Director of BIG Sustainability, Tore Banke, has been appointed Adjunct Professor at IE University Madrid – School of Architecture & Design. Along with Principal at Regenesis Group, Bill Reed and Emmanuel Pauwels, Founder of Green Living Projects, Tore will be contributing to the Sustainable Leadership Program, which brings together practice and academia in addressing the importance of sustainability in the building sector.
Located north of Georgetown, Kentucky, the new 35,000-square-foot distillery and 20,000-square-foot rickhouse will break ground in 2023 and is expected to open in 2025. The architecture for the Blue Run distillery and HQ celebrates the art of whiskey-making, sustainable technologies, and the landscape of Kentucky.
“For Blue Run we have boiled the entire process of whiskey-making down to a single linear sequence – from distilling to maturing to bottling. The half-mile long process meanders through the gentle hillsides creating bends and banks, inlets and outlooks. A single shingled roof of photovoltaic tiles twists and turns to maintain optimal orientation even as the activities underneath require grandeur or intimacy. In the same way the Georgetown Spring is shaped by how the water flows through it, Blue Run Distillery is shaped by the flow of the whiskey and the processes and people who make it,” Bjarke Ingels, Founder & Creative Director, BIG.
Climate ministers from around the world gathered at the Copenhagen Climate Ministerial, along with Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen and HRH Crown Prince Frederik of Denmark to pave the way for an ambitious COP28. Creative Director and Founder, Bjarke Ingels spoke to the esteemed audience about BIG’s Plan for The Planet – a masterplan for creating a sustainable, carbon-neutral world driven on renewable energy.
BIG hosted the Mayor of Seoul, Oh Se-hoon, on his recent visit to Copenhagen, which aimed at exploring how urban development benefits from well-designed architecture. Partner Brian Yang and Associate Jinho Lee welcomed the Mayor at our CPH office, followed by visits to BIG’s projects in Copenhagen, including the Copenhagen Harbor Baths, Urban Rigger and Noma, ending at Copenhill with a tour lead by Bjarke Ingels.
The Sluishuis neighborhood in Amsterdam has been named Best Residential Project at this year’s MIPIM Awards. This year, the MIPIM jury focused on buildings that enrich the lives of their users, the environment and community.
Sluishuis is a reinterpretation of the classic courtyard typology for life on water, bringing 442 zero-energy homes and a comprehensive water-quality program with space for up to 30 houseboats to the banks of the IJ River in Amsterdam. Designed by BIG and Barcode Architects, the building is shaped by its surroundings, at once close to large infrastructure and to small-scale urban communities.
BIG’s Creative Director and Founder, Bjarke Ingels, sat with Wajahat Ali at SXSW in Austin, Texas to speak about the future of 3D-printed architecture and BIG’s collaboration with 3D-printing company, ICON, on a 100-homes community in Wolf Ranch and the reimagined El Cosmico in Marfa.
Developed together with Bassin 7, NCC and Rambøll, BIG has designed an 18-storey hotel overlooking the Aarhus waterfront, which will house office spaces, restaurants, a conference center, pool and spa. A public staircase designed by BIG Landscape, will spiral from the harbour to an observation deck on the hotel’s roof.
The project is the last addition to the realization of BIG’s Aarhus Harbour Masterplan developed in collaboration with Gehl Architects, which includes the BIG-designed AARhus Residences, Aarhus Theatre, The Beach Huts, Kampanilen and Aarhus Harbour Bath.
The University of Kansas School of Architecture & Design has appointed BIG to complete space planning, programming, and concept design for the multidisciplinary design school. After a decade of increasing enrollment numbers and expanded program offerings, the school is working to transform its facilities to accommodate recent growth and upgrade academic spaces. By taking advantage of existing facility strengths in the heart of KU’s Lawrence campus, BIG will develop a plan that visualizes a redesigned home for the school that respects the established character of the site while also being optimized for innovative teaching and research.
“For an architect, each project is kicked off with a crash course seeking to educate ourselves in an entirely new field, because we rarely design for other architects (they tend to do that themselves). In this case – with our first design for a school of architecture and design – I feel like I have been preparing for this on a daily basis for the last three decades,” said BIG Founder and Creative Director Bjarke Ingels. “We want to create the physical framework for future generations of Kansas form-givers, architects and designers – a space that provokes unexpected encounters, triggers critical conversations and builds new bridges between discourses and skill sets, arts, crafts and technologies. The design work is just about to begin, even if my research for it started a generation ago.”
Landsec’s redevelopment of Red Lion Court, Bankside has received planning permission to create a green office cluster in Southwark. The new Red Lion Court development will deliver 230,000 sq ft of Grade A offices, retail and open public space on the banks of the River Thames, adjacent to Borough Yards. The BIG-designed building will provide access to outdoor spaces on every floor, an extensive communal roof terrace and unfettered views over the river into the City.
Plans for the building have been drawn up in collaboration with the local community following a two year public consultation. Over 45% of the site will be publicly accessible, including an expanded Thames Path, a pocket park and community garden plus affordable office space, flexible retail, a bike repair centre and wellness centre.
Red Lion Court has been designed to be net-zero in both construction and operation. By reusing part of the existing building and prioritising low carbon and recycled materials, the design will meet GLA and Southwark policy in terms of sustainability, biodiversity and energy efficiency. The completed building will be fully electric and target WELL Core Platinum and BREEAM ‘Outstanding’.
The nomadic campground hotel in Marfa will be expanded and reimagined as a 62-acre community, featuring large-scale 3D-printed structures for new guest units and hospitality spaces. Breaking ground in 2024, El Cosmico will continue to celebrate the convergence of creative culture and the minimalistic natural environment of the Marfa landscape.
To celebrate the collaboration, the team partnered with Austin’s Long Center for the Performing Arts to bring a taste of El Cosmico to Austin, Texas during SXSW. The 3D-printed performance pavilion combines the architectural design themes planned for the new El Cosmico in Marfa in a single, sculptural space for culture and community in the heart of downtown Austin.
“Our collaboration with El Cosmico and ICON has allowed us to pursue the formal and material possibilities of cutting-edge 3D printed construction untethered by the traditional limitations of a conventional site or client. Liz Lambert’s legacy for reimagining hospitality and her pioneering of a contemporary Texan aesthetic combined with the Minimalistic nature and culture, art and landscape of Marfa has been the perfect fit to pursue a new architectural vernacular language for El Cosmico in Marfa. Organic shapes, Euclidian circular geometries and a color palette born from the local terroir makes El Cosmico feel as if literally erected from the site it stands on. As an outpost of El Cosmico in Austin, Liz Lambert, ICON and BIG have partnered to create a permanent pavilion for music and performances. A single crescent wall emerges from the natural slope of the Long Centre’s front lawn. The adobe like color and texture of the horizontally layered wall appears like geological strata in an exposed cliff. Inspired by the Uruguayan engineer and architect Eladio Dieste, the sinuous curves at the foot of the pavilion provide both structural stability and social niches for the audience and performers. Organic form as structural function,” Bjarke Ingels, Founder & Creative Director, BIG.
BIG wishes women everywhere a Happy International Women’s Day – powerhouses within the industry and beyond 🚀🌹
In celebration of International Women’s Day, BIG’s CEO and Partner, Sheela Sogaard, gave a keynote at their annual Global Women in Novo Nordisk event. Sheela shared her personal story on being a woman in leadership along with her perspective on how companies can drive change towards gender equality in the workspace and beyond.
Bloomberg details the world’s largest community of 3D-printed homes, situated north of Austin, Texas in the city of Georgetown’s master-planned community of Wolf Ranch. The project – built by ICON and Lennar and co-designed by BIG – is a 100-home community of 3D-printed houses titled ‘The Genesis Collection’.
Described as representing “perhaps the most significant innovation in residential construction in decades,” the construction of The Genesis Collection is underway, using ICON’s Vulcan robotic construction systems, software, and advanced materials to print the homes of the future.
BIG’s CEO and Partner, Sheela Sogaard is appointed Adjunct Professor at Copenhagen Business School in Denmark. At her inaugural lecture, Sheela spoke about driving strategic priorities and sustainable growth for the past 15 years as a leader at BIG.
The Plus has received the Norwegian DOGA Award for Design and Architecture. Aiming to connect people, production, nature, technology and architecture, The Plus doubles as a public park and exhibition center inviting visitors to follow the entire production process and sharing knowledge on resource consumption, circular design and sustainable manufacturing.
“This is a factory with a playful and visionary idiom. The open design and visitor center in the heart of the factory has created an attraction and contributed to pride in the local community. With its careful placement and use of wooden materials, colors, light and air, The Plus provides a refreshing contrast to traditional production facilities,” emphasized the DOGA jury.
After a two-stage voting process with more than 150,000 votes cast, ArchDaily’s readers have selected CapitaSpring as the winner of the Building of the Year Award in the Office category. The award is the largest peer-based, crowdsourced architecture award in the world and highlights innovative projects that respond to the increasing complexity of our world and the challenges posed to our built environments.
CNN names Copenhagen one of the world’s 10 best cities to see while riding a bicycle and highlights a 22-kilometer route that covers BIG’s 10 projects in the Danish capital. Combining the native love for design and bicycling, the route takes you through some of BIG’s earliest projects, including the Copenhagen Harbor Baths, along with newer developments such as the Kaktus Towers, which will be completed this year.
The design-build team comprised of BIG, Turner Construction Company, E.E. Cruz, Arcadis, SCAPE, and WSP is selected by the Battery Park City Authority (BPCA) to expand and enhance Battery Park City public spaces while creating vital protection for the neighborhood against rising sea levels and increased storm intensity. The project covers an area along the Hudson River waterfront between the northwest end of Battery Park and a high point on Greenwich Street in Tribeca. Design is still underway, but preliminary plans call for about 8,000 linear ft of flood and seepage barriers, plus interior drainage improvements to protect the 92-acre area.
NYC Mayor Eric Adams, Queens Borough President Donovan Richards, construction workers and the BIG design team gathered to celebrate the topping off of Wildflower Studios, a 775,042 sq ft vertical village for film and television production backed by New York-native Robert De Niro. The frame of the studio, located next to the historic Steinway & Sons piano factory was officially completed Thursday with the installation of its final beam. The building will feature the world’s first vertical soundstage and be the future home to countless “Made in NY” productions, expected to open later this year.
Architectural Digest highlights Biosphere TreeHotel on their list of 20 Works of Wonders. Selected by Architectural Digest’s global network of editors, the WoW list names the most important new works in architecture, art, and design every year.
The National Gallery of Art in Greenland is brought one step closer to realization after receiving a major private donation. Located on a steep slope overlooking the fjords of Greenland, the gallery will be a social, political, and architectural focal point for the strong cultural roots of the Greenlandic people.
BIG’s ‘leaning’ Qianhai Prisma Towers, featuring a 300m tall residential tower and a 250m tall office tower, will complete the new Qianhai Bay development, solidifying Qianhai’s position as the burgeoning financial and cultural center of Shenzhen.
“Both towers are conceived as simple prismatic building envelopes split open to make room for public space on the ground where they stand. The open seams and gaping corners allow the green spaces to ascend from the ground to the sky leaving wedges for outdoor gardens and terraces for the life of the people living and working within. With its timeless simplicity and inviting openness – the architecture of the two towers is firmly rooted in the urban values underpinning Shenzhen – a vertical modern city of 1000 parks.” Bjarke Ingels, Founder & Creative Director, BIG.
The Plus has been named Architecture of The Year at the 2023 Scandinavian Design Awards. In its motivation the jury states that: “Vestre’s furniture factory The Plus is a forerunner and an outstanding example of how to take sustainability issues very seriously right down to the tiniest detail.”
Located in the Norwegian woods, the building serves as a factory for furniture manufacturer, Vestre – a company dedicated to encouraging a shift towards transparent, carbon-neutral fabrication in the manufacturing industry.
We’re honored to have two BIG projects shortlisted for the upcoming MIPIM Awards – Sluishuis for Best Residential Project and Fuse Valley for Best New Development. In addition to the usual criteria, this year’s jury focuses on projects with a holistic commitment to sustainability, best serving its users, environment and community.
We would like to wish everyone a happy and prosperous Year of the Rabbit! 恭贺新禧!
The new National Theatre of Albania has broken ground in Tirana. Located in the cultural heart of the country’s capital, adjacent to the iconic Skanderberg Square, the new theatre is tailored to Albania’s thriving theatre and performance scene. The bow tie-shaped building offers a ground level plaza and a publicly accessible rooftop amphitheater to breathe life into and around the building throughout the day.
Denmark’s Refugee Museum wins the Danish Building of the Year award. Located at the site of Denmark’s largest Refugee camp from World War II, the museum gives a voice and a face to refugees worldwide and captures the universal challenges, emotions, spirit and stories shared by displaced humans.
Interior Design Magazine awarded two of BIG’s projects with a Best of Year Award at their annual awards ceremony in New York City! The Plus, Norway won the ‘Greater World Sustainability’ category, while the Biosphere TreeHotel room in Sweden won the ‘Small Resort’ category.
Located at the heart of Singapore’s financial district, the 280-meter tall mixed-use high-rise has received the Silver MIPIM ASIA Award for Best Mixed-Use Development! The high-rise is celebrated as an oasis that continues the city’s pioneering vertical urbanism with a diverse neighborhood of restaurants, office spaces, residences, and sky gardens from the ground all the way up to the 51st floor.
Our first building in South America is officially complete! After four years of construction, the 130m-high, 32-story IQON stands as the tallest building in the Ecuadorian capital of Quito – a city with one of the highest elevations in the world. Biophilia from the neighboring La Carolina Park continues up onto the building façade – which doubles as the building’s structure – and into the private domain of each home. The sculptural planters host the roots of the trees and appear as concrete sculptures inside the apartments.
The latest issue of Architectural Digest features the BIG-designed single-family home ‘Villa Gug’ – located in the countryside of Northern Denmark. The home is informed by client Mads Peter Veiby’s passion for cars. Instead of hiding the cars away in the basement or garage, the house smoothly transitions from the car to the home. “When you see it, the house reads as if it was designed in a single doodle…In the end, it’s a very simple house that produces a lot of different experiences and surprises,” says Bjarke Ingels.
From the lab to the field to the Moon….it’s time to build! ICON has received $57.2 million in a NASA award to develop a lunar surface construction system that will target humanity’s first-ever construction on another planetary body. The contract, awarded under Phase III of NASA’s Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) program, builds upon previous funding for Project Olympus and will continue research and development for space-based construction systems to support future exploration of the Moon and beyond – including imagining humanity’s first home on the moon, designed in collaboration with BIG.
BIG has been named on the Architectural Digest AD100 list for the sixth consecutive year! Now entering its fourth decade, the annual list has evolved into a survey of the top names in interior decoration, architecture and landscape design, released in the publication’s January issue.
BIG’s CEO and Partner Sheela Søgaard has been honored with the title CEO of the Year 2022 by the Danish Association of Managers and Executives. Former winners of the award include Novo Nordisk’s Lars Fruergaard, Ørsted’s Mads Nipper and the Head Coach for the Danish National Soccer Team, Kasper Hjulmand.
The Plus wins DETAIL’s Reader’s Award, selected by DETAIL’s readers in an online vote from a shortlist chosen by the jury. Located in Norway, The Plus was built in just 18 months and will be the first industrial building to achieve the highest environmental rating, BREEAM Outstanding.
BIG, APM Terminals and Maersk reimagine the future of the shipping industry with the green transformation of the Aqaba Port Terminal in Jordan by 2040. The project is the first step towards decarbonization of major ports and container terminals – and connecting shipping infrastructure to local communities.
“Over the last decades, industries have driven economic growth, but also contributed to social inequalities and severe environmental impact. Aqaba Container Terminal is an example of how cleaner, quieter and safer infrastructure can create new forms of sustainable urban environments. As an urban planner and landscape architect the collaboration has been a unique chance to explore the hidden potential behind industrial sites and rethink infrastructure as a catalyst for urban, sustainable transformation.”, Giulia Frittoli, Partner, BIG – Bjarke Ingels Group
Construction on the world’s largest community of 3D-printed homes is underway! Situated north of Austin, Texas in the city of Georgetown’s master-planned community of Wolf Ranch, the 100-home community – built by ICON and Lennar and co-designed by BIG – highlights the possibilities of additive construction. The homes will include eight floorplans with 24 unique configurations ranging from 1,574 – 2,112 SF, and will be powered by solar energy. Delivered using a fleet of ICON’s Vulcan robotic construction systems, software and advanced materials, each home’s full wall system minimizes waste typically associated with standard construction processes.
Google Bay View is officially the world’s largest building to achieve LEED Platinum certification by U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC). The LEED v4 BD+C: NC Platinum certification recognizes the HQ’s sustainability-driven design: Google Bay View is a 100% electric building, powered in part by a first-of-its-kind “dragonscale” solar skin, which generates 40% of the annual electricity. The Campus also includes the largest geothermal pile system in North America and has net-positive water use – where all of the site’s non-potable water demands are met using the recycled water generated on-site.
Archdaily features BIG’s curvilinear opposites in Canada – the Vancouver House in British Columbia, and Telus Sky in Calgary. While residential Vancouver House gradually ascends from a triangular footprint on the ground into a rectangular tower, unveiling downtown from the Granville Bridge – the mixed-use Telus Sky inversely transitions from larger floorplates for working spaces on the lower floors to a more slender shape for living and balconies towards the top.
Canninghill Piers, under construction in Singapore’s vibrant Clark Quay enclave, is honored in five different award categories at EdgeProp Excellence Awards 2022, including: People’s Choice Award, a result of public votes, and the Top Development Award appointed by the Jury. Canninghill Piers is developed by Capitaland and City Developments Ltd. and estimated for completion in 2025.
Sluishuis has been awarded twice at the IPAX European Property Awards in Amsterdam – one of the world’s most renowned programs in the property industry. The residential building wins both the award for ‘Best Architecture Multiple Residence’ as well as ‘Best Residential Development 20+ Units’. Shuishuis is the newest addition to the Ijburg Island in Amsterdam and was recently also granted the Architectenweb Award for ‘Residential building of the Year’.
Step inside BIG Barcelona! Our Catalonian outpost opened in 2019 and has since grown to a thriving 70+ BIGster studio designing away at the new Farfetch HQ in the hills of Porto, the solar cupola Joint Research Center in Sevilla, a tribute to Basque culinary ingenuity with Gastronomy Open Ecosystem, 233 bird and bat homes in Northern Sweden and many other projects led by BIG Partner Joao Albuquerque.
Maison de l’Économie Créative et de la Culture en Aquitaine (MECA) has been awarded a 2022 Urban Land Institute (ULI) Global Award for Excellence! The Awards for Excellence program, launched by ULI in 1979, recognizes outstanding development efforts in the private, public, and not-for-profit sectors. In 2022, there were a total of six winners.
“This contemporary art center brings together three institutions. The result is remarkable in terms of urban regeneration, and demonstrates perfectly how to encourage exchange, cross-fertilization and the successful collaboration of cultural institutions. Rarely has the leadership and excellent management of a project been observed at such a high level,” emphasized the ULI judges.
The Danish Association of Managers and Executives ‘Lederne’ has nominated BIG CEO and Partner Sheela Søgaard as CEO of the Year 2022. Since 2002, the Association has awarded a CEO the title, who they believe deliver extraordinary results, drive diversity in their organizations, strengthen sustainability efforts and motivate their employees to excel. Sheela has been nominated together with Jeppe Rindom, Co-Founder and CEO at Pleo, Nana Bule, CEO of Microsoft Denmark & Iceland, and Jesper Hjulman, Group CEO of Andel. The winner will be announced on November 24th 2022.
Reaching its full 140 meter height, the new EDGE East Side high-rise is expected to be completed by 2023. Located close to the Warschauer station and the Mercedes-Benz Arena, The EDGE East Side will be a vertical hub of 65,000 square meters that connects two of Berlin’s most vibrant and artistic suburbs: Friedrichshain and Kreuzberg.
The eighth Oslo Architecture Triennale, which has the theme ‘Mission Neighborhood – (Re)forming Communities’, sees the former Munch Museum in Tøyen temporarily transformed into the Oslo Neighborhood Lab investigating how architects, designers and city stakeholders can help to create more sustainable, diverse and generous neighborhoods. Titled ‘Hotspots’, BIG’s contribution explores how power plants can become neighborhood assets and integral parts of our communities.
Claremont McKenna College’s new 135,000 SF Robert Day Sciences Center has broken ground! The building will be home to the College’s next-generation Kravis Department of Integrated Sciences – a powerful, multi-disciplinary, computational approach to advance gene, brain, and climate knowledge. Each level of the building is oriented towards a different direction of the campus, providing a 360-degree connection between the Center and the college-at-large – allowing life to seamlessly flow between the inside and outside while encouraging inter-disciplinary collaboration.
“More than ever, we are seeing the confluence of previously distinct disciplines: breakthroughs in computer and data science lead to breakthroughs in the natural and life sciences. As a consequence, we need to provide spaces for the integration of these previously siloed sciences. The architecture for the new Robert Day Sciences Center’s seeks to maximize this integration and interaction. The labs and classrooms are stacked in a Jenga-like composition framing a column-free, open internal space with the freedom and flexibility to adapt the ever-evolving demands of technology and science. It is our hope that the building will not only provoke new conversations between scientists but that it may also stimulate the rest of the liberal arts students to take a deeper interest in the sciences and vice versa. The analytical embracing the experimental – rationality intersecting with creativity,” says Bjarke Ingels, Founder, BIG.
BIG’s recently completed ‘Sneglehusene’ just outside of Aarhus have received the City’s highest honor for its exceptional architectural quality and contribution to the built environment. The project brings 93 new homes to the neighborhood of Nye, mobilizing modular construction with modest materials and creating generous living spaces in close connection to nature and city life.
“As an architect, one typically only gets to build a house once. With the ‘Sneglehusene’, we were given the opportunity to evolve our housing concept from an earlier project, while also developing the buildings’ own identity. Our modular concept has made it possible for us to maintain simplicity in the execution despite the construction’s complexity, and we have been allowed to improve the concept with all our experiences. It is a joy to see how the buildings have become homes filled with life, and we’re very proud to have contributed to the realization of the vision for the Nye neighborhood”, Partner, BIG, Finn Noerkjaer.
After meeting some of the first prospective Nabr residents in San Jose last week, the beta version of Nabr’s Design Studio – and pre-sales on its very first building, SoFA One – have launched. Co-founded by Bjarke Ingels, Roni Bahar and Nick Chim, Nabr applies technology and productization to increase the quality and volume of apartments available in major cities, starting in San Jose.
The Professional Women in Construction, New York have recognized BIG’s CEO and Partner, Sheela Maini Søgaard with an Honoree Award at their September Salute to Women of Achievement event! The Honoree award, which celebrates women’s dedication to their craft and their passion to create a more equitable path forward, was accepted by BIG NYC Project Manager, Flora Bao on behalf of Sheela.
Singapore has a new skyline addition with the completion of CapitaSpring – a 280-meter-tall high-rise oasis that continues the city’s pioneering vertical urbanism with a diverse neighborhood of restaurants, office space, a serviced residence and sky gardens from the ground all the way up to the 51st floor. Currently among the city’s tallest towers, CapitaSpring is developed by CapitaLand Development (CLD), CapitaLand Integrated Commercial Trust and Mitsubishi Estate Co., Ltd. It and designed by BIG-Bjarke Ingels Group and CRA-Carlo Ratti Associati who collaborated on its architecture, public space, and digital user experience (respectively).
BIG’s very first hotel, the Hôtel des Horlogers – located in the Swiss Vallée de Joux – has opened, marking BIG’s second collaboration with luxury watchmaking brand, Audemars Piguet. While the Musée Atelier Audemars Piguet defines a visitor experience inspired by the centripetal and centrifugal forces of time through the spiral form, the 8,000 m2 hotel zigzags through the de Joux valley and welcomes guests into the ‘time’ journey by reimagining the region’s historic winding watchmakers trail – blurring the boundaries of landscape and building.
BIG and WXY’s Downtown Brooklyn Public Realm Action Plan has been named on Fast Company’s list of Most Innovative Designs for 2022! Listed in the General Excellence category, the program honors the designers and businesses solving the most crucial problems of today and anticipating the pressing issues of tomorrow.
Her Majesty, Queen Margrethe II of Denmark has officiated BIG’s exhibition at the annual Golden Days culture festival in the heart of Copenhagen. Titled ’50 Queens’, the exhibit is a sculptural takeover of Copenhagen’s iconic King’s Square – temporarily renamed to Queen’s Square – featuring notable women in Danish history with the mission to bring more diversity to the city’s many male statues and celebrate Denmark’s fearless women. The exhibition was led by BIG Landscape Partner, Giulia Frittoli and Partner, David Zahle.
“Our exhibition celebrates the untold stories of women who have made significant contributions to Danish history but haven’t yet been properly recognized. As more focus is brought to issues of social justice and equality, we are so proud and honored to contribute to the conversation and give a voice to those who haven’t been heard. With 50 Queens, I hope we can raise awareness about the importance of gender equality and social diversity in our cities and public spaces to inform how we can improve our urban communities of today and plan for more equal cities of tomorrow,” says Giulia Frittoli, Partner, BIG
Held at the Brooklyn Museum on July 25th, the first Telosa Town Hall featured a panel discussion including Telosa Founder and ex-Walmart CEO, Marc Lore; former U.S. attorney, Preet Bharara; Diversity and Inclusion expert, Netta Jenkins; and BIG Associate and Telosa lead architect, Alana Goldweit. Moderated by journalist Nora Ali, 200 guests joined the event to learn more about Telosa’s progress, including how the team is aiming for 50,000 residents to be occupying the new city by 2030, and hints at where the new city might rise.
New York City today celebrated the completion of the first part of the East Side Coastal Resiliency (ESCR) Project that represents a new class of resilient infrastructure for New York City. The BIG-designed project will offer coastal protection that protects New York City’s waterfront neighborhoods from devastating storm surge and regular tidal flooding, while also improving accessibility, increasing ecological diversity, and delivering improved recreational amenities to a vibrant and highly diverse community. The entire project is expected to be complete in 2026.
“The East Side Coastal Resiliency project is more than infrastructure; it’s how we will protect our city from rising seas and stronger storms. This one project will create good jobs, put cutting edge technology and engineering into action, and, most importantly, protect more than 100,000 New York City residents from extreme weather. New York City is leading the way on climate, and we will continue to address the extreme weather threats that every neighborhood faces with the urgency it demands.” said New York City Mayor Eric Adams.
As reported by Architectural Digest, the 23rd iteration of the Triennale di Milano investigates “the unknown,” from the cosmos to the abyss! Curated by Ersilia Vaudo—astrophysicist and Chief Diversity Officer of the European Space Agency—the exhibition includes exclusive models from BIG, ICON, and NASA’s Mars Dune Alpha, Mars Science City, and Project Olympus collaborations.
Located on the outskirts of Amsterdam, the 49.000 m2 ‘floating’ neighborhood with public roofscapes and riverwalks reinterprets the classic courtyard typology for life on the water.
Developed by Amsterdam-based joint venture VORM/BESIX, the mixed-use development Sluishuis in the neighborhood of IJburg Steigereiland is officially completed following four years of construction. Designed by BIG – Bjarke Ingels Group and Barcode Architects, Sluishuis brings 442 zero-energy owner-occupied and rented homes, a public rooftop garden and walkway, and a comprehensive water-quality program with space for up to 30 houseboats to the area.
“Having spent my formative years as an architect in Holland at the end of the 20th century, it feels like a homecoming to get to contribute to the architecture of the city that I have loved and admired for so long. Our Sluishuis is conceived as a city block of downtown Amsterdam floating in the IJ Lake, complete with all aspects of city life. Towards the city, the building kneels down to invite visitors to climb its roof and enjoy the panoramic view of the new neighborhoods on the IJ. Toward the water, Sluishuis rises from the river, opening a gigantic gate for boats to enter and dock in the port/yard. A building inside the port, with a port inside the building.”
A California agency has cleared the way for the Oakland Athletics to continue planning their $12 billion waterfront ballpark project. The San Francisco Bay Conservation and Development Commission voted 23-2 to reclassify a 56-acre terminal at the Port of Oakland as a mixed-use area where a new ballpark could be built. Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf said the approval moved the city closer to bringing “this bold vision into a beautiful reality and keep our A’s rooted in Oakland for generations to come.”
As reported by The Guardian, the BIG and Heatherwick Studios-designed Google Kings Cross – the tech company’s new UK headquarters – has topped off, with a local celebration marking the occasion. Nicknamed ‘the landscraper,’ approximately 40,000 tonnes of soil will be transported to the rooftop garden, which stretches along the length of the building and in which 250 trees will be planted. The landscraper will also include a community space for use by local residents, as well as ground-floor retail units.
The new Refugee Museum of Denmark, FLUGT, designed by BIG-Bjarke Ingels Group and exhibition designers Tinker Imagineers is officially inaugurated in the presence of Queen Margrethe II. Located at the site of Denmark’s largest Refugee camp from World War II, FLUGT, gives a voice and a face to refugees worldwide and captures the universal challenges, emotions, spirit and stories shared by displaced humans.
Designed in close collaboration with Treehotel and Swedish ornithologist Ulf Öhman, the new BIG-designed hotel room titled Biosphere brings 350 bird houses to Swedish Lapland, increasing and strengthening the local biosphere and natural habitat. The room is available for bookings on the hotel’s website.
“I got to spend a few days and nights in some of the Treehotel rooms right before the pandemic, and left with a sense of rejuvenation from complete immersion into nature. I couldn’t help wondering if there was a way to take the immersion one step further – and almost instantly the idea of inviting not only the human visitors but also the resident bird and bat population to cohabit a spherical swarm of nests came to life. After our first conversations with Ulf Öhman from Norrbotten Ornithological Association we were relieved to learn that birds don’t drop where they nest – so there is hope for the glass to remain clear within this cloud of aviary architecture.” BIG Founder & Creative Director, Bjarke Ingels.
With ‘The Grandmother of Juneteenth,’ Ms. Opal Lee at the helm, the new 50,000 sq ft museum dedicated to preserving the history of Juneteenth and legacy of freedom will be designed by BIG and African American-owned design and build firm, KAI Enterprises, as reported by The New York Times.
“As a black architect, this project is one of the most rewarding experiences of my career…After nearly 40 years in this profession, I have the opportunity to lead a design for a project that is focused on African American culture,” says Douglass Alligood, Partner, BIG-Bjarke Ingels Group. “Our engagement with Ms. Opal Lee is what informed a lot of the design principles; our hope is that this building will become a gateway to the Historic Southside community of Fort Worth while serving as a national and global destination. Juneteenth is not only American history – it is world history.”
Located in the Historic Southside of Fort Worth, Texas – one of the South’s most underserved communities – The National Juneteenth Museum will be the epicenter for the education, preservation and celebration of Juneteenth nationally and globally, hosting exhibitions, discussions, and events about the significance of African American freedom.
The BIG-designed mixed-used residential development has received the NYC BIG APPLE BROWNFIELD AWARD, in the category of Community Advocacy and Engagement. While housing a nursing school on the street level, one-third of the residential units above are affordable housing units, strengthening the housing diversity within the neighborhood.
After a 2-year design competition, the winning proposal for the largest dock of the internationally acclaimed Zurich airport by BIG, HOK, Buro Happold, 10:8, Pirmin Jung, NACO and others is selected from 10 global competition entries. The Dock A extension, comprised predominantly of solid Swiss wood, will celebrate Swiss building tradition and innovation and strengthen the airports continued status as the gateway of Switzerland.
During The Reconstructing the Future for People and Planet Conference, hosted by Bauhaus Earth and the Pontifical Academy of Sciences (PAS) with Cardinal Peter Turkson, architects Francis Kére, Shigeru Ban, Bjarke Ingels and many other speakers – the European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen met with Pope Francis for a conversation about the war in Ukraine, climate, and sustainable architecture, sharing BIG’s recent design for Joint Research Centre in Sevilla, Spain.
Norwegian furniture manufacturer, Vestre’s new HQ, The Plus – a new furniture factory, experience center, and 300-acre public park – has officially opened its doors to the public! Set to become the first industrial building to achieve the highest environmental BREEAM certification, the colorful manufacturing village is dedicated to carbon-neutral fabrication of urban furniture, leading the way for manufacturing facilities and high-efficiency production of the future.
BIG has put forward plans for a 32,036m² office scheme next to the Financial Times building on London’s South Bank. Working on the project with developer Landsec since 2018, the building’s design is defined by an arrangement of ‘jumping blocks’ of differing sizes, which will house flexible workspace adapted to modern requirements and the post-Covid working world.
In a live broadcast, the City of Prague today unveiled BIG’s design for the first national concert hall in over 100 years: The Vltava Philharmonic Hall. The new concert hall will become the home of the world-class philharmonic for 1800+ audiences, celebrating the Czech music tradition and cementing the country as a cultural capital in Europe. The proposal was chosen among a total of 19 anonymous global entries.
“The Vltava Philharmonic Hall is composed as a meandering journey from riverbank to rooftop. Public flows and belvedere plazas unite the city life of Prague to the music within. Its halls are formed for sight, fine-tuned for sound, and orchestrated for functionality and connectivity. From this rhythmic structure, a symphony of colonnades and balconies extend as platforms for public life. Expressive yet pragmatic, the new Philharmonic will ascend to form a key landmark for Prague – from river to roof.” Bjarke Ingels, Founder & Partner, BIG.
Designed by BIG-Bjarke Ingels Group and Heatherwick Studios in close collaboration with Google, Bay View is Google’s first-ever ground-up campus with the mission to operate on carbon-free energy, 24 hours a day, seven days a week by 2030. The buildings deliver on Google’s ambition to create human-centric, sustainable innovations for the future of Google’s workplace as well as scalable, replicable solutions for the construction industry and beyond.
“Our design of the new Bay View campus is the result of an incredibly collaborative design process. Working with a client as data driven as Google has led to an architecture where every single decision is informed by hard information and empirical analysis. The result is a campus where the striking dragonscale solar canopies harvest every photon that hits the buildings; the energy piles store and extract heating and cooling from the ground, and even the naturally beautiful floras are in fact hardworking rootzone gardens that filter and clean the water from the buildings. All in all, a campus where front of house and back of house, technology and architecture, and form and function have been fused into a new and striking hybrid,” says Bjarke Ingels, Founder and Creative Director, BIG-Bjarke Ingels Group.
BIG’s design proposal for the new 9,000 m2 Gastronomy Open Ecosystem (GOe) for the Basque Culinary Center at the heart of San Sebastian bridges science, gastronomy, and nature to promote culinary research, innovation, and enjoyment. The Basque Culinary Center, a pioneering gastronomic institution, launched the international design competition for the new food innovation hub GOe in 2021 with the mission to bring food start-ups, researchers, and chefs under one roof. GOe will continue the development of alternative proteins, agricultural robotics, prevention of food waste, and much more from their new BIG-designed building, a proposal selected among five invited architects including OMA, Snøhetta, 3XN and Toyo Ito & Associates.
“We have had the great pleasure of collaborating with one of the most brilliant minds in modern gastronomy with our design for Rene Redzepis NOMA in our native Copenhagen. We are more than excited to take our architectural exploration of the world of Gastronomy to the next level with the work for The Gastronomic Open Ecosystem in San Sebastian. Conceived as an architectural extension of the dramatic landscape and cityscape of San Sebastian, our proposed design liberates the ground and provides parks on the roof to invite the public life of the city to engage with the art and science of gastronomy. Located on the heralded Camino de Santiago de Compostela – we believe that this architectural fusion of gastronomy and technology, city and landscape, building and park has the potential to become a destination in its own right for culinary pilgrims from around the world.” said Bjarke Ingels, Founder and Creative Director, BIG-Bjarke Ingels Group.
OCEANIX Busan – the world’s first prototype of a resilient and sustainable floating community – is unveiled at The United Nations HQ by partners UN-Habitat, the Busan Metropolitan City of the Republic of Korea, OCEANIX, BIG, and SAMOO. Designed by BIG alongside local architects SAMOO, OCEANIX Busan aims to provide breakthrough technology for coastal cities facing severe land shortages that are compounded by climatic threats.
Located at the former EXPO ´92 Sevilla site, in Isla de la Cartuja, the new 9900 m2 building for the European Commission, ties into the City of Sevilla’s goal to become a global benchmark for sustainability by 2025 and the local vision of the eCitySevilla project to decarbonize and transition Isla de la Cartuja to 100% renewable energy sources. The JRC building will house 12 research units and supporting functions as well as public and private outdoor spaces. The international design competition kicked off in 2021 with 66 offices competing for the project, expected to break ground in 2024.
“With our design for the Joint Research Centre in Sevilla, more than anything, we have attempted to allow the sustainable performance of the building to drive an architectural aesthetic that not only makes the building perform better but also makes it more inhabitable and more beautiful – a new Andalusian environmental vernacular,” said Bjarke Ingels.” Having started my studies as an architect in Andalusia and later returning to ETSAB in Barcelona, to now having a 50–person BIG office in Barcelona, this project feels like coming full circle.”
The BIG-designed Canada Water Masterplan has been given outline consent by Southwark Council. BIG will work on detailed designs for the tallest building, a 110m-tall waterside tower, which is set to be made of five vertical blocks which twist around a central core, creating terrace spaces overlooking Canada Water.
The BIG-designed Musée Atelier Audemars Piguet has been awarded “Best Cultural and Sports Infrastructure” Award at MIPIM’s 31st iteration! This year, in addition to the usual criteria, the jury also looked at how the project adapts to the consequences of the pandemic on the way people live, work, sho, and entertain themselves.
The first of its kind in the world, a new Neuroscience Center designed by BIG will bring together psychiatry and neuroscience under one roof to combine groundbreaking science and treatment of physical and mental brain diseases, spinal cord and nervous systems. BIG’s 20 000 m2 design proposal for Aarhus University Hospital mimics the gyrification of the human brain to utilize the limited site area most efficiently while creating synergies between the different disciplines within the hospital. “The brain is the most complex organ in the human body. Our design for the new Danish Neuroscience Center in Aarhus, replicates the most essential feature of the brain – the gyrification – to create more connections and space within limited confines. The building folds bring light, lots of new pathways and green pockets into the hospital making nature and biodiversity part of the hospital’s research and the healing journey of its patients. ” said Bjarke Ingels, Founding Partner & Creative Director. Established in 2009, The Danish Neuroscience Center (DNC) has become a world-class research and treatment facility for understanding and treating the most complex, efficient and adaptive organ in our body – the brain. A new building for DNC, set to open in 2026, will connect directly with the existing campus of Aarhus University Hospital and seeks to intensify the hospital’s unique approach combining healthcare, education and scientific research to collaborate and inspire each other.
Off the southern shore of Penang Island, Malaysia, the Penang State Government plans for 4,500 acres of three manmade islands to set a global example for sustainable urbanism. Using development as an opportunity to create new ecological systems, BIG, Hijjas and Ramboll’s vision for the Penang South Islands is designed to protect, preserve, and grow the rich biodiversity of Penang where land reclamation has destroyed the coastal habitats of one of the most biodiverse places in the world.
Last year the UN reported that over 1 million species are at risk of extinction. Many of these species will be extinct over the next decade, driving their plan for the 2021-2030 UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration to recover lost habitats and increase biodiversity globally. Biodiversity creates healthy ecosystems, and healthy ecosystems better withstand natural disasters, stabilize climate, provide water and food resources, and contribute to poverty alleviation. Put directly by UNESCO Director-General Audrey Azoulay, “protecting biodiversity amounts to protecting humanity.”
The design and construction industry has significant strides to make to decrease our impact on the environment. Buildings and construction account for nearly 40% of energy-related carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions, and development not only has lasting impacts on water sources and air quality, but destroys natural habitats.
In response, urban design should push the UN Sustainable Design Goals by creating places that do not just accommodate nature, but are fundamentally structured around building new ecological systems. Central to the approach for the vision for Penang South Islands is allowing biodiversity to shape the vision for the islands, while creating ecological, cultural and economic growth.
These goals drove the design for BiodiverCity throughout the competition period that took place at the beginning of 2020, and continue to serve as the foundation for the project’s development. Penang Island, which accounts for most of Penang’s economic activity, has run out of land for safe development, open spaces and infrastructure including flood mitigation and new roads to address congestion. This has resulted in poorly sited ad-hoc and hill slope developments in the region. The Penang South Islands masterplan is an opportunity for a holistic approach to a vibrant community with a mix of high end and social housing, tourism, industrial and commercial land, public amenities and recreational spaces.
At the beginning of the competition phase, the project team estimated the total carbon footprint, impact on habitat, and typical financial return of the masterplan if the project had been designed using conventional techniques. In turn, they defined ambitious, but achievable targets for these same metrics using new, innovative techniques to structure the project around habitat protection and development.
Compared to a conventional development approach similarly scaled, BiodiverCity, allows for a reduction in carbon footprint by more than 50%; an increase in habitat value by more than 200%, and 5% additional return on profit margin through value-added.
