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Architecture

A rendering of the 10-ton block of ice.

Cool Finds

Watch a 10-Ton Ice Cube Melt on a Seattle Square

It’s a different kind of block party

Kayak may be the best way to explore the climate change memorial of the future.

Anthropocene

What Will the Memorials of the Future Look Like?

From underwater trees to mechanical parrots, the memorials of tomorrow don’t look much like the ones that exist today

Trending Today

Hearst Castle Has a Brush With California’s Wildfires

Curators were ready to evacuate the Hearst Estate, now a state park and museum full of priceless art, furniture and history

The Dessen Bauhaus was home to ambitious movement that went far beyond blocky architecture.

Cool Finds

Harvard Just Launched a Fascinating Resource All About Bauhaus

The newly digitized collection is as ambitious as the art school it documents

The newly opened glass bridge in Zhangjiajie Forest Park

Cool Finds

Gulp: The World’s Highest, Longest Glass Bridge Opens in China

The new bridge in Hunan’s Zhangjiajie Forest Park overlooks the mountains that inspired Avatar

"The Hive" is on display at the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew, in London, England, through the end of 2017.

Art Meets Science

This Sculpture Is Controlled by Live Honeybees

Artist Wolfgang Buttress collaborated with a multidisciplinary team to create a giant, metallic hive

The viewing pod slides up and down the tower, which has been acknowledged as world's most slender by Guinness World Records.

Cool Finds

New Observation Tower Is World’s Thinnest

Brighton’s West Pier comes back to life…as a crazy vertical viewing tower

The cave is supported by six pillars hewn from the same rock.

Cool Finds

Archaeologists Are Trying to Digitally Preserve an Ancient Cave Before It’s Demolished

The 5th-century cave is in the way of an airport expansion

Cool Finds

The World’s Largest Picnic Basket Faces an Uncertain Future

The fast decline of a kitschy landmark

A courtyard in front of a mosque adjacent to the al-Qarawiyyin Library, pre-restoration.

Cool Finds

The World’s Oldest Working Library Will Soon Open Its Doors to the Public

After renovations wrap up in September, the library at Morocco’s al-Qarawiyyin University will debut an exhibition section for non-scholars

A fireplace at Melford Hall.

Cool Finds

These Beatrix Potter Illustrations Were Found Tucked Inside a Mansion’s Books

The children’s book author found inspiration on vacation

The Smithsonian's National Museum of American History holds this patent model for a Gorrie ice machine, the first mechanical refrigeration or ice-making machine the U.S. Patent Office patented.

Six of History’s Smartest, Weirdest and Most Interesting Inventions for Beating the Heat

From a bicycle mister to ice energy, here are a few innovative ways for cooling down

Cupid Fountain

The Heiress to a Gun Empire Built a Mansion Forever Haunted by the Blood Money That Built It

Sarah Winchester inherited a fortune and used it to construct a mysterious mansion in northern California

Photograph of the megalithic cluster of Carregal do Sal, one of the passage graves in Portugal that may have doubled as an ancient telescope.

New Research

These Ancient Tombs May Have Been Both Grave and Observatory

The best view of the heavens could be from within the tomb

One of the most stunning features of Taiwan's Lukang Longshan Temple is its extravagant wood caisson ceiling.

Experience the Secrets of a Threatened Taiwanese Temple

New 3D reconstructions make it possible to look inside Lukang Longshan

Residents of Makoko look on its floating school at night in December. Today, the school is nothing more than an empty, broken platform.

Trending Today

This Floating School Was a Design Nerd’s Dream

…until it sank

Some architects are in a timber state of mind.

The Innovative Spirit fy17

Will Skyscrapers of the Future Be Built From Wood?

Why cross-laminated timber might become the newest trend in urban architecture

Imagine a meta-memorial of the National Parks that projects high-definition video and recordings in metro stations, examining the role of wilderness in times of social inequality and ecological change.

The Innovative Spirit fy17

What Will Future Monuments in the Nation’s Capital Look Like?

Changing times and tastes leave little room for monolithic marble on the Mall

Architects Reimagine Detroit

A new exhibition in Venice showcases how 12 teams would reinvent four sites in Detroit badly in need of facelifts

Eltz Castle

Visit Seven Storybook Castles in Germany

These magnificent structures are straight out of a fairy tale

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