World’s First 360-Degree Infinity Pool Proposed For London Skyline
Compass Pools has unveiled a concept for a four-sided infinity pool atop a London skyscraper, accessed via a submarine-style door. Called Infinity London, the project is described by the swimming pool manufacturer as “only building in the world to incorporate a 360-degree infinity pool”.

How To Redesign Cities To Fight Loneliness
What do cities have to do with loneliness? “The way we build and organize our cities can help or hinder social connection,” reads a Grattan Institute report. It’s not that the built environment “causes” interaction, but it can certainly either enable or constrain potential interaction.

“3,000 Miles”, A Short Doc About Life In New York Through Voice Mails
On July 5th, 2016, Sean Wang moved across the country to work and live in New York City for one year. This is a personal documentary of his year, chronicled by voicemails left by his mom.

Could This Gorgeous Electric Plane Be The Tesla Of The Skies?
Called the “ZER0”, it’s an electric plane designed for efficiency rather than speed. The vehicle is only a concept, but it’s a compelling case study in how we might reconsider air travel to help the environment, developed by designer Joe Doucet.

Kings Of Cocaine: How The Albanian Mafia Seized Control Of The UK Drug Trade
Hellbanianz belong to the “retail game” of the cocaine trade. They are the street dealers and enforcers of the Mafia Shqiptare, the Albanian organised criminal syndicates who, the National Crime Agency believe, are consolidating power within the UK criminal underworld and on their way to a near total takeover of the UK’s £5bn cocaine market.

The $15BN Island That Will Make Or Break Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka has reclaimed two square kilometers of land from the Indian Ocean to double the size of its capital and retain talent, but will the investment pay off?

The Radical Plan To Save The Fastest Sinking City In The World
Many of our coastal cities are imperiled, but none have plotted an escape quite as audacious as Jakarta’s. President Joko Widodo plans to pick up and move the capital, along with 7 million people.

Will Upzoning Neighborhoods Make Homes More Affordable?
Housing affordability is a growing issue in America, and there’s a battle over how to fix it happening on blocks across the country. Zoning—the rules that govern how cities use their land—is on the front line. Cities and states across the country are proposing new upzoning laws to combat the housing crisis. Will they work?

The ‘Ocean Community’ Responds To Rising Sea Levels With Luxury Houseboats
RCA intelligent mobility graduate Wojciech Morsztyn envisions ‘Ocean Community’, a series of inter-linked luxury houseboats as the solution to rising sea levels. Connected via walkways, the floating pods make for autonomous living, with the ability to store and filter water, channel airflow for cooling and harvest energy from the sun and wind.

Coroflot Mobile Work Unit, Where Mobility And Creative Talent Come Together
Coroflot, a website dedicated to connecting designers with creative professional opportunities, is excited to introduce the Mobile Work Unit (MWU). The concept for the trailer-office grew from a desire to create a space solution that referenced both the mobility and creative talent of the Coroflot community.

Is This A Chinese City In Malaysia?
Forest City is being built in the Malaysian state of Johor in the southern part of the country. Here, the Johore Strait acts as a natural border between Malaysia and the independent city-state Singapore. It is one of the most ambitious urban development projects currently underway. An entire new city built from scratch.

Smart Frames For Growing Plants In The City
French company, Urban Canopee, has developed lightweight, adaptable and flexible frames, which serve as support for climbing plants — both in isolation or in groups — and to create a verdant canopy. The company hopes the easy-to-use frames will be used to grow plants on the roofs of buildings and other public spaces.

The Ever-Growing Car: Why Do They Keep Getting Wider?
We all know cars getting bigger and heavier. Most of us know why they are getting bigger, too. To comply with today’s stringent crash regulations – by passing offset, side and roof impact tests, as well as those evaluating pedestrian protection performance – cars require considerable cubic metres of controllably crushable bodywork.

A New Start-Up Wants To Use AI To Replace “Expensive, Architect-Designed” Homes
Tech start-up Higharc aims to “reinvent home design for the digital age.” The company uses iterative design to create “custom” 3D models and plans. Algorithmic design isn’t new to architecture, but it looks like Higharc seeks to do away with “expensive, architect-designed plans that take forever to produce.”

Gustave Eiffel’s Secret Apartment In The Eiffel Tower
When the Eiffel Tower opened in 1889 to much wonder and acclaim, designer Gustave Eiffel soaked up the praise, but as if that wasn’t enough, it was soon revealed that he had built himself a small apartment near the top of the world wonder.

The Beautiful Hidden Logic Of Cities
Driving around your city, you’re probably somewhat aware of Avenues and Boulevards and Streets and Roads and so on. However, it’s hard to get an overall view of how all these road designations knit together. By coloring them, we can suddenly see a new, stunning view of what we normally take for granted.

A Parallel Neighborhood Of Unhoused People Has Grown Up Around The Existing Community
In Koreatown, the homeless live on sidewalks, in alleyways, parks—and anyplace else they can find. Dilapidated tents bound together with rope create strange formations amid the city’s mix of modern and Art Deco architecture. They awkwardly jut from the sidewalks like poorly crafted spaceships.

The Fall Of New York And The Urban Crisis Of Affluence
I have never seen what is going on now: the systematic, wholesale transformation of New York into a reserve of the obscenely wealthy and the barely here—a place increasingly devoid of the idiosyncrasy, the complexity, the opportunity, and the roiling excitement that make a city great.

The Epic Rise And Hard Fall Of New York’s Taxi King
The man known as the Taxi King arrived at his 2014 holiday party in a $384,000 Ferrari, wearing a custom Italian suit. Five years later, that man, Evgeny A. Freidman, stood in a mostly empty courtroom in Albany, N.Y., as a judge sentenced him to probation for tax fraud.

L’Oréal’s Clip-on Sensor Tracks Your Exposure To UV Rays
The future of wearable skincare technology is roughly the size of an M&M. L’Oréal’s La Roche-Posay My Skin Track UV sensor clips onto clothing and measures the wearer’s exposure to UV radiation, a form of radiation that is known to damage skin and, in large amounts, cause skin cancer.

Wild Juxtapositions Of Saudi Arabia Modern And Ancient
Few countries in history have experienced as sudden a transformation as Saudi Arabia. The discovery and exploitation of oil brought an unprecedented influx of wealth. Photographer Peter Bogaczewicz captures the past and present of the oil-rich kingdom as it undergoes dramatic transformation.