The Serpentine Galleries and Acute Art have collaborated to resurrect the final, large-scale public installation from the late environmental artist Christo. Beginning this week, visitors to Hyde Park in London can pull out their phones and, after downloading the Acute Art app, see the "London Mastaba" floating in the park's Serpentine Lake—thanks to augmented reality. Made from hundreds of colorful, stacked barrels, Christo's original installation only floated in the lake for three months in 2018, but Acute Art's The London Mastaba AR (Hyde Park) serves as a digital replica. In addition to the site-specific augmented reality exhibition, Acute Art will also release a version of the app allowing users to "see" the work in their immediate surroundings—wherever they might be. [ACUTE ART]
Researchers from Kamp C, the Center for Sustainability and Innovation in Construction in Westerlo, Belgium, have used Europe's largest 3D concrete printer to print an entire house in one piece—the first of its kind, according to the organization. Created using an on-site fixed printer, the demo house is two-stories tall and just under 970 square feet, and is rughly the size of other row houses in the area. Using a concrete mixture that boasts a high compression strength once set, researchers printed the house without formwork, reducing waste and cutting the project's construction time to three weeks. [Kamp C]
Continuing their intensive and methodical research on the transmission of COVID-19 in the built environment, researchers from the University of Oregon have released a report on the airborne transmission of viral COVID-19 particles through HVAC systems in healthcare facilities. In a not-yet-peer-reviewed preprint of Identification of SARS-CoV-2 RNA in Healthcare Heating, Ventilation, and Air Conditioning Units, researchers explain that they found SARS-CoV-2 RNA in 25% of the air samples collected from nine different locations—bolstering the possibility that the virus can travel through a building's HVAC system. "Although no known transmission events were determined to be associated with these specimens, the findings suggest the potential for HVAC systems to facilitate transmission by environmental contamination via shared air volumes with locations remote from areas where infected persons reside," the report states. "More work is needed to further evaluate the risk of SARS-CoV-2 transmission via HVAC systems and to verify effectiveness of building operations mitigation strategies for the protection of building occupants." [MedRxiv]
The USC School of Architecture and the Getty Research Institute have acquired the archives of trailblazing architect Paul Revere Williams. Carefully tended over the years by Williams’ granddaughter, Karen Elyse Hudson, the archive includes approximately 35,000 plans, and 10,000 original drawings, blueprints, and project diazotypes, hand-colored renderings, vintage photographs, correspondence, and other materials relating to Williams' built and unbuilt work. Williams was posthumously awarded the 2017 AIA Gold Medal. [ARCHITECT]
The global software development giant Atlassian has announced plans to build the world's largest hybrid timber building for its new headquarters in Sydney. Designed by New York–based SHoP Architects and the Australian firm BVN Architecture, the project aligns with Atlassian's commitment to achieve 100% renewable energy and net-zero emissions by 2050 by aiming for sustainable benchmarks such as low levels of embodied carbon in construction, low levels of overall energy consumption, and the use of 100% renewable energy for the building's operation. Currently slated for completion 2025, the project will also feature an electricity-generating facade system with self-shading capabilities to reduce internal heat gain. [ARCHITECT]
Conferences around the world are moving online to prevent the further spread of COVID-19 and Autodesk University 2020 is among them. But this year, the digital AEC event is being offered free of charge—all you need to do is register. [Autodesk]
The Museum of Modern Art in New York is one of myriad museums shuttered during the COVID-19 pandemic, but you can still experience some of its exhibitions online. Neri Oxman, the multidisciplinary designer, inventor, and founder and director of the Mediated Matter Group at the MIT Media Lab, has launched an online version of her recent MoMA retrospective, Neri Oxman: Material Ecology, that allows visitors around the world to learn more about her innovative digital fabrication methods. [ARCHITECT]
Rutgers University's Institute for Health, Health Care Policy and Aging Research and Robert Wood Johnson Medical School have named Mariana Figueiro as the new director for their Center on Healthy Aging. Figueiro was formerly the director of the Lighting Research Center and a professor of architecture at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, in Troy, N.Y. At the LRC, she also directed the Light and Health program since 1999. [Architectural Lighting]
