Albion Wharf

The conspicuous glazed volume, which houses the luxury private flats of Foster and Partners' Albion Riverside, have become a prominent landmark on the River Thames, in full view from London's Chelsea Embankment. Stephen Archer describes how this signature building contrasts with, and is reinforced by, a new block of affordable housing, also by Fosters, for the Peabody Trust. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Lithuania: assembling in cities

A period of accelerated urbanism in Lithuania has coincided with a slackening of the planning system. This has inevitably unleashed a degree of urban chaos - with individual house-owners and developers building, largely unchecked, whatever they desire. Amidst this unruly, if burgeoning built environment, Audrys Karalius highlights some significant architectural schemes, many of which pick up the torch of the architects who were designing in Lithuania's formative interwar years. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Too Good to Be True: The Survival of English Everyday PoMo

‘Intelligent, eclectic, witty, profoundly humanistic, and keen to debunk an inflexible, elitist and dangerously authoritarian Modernism’: Kester Rattenbury evokes the spirit of early British Post-Modernism. She reminds us of how in the early 1980s it spearheaded a spirited community architecture that played a strategic role in protest against wholesale, motorway-led redevelopments and the survival of Convent Garden. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Practices Abroad: Today's Diaspora,Tomorrow's Architecture

A surprising number of architects of Iranian origin, working outside of Iran, have come to international attention in recent years. Guest-Editor Michael Hensel looks at the work of US-based Hariri & Hariri and NADAAA&; and London-located Farjadi Architects and studio INTEGRATE. Chosen for the variety of their approaches, Hensel attempts to trace whether there are indeed shared connections and traits in their work that can be characterised as uniquely Iranian.     

Rebuilding from Below the Bottom: Haiti

The devastation of Port-au-Prince, Haiti, on 12 January 2010 makes this issue of AD especially pertinent, and the subsequent earthquake in Chile shows that strategies to rebuild after each crisis must be very different. Jayne Merkel and Craig Whitaker argue that, although there is much to be learned from previous disasters, no single response pertains. In Haiti, international architectural talent and expertise are irrelevant - even undesirable - until the social, cultural and political factors that helped devastate this once verdant and prosperous land are better understood. It is important to move slowly at first in order to go faster later. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Recombinant Landscapes in the American City

How are urban actors, such as landscape designers, community groups, developers and local politicians, actively restructuring their environments to meet the challenges of the American city in the new global context? Grahame Shane outlines the approaches to landscape that have been emerging since the mid-20th century and are set to recombine urban assemblages whether they are located in historic city centres, postindustrial waterfronts or suburban sprawl. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.