Two visionary hotel concepts, Zendai Hotel Yin – an ultra luxury, boutique-style “city retreat” and Zendai Art Hotel – a 5-star business hotel, will open in Shanghai’s latest architectural masterpiece, the ‘Himalayas Centre’ which is due to open in Pudong in spring 2010, in time for the Shanghai World Expo.

The Himalayas Centre is located opposite to Shanghai’s New International Expo Centre and just 15 minutes from the city’s main financial district in Pudong.

Behind the design of the mixed-use development, located opposite the New International Expo Centre, is Arata Isozaki, renowned for his work on the Barcelona Olympics Stadium and Los Angeles Museum of Modern Art

Designed by one of the world’s leading architects, Arata Isozaki who is renowned for his work on the Barcelona Olympics Stadium and the Los Angeles Museum of Modern Art, the Himalayas Centre is being hailed by developers, the Zendai Group, as an “archisculptural icon for 21st century China”.

The Himalayas Centre will incorporate the Daguan Theatre with multi-functional auditorium seating 1,600, the Himalayas Mall and Himalayas Creative Complex / Museum Zone, as well as the two luxury hotels.

Looking at these amazing Alila Villas Uluwatu in Bali, Indonesia. Designed by Singapore based WOHA and built on 14.4 hectacres, the Alila Villas are a prime example of amazing sustainable architecture.

With Alila Villas Uluwatu, the architects wanted to create more than the usual stereotypical ideas of Bali, creating a design that worked with the dry Balinese Savannah vegetation and gently sloping site, not against it.

These modern contemporary Balinese villas use sustainable wood for construction (old timbre telegraph poles and wood railway sleepers) to replicate the typical dry Balinese Savannah vegetation.

Notable design features include the flat roofs, laid with batu chandi (local volcanic rock). This porous Javanese rock (a product of Mt Merapi’s eruptions) serves a threefold purpose: insulation; as a means of blending in with the local landscape; and for water absorption to support plant life.

Even the jigsaw-like exteriors of the pavilion serve more than an aesthetic purpose. The slats of these exteriors are made from a mixture of recycled wood and bronze, allowing for breeze to circulate yet maintaining privacy in partially shielding its occupants away from prying eyes.

The villas are perched on limestone cliffs with a stunning view over the Indian Ocean, large windows that extend into the natural open spaces. This green resort opens its doors to the public in 2009. Via Contemporist

Istanbul is developing and turning very cosmopolitan at a fast rate. A proof of this is the Istanbul Sapphire which is a 261-meter skyscraper. It will be completed in late 2009 and will then be the tallest residential building in all of Europe.

The skyscraper has been under construction for three years and recently reached full height. There will be 174 private residences divided between 64 floors. The other features of this towering building include a shopping center, fitness center and spa, restaurants and includes vertical gardens and a viewing terrace.

The total cost of the project is currently $200 million and around 40 percent of the whole project has been sold.

Above Amsterdam’s new “Marketplace for Furnishings” floats a restaurant designed by London’s Virgile & Stone. The copper restaurant sits on top of concrete columns and is accessed by to two bridges on the second floor.

Even though the economy is grim, big malls are opening around the world. We recently mentioned the opening of the Westfield Mall in London and now the Dubai Mall has officially opened boasting the largest number of retailers in the world.

As we mentioned earlier this year, the mall boasts a gold souk, a 10-million litre (2.2 million gallon) aquarium and an Olympic-size ice rink in addition to rows and rows of stores.

The mall is situated at the foot of Burj Dubai (Dubai Tower), already the tallest building on earth at around 700 meters (2,300 feet) and still under construction.
The mall is scheduled to house branches of some of the world’s best known retail chains, such as Marks and Spencer, Galeries Lafayette and even Bloomingdales, which has never before had stores outside the United States.

The municipality of Rødovre, an independent municipality of Copenhagen, Denmark, announced yesterday MVRDV and co-architect ADEPT winner of the design competition of the Rødovre Skyscraper. The 116 meter tall tower accommodates apartments, a hotel, retail and offices. A public park and a plaza are also part of the privately funded scheme.

The new skyscraper with a total surface of 21,688 sq meters will be located at Roskildevej, a major artery East of the centre of Copenhagen. The skyscraper is shaped to reflect Copenhagen’s historical spire and present day high-rise blending in the skyline of the city, it further combines the two distinctive typologies of Rødovre, the single family home and the skyscraper in a vertical village. Consideration of these local characteristics leads to Copenhagen’s first contemporary high-rise.

Responding to unstable markets the design is based on a flexible grid, allowing alteration of the program by re-designating units. These ‘pixels’ are each 60m2 square and arranged around the central core of the building, which for flexibility consists of three bundled cores allowing separate access to the different program segments.

On the lower floors the volume is slim to create space for the surrounding public plaza with retail and restaurants; the lower part of the high rise consists of offices, the middle part leans north in order to create a variety of sky gardens that are terraced along the south side. This creates a stacked neighbourhood, a Sky Village. From this south orientation the apartments are benefitting. The top of the building will be occupied by a hotel enjoying the view towards Copenhagen city centre. The constellation of the pixels allows flexibility in function; the building can be transformed by market forces, however at this moment it is foreseen to include 970 sq m retail, 15,800 sq m offices, 3,650 sq m housing and 2,000 sq m hotel and a basement of 13,600 sq m containing parking and storage.

Flexibility for adaptation is one of the best sustainable characteristics of a building. Besides this the Sky Village will also integrate the latest technologies according to the progressive Danish environmental standards. Furthermore the plans include a greywater circuit, the use of 40% recycled concrete in the foundation and a variety of energy producing devices on the façade.