Changdong Station Transit Center, Seoul

 

Changdong Station winner – image ©D & B Partners Architects

 

Whereas international competitions for real projects have become a rarity lately, Korea is a welcome exception. Among the plethora of competition announcements we receive almost weekly, several have ended with foreign firms as winners. But the history of welcoming international

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Ropax Ferry Terminal Competition in Riga

 

1st Place: Zaha Hadid Architects – night view from river – Render by Negativ

 

Arriving to board a ferry boat or cruise ship used to be a rather mundane experience. If you had luggage, you might be able to drop it off upon boarding, assuming that the boarding operation was sophisticated

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New Kaohsiung Port and Cruise Terminal, Taiwan

 

RUR model perspective – ©RUR

 

New Kaohsiung Port and Cruise Terminal, Taiwan (2011-2020) Reiser+Umemoto RUR Architecture PC/ Jesse Reiser – U.S.A. with Fei & Cheng Associates/Philip T.C. Fei – R.O.C. (Tendener) This was probably the last international open competition result that was built in Taiwan. A later competition for the Keelung

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Respect for the Old, In with the New

 

Image courtesy Budapest Development Agency ©Grimshaw

Budapest’s Nygati Rail Station Competition

 

Completed in 1877, Budapest’s Nygati Railway Station has witnessed many of the twists and turns of Hungarian history: the Austro-Hungarian Empire, revolutions of post-World War I and 1956, and various shades of expansion and shrinkage in their territory. Its important

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Infrastructure Hub as Urban Revitalization Catalyst

 

Vilnius Railway Station and Public Square Competition

 

Vilnius Station competition Image: ©Zaha Hadid Architects

 

 

Aerial view of Vilnius railway station (2021)

 

In European cities, recent history has seen their central railway stations become the subject of upgrades, or totally new projects, many of them springing up

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Reimagining the Thompson Center

 

Public Pool Image: ©Perkins&Will

 

The Chicago Architecture Club Shines the Spotlight on

Another Endangered Landmark

 

What do Bertrad Goldberg and Helmut Jahn have in common? Besides having high-profile buildings threatened by demolition, both served as subject matter for two competitions sponsored by the Chicago Architecture Club (CAC)—raising public

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A Russian City Sets Its Priorities in the Public Realm

 

Astrakhan Looks to Raise Its Quality of Life Index

 

Aerial view of downtown Astrakhan

 

 

Planning competitions with a strong landscape component take many forms, including some for plazas and gateways to major town centers, city neighborhood sites with multi-story housing units, university campus plans and finally, comprehensive city plans—the latter

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A New Meeting Place for Moscovites

 

SWA/Balsley Wins Paveletskaya Plaza Landscape Competition

 

Aerial view at night – courtesy SWA/Balsley 5+ Design

 

0f the nine railway stations in Moscow, Paveletskaya is the largest and one of the last of those that opened around the turn of the century. Compared to other Moscow stations, Paveletskaya, designed by Alexander Krasovsky

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One Design to Fit All

 

Image Courtesy Network Rail

 

From Grand Central Station to King’s Cross in London, railway stations have often represented some of the major architectural accomplishments of our times. But those edifices have been primarily located in great cities. In the U.K. there are over 2,000 stations located in medium-sized, small, and rural communities.

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Another Competition for Moscow’s Expanding Subway Network

 

Image © Zaha Hadid Architects

 

Even under Stalin, Moscow subway stations represented the crown jewels of the city’s projects when it came to design. In more recent years, the emphasis placed on modern design in the city’s expanding metro rail network has resulted in some major new projects, and this year’s competitions

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