Issue 126 of The Plan opens with an editorial by Kimberly Dowdell entitled “Designing for Life.” In it, she looks at how architecture is a fundamental ingredient for supporting both the environment and society’s most marginalized communities. Next, by reviewing several important examples, Michael Webb takes us on a tour through Moscow constructivism. This serves as an introduction to his look at the restoration of the Narkomfin Building by Ginzburg Architects. In our Design column, we look at Connected, a design challenge in which important designers worked remotely, basing their project on their experience with lockdown. The event was organized by the AHEC as part of 2020’s London Design Festival. The Interior column looks at a unique project by Benedetto Camerana in Turin, where open spaces and glazed surfaces have injected new life into Torre Littoria. China-based studio Zhu-Pei has designed a contemporary museum that references an ancient past to form a focal point for rebalancing all the different elements at work in its location. The Architecture section of this issue is entirely devoted to Italian architecture. Archea Associati has rethought the concept of the sports stadium, breathing new life into the architecture of Tirana in a polychromatic project that forms an urban-scale landmark. Following a painstaking design approach in which historical memory embraces the future, deamicisarchitetti has transformed the morphology of the historical balcony houses of downtown Milan into a more contemporary courtyard-style design. Studio Architetti Mar, Galeazzo Architetti Associati, and Pool Engineering collaborated on the project for Padua University’s new Polo Umanistico (Humanities hub), producing a design that, although poised between history and contemporaneity, maintains a formal and substantial compositional balance throughout. Rome- based studio Alvisi Kirimoto has put its name to a social housing development that harmonizes the urban macro-scale with the domestic micro-scale, all in the name of wellbeing and quality of life. Finally, with its elegant, sensitive reinterpretation of a historical Sicilian country home, Iraci Architetti has turned a restoration project into a work of art.

Issue 125 begins with an editorial entitled “Living Together,” in which Tatiana Bilbao talks about her experience with designing social housing and the problems stemming from uncontrolled urbanization. In Viaggio in Italia, Valerio Paolo Mosco takes a look at Atelier(s) Alfonso Femia AF517, revealing architecture that reinvents reality as poetry. In Letter from America, Studio MOS presents an example of domestic surrealism, while Eduardo Castillio exemplifies the aesthetic concept of wabi in a timber house distinguished by both its craft and intellectual nature. Ignazio Lo Manto showcases a project that combines the essential simplicity of shapes with measurement, precision, technique, rigor, and a careful study of light. Santiago Valdivieso and Stefano Rolla have designed a modular structure that specifically responds to the needs of both its setting and its occupants. MYGG Studio offers an example of timeless architecture, in the form of a rectangular prism that draws in the spiritual energy of its site and creates a portal to it. Studio Transit melds rationality and expression in its manipulation of elevations and volumes to create a complex marked by its high dynamism. In the Interior column, the restaurant is the scene and the diners are the actors, while, from the street, we can watch the spectacle of the new architecture being created by Studio Partisans.

The theme of this issue is designer homes. Guillermo Acuña from Arquitectos Asociados shows us how a stilt house can be transformed into a community space, while SO – IL and Shenton Architects create complex relationships between a home and its surroundings on the North Fork of Long Island. With a design inspired by sustainability, Architecture BRIO further explores the dialogue with the environment in its artist retreat. Christoff : Finio has designed a timber family home that’s fully immersed in nature, while Plasma Studio has embraced the idea of designing an innovative, hi-tech family home. Damilanostudio Architects and Villa IE investigate the connections between Asia and the Alps of Italy’s Piedmont region, while Robert Konieczny of KWK Promes has designed a home from the garden up. In our regular tour of Italy, Diverserighestudio reveals a face of the country that’s alternative, solid, and reliable. Finally, in this edition’s editorial, Larry Scarpa discusses how the concept of the dense city can be used to promote quality of life and social change.

This issue begins with an editorial by Toyo Ito on the need to create shared spaces. In Letter from China, Amateur Architecture Studio demonstrates how traditions can be passed on through contemporary forms. In our regular Viaggio in Italia column, Nemesi Architects takes us on a tour of Italy’s avant-garde scene, while Trahan Architects shows us how architecture cannot escape its natural setting. Barclay & Crousse have apparently taken this last point as the inspiration for its architecture, with its material and spatial essentialism. Respect for existing architecture can be part and parcel of any renovation approach, as demonstrated by BCHO Architects’ renovation of an office complex. Bernardo Rodrigues and Laura von Dellemann use light to enhance human memory, while Remo Dorigati and Pierluigi Salvadeo design a university campus that encourages inclusiveness. Finally, compositional form is the key element of Biblioteca, designed by Patkau Architects + Group2.

In this issue, MasArquitectos & Gubbins Polidura Arquitectos and Perkins & Will explain how architecture can harmonize with even the most indomitable natural setting, while Sparano + Mooney Architecture presents a series of examples of how it can differentiate itself from its setting by interpreting it. Design is often a challenge, and it’s from that perspective that Studio Westway demonstrates how it’s possible to bring together the history of a country with the history of a successful company. Our column dedicated to China focuses on the work of Tongji Architectural Design Group, while Emilio Faroldi describes a different way of thinking about universities. The elegance and lightness of forms are fluid elements that can be translated into either a city tower, such as Morphosis, or the understated simplicity of MoDus Architects’ designs. The current interest in a new community-focused architecture is the theme of Yehuda Safran’s interview with Hashim Sarkis.

This Italian-themed issue begins with Simon Henley, founding partner of Henley Halebrown, reflecting on the façade’s role in architecture. Quality approaches to the renovation – and complete overhaul – of manufacturing facilities are showcased through designs by Antonio Citterio Patricia Viel (Bergamo), Studio Transit (Rome), 967arch (Santena, Turin), Giuseppe Tortato Architetti (Milan), and ASArchitects (Pitigliano, Grosseto). Designing spaces for children and education is an important challenge for architects. The designs of CL&AA (Colognola ai Colli, Verona) and Roland Baldi Architetti (Sluderno, Bolzano) both reveal an ability to listen to the needs of children and teachers. Moving beyond Italy’s borders, the villa in Lugano, designed by Nicola Probst Architetti, exemplifies the relationship between environmental context and architectural rigor. Finally, we look at the power of objects and their role in memory – that is, the inspiration behind Legacy, a design-themed event held at the last London Design Festival.

The relationship between architecture and context, between tradition and modernity, as well as the role of architecture in urban redevelopment and rebirth are just some of the issues discussed by Louis Becker, design principal and partner at Henning Larsen Architects. These themes are also exemplified in the designs of ARCHSTUDIO, DnA_Design and Architecture, OPEN Architecture, and Studio Zhu-Pei (China), Ipostudio and Alessandro Bucci Architetti (Italy), Wilmotte & Associés (Metz, France), GG-loop (Amsterdam), and Hopkins Architects (Wimbledon, London). Architecture is also about the monumental and the spectacular, as shown by Johnson Fain’s design for Christ Cathedral in California, and the residential designs of Powerhouse Company in Munich and Ryue Nishizawa on the Chilean coast.