Ecca collection

Agora Theatre

You can’t miss the new theatre in Lelystad, the Netherlands, designed by UN Studio. A faceted building, clad in the colours of the setting sun, it is a project that makes its presence felt despite its relatively low height. The excitement of the exterior is not diminished as you move inside, to a series of spaces of complex geometry and bright colours, culminating in the womb-like, multisurfaced interior of the bright red theatre itself.

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China Pavilion - Shanghai Expo

One of the most striking pavilions at last year’s Shanghai Expo came, appropriately, from the home country. It was obvious immediately that it was Chinese, through both the inverted pyramid of its shape, with strong horizontals, and the bright red that is immediately reminiscent of monuments such as Beijing’s Forbidden City. The horizontals, with ends cantilevering a short distance beyond the supporting elements below, pay homage to one of the most typical forms in traditional Chinese architecture, interlocking ‘dougong’ brackets. These were always realised in timber but here, in this modern interpretation, are clad in aluminium.

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Arcus College

The new campus of the Arcus College in Heerlen, in the southeast Netherlands is a regional provider of vocational training for the Limburg province. It was designed, says architect IAA Architecten, “to meet the challenges of contemporary vocational education, anticipating future developments in this field and creating an optimised learning environment for a new generation of students”. 

Photography: Little Planet www.littleplanet.be

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