Although the exhibition “Sensing Spaces” at London’s Royal Academy presents architecture, it doesn’t celebrate the stars of the scene and their prestigious projects. Instead it shows impressive, atmospheric installations on the topic of space, space that wants to be explored and experienced.

Light planner Ulrike Brandi from Hamburg has mixed feelings about the innovations in the lighting industry in recent years, arguing that energy efficiency is not everything. Uta Abendroth spoke to Ulrike Brandi about excessively bright light, light’s comforting aspects and the good old light bulb.

Frankfurt gleams in a new light – in 2014, parallel to the Light + Building trade fair, one of the world’s largest and most renowned light festivals will take place again, the Luminale. Take a look at our preview of the top ten light-installations.

French designer Martin de Bie couldn’t care two hoots about conventional products. Instead of focusing on functionality and usage, he develops instruments that transform sounds into light and entice the senses.

Kvadrat is reaching out into the fashion world: to Alfredo Häberli, Patricia Urquiola and the Bouroullec brothers. With them, Belgian fashion designer Raf Simons has now unfurled a new fabrics collection for the Danish textile experts. And is thus taking fabrics from the cat walk to the sofa.

Architects, designers and professionals are looking expectantly towards this year´s Light + Building, taking place in Frankfurt, March 30th to April 04th - this year focused on subjects as LEDs, networking buildings and the impact of light on the human body. At the same time the Luminale as an exciting event gives with its several highlights opportunity to discover the city.

Assuming the BMW’s i3 electric car is an international success, it will no doubt influence how we buy and use cars – and get from A to B – in the future. Ranges, service packages and even refueling could soon be dictated by the concepts of carmakers.

Google has premiered seven new designs for its Internet glasses: four frames for optical lenses and three pairs of shades. But are they smart enough to convince non-techies to be online at all times, walking through life as part of the digital network?

In recent years, the Stockholm Furniture Fair has morphed into a serious contender that can hold its own alongside interior design heavyweights imm cologne and Milan’s Salone. This is partly the product of the great range of fringe events during the Stockholm Design Week, held at the same time.

It is an ambitious idea to focus an exhibition purely on the aesthetic of objects in their emergent state, but this has been beautifully accomplished by the Design Museum London: Barber Osgerby’s “In the Making”.

In the Netherlands the number of days with strong precipitation increased to 85 percent. What to do with all the water in a sealed city like Rotterdam? With their concept for Rotterdam’s Benthemplein square, the architects and planners at De Urbanisten demonstrate how water management can be incorporated into urban square design.

An exhibition in the Frankfurt Museum Angewandte Kunst focusing on the furniture of designer Ferdinand Kramer. But his product designs remain tied to his architectural legacy, which is well worth taking a look at.

Frankfurt’s Museum of Applied Art presents Ferdinand Kramer – the designer, that is, not the architect. The show focuses on Kramer’s philosophy of creating adaptable, multi-purpose furniture.

“Selfie-ism”, the well-known phenomenon of uploading cell-phone photos onto social media platforms, is now also possible on building façades. Architect Asif Khan has created a façade that portrays three-dimensional faces.

Media façades tend to be viewed with a critical eye – at least by architects. Indeed, many are just a glowing, in the worst case, flashing form of decoration for mediocre architecture. But is everything that flashes instantly bad?

Christian Werner has re-engineered the sofa. Because what people expect of them has changed in the age of Smartphone, tablet PCs, etc. Today, it’s a matter of course to put your feet up, as the sofa trebles up as home office, dining venue and relaxing chaise longue. Uta Abendroth chatted with the Berlin-born designer about his latest creation, “Prado” for Ligne Roset.

The tower of Goethe University Frankfurt’s Educational Department has been demolished. The building was just 42 years old. An obituary.

The legendary statesman had a penchant for luxurious hotel complexes. These and others are now featuring in the illustrated volume “Holidays after the Fall”: A photographic journey to the architectural legacy of the heyday of tourism in socialist Croatia.

Imm cologne attract creative minds from all over the world – this time they included Marc Bailly, interior architect straight from New York. He joined Robert Volhard, Stylepark MD, for a tour of the Cologne interiors fair to find out all about innovative design this side of the Great Pond.

When do we regard things as authentic? Take wood that’s no longer wood, for example, and flooring that looks precisely like wood – how does this make us feel? What are the limitations to emulating natural materials, disassociating them from their familiar contexts and advancing them functionally? Architects Lars Krückeberg, Titus Bernhard, Günter Katherl and Dirk Zweering teamed up with architectural critic Angelika Fitz to debate these and similar issues in the context of “Innovations@Domotex”.

Wildau Technical University of Applied Sciences stands on the grounds of what was once Europe’s largest locomotive factory. The old and new buildings together form a highly attractive campus on Berlin’s doorstep.

What is of interest to a designer at a trade fair like the Domotex in Hanover? Uta Abendroth accompanied Petra Blaisse, founder of Amsterdam studio Inside Outside, on a tour of the fair and discussed traditiony, art works and inspiration with her. Oh, and good taste, as well.

To get to the end. We’ve almost worked our way through the stack. At the very bottom there’s a volume that should not go unmentioned. It describes and construes democracy as a challenge, visually, too.

Simon Collezione was presented in a new look at the imm cologne. Entrepreneur Dino Gavina and architect Carlo Scarpa shaped the collection that now belongs to Cassina. Thomas Edelmann spoke to Tobia Scarpa about his father, mayonnaise and opportunities for trying out the new.

The stack’s getting smaller, but the work of remembering what was left lying is not yet at an end. Because quite a lot has accumulated as regards architecture and the museum.

Be it lightweight wooden tables, noodles shaped like flower blossoms, or old roof tiles as part of seats: the [D³] Contest and the college booths in Hall 1 at the imm cologne showed young designers prioritizing flexibility and sustainability. New 3D printing methods are driving the manufacturing process.

At this year’s Domotex, visitors were able to find out all about new floor coverings – in special zones, through guided tours and in the form of debates among expert at the Innovations@Domotex. Stylepark talked with the exhibitors and visitors about the new concept.

Furniture design in a swirl of colors: At the imm cologne designers and manufacturers have dipped deep into pots of color and mixed up any number of great tones. We checked out what worlds of color are competing with each other.

The pile still hasn’t been cleared. But I’m tempted by what I haven’t yet seen or read. So let’s keep looking. This time in the direction of photography and drawing.

Trade fairs are not only catwalks for products. People also meet here. On the evening of the first day, AD magazine, Stylepark and Marc Meiré invited designers, manufacturers, artists, intermediaries and journalists to Marc Meiré’s house to swap notes on what’s to be seen and to debate what the pressing current issues are.

The imm cologne 2014 is highly diverse. Color brings a touch of friendliness to interiors everywhere, designers and manufacturers alike wallow in superbly finished woods and rely on materials such as copper and brass. Instead of going for the new, they’ve updated the tried-and-true. And revitalized Modernism.

Each time a new year begins, one is beset by a strange sense of disquiet. As though we needed to fight off a virus, we start tidying up. And in so doing, come across piles of books that deserve to be ignored no longer. So, here we go – let’s take a look at what we’ve got.

Hurly-burly in the morning in Hall 11.2 at the imm cologne – Fire! A performance in the hall with Italian exhibitors such as B & B Italia, Poliform or MDF?