seattle, an Effort Not to Forget the Past: A new project gathers the collective memory of places that no longer exist: "Ghosts of Seattle Past" edited by Jaimee Garbacik...anthology of essays, interviews, photography, and graphic art...Q&A re: what she learned along the way, and why what’s happening in Seattle should matter to urban dwellers everywhere.- Atlas Obscura

Diana Budd: A Book About Concrete Architecture - Made From Concrete: You can judge this book by its cover: "Concrete Photobook" by Budapest-based photographer Gábor Kasza...“It is waterproof, oil proof, UV and radiation resistant."- Fast Company / Co.Design

ANN feature: Shane O'Toole: Preface to "One Hundred & One Hosannas for Architecture": It is a truism to say that journalism is the first draft of history. Historians always place great weight on contemporary accounts...a work of architecture is not complete until it has been written about.- ArchNewsNow.com

ARM Architecture (Ashton Raggatt McDougall): Geelong Library and Heritage Centre, Geelong, Australia: ...an early Australian picturesque of the beautiful ruin...recalls the great civic gestures of the 19th century, a sign when the dome was symbolic of democracy, enlightenment and civil society. -- Taylor Cullity Lethlean [images]