PUGH + SCARPA AIA FIRM AWARD 2010 It's not easy to pigeonhole Pugh + Scarpa Architects. And that's the way partners Gwynne Pugh, Larry Scarpa, and Angela Brooks like it. The buildings they create are dynamic, many with colorful, angular, patterned facades that exude a sense of whimsical energy. Even at its most eye-catching, the work is also decisively rooted in function and energy efficiency. The firm has also established a substantial portfolio of affordable housing projects. — Published 2010.0127
	HOLL'S LINKED HYBRID China's recent willinginess to be an architectural testing ground has left it with a fair share of question marks dotting urban horizons, but in Linked Hybrid the gamble may have paid off. The bold, high-end residential complex in Beijing, by Steven Holl Architects, offers a more pervasive and open sense of neighborhood than most other modern high-rise housing in the city. — Published 2010.0120
	AUTODESK UNIVERSITY 2009 At Autodesk University 2009, Autodesk CEO Carl Bass said he was encouraged by signs that the economy seems to be improving. He also acknowledged that Autodesk customers worldwide are being challenged to stay competitive. He suggested that this translates into being able to work more efficiently and being able to do more with less — an idea echoed in every presentation at AU 2009. — Published 2010.0113
	PORTOLA VALLEY TOWN CENTER When Portola Valley, California sought an updated, seismically safer civic complex, the existing mid-20th-century wood-and-concrete-block campus was deconstructed and its parts repurposed, along with other salvaged components, to create a sustainable new facility on another portion of the site. The resulting Portola Valley Town Center is targeted for LEED Platinum certification and was named one of the Top Ten Green Projects for 2009 by the AIA Committee on the Environment (COTE). — Published 2009.1007
	HISTORIC PRESERVATION IN SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA The overwhelming cultural and architectural diversity of the African continent is united by the shared experience of wholesale exploitation and colonization by outside forces. Though many world regions grapple with the complications of post-colonialism, this problem is especially acute in sub-Saharan Africa, where this legacy pervades all contemporary experiences, including heritage conservation. — Published 2009.0916
	MAKING BUILDINGS GOOD The days of making the business case for sustainable design, or even explaining what LEED means and why it is important, have passed. Today's green building challenges have moved to more complicated areas of policy — permitting and politics — and the motivating sense of competition to be "the greenest." — Published 2009.0722
	ENGINEERING A PEI CANTILEVER - DALLAS CITY HALL Innovative architecture often requires equally innovative engineering and technologies for successful realization. An outstanding example of design and engineering interdependence can be seen in the Dallas City Hall, a landmark building completed in 1977, designed with daring vision by one of the world's leading architectural teams, I.M. Pei & Partners. — Published 2009.0708
	SOLID GREEN PRACTICE Given the urgency of our response to climate change and other environmental needs, is it really okay to keep building new non-green buildings? Here are nine U.S. firms that took sustainability to heart and made green design a centerpiece of their work, and have now taken the next logical step: they have committed to create only green buildings, from here on out. — Published 2009.0506
	GREEN STIMULUS MULTIPLICATION What if there were a way for states, cities, and counties to leverage each dollar of federal stimulus money they spend to generate $14 of private spending, create 14 times the number of jobs, reimburse the federal government $3, and get a dollar back to boot? And what if that economic solution could also help us tackle climate change by constructively attacking building-related carbon emissions? — Published 2009.0506
	AUSSIE ARCHITECTURE AWARDS 2008 The new creative arts building at Brisbane Girls Grammar School in Brisbane, Queensland, combines two contrasting halves into a dynamic whole. Public spaces and circulation are housed in the eastern wing of the Cherrell Hirst Creative Learning Centre, with its columns radiating in a distinctive K shape. The horizontally layered western wing contains flexible teaching spaces for art, music, drama, and technology. The two wings meet at a central atrium intended to foster social interaction and informal learning. — Published 2008.1119

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