Promotion: creative networking event Look Book's 2024 edition will feature 17 craftspeople and design studios specialising in creating lights and lamps. In its eighth year, the Look Book annual event, featured as part of the International Contemporary Furniture Fair (ICFF), showcases North American designers and studios, attracting international architects and interior designers to explore their latest products. The event aims to create connections and foster collaborations with design studios, artisans and makers. This year's (ICFF) will take place from 19 to 21 May at Manhattan's Javits Cen ..read more

Curator Carlo Ratti and president of the Venice Architecture Biennale Pietrangelo Buttafuoco have announced Intelligens Natural Artificial Collective as the title and theme of the event's nineteenth edition. The word Intelligens was chosen to suggest an inclusive "future of intelligence," according to Ratti. "The title of the International Architecture Exhibition is usually announced both in English and in Italian," Ratti said. "In 2025 it will be condensed into a single word for both languages via the common Latin precedent: intelligens." "The title Intelligens is linked to the modern term ..read more

Tropical modernism informed the plaster finishes of this extension in Hackney, London, which has been completed by local architecture studio Sonn. Aptly named The Plaster House, Sonn was tasked with adding an additional bedroom to the Victorian terraced building, as well as improving its connection to a rear garden. Plaster finishes were used both internally and externally Looking to create a uniform, "carved-out" feeling for the space, the studio used a variety of plaster finishes in a range of pale colours both internally and externally. "A focus on light, height and connection to the garde ..read more

Architecture studio Celoria Architects has completed House C, a concrete home in Mendrisio, Switzerland, informed by the region's grotti– cellar-like communal spaces where local cuisine is served. Designed for the studio's founder, Aldo Celoria, the home's foundations are formed by what was once a traditional cellar and dining area dug into the sloping site, which used to be visited by Celoria's family. House C is a concrete home in Mendrisio Referencing this history, the home was designed as what Celoria describes as a "massive primitive object embedded in the mountain", centred around a lar ..read more

The United Nations has predicted it will take "until 2040 and probably longer" to rebuild the homes in Gaza that have been destroyed in the Israel-Hamas war. Using data from the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, the report estimated it would take 16 years to rebuild the homes destroyed in Gaza as Israel's military action in Palestine continues, following the 7 October 2023 assault on Israel by Hamas militants. "Even under optimistic scenarios for the pace of physical reconstruction, the scale of destruction in Gaza has been such that, simply from the narrow perspective of moving ..read more

In this week's comments update, readers are discussing a rammed-earth public toilet in Japan designed by local studio Tono Mirai Architects. Called Toiletowa, the curving structure is located in a park in Saitama and has a wooden frame covered with rammed earth that was made from soil sourced from construction sites. Tono Mirai Architects enclosed a toilet in a Japanese park with rammed earth "That roof structure looks delicious" Commenter Henry asked if Toiletowa is "the most beautiful public loo in the world? Probably". Sharad Majumdar concurred with Henry's assessment, writing "looks ..read more

Architects should finally acknowledge that the profession is no longer a guaranteed route to prosperity and unionise, writes Phineas Harper. We've all met them: architecture graduates up to their eyeballs in debt, paying two thirds of their income in rent, and effectively earning less than minimum wage but who still identify as "middle class". Why, despite being saddled with low pay and crushing hours, do so many architects think they are more privileged than they really are? Though privately educated nepo babies with family wealth and connections dominate many top jobs in the sector, the vas ..read more

The founders of Spanish studio Masquespacio have transformed a traditional Valencian farmhouse into their self-designed home and studio, with maximalist interiors that nod to the Memphis movement. Creative and life partners Ana Milena Hernández Palacios and Christophe Penasse renovated the 1920s villa, which was once a farmhouse on the outskirts of Valencia, to create a hybrid home and studio that reflects their maximalist approach to interiors. Masquespacio has designed a live-work space in Valencia "Everything revolves around the concept of play," explained Hernández Palacios, who co-founde ..read more

Promotion: XL Extralight showcased its manufacturing process in an exhibition designed by Italian architect Andrea Caputo as an "immersive museum itinerary" during Milan design week. Named Industream and put together by Caputo in collaboration with artist duo Invernomuto, the exhibition demonstrated the complex industrial process behind XL Extralight's footwear and foam design technology. Although the company's core business is soles for footwear, it said its technology is leading it to other categories where lightness, durability and water-resistant properties are valued. Italian architect A ..read more

Pupils from The Piggott School in Reading, England, have won the Design Museum's Design Ventura competition with their invention of a card game that encourages children to learn about colours in their surroundings. The Colour Countdown game came out on top in the competition, which invites secondary school students aged 13 to 16 to develop a product that can be sold in the Design Museum's gift shop. Colour Countdown has won the 2024 Design Ventura competition This year's brief, set by south London textile designer Kangan Arora, called for responses to the theme of colour and community, challe ..read more