BNIM’s glass-shrouded Fine Arts + Design Studios settles into the Great Plains

Overland Park, Kansas, is a small city located squarely between Lawrence and Kansas City, just south of the meandering Kansas River and dissected by the I-435 and I-35. This being the Great Plains, the city is marked by an overwhelming horizontality carved with a gridiron grid populated with the winding routes of suburban subdivisions. However, this

WEISS/MANFREDI’s new building for Tulane makes the most of clear glass

For The Commons, Tulane University’s new campus hub, WEISS/MANFREDI designed a glass facade that avoids clichés despite using some conventional materials. The angular, building shimmers in the New Orleans light, its mirrored surface broken up by chunky stripes and iridescent hues. It’s hardly a typical glass box, but the building’s distinctive look belies its use of a humble material:

ODA’s 420 Kent leans towards the New York skyline with cantilevered massing and reflective glass

From South Williamsburg to Long Island City, the formerly industrial waterfront of Brooklyn and Queens is undergoing an exhaustive spree of development delivering thousands of residential and commercial units. 420 Kent, a project developed by Spitzer Enterprises and designed by New York-based architecture firm ODA, continues that trend with three mixed-use towers that establish a

Ennead and Bora Architects’s Knight Campus takes shape with a double-glass facade

The University of Oregon’s Phil and Penny Knight Campus for Accelerating Scientific Impact is one of the most significant expansions to the Eugene campus following the construction of OFFICE 52’s Tykeson Hall and Hacker Architect’s Berwick Hall. The project is a collaboration between design architect Ennead Architects and architect-of-record Bora Architects, with Thornton Tomasetti acting as facade consultant, and will enclose state-of-the-art research

KPF’s One Vanderbilt soars with terra-cotta and glass

One Vanderbilt, designed by Kohn Pedersen Fox (KPF), is not a subtle project; the tower topped out in September 2019 and rises from an entire city block with a behemoth massing to a height of just over 1,400 feet. The tower is visible across the metropolitan region, from the New Jersey Meadows to the Bronx-Queens

The International Spy Museum is veiled in cantilevered glass megapanels

The International Spy Museum presents a striking figure in the relatively staid streetscape of Washington, D.C. The building opened in May 2019 and was designed by London-based Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners (RSHP) in collaboration with architect-of-record Hickok Cole, and replaced the original home of the Spy Musem that was constructed in 2002. The project is a demonstration of high-tech

UN Studio enlivens a storefront in Amsterdam with flowing glass

Completed in December 2019, The Looking Glass is a four-story mixed-use renovation for developer Warenar Real Estate that offers a thoughtful solution for merging contemporary design within the centuries-old Museum Quarter of Amsterdam. Designed by Dutch architectural practice UN Studio, the approach addresses both the contextual and use demands of the site with finely curved glass panels and well-crafted

Glass panels with the sky reflected

REX and Front’s 2050 M Street stands lightly with fluted glass

Set to open in mid-March, 2050 M Street is a novel commercial project located in the Dupont Circle neighborhood of Washington, D.C. REX, an architecture and design firm based in New York, is the design architect for the project. In contrast to the imposing massing of Beaux-Arts, Brutalist, and droll mid-century Miesian bootlegs that dominate the capital,

MVRDV’s Depot houses a national archive behind mirror glass

The Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen (MBVB), located in Rotterdam’s 10-acre Museumpark, is receiving a striking new addition designed by MVRDV. Depot will house up to 125,000 of the museum’s artworks not currently used for exhibitions, with over 70,000 of the pieces being made accessible to the public in a semi-curated format. In response to the site and the

Olson Kundig’s Jordan Schnitzer Museum reflects its surroundings with red mirrored glass

With a permanent art collection of approximately 3,500 pieces hailing from the 20th and 21st centuries, the Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art at Washington State University is arguably the most prestigious curatorial institution in Pullman, Washington, and joins a string of art museums founded by the Schnitzer family across the Pacific Northwest. The project opened in 2018

BKSK and BuroHappold crown Tammany Hall with a glass shell

The neo-Georgian Tammany Hall located on the northeastern corner of Union Square has assumed multiple identities over the course of its nearly century-long existence: It has been the home of the notoriously corrupt Society of St. Tammany, a union headquarters, and a theater and film school. Now, BKSK Architects and BuroHappold Engineering are leading the conversion of the building into a

CetraRuddy’s ARO undulates in Midtown with composite aluminum and glass

New York-based architectural practice CetraRuddy is no stranger to designing residential skyscrapers in Manhattan, with a body of work differing from typical contemporary glass stalagmites thanks to the inclusion of significant swathes of stone and metal. ARO, a slender 62-story tower located in Midtown West that wrapped up this year, continues this trend with a facade of

Corner detail of the Mercantile Exchange lobby

Krueck + Sexton and Thornton Tomasetti bring undulating glass to Chicago’s Mercantile Exchange

Chicago’s Krueck + Sexton Architects, a practice founded in 1979, has established a particular niche in the design and implementation of complex glass facades. Their projects present a significant range in terms of location and scale, ranging from the multiplanar Spertus Institute on Michigan Boulevard to a slew of private residences and the restoration of Mies

Detail of curtain wall module

Pei Cobb Freed’s One Dalton joins the Boston skyline with curved glass curtainwall

Rising from a triangular lot in Boston’s Back Bay, One Dalton is a 61-story, 706,000-square-foot residential tower designed by Pei Cobb Freed & Partners. Its gently curving triangular floorplan—a direct product of the unique site—is extruded vertically to create the building’s clean but dynamic glass form. The slightly bulging facades and the sheer size of

Detail of mechanical ventilation

Ron Arad Architect’s Totzeret Haaretz contorts over Tel Aviv with glass and sintered stone

The recently completed Totzeret Haaretz (ToHa) office tower on the eastern border of Tel Aviv offers a new public-facing approach to superblock megadevelopments, while simultaneously delivering a remarkably unique design merging glass, sintered stone, and brass. Designed by Ron Arad Architects with the help of executive architects Yashar Architects, the 29-story tower is the first phase of a larger project

Aerial image of the under construction Academy Museum of Motion Pictures, featuring a giant glass dome

Renzo Piano crowns the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures with a sweeping glass dome

When it opens in 2020, the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures, located in the heart of Los Angeles, will be the world’s premier museum dedicated to movies. Designed by Renzo Piano Building Workshop (RPBW), the building consists of a renovation and restoration of the 1939 May Company Department Store—now known as the Saban Building—and a new, concrete and glass spherical