OMA (The Office for Metropolitan Architecture) has unveiled more images of a residential project for Singapore, called The Interlace. The project is comprised by 32 6-storeys-apartment blocks and stacked in hexagonal arrangements.

Designed by Ole Scheeren, partner of the Office for Metropolitan Architecture (OMA), The Interlace breaks away from Singapore’s standard typology of isolated, vertical apartment towers and instead explores a dramatically different approach to tropical living: an expansive interconnected network of living and communal spaces integrated with the natural environment. Thirty-one apartment blocks, each six-stories tall and identical in length, are stacked in a hexagonal arrangement to form eight large-scale open and permeable courtyards. The interlocking blocks form a vertical village with cascading sky gardens and both private and public roof terraces.

OMA is led by six partners – Rem Koolhaas, Ole Scheeren, Ellen van Loon, Reinier de Graaf, Shohei Shigematsu and Managing Partner, Victor van der Chijs – and employs a staff of around 220 of more than 35 nationalities. Architects, researchers, designers, model makers, industrial designers and graphic designers work in close collaboration, and expert consultants are intimately involved from the beginning of the design process. / Via Dezeen & OMA

When banker and art collector Adolphe Stoclet commissioned this house from one of the leading architects of the Vienna Secession movement, Josef Hoffmann, in 1905, he imposed neither aesthetic nor financial restrictions on the project. The house and garden were completed in 1911 and their austere geometry marked a turning point in Art Nouveau, foreshadowing Art Deco and the Modern Movement in architecture. Stoclet House is one of the most accomplished and homogenous buildings of the Vienna Secession, and features works by Koloman Moser and Gustav Klimt, embodying the aspiration of creating a ‘total work of art’ (Gesamtkunstwerk). Bearing testimony to artistic renewal in European architecture, the house retains a high level of integrity, both externally and internally as it retains most of its original fixtures and furnishings. / via UNESCO.org

The twin watchmaking towns, La Chaux-de-Fonds & Le Locle, have been awarded World Heritage status. They joined nine other Swiss sites that were also labeled by Unesco (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization.) The twin towns that located 1,000 meters above sea level with tough climate, lack of major communication links and raw materials, have not only overcome the serious damage by two big fires in the early 17th and 18th centuries, but developed the model of successful watchmaking industry.

There is also another World Heritage project which these two towns are interested in. Presented by France in partnership with Argentina, Germany, Belgium, Japan and Switzerland, it brings together 22 buildings that illustrate the creativity and diversity of Le Corbusier. Although the project still has some way to go, the Switzerland government is highly expected their four Le Corbusier buildings would be honored with the title too.

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Maison Blanche

Chemin de Pouillerel 12
Case postale 2329
2302 La Chaux-de-Fonds
Switzerland

Le Corbusier 1912