Warning! We're about to go into deep endgame spoilers for Blue Prince, well beyond rolling the credits by reaching Room 46. Read on at your own risk.I had been playing Blue Prince for more than 100 hours before I felt like I truly understood what the game was really about.The revelation came in the form of a journal entry, secreted away in a safety deposit box, hidden within the sometimes tough-to-access vault of the strange and shifting Mount Holly Manor. Reaching the paper requires solving one of Blue Prince's toughest, most obtuse, and most rewarding puzzles, one you won't even realize exists until you've broken through riddle after riddle and uncovered mystery after mystery. It recontextualizes everything that has come before it, not only the winding and involved test of wits that is the manor itself, but the story that had to be similarly excavated along the way--one of political intrigue and family tragedy, the rising and falling of kingdoms, the stoking of revolution, and the sacrifice necessary to breathe life into ideals.Continue Reading at GameSpot

In a new effort to advance sovereign AI for European public service media, NVIDIA and the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) are working together to give the media industry access to high-quality and trusted cloud and AI technologies. Announced at NVIDIA GTC Paris at VivaTech, NVIDIA’s collaboration with the EBU — the world’s leading alliance of public service media with more than 110 member organizations in 50+ countries, reaching an audience of over 1 billion — focuses on helping build sovereign AI and cloud frameworks, driving workforce development and cultivating an AI ecosystem to create a more equitable, accessible and resilient European media landscape. The work will create better foundations for public service media to benefit from European cloud infrastructure and AI services that are exclusively governed by European policy, comply with European data protection and privacy rules, and embody European values. Sovereign AI ensures nations can develop and deploy artificial intelligence using local infrastructure, datasets and expertise. By investing in it, European countries can preserve their cultural identity, enhance public trust and support innovation specific to their needs. “We are proud to collaborate with NVIDIA to drive the development of sovereign AI and cloud services,” said Michael Eberhard, chief technology officer of public broadcaster ARD/SWR, and chair of the EBU Technical Committee. “By advancing these capabilities together, we’re helping ensure that powerful, compliant and accessible media services are made available to all EBU members — powering innovation, resilience and strategic autonomy across the board.” Empowering Media Innovation in Europe To support the development of sovereign AI technologies, NVIDIA and the EBU will establish frameworks that prioritize independence and public trust, helping ensure that AI serves the interests of Europeans while preserving the autonomy of media organizations. Through this collaboration, NVIDIA and the EBU will develop hybrid cloud architectures designed to meet the highest standards of European public service media. The EBU will contribute its Dynamic Media Facility (DMF) and Media eXchange Layer (MXL) architecture, aiming to enable interoperability and scalability for workflows, as well as cost- and energy-efficient AI training and inference. Following open-source principles, this work aims to create an accessible, dynamic technology ecosystem. The collaboration will also provide public service media companies with the tools to deliver personalized, contextually relevant services and content recommendation systems, with a focus on transparency, accountability and cultural identity. This will be realized through investment in sovereign cloud and AI infrastructure and software platforms such as NVIDIA AI Enterprise, custom foundation models, large language models trained with local data, and retrieval-augmented generation technologies. As part of the collaboration, NVIDIA is also making available resources from its Deep Learning Institute, offering European media organizations comprehensive training programs to create an AI-ready workforce. This will support the EBU’s efforts to help ensure news integrity in the age of AI. In addition, the EBU and its partners are investing in local data centers and cloud platforms that support sovereign technologies, such as NVIDIA GB200 Grace Blackwell Superchip, NVIDIA RTX PRO Servers, NVIDIA DGX Cloud and NVIDIA Holoscan for Media — helping members of the union achieve secure and cost- and energy-efficient AI training, while promoting AI research and development. Partnering With Public Service Media for Sovereign Cloud and AI Collaboration within the media sector is essential for the development and application of comprehensive standards and best practices that ensure the creation and deployment of sovereign European cloud and AI. By engaging with independent software vendors, data center providers, cloud service providers and original equipment manufacturers, NVIDIA and the EBU aim to create a unified approach to sovereign cloud and AI. This work will also facilitate discussions between the cloud and AI industry and European regulators, helping ensure the development of practical solutions that benefit both the general public and media organizations. “Building sovereign cloud and AI capabilities based on EBU’s Dynamic Media Facility and Media eXchange Layer architecture requires strong cross-industry collaboration,” said Antonio Arcidiacono, chief technology and innovation officer at the EBU. “By collaborating with NVIDIA, as well as a broad ecosystem of media technology partners, we are fostering a shared foundation for trust, innovation and resilience that supports the growth of European media.” Learn more about the EBU. Watch the NVIDIA GTC Paris keynote from NVIDIA founder and CEO Jensen Huang at VivaTech, and explore GTC Paris sessions. 

Casa Sofia | © Fernando Guerra / FG+SG Located in the historic heart of Lagos, Portugal, Casa Sofia by Mário Martins Atelier is a thoughtful exercise in urban integration and contemporary reinterpretation. Occupying a site once held by a modest two-story house, the project is situated on the corner of a block facing the Church of St Sebastião. With its commanding presence, this national monument set a formidable challenge for the architects: introducing a new residence that respects the weight of history while offering a clear, contemporary expression. Casa Sofia Technical Information Architects1-4: Mário Martins Atelier Location: Lagos, Portugal Project Completion Years: 2023 Photographs: © Fernando Guerra / FG+SG It is therefore important to design a building to fit into and complete the block. A house that is quiet and solid, with rhythmic metrics, whose new design brings an identity, with the weight and scent of the times, to a city that has existed for many centuries. – Mário Martins Atelier Casa Sofia Photographs © Fernando Guerra / FG+SG © Fernando Guerra / FG+SG © Fernando Guerra / FG+SG © Fernando Guerra / FG+SG © Fernando Guerra / FG+SG © Fernando Guerra / FG+SG © Fernando Guerra / FG+SG © Fernando Guerra / FG+SG © Fernando Guerra / FG+SG © Fernando Guerra / FG+SG © Fernando Guerra / FG+SG Spatial Organization and Circulation The design’s ambition is anchored in reconciling modern residential needs with the dense urban fabric that defines the walled city. Rather than imposing a bold or disruptive form, the project embraces the existing rhythms and textures of the surrounding architecture. The result is a building that both defers to and elevates the neighborhood’s character. Its restrained profile and carefully modulated facade echo the massing and articulation of the original house while introducing an identity that is clearly of its time. At the core of Casa Sofia’s spatial organization is a deliberate hierarchy of spaces that transitions seamlessly between public, semi-public, and private domains. Entry from the street occurs through a modest set of steps leading to an exterior atrium. This threshold mediates the relationship between the public realm and the interior, grounding the house in its urban context. Once inside, an open hall reveals the vertical flow of the building, dominated by a staircase that appears to float, linking the house’s various levels while maintaining visual continuity throughout. The ground floor houses three bedrooms, each with an ensuite bathroom, radiating from the central hall. This level also contains a small basement for technical support, reinforcing the discreet layering of functional and domestic spaces. Midway up the staircase, the house opens onto a garage, a laundry room, and an intimate courtyard. These areas, essential for daily life, are seamlessly integrated into the overall composition, contributing to a spatial richness that is both pragmatic and sensorial. On the first floor, an open-plan arrangement accommodates the main living spaces. Around a central void, the living and dining areas, kitchen, and master suite are arranged to encourage visual interplay and shared light. This configuration enhances the spatial porosity, ensuring that despite the density of the historic center, the house retains a sense of openness and fluidity. Above, a recessed roof level recedes from the street, culminating in a panoramic terrace with a swimming pool. Here, the building dissolves into the sky, offering expansive views and light-filled leisure spaces that contrast with the more enclosed lower floors. Materiality and Craftsmanship Materiality plays a decisive role in mediating the building’s relationship with its context. White-painted plaster, a familiar element in the region, is punctuated by deep limestone moldings. These details create a play of light and shadow that emphasizes the facade’s verticality and rhythm. The generous thickness of the walls, carried over from the site’s earlier construction, lends a sense of solidity and permanence to the house, recalling the tactile traditions of the Algarve’s architecture. The interior and exterior detailing is characterized by an economy of means, where each material is selected for its ability to reinforce the house’s quiet presence. Local materials and craftsmanship ground the project in its immediate context while responding to environmental imperatives. High thermal comfort is achieved through careful orientation and passive design strategies, complemented by the integration of solar control and water conservation measures. These considerations underscore the project’s commitment to sustainability without resorting to superficial gestures. Broader Urban and Cultural Implications Beyond its immediate function as a family home, Casa Sofia engages in a broader dialogue with its urban and cultural surroundings. The project exemplifies a measured response to the question of how to build within a historical setting without resorting to nostalgia or pastiche. It demonstrates that contemporary architecture can find resonance within heritage contexts by prioritizing the values of continuity, scale, and material authenticity. In its measured dialogue with the Church of St Sebastião and the centuries-old urban landscape of Lagos, Casa Sofia illustrates the potential for architecture to enrich the experience of place through quiet, rigorous interventions. It is a project that reaffirms architecture’s capacity to negotiate between past and present, crafting spaces that are at once deeply contextual and unambiguously of their moment. Casa Sofia Plans Sketch | © Mário Martins Atelier Ground Level | © Mário Martins Atelier Level 1 | © Mário Martins Atelier Level 2 | © Mário Martins Atelier Roof Plan | © Mário Martins Atelier Section | © Mário Martins Atelier Casa Sofia Image Gallery About Mário Martins Atelier Mário Martins Atelier is a Portuguese architecture and urbanism practice founded in 2000 by architect Mário Martins, who holds a degree from the Faculty of Architecture at the Technical University of Lisbon (1988). Headquartered in Lagos with a secondary office in Lisbon, the firm operates with a dedicated multidisciplinary team. The office has developed a broad spectrum of work, from single-family homes and collective housing to public buildings and urban regeneration, distinguished by technical precision, contextual sensitivity, and sustainable strategies. Credits and Additional Notes Lead Architect: Mário Martins, arq. Project Team: Rita Rocha, Sónia Fialho, Susana Caetano, Susana Jóia, Ana Graça Engineering: Nuno Grave Engenharia Building: Marques Antunes Engenharia Lda

Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference 2025 saw a range of announcements that offered a glimpse into the future of Apple’s software design and artificial intelligence (AI) strategy, highlighted by a new design language called  Liquid Glass and by Apple Intelligence news. Liquid Glass is designed to add translucency and dynamic movement to Apple’s user interface across iPhones, iPads, Macs, Apple Watches, and Apple TVs. The overhaul aims to make interactions with elements like buttons and sidebars adapt contextually. However, the real news of WWDC could be what we didn’t see.  Analysts had high expectations for Apple’s AI strategy, and while Apple Intelligence was talked about, many market watchers reported that it lacked the innovation that have come from Google’s and Microsoft’s generative AI (genAI) rollouts. The question of whether Apple is playing catch-up lingered at WWDC 2025, and comments from Apple execs about delays to a significant AI overhaul for Siri were apparently interpreted as a setback by investors, leading to a negative reaction and drop in stock price. Follow this page for Computerworld‘s coverage of WWDC25. WWDC25 news and analysis Apple’s AI Revolution: Insights from WWDC June 13, 2025: At Apple’s big developer event, developers were served a feast of AI-related updates, including APIs that let them use Apple Intelligence in their apps and ChatGPT-augmentation from within Xcode. As a development environment, Apple has secured its future, with Macs forming the most computationally performant systems you can affordably purchase for the job. For developers, Apple’s tools get a lot better for AI June 12, 2025: Apple announced one important AI update at WWDC this week, the introduction of support for third-party large language models (LLM) such as ChatGPT from within Xcode. It’s a big step that should benefit developers, accelerating app development. WWDC 25: What’s new for Apple and the enterprise? June 11, 2025: Beyond its new Liquid Glass UI and other major improvements across its operating systems, Apple introduced a hoard of changes, tweaks, and enhancements for IT admins at WWDC 2025. What we know so far about Apple’s Liquid Glass UI June 10, 2025: What Apple has tried to achieve with Liquid Glass is to bring together the optical quality of glass and the fluidity of liquid to emphasize transparency and lighting when using your devices.  WWDC first look: How Apple is improving its ecosystem June 9, 2025: While the new user interface design Apple execs highlighted at this year’s Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) might have been a bit of an eye-candy distraction, Apple’s enterprise users were not forgotten. Apple infuses AI into the Vision Pro June 8, 2025: Sluggish sales of Apple’s Vision Pro mixed reality headset haven’t dampened the company’s enthusiasm for advancing the device’s 3D computing experience, which now incorporates AI to deliver richer context and experiences. WWDC: Apple is about to unlock international business June 4, 2025: One of the more exciting pre-WWDC rumors is that Apple is preparing to make language problems go away by implementing focused artificial intelligence in Messages, which will apparently be able to translate incoming and outgoing messages on the fly. 

You’ve drawn fifty versions of the same screen — and you still hate every one of them. Begrudgingly, you pick three, show them to your product manager, and hear: “Looks cool, but the idea doesn’t work.” Sound familiar? In this article, I’ll unpack why designers fall into detail work at the wrong moment, examining both process pitfalls and the underlying psychological reasons, as understanding these traps is the first step to overcoming them. I’ll also share tactics I use to climb out of that trap. Reason #1 You’re Afraid To Show Rough Work We designers worship detail. We’re taught that true craft equals razor‑sharp typography, perfect grids, and pixel precision. So the minute a task arrives, we pop open Figma and start polishing long before polish is needed. I’ve skipped the sketch phase more times than I care to admit. I told myself it would be faster, yet I always ended up spending hours producing a tidy mock‑up when a scribbled thumbnail would have sparked a five‑minute chat with my product manager. Rough sketches felt “unprofessional,” so I hid them. The cost? Lost time, wasted energy — and, by the third redo, teammates were quietly wondering if I even understood the brief. The real problem here is the habit: we open Figma and start perfecting the UI before we’ve even solved the problem. So why do we hide these rough sketches? It’s not just a bad habit or plain silly. There are solid psychological reasons behind it. We often just call it perfectionism, but it’s deeper than wanting things neat. Digging into the psychology (like the research by Hewitt and Flett) shows there are a couple of flavors driving this: Socially prescribed perfectionismIt’s that nagging feeling that everyone else expects perfect work from you, which makes showing anything rough feel like walking into the lion’s den. Self-oriented perfectionismWhere you’re the one setting impossibly high standards for yourself, leading to brutal self-criticism if anything looks slightly off. Either way, the result’s the same: showing unfinished work feels wrong, and you miss out on that vital early feedback. Back to the design side, remember that clients rarely see architects’ first pencil sketches, but these sketches still exist; they guide structural choices before the 3D render. Treat your thumbnails the same way — artifacts meant to collapse uncertainty, not portfolio pieces. Once stakeholders see the upside, roughness becomes a badge of speed, not sloppiness. So, the key is to consciously make that shift: Treat early sketches as disposable tools for thinking and actively share them to get feedback faster. Reason #2: You Fix The Symptom, Not The Cause Before tackling any task, we need to understand what business outcome we’re aiming for. Product managers might come to us asking to enlarge the payment button in the shopping cart because users aren’t noticing it. The suggested solution itself isn’t necessarily bad, but before redesigning the button, we should ask, “What data suggests they aren’t noticing it?” Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying you shouldn’t trust your product manager. On the contrary, these questions help ensure you’re on the same page and working with the same data. From my experience, here are several reasons why users might not be clicking that coveted button: Users don’t understand that this step is for payment. They understand it’s about payment but expect order confirmation first. Due to incorrect translation, users don’t understand what the button means. Lack of trust signals (no security icons, unclear seller information). Unexpected additional costs (hidden fees, shipping) that appear at this stage. Technical issues (inactive button, page freezing). Now, imagine you simply did what the manager suggested. Would you have solved the problem? Hardly. Moreover, the responsibility for the unresolved issue would fall on you, as the interface solution lies within the design domain. The product manager actually did their job correctly by identifying a problem: suspiciously, few users are clicking the button. Psychologically, taking on this bigger role isn’t easy. It means overcoming the fear of making mistakes and the discomfort of exploring unclear problems rather than just doing tasks. This shift means seeing ourselves as partners who create value — even if it means fighting a hesitation to question product managers (which might come from a fear of speaking up or a desire to avoid challenging authority) — and understanding that using our product logic expertise proactively is crucial for modern designers. There’s another critical reason why we, designers, need to be a bit like product managers: the rise of AI. I deliberately used a simple example about enlarging a button, but I’m confident that in the near future, AI will easily handle routine design tasks. This worries me, but at the same time, I’m already gladly stepping into the product manager’s territory: understanding product and business metrics, formulating hypotheses, conducting research, and so on. It might sound like I’m taking work away from PMs, but believe me, they undoubtedly have enough on their plates and are usually more than happy to delegate some responsibilities to designers. Reason #3: You’re Solving The Wrong Problem Before solving anything, ask whether the problem even deserves your attention. During a major home‑screen redesign, our goal was to drive more users into paid services. The initial hypothesis — making service buttons bigger and brighter might help returning users — seemed reasonable enough to test. However, even when A/B tests (a method of comparing two versions of a design to determine which performs better) showed minimal impact, we continued to tweak those buttons. Only later did it click: the home screen isn’t the place to sell; visitors open the app to start, not to buy. We removed that promo block, and nothing broke. Contextual entry points deeper into the journey performed brilliantly. Lesson learned: Without the right context, any visual tweak is lipstick on a pig. Why did we get stuck polishing buttons instead of stopping sooner? It’s easy to get tunnel vision. Psychologically, it’s likely the good old sunk cost fallacy kicking in: we’d already invested time in the buttons, so stopping felt like wasting that effort, even though the data wasn’t promising. It’s just easier to keep fiddling with something familiar than to admit we need a new plan. Perhaps the simple question I should have asked myself when results stalled was: “Are we optimizing the right thing or just polishing something that fundamentally doesn’t fit the user’s primary goal here?” That alone might have saved hours. Reason #4: You’re Drowning In Unactionable Feedback We all discuss our work with colleagues. But here’s a crucial point: what kind of question do you pose to kick off that discussion? If your go-to is “What do you think?” well, that question might lead you down a rabbit hole of personal opinions rather than actionable insights. While experienced colleagues will cut through the noise, others, unsure what to evaluate, might comment on anything and everything — fonts, button colors, even when you desperately need to discuss a user flow. What matters here are two things: The question you ask, The context you give. That means clearly stating the problem, what you’ve learned, and how your idea aims to fix it. For instance: “The problem is our payment conversion rate has dropped by X%. I’ve interviewed users and found they abandon payment because they don’t understand how the total amount is calculated. My solution is to show a detailed cost breakdown. Do you think this actually solves the problem for them?” Here, you’ve stated the problem (conversion drop), shared your insight (user confusion), explained your solution (cost breakdown), and asked a direct question. It’s even better if you prepare a list of specific sub-questions. For instance: “Are all items in the cost breakdown clear?” or “Does the placement of this breakdown feel intuitive within the payment flow?” Another good habit is to keep your rough sketches and previous iterations handy. Some of your colleagues’ suggestions might be things you’ve already tried. It’s great if you can discuss them immediately to either revisit those ideas or definitively set them aside. I’m not a psychologist, but experience tells me that, psychologically, the reluctance to be this specific often stems from a fear of our solution being rejected. We tend to internalize feedback: a seemingly innocent comment like, “Have you considered other ways to organize this section?” or “Perhaps explore a different structure for this part?” can instantly morph in our minds into “You completely messed up the structure. You’re a bad designer.” Imposter syndrome, in all its glory. So, to wrap up this point, here are two recommendations: Prepare for every design discussion.A couple of focused questions will yield far more valuable input than a vague “So, what do you think?”. Actively work on separating feedback on your design from your self-worth.If a mistake is pointed out, acknowledge it, learn from it, and you’ll be less likely to repeat it. This is often easier said than done. For me, it took years of working with a psychotherapist. If you struggle with this, I sincerely wish you strength in overcoming it. Reason #5 You’re Just Tired Sometimes, the issue isn’t strategic at all — it’s fatigue. Fussing over icon corners can feel like a cozy bunker when your brain is fried. There’s a name for this: decision fatigue. Basically, your brain’s battery for hard thinking is low, so it hides out in the easy, comfy zone of pixel-pushing. A striking example comes from a New York Times article titled “Do You Suffer From Decision Fatigue?.” It described how judges deciding on release requests were far more likely to grant release early in the day (about 70% of cases) compared to late in the day (less than 10%) simply because their decision-making energy was depleted. Luckily, designers rarely hold someone’s freedom in their hands, but the example dramatically shows how fatigue can impact our judgment and productivity. What helps here: Swap tasks.Trade tickets with another designer; novelty resets your focus. Talk to another designer.If NDA permits, ask peers outside the team for a sanity check. Step away.Even a ten‑minute walk can do more than a double‑shot espresso. By the way, I came up with these ideas while walking around my office. I was lucky to work near a river, and those short walks quickly turned into a helpful habit. And one more trick that helps me snap out of detail mode early: if I catch myself making around 20 little tweaks — changing font weight, color, border radius — I just stop. Over time, it turned into a habit. I have a similar one with Instagram: by the third reel, my brain quietly asks, “Wait, weren’t we working?” Funny how that kind of nudge saves a ton of time. Four Steps I Use to Avoid Drowning In Detail Knowing these potential traps, here’s the practical process I use to stay on track: 1. Define the Core Problem & Business Goal Before anything, dig deep: what’s the actual problem we’re solving, not just the requested task or a surface-level symptom? Ask ‘why’ repeatedly. What user pain or business need are we addressing? Then, state the clear business goal: “What metric am I moving, and do we have data to prove this is the right lever?” If retention is the goal, decide whether push reminders, gamification, or personalised content is the best route. The wrong lever, or tackling a symptom instead of the cause, dooms everything downstream. 2. Choose the Mechanic (Solution Principle) Once the core problem and goal are clear, lock the solution principle or ‘mechanic’ first. Going with a game layer? Decide if it’s leaderboards, streaks, or badges. Write it down. Then move on. No UI yet. This keeps the focus high-level before diving into pixels. 3. Wireframe the Flow & Get Focused Feedback Now open Figma. Map screens, layout, and transitions. Boxes and arrows are enough. Keep the fidelity low so the discussion stays on the flow, not colour. Crucially, when you share these early wires, ask specific questions and provide clear context (as discussed in ‘Reason #4’) to get actionable feedback, not just vague opinions. 4. Polish the Visuals (Mindfully) I only let myself tweak grids, type scales, and shadows after the flow is validated. If progress stalls, or before a major polish effort, I surface the work in a design critique — again using targeted questions and clear context — instead of hiding in version 47. This ensures detailing serves the now-validated solution. Even for something as small as a single button, running these four checkpoints takes about ten minutes and saves hours of decorative dithering. Wrapping Up Next time you feel the pull to vanish into mock‑ups before the problem is nailed down, pause and ask what you might be avoiding. Yes, that can expose an uncomfortable truth. But pausing to ask what you might be avoiding — maybe the fuzzy core problem, or just asking for tough feedback — gives you the power to face the real issue head-on. It keeps the project focused on solving the right problem, not just perfecting a flawed solution. Attention to detail is a superpower when used at the right moment. Obsessing over pixels too soon, though, is a bad habit and a warning light telling us the process needs a rethink.

AI researchers have recently been asking themselves a version of the question, “Is that really Zuck?”As first reported by Bloomberg, the Meta CEO has been personally asking top AI talent to join his new “superintelligence” AI lab and reboot Llama. His recruiting process typically goes like this: a cold outreach via email or WhatsApp that cites the recruit’s work history and requests a 15-minute chat. Dozens of researchers have gotten these kinds of messages at Google alone. For those who do agree to hear his pitch (amazingly, not all of them do), Zuckerberg highlights the latitude they’ll have to make risky bets, the scale of Meta’s products, and the money he’s prepared to invest in the infrastructure to support them. He makes clear that this new team will be empowered and sit with him at Meta’s headquarters, where I’m told the desks have already been rearranged for the incoming team.Most of the headlines so far have focused on the eye-popping compensation packages Zuckerberg is offering, some of which are well into the eight-figure range. As I’ve covered before, hiring the best AI researcher is like hiring a star basketball player: there are very few of them, and you have to pay up. Case in point: Zuckerberg basically just paid 14 Instagrams to hire away Scale AI CEO Alexandr Wang. It’s easily the most expensive hire of all time, dwarfing the billions that Google spent to rehire Noam Shazeer and his core team from Character.AI (a deal Zuckerberg passed on). “Opportunities of this magnitude often come at a cost,” Wang wrote in his note to employees this week. “In this instance, that cost is my departure.”Zuckerberg’s recruiting spree is already starting to rattle his competitors. The day before his offer deadline for some senior OpenAI employees, Sam Altman dropped an essay proclaiming that “before anything else, we are a superintelligence research company.” And after Zuckerberg tried to hire DeepMind CTO Koray Kavukcuoglu, he was given a larger SVP title and now reports directly to Google CEO Sundar Pichai. I expect Wang to have the title of “chief AI officer” at Meta when the new lab is announced. Jack Rae, a principal researcher from DeepMind who has signed on, will lead pre-training. Meta certainly needs a reset. According to my sources, Llama has fallen so far behind that Meta’s product teams have recently discussed using AI models from other companies (although that is highly unlikely to happen). Meta’s internal coding tool for engineers, however, is already using Claude. While Meta’s existing AI researchers have good reason to be looking over their shoulders, Zuckerberg’s $14.3 billion investment in Scale is making many longtime employees, or Scaliens, quite wealthy. They were popping champagne in the office this morning. Then, Wang held his last all-hands meeting to say goodbye and cried. He didn’t mention what he would be doing at Meta. I expect his new team will be unveiled within the next few weeks after Zuckerberg gets a critical number of members to officially sign on. Tim Cook. Getty Images / The VergeApple’s AI problemApple is accustomed to being on top of the tech industry, and for good reason: the company has enjoyed a nearly unrivaled run of dominance. After spending time at Apple HQ this week for WWDC, I’m not sure that its leaders appreciate the meteorite that is heading their way. The hubris they display suggests they don’t understand how AI is fundamentally changing how people use and build software.Heading into the keynote on Monday, everyone knew not to expect the revamped Siri that had been promised the previous year. Apple, to its credit, acknowledged that it dropped the ball there, and it sounds like a large language model rebuild of Siri is very much underway and coming in 2026.The AI industry moves much faster than Apple’s release schedule, though. By the time Siri is perhaps good enough to keep pace, it will have to contend with the lock-in that OpenAI and others are building through their memory features. Apple and OpenAI are currently partners, but both companies want to ultimately control the interface for interacting with AI, which puts them on a collision course. Apple’s decision to let developers use its own, on-device foundational models for free in their apps sounds strategically smart, but unfortunately, the models look far from leading. Apple ran its own benchmarks, which aren’t impressive, and has confirmed a measly context window of 4,096 tokens. It’s also saying that the models will be updated alongside its operating systems — a snail’s pace compared to how quickly AI companies move. I’d be surprised if any serious developers use these Apple models, although I can see them being helpful to indie devs who are just getting started and don’t want to spend on the leading cloud models. I don’t think most people care about the privacy angle that Apple is claiming as a differentiator; they are already sharing their darkest secrets with ChatGPT and other assistants. Some of the new Apple Intelligence features I demoed this week were impressive, such as live language translation for calls. Mostly, I came away with the impression that the company is heavily leaning on its ChatGPT partnership as a stopgap until Apple Intelligence and Siri are both where they need to be. AI probably isn’t a near-term risk to Apple’s business. No one has shipped anything close to the contextually aware Siri that was demoed at last year’s WWDC. People will continue to buy Apple hardware for a long time, even after Sam Altman and Jony Ive announce their first AI device for ChatGPT next year. AR glasses aren’t going mainstream anytime soon either, although we can expect to see more eyewear from Meta, Google, and Snap over the coming year. In aggregate, these AI-powered devices could begin to siphon away engagement from the iPhone, but I don’t see people fully replacing their smartphones for a long time. The bigger question after this week is whether Apple has what it takes to rise to the occasion and culturally reset itself for the AI era. I would have loved to hear Tim Cook address this issue directly, but the only interview he did for WWDC was a cover story in Variety about the company’s new F1 movie.ElsewhereAI agents are coming. I recently caught up with Databricks CEO Ali Ghodsi ahead of his company’s annual developer conference this week in San Francisco. Given Databricks’ position, he has a unique, bird’s-eye view of where things are headed for AI. He doesn’t envision a near-term future where AI agents completely automate real-world tasks, but he does predict a wave of startups over the next year that will come close to completing actions in areas such as travel booking. He thinks humans will need (and want) to approve what an agent does before it goes off and completes a task. “We have most of the airplanes flying automated, and we still want pilots in there.”Buyouts are the new normal at Google. That much is clear after this week’s rollout of the “voluntary exit program” in core engineering, the Search organization, and some other divisions. In his internal memo, Search SVP Nick Fox was clear that management thinks buyouts have been successful in other parts of the company that have tried them. In a separate memo I saw, engineering exec Jen Fitzpatrick called the buyouts an “opportunity to create internal mobility and fresh growth opportunities.” Google appears to be attempting a cultural reset, which will be a challenging task for a company of its size. We’ll see if it can pull it off. Evan Spiegel wants help with AR glasses. I doubt that his announcement that consumer glasses are coming next year was solely aimed at AR developers. Telegraphing the plan and announcing that Snap has spent $3 billion on hardware to date feels more aimed at potential partners that want to make a bigger glasses play, such as Google. A strategic investment could help insulate Snap from the pain of the stock market. A full acquisition may not be off the table, either. When he was recently asked if he’d be open to a sale, Spiegel didn’t shut it down like he always has, but instead said he’d “consider anything” that helps the company “create the next computing platform.”Link listMore to click on:If you haven’t already, don’t forget to subscribe to The Verge, which includes unlimited access to Command Line and all of our reporting.As always, I welcome your feedback, especially if you’re an AI researcher fielding a juicy job offer. You can respond here or ping me securely on Signal.Thanks for subscribing.See More:

In 2024, Egypt completed its 1,155km stretch of the Cairo–Cape Town Highway, a 10,228km‑long road connecting 10 African countries – Egypt, Sudan, South Sudan, Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Botswana and South Africa.   The imaginary of ‘Cape to Cairo’ is not new. In 1874, editor of the Daily Telegraph Edwin Arnold proposed a plan to connect the African continent by rail, a project that came to be known as the Cape to Cairo Railway project. Cecil Rhodes expressed his support for the project, seeing it as a means to connect the various ‘possessions’ of the British Empire across Africa, facilitating the movement of troops and natural resources. This railway project was never completed, and in 1970 was overlaid by a very different attempt at connecting the Cape to Cairo, as part of the Trans‑African Highway network. This 56,683km‑long system of highways – some dating from the colonial era, some built as part of the 1970s project, and some only recently built – aimed to create lines of connection across the African continent, from north to south as well as east to west.  Here, postcolonial state power invested in ‘moving the continent’s people and economies from past to future’, as architectural historians Kenny Cupers and Prita Meier write in their 2020 essay ‘Infrastructure between Statehood and Selfhood: The Trans‑African Highway’. The highways were to be built with the support of Kenya’s president Jomo Kenyatta, Ghana’s president Kwame Nkrumah and Ghana’s director of social welfare Robert Gardiner, as well as the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA). This project was part of a particular historical moment during which anticolonial ideas animated most of the African continent; alongside trade, this iteration of Cape to Cairo centred social and cultural connection between African peoples. But though largely socialist in ambition, the project nevertheless engaged modernist developmentalist logics that cemented capitalism.  Lead image: Over a century in the making, the final stretches of the Cairo–Cape Town Highway are being finished. Egypt completed the section within its borders last year and a section over the dry Merille River in Kenya was constructed in 2019. Credit: Allan Muturi / SOPA / ZUMA / Alamy. Above: The route from Cairo to Cape Town, outlined in red, belongs to the Trans‑African Highway network, which comprises nine routes, here in black The project failed to fully materialise at the time, but efforts to complete the Trans‑African Highway network have been revived in the last 20 years; large parts are now complete though some links remain unbuilt and many roads are unpaved or hazardous. The most recent attempts to realise this project coincide with a new continental free trade agreement, the agreement on African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), established in 2019, to increase trade within the continent. The contemporary manifestation of the Cairo–Cape Town Highway – also known as Trans‑African Highway (TAH) 4 – is marked by deepening neoliberal politics. Represented as an opportunity to boost trade and exports, connecting Egypt to African markets that the Egyptian government view as ‘untapped’, the project invokes notions of trade steeped in extraction, reflecting the neoliberal logic underpinning contemporary Egyptian governance; today, the country’s political project, led by Abdel Fattah El Sisi, is oriented towards Egyptian dominance and extraction in relation to the rest of the continent.  Through an allusion to markets ripe for extraction, this language brings to the fore historical forms of domination that have shaped the connections between Egypt and the rest of the continent; previous iterations of connection across the continent often reproduced forms of domination stretching from the north of the African continent to the south, including the Trans‑Saharan slave trade routes across Africa that ended in various North African and Middle Eastern territories. These networks, beginning in the 8th century and lasting until the 20th, produced racialised hierarchies across the continent, shaping North Africa into a comparably privileged space proximate to ‘Arabness’. This was a racialised division based on a civilisational narrative that saw Arabs as superior, but more importantly a political economic division resulting from the slave trade routes that produced huge profits for North Africa and the Middle East. In the contemporary moment, these racialised hierarchies are bound up in political economic dependency on the Arab Gulf states, who are themselves dependent on resource extraction, land grabbing and privatisation across the entire African continent.  ‘The Cairo–Cape Town Highway connects Egypt to African markets viewed as “untapped”, invoking notions steeped in extraction’ However, this imaginary conjured by the Cairo–Cape Town Highway is countered by a network of streets scattered across Africa that traces the web of Egyptian Pan‑African solidarity across the continent. In Lusaka in Zambia, you might find yourself on Nasser Road, as you might in Mwanza in Tanzania or Luanda in Angola. In Mombasa in Kenya, you might be driving down Abdel Nasser Road; in Kampala in Uganda, you might find yourself at Nasser Road University; and in Tunis in Tunisia, you might end up on Gamal Abdel Nasser Street. These street names are a reference to Gamal Abdel Nasser, Egypt’s first postcolonial leader and president between 1956 and 1970.  Read against the contemporary Cairo–Cape Town Highway, these place names signal a different form of connection that brings to life Egyptian Pan‑Africanism, when solidarity was the hegemonic force connecting the continent, coming up against the notion of a natural or timeless ‘great divide’ within Africa. From the memoirs of Egyptian officials who were posted around Africa as conduits of solidarity, to the broadcasts of Radio Cairo that were heard across the continent, to the various conferences attended by anticolonial movements and postcolonial states, Egypt’s orientation towards Pan‑Africanism, beginning in the early 20th century and lasting until the 1970s, was both material and ideological. Figures and movements forged webs of solidarity with their African comrades, imagining an Africa that was united through shared commitments to ending colonialism and capitalist extraction.  The route between Cape Town in South Africa and Cairo in Egypt has long occupied the colonial imaginary. In 1930, Margaret Belcher and Ellen Budgell made the journey, sponsored by car brand Morris and oil company Shell Credit: Fox Photos / Getty The pair made use of the road built by British colonisers in the 19th century, and which forms the basis for the current Cairo–Cape Town Highway. The road was preceded by the 1874 Cape to Cairo Railway project, which connected the colonies of the British Empire Credit: Library of Congress, Geography and Map Division This network of eponymous streets represents attempts to inscribe anticolonial power into the materiality of the city. Street‑naming practices are one way in which the past comes into the present, ‘weaving history into the geographic fabric of everyday life’, as geographer Derek Alderman wrote in his 2002 essay ‘Street Names as Memorial Arenas’. In this vein, the renaming of streets during decolonisation marked a practice of contesting the production of colonial space. In the newly postcolonial city, renaming was a way of ‘claiming the city back’, Alderman continues. While these changes may appear discursive, it is their embedding in material spaces, through signs and maps, that make the names come to life; place names become a part of the everyday through sharing addresses or giving directions. This quality makes them powerful; consciously or unconsciously, they form part of how the spaces of the city are navigated.  These are traces that were once part of a dominant historical narrative; yet when they are encountered in the present, during a different historical moment, they no longer act as expressions of power but instead conjure up a moment that has long passed. A street in Lusaka named after an Egyptian general made more sense 60 years ago than it does today, yet contextualising it recovers a marginalised history of Egyptian Pan‑Africanism.  Markers such as street names or monuments are simultaneously markers of anticolonial struggle as well as expressions of state power – part of an attempt, by political projects such as Nasser’s, to exert their own dominance over cities, towns and villages. That such traces are expressions of both anticolonial hopes and postcolonial state power produces a sense of tension within them. For instance, Nasser’s postcolonial project in Egypt was a contradictory one; it gave life to anticolonial hopes – for instance by breaking away from European capitalism and embracing anticolonial geopolitics – while crushing many parts of the left through repression, censorship and imprisonment. Traces of Nasser found today inscribe both anticolonial promises – those that came to life and those that did not – while reproducing postcolonial power that in most instances ended in dictatorship.  Recent efforts to complete the route build on those of the post‑independence era – work on a section north of Nairobi started in 1968 Credit: Associated Press / Alamy The Trans‑African Highway network was conceived in 1970 in the spirit of Pan‑Africanism At that time, the routes did not extend into South Africa, which was in the grip of apartheid. The Trans‑African Highway initiative was motivated by a desire to improve trade and centre cultural links across the continent – an ambition that was even celebrated on postage stamps There have been long‑standing debates about the erasure of the radical anticolonial spirit from the more conservative postcolonial states that emerged; the promises and hopes of anticolonialism, not least among them socialism and a world free of white supremacy, remain largely unrealised. Instead, by the 1970s neoliberalism emerged as a new hegemonic project. The contemporary instantiation of Cape to Cairo highlights just how pervasive neoliberal logics continue to be, despite multiple global financial crises and the 2011 Egyptian revolution demanding ‘bread, freedom, social justice’.  But the network of streets named after anticolonial figures and events across the world is testament to the immense power and promise of anticolonial revolution. Most of the 20th century was characterised by anticolonial struggle, decolonisation and postcolonial nation‑building, as nations across the global south gained independence from European empire and founded their own political projects. Anticolonial traces, present in street and place names, point to the possibility of solidarity as a means of reorienting colonial geographies. They are a reminder that there have been other imaginings of Cape to Cairo, and that things can be – and have been – otherwise. 2025-06-13 Kristina Rapacki Share

Casa Morena | © Fernando Guerra / FG+SG In the coastal enclave of Lagos, Portugal, Mário Martins Atelier has crafted Casa Morena. This residence quietly asserts itself as an ode to the dialogue between architecture and its natural setting. Completed in 2024, this project demonstrates a considered response to its environment, where the interplay of light, material, and landscape defines a sense of place rather than architectural imposition. Casa Morena Technical Information Architects1-5: Mário Martins Atelier Location: Lagos, Portugal Project Years: 2024 Photographs: © Fernando Guerra / FG+SG A simple house, one that wishes to be discreet and to be influenced by its location, to become a house that is pleasant with thoughtful landscaping. – Mário Martins Atelier Casa Morena Photographs © Fernando Guerra / FG+SG © Fernando Guerra / FG+SG © Fernando Guerra / FG+SG © Fernando Guerra / FG+SG © Fernando Guerra / FG+SG © Fernando Guerra / FG+SG © Fernando Guerra / FG+SG © Fernando Guerra / FG+SG © Fernando Guerra / FG+SG © Fernando Guerra / FG+SG A Contextual Response to Landscape and Light The design of Casa Morena finds its genesis in the site itself, a pine-scented plot overlooking the expanse of a bay. The pine trees, longstanding witnesses to the landscape’s evolution, provide the project’s visual anchor and spatial logic. In a move that both respects and celebrates these natural elements, Mário Martins Atelier structured the house’s reticulated plan to echo the presence of the trees, creating a composition that unfolds as a series of volumes harmonizing with the vertical rhythm of the trunks. The solid base of the house, built from locally sourced schist, emerges directly from the terrain. These robust walls establish a tactile continuity with the ground, their rough textures anchoring the architecture within the landscape. In contrast, the upper volumes of the house adopt a distinctly lighter expression: horizontal planes rendered in white plaster, their smooth surfaces catching and refracting the region’s luminous sun. This duality, earthbound solidity, and aerial lightness establish an architectural narrative rooted in the elemental. Casa Morena Experiential Flow Casa Morena’s spatial arrangement articulates a clear hierarchy of public and private domains. On the ground floor, the house embraces openness and transparency. An expansive entrance hall blurs the threshold inside and out, guiding inhabitants and visitors into a luminous social heart. The lounge, kitchen, and office flow seamlessly into the garden, unified by a continuous glazed façade that invites the outside in. This deliberate porosity extends to a covered terrace, an intermediary space that dissolves the boundary between shelter and exposure. The terrace, framed by the garden’s green canopy and the swimming pool’s long line, becomes a place of repose and contemplation. The pool itself demarcates the transition from a cultivated garden to the looser, more rugged landscape beyond, its linear form echoing the horizon’s expanse. Ascending to the upper floor, the architectural language shifts towards intimacy. The bedrooms, each with direct access to terraces and patios, create secluded zones that still maintain a fluid relationship with the outdoors. A discreet rooftop terrace, accessible from these private quarters, offers a hidden sanctuary where the interplay of views and light remains uninterrupted. Material Tectonics and Environmental Strategy Casa Morena’s material palette is rooted in regional specificity and tactile sensibility. Schist, extracted from the site, is not merely a structural element but a narrative thread linking the building to its geological past. Its earthy warmth and rugged surface provide a counterpoint to the luminous white of the upper volumes, an articulation of contrast that enlivens the building’s silhouette. White, the chromatic signature of the Algarve region, is employed with restraint and nuance. Its reflective qualities intensify the play of shadow and light, a dynamic that shifts with the passing of the day. In this interplay, architecture becomes an instrument for registering the ephemeral, and the environment itself becomes a participant in the spatial drama. Environmental stewardship is also woven into the project’s DNA. Discreetly integrated systems on the roof harness solar energy and manage water resources, extending the house’s commitment to a sustainable coexistence with its setting. Casa Morena Plans Basement | © Mario Martins Atelier Ground Level | © Mario Martins Atelier Upper Level | © Mario Martins Atelier Roof Plan | © Mario Martins Atelier Elevations | © Mario Martins Atelier Casa Morena Image Gallery About Mário Martins Atelier Mário Martins Atelier is an architectural studio based in Lagos and Lisbon, Portugal, led by Mário Martins. The practice is known for its context-sensitive approach, crafting contemporary projects seamlessly integrating with their surroundings while prioritizing regional materials and environmental considerations. Credits and Additional Notes Lead Architect: Mário Martins, arq. Project Team: Nuno Colaço, Sónia Fialho, Susana Jóia, Mariana Franco, Ana Graça Engineering: Nuno Grave Engenharia Landscape: HB-Hipolito Bettencourt – Arquitectura Paisagista, Lda. Building Contractor: Marques Antunes Engenharia Lda.

These annual rankings were last updated on June 13, 2025. Want to see your firm on next year’s list? Continue reading for more on how you can improve your studio’s ranking. New Zealand is a one-of-a-kind island in the Pacific, famous for its indigenous Maori architecture. The country has managed to preserve an array of historical aboriginal ruins, such as marae (meeting grounds) and wharenui (meeting houses), despite its European colonization during the 19th century. Apart from the country’s ancient ruins, New Zealand is also home to several notable architectural landmarks like the famous Sky Tower piercing the Auckland skyline to the organic forms of the Te Papa Tongarewa Museum in Wellington. Renowned architects like Sir Ian Athfield, whose works blend modernist principles with a deep respect for the natural landscape, have left an indelible mark on the country’s architectural legacy. Being home to a stunning tropical landscape, New Zealand architects have developed eco-friendly residential designs that harness the power of renewable energy as well as visionary urban developments prioritizing livability and connectivity. A notable example is Turanga Central Library in Christchurch, a project that exceeds all eco-friendly design standards and benchmark emissions. Finally, concepts like passive design are increasingly becoming standard practice in architectural circles. With so many architecture firms to choose from, it’s challenging for clients to identify the industry leaders that will be an ideal fit for their project needs. Fortunately, Architizer is able to provide guidance on the top design firms in New Zealand based on more than a decade of data and industry knowledge. How are these architecture firms ranked? The following ranking has been created according to key statistics that demonstrate each firm’s level of architectural excellence. The following metrics have been accumulated to establish each architecture firm’s ranking, in order of priority: The number of A+Awards won (2013 to 2025) The number of A+Awards finalists (2013 to 2025) The number of projects selected as “Project of the Day” (2009 to 2025) The number of projects selected as “Featured Project” (2009 to 2025) The number of projects uploaded to Architizer (2009 to 2025) Each of these metrics is explained in more detail at the foot of this article. This ranking list will be updated annually, taking into account new achievements of New Zealand architecture firms throughout the year. Without further ado, here are the 30 best architecture firms in New Zealand: 30. CoLab Architecture © CoLab Architecture Ltd CoLab Architecture is a small practice of two directors, Tobin Smith and Blair Paterson, based in Christchurch New Zealand. Tobin is a creative designer with a wealth of experience in the building industry. Blair is a registered architect and graduate from the University of Auckland. “We like architecture to be visually powerful, intellectually elegant, and above all timeless. For us, timeless design is achieved through simplicity and strength of concept — in other words, a single idea executed beautifully with a dedication to the details. We strive to create architecture that is conscious of local climate (hunker down in the winter and open up in summer) and the environment (scale and relationship to other buildings and the natural environment).” Some of CoLab Architecture’s most prominent projects include: Urban Cottage, Christchurch, New Zealand The following statistics helped CoLab Architecture Ltd achieve 30th place in the 30 Best Architecture Firms in New Zealand: Featured Projects 1 Total Projects 1 29. Paul Whittaker © Paul Whittaker Paul Whittaker is an architecture firm based in New Zealand. Its work revolves around residential architecture. Some of Paul Whittaker’s most prominent projects include: Whittaker Cube, Kakanui, New Zealand The following statistics helped Paul Whittaker achieve 29th place in the 30 Best Architecture Firms in New Zealand: Featured Projects 1 Total Projects 1 28. Space Division © Simon Devitt Photographer Space Division is a boutique architectural practice that aims to positively impact the lives and environment of its clients and their communities by purposefully producing quality space. We believe our name reflects both the essence of what we do, but also how we strive to do it – succinctly and simply. Our design process is inclusive and client focused with their desires, physical constraints, budgets, time frames, compliance and construction processes all carefully considered and incorporated into our designs. Space Division has successfully applied this approach to a broad range of project types within the field of architecture, ranging from commercial developments, urban infrastructure to baches, playhouses and residential homes. Space Divisions team is committed to delivering a very personal and complete service to each of their clients, at each stage of the process. To assist in achieving this Space Division collaborates with a range of trusted technical specialists, based on the specific needs of our client. Which ensures we stay focussed, passionate agile and easily scalable. Some of Space Division’s most prominent projects include: Stradwick House, Auckland, New Zealand The following statistics helped Space Division achieve 28th place in the 30 Best Architecture Firms in New Zealand: Featured Projects 1 Total Projects 1 27. Sumich Chaplin Architects © Sumich Chaplin Architects Sumich Chaplin Architects undertake to provide creative, enduring architectural design based on a clear understanding and interpretation of a client’s brief. We work with an appreciation and respect for the surrounding landscape and environment. Some of Sumich Chaplin Architects’ most prominent projects include: Millbrook House, Arrowtown, New Zealand The following statistics helped Sumich Chaplin Architects achieve 27th place in the 30 Best Architecture Firms in New Zealand: Featured Projects 1 Total Projects 1 26. Daniel Marshall Architects © Simon Devitt Photographer Daniel Marshall Architects (DMA) is an Auckland based practice who are passionate about designing high quality and award winning New Zealand architecture. Our work has been published in periodicals and books internationally as well as numerous digital publications. Daniel leads a core team of four individually accomplished designers who skillfully collaborate to resolve architectural projects from their conception through to their occupation. DMA believe architecture is a ‘generalist’ profession which engages with all components of an architectural project; during conceptual design, documentation and construction phases.  We pride ourselves on being able to holistically engage with a complex of architectural issues to arrive at a design solution equally appropriate to its context (site and surrounds) and the unique ways our clients prefer to live. Some of Daniel Marshall Architects’ most prominent projects include: Lucerne, Auckland, New Zealand House in Herne Bay, Herne Bay, Auckland, New Zealand The following statistics helped Daniel Marshall Architects achieve 26th place in the 30 Best Architecture Firms in New Zealand: Featured Projects 1 Total Projects 2 25. AW Architects © AW Architects Creative studio based in Christchurch, New Zealand. AW-ARCH is committed to an inclusive culture where everyone is encouraged to share their perspectives – our partners, our colleagues and our clients. Our team comes from all over the globe, bringing with them a variety of experiences. We embrace the differences that shape people’s lives, including race, ethnicity, identity and ability. We come together around the drawing board, the monitor, and the lunch table, immersed in the free exchange of ideas and synthesizing the diverse viewpoints of creative people, which stimulates innovative design and makes our work possible. Mentorship is key to engagement within AW-ARCH, energizing our studio and feeding invention. It’s our social and professional responsibility and helps us develop and retain a dedicated team. This includes offering internships that introduce young people to our profession, as well as supporting opportunities for our people outside the office — teaching, volunteering and exploring. Some of AW Architects’ most prominent projects include: OCEAN VIEW TERRACE HOUSE, Christchurch, New Zealand 212 CASHEL STREET, Christchurch, New Zealand LAKE HOUSE, Queenstown, New Zealand RIVER HOUSE, Christchurch, New Zealand HE PUNA TAIMOANA, Christchurch, New Zealand The following statistics helped AW Architects achieve 25th place in the 30 Best Architecture Firms in New Zealand: A+Awards Finalist 1 Total Projects 9 24. Archimedia © Patrick Reynolds Archimedia is a New Zealand architecture practice with NZRAB and green star accredited staff, offering design services in the disciplines of architecture, interiors and ecology. Delivering architecture involves intervention in both natural eco-systems and the built environment — the context within which human beings live their lives. Archimedia uses the word “ecology” to extend the concept of sustainability to urban design and master planning and integrates this holistic strategy into every project. Archimedia prioritizes client project requirements, functionality, operational efficiency, feasibility and programme. Some of Archimedia’s most prominent projects include: Te Oro, Auckland, New Zealand Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tamaki, Auckland, New Zealand Hekerua Bay Residence, New Zealand Eye Institute , Remuera, Auckland, New Zealand University of Auckland Business School, Auckland, New Zealand The following statistics helped Archimedia achieve 24th place in the 30 Best Architecture Firms in New Zealand: Featured Projects 1 Total Projects 25 23. MC Architecture Studio © MC Architecture Studio Ltd The studio’s work, questioning the boundary between art and architecture, provides engaging and innovative living space with the highest sustainability standard. Design solutions are tailored on client needs and site’s characteristics. Hence the final product will be unique and strongly related to the context and wider environment. On a specific-project basis, the studio, maintaining the leadership of the whole process, works in a network with local and international practices to achieve the best operational efficiency and local knowledge worldwide to accommodate the needs of a big scale project or specific requirements. Some of MC Architecture Studio’s most prominent projects include: Cass Bay House, Cass Bay, Lyttelton, New Zealand Ashburton Alteration, Ashburton, New Zealand restaurant/cafe, Ovindoli, Italy Private Residence, Christchurch, New Zealand Private Residence, Christchurch, New Zealand The following statistics helped MC Architecture Studio Ltd achieve 23rd place in the 30 Best Architecture Firms in New Zealand: Featured Projects 2 Total Projects 19 22. Architecture van Brandenburg © Architecture van Brandenburg Van Brandenburg is a design focused studio for architecture, landscape architecture, urbanism, and product design with studios in Queenstown and Dunedin, New Zealand. With global reach Van Brandenburg conducts themselves internationally, where the team of architects, designers and innovators create organic built form, inspired by nature, and captured by curvilinear design. Some of Architecture van Brandenburg’s most prominent projects include: Marisfrolg Fashion Campus, Shenzhen, China The following statistics helped Architecture van Brandenburg achieve 22nd place in the 30 Best Architecture Firms in New Zealand: A+Awards Winner 1 Featured Projects 1 Total Projects 1 21. MacKayCurtis © MacKayCurtis MacKay Curtis is a design led practice with a mission to create functional architecture of lasting beauty that enhances peoples lives. Some of MacKayCurtis’ most prominent projects include: Mawhitipana House, Auckland, New Zealand The following statistics helped MacKayCurtis achieve 21st place in the 30 Best Architecture Firms in New Zealand: A+Awards Winner 1 Featured Projects 1 Total Projects 1 20. Gerrad Hall Architects © Gerrad Hall Architects We aspire to create houses that are a joyful sensory experience. Some of Gerrad Hall Architects’ most prominent projects include: Inland House, Mangawhai, New Zealand Herne Bay Villa Alteration, Auckland, New Zealand The following statistics helped Gerrad Hall Architects achieve 20th place in the 30 Best Architecture Firms in New Zealand: Featured Projects 2 Total Projects 2 19. Dorrington Atcheson Architects © Dorrington Atcheson Architects Dorrington Atcheson Architects was founded as Dorrington Architects & Associates was formed in 2010, resulting in a combined 20 years of experience in the New Zealand architectural market. We’re a boutique architecture firm working on a range of projects and budgets. We love our work, we pride ourselves on the work we do and we enjoy working with our clients to achieve a result that resolves their brief. The design process is a collaborative effort, working with the client, budget, site and brief, to find unique solutions that solve the project at hand. The style of our projects are determined by the site and the budget, with a leaning towards contemporary modernist design, utilizing a rich natural material palette, creating clean and tranquil spaces. Some of Dorrington Atcheson Architects’ most prominent projects include: Lynch Street Coopers Beach House, Coopers Beach, New Zealand Rutherford House, Tauranga Taupo, New Zealand Winsomere Cres Kathryn Wilson Shoebox, Auckland, New Zealand The following statistics helped Dorrington Atcheson Architects achieve 19th place in the 30 Best Architecture Firms in New Zealand: Featured Projects 2 Total Projects 14 18. Andrew Barre Lab © Marcela Grassi Andrew Barrie Lab is an architectural practice that undertakes a diverse range of projects. We make buildings, books, maps, classes, exhibitions and research. Some of Andrew Barre Lab’s most prominent projects include: Learning from Trees, Venice, Italy The following statistics helped Andrew Barre Lab achieve 18th place in the 30 Best Architecture Firms in New Zealand: A+Awards Finalist 2 Featured Projects 1 Total Projects 1 17. Warren and Mahoney © Simon Devitt Photographer Warren and Mahoney is an insight led multidisciplinary architectural practice with six locations functioning as a single office. Our clients and projects span New Zealand, Australia and the Pacific Rim. The practice has over 190 people, comprising of specialists working across the disciplines of architecture, workplace, masterplanning, urban design and sustainable design. We draw from the wider group for skills and experience on every project, regardless of the location. Some of Warren and Mahoney’s most prominent projects include: MIT Manukau & Transport Interchange, Auckland, New Zealand Carlaw Park Student Accommodation, Auckland, New Zealand Pt Resolution Footbridge, Auckland, New Zealand Isaac Theatre Royal, Christchurch, New Zealand University of Auckland Recreation and Wellness Centre, Auckland, New Zealand The following statistics helped Warren and Mahoney achieve 17th place in the 30 Best Architecture Firms in New Zealand: Featured Projects 2 Total Projects 5 16. South Architects Limited © South Architects Limited Led by Craig South, our friendly professional team is dedicated to crafting for uniqueness and producing carefully considered architecture that will endure and be loved. At South Architects, every project has a unique story. This story starts and ends with our clients, whose values and aspirations fundamentally empower and inspire our whole design process. Working together with our clients is pivotal to how we operate and we share a passion for innovation in design. We invite you to meet us and explore what we can do for you. As you will discover, our client focussed process is thorough, robust and responsive. We see architecture as the culmination of a journey with you. Some of South Architects Limited’s most prominent projects include: Three Gables, Christchurch, New Zealand Concrete Copper Home, Christchurch, New Zealand Driftwood Home, Christchurch, New Zealand Half Gable Townhouses, Christchurch, New Zealand Kilmore Street, Christchurch, New Zealand The following statistics helped South Architects Limited achieve 16th place in the 30 Best Architecture Firms in New Zealand: Featured Projects 3 Total Projects 6 15. Pac Studio © Pac Studio Pac Studio is an ideas-driven design office, committed to intellectual and artistic rigor and fueled by a strong commitment to realizing ideas in the world. We believe a thoughtful and inclusive approach to design, which puts people at the heart of any potential solution, is the key to compelling and positive architecture. Through our relationships with inter-related disciplines — furniture, art, landscape and academia — we can create a whole that is greater than the sum of its parts. We are open to unconventional propositions. We are architects and designers with substantial experience delivering highly awarded architectural projects on multiple scales. Some of Pac Studio’s most prominent projects include: Space Invader, Auckland, New Zealand Split House, Auckland, New Zealand Yolk House, Auckland, New Zealand Wanaka Crib, Wanaka, New Zealand Pahi House, Pahi, New Zealand The following statistics helped Pac Studio achieve 15th place in the 30 Best Architecture Firms in New Zealand: Featured Projects 3 Total Projects 8 14. Jasmax © Jasmax Jasmax is one of New Zealand’s largest and longest established architecture and design practices. With over 250 staff nationwide, the practice has delivered some of the country’s most well known projects, from the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa to major infrastructure and masterplanning projects such as Auckland’s Britomart Station. From our four regional offices, the practice works with clients, stakeholders and communities across the following sectors: commercial, cultural and civic, education, infrastructure, health, hospitality, retail, residential, sports and recreation, and urban design. Environmentally sustainable design is part of everything we do, and we were proud to work with Ngāi Tūhoe to design one of New Zealand’s most advanced sustainable buildings, Te Uru Taumatua; which has been designed to the stringent criteria of the International Living Future Institute’s Living Building Challenge. Some of Jasmax’s most prominent projects include: The Surf Club at Muriwai, Muriwai, New Zealand Auckland University Mana Hauora Building, Auckland, New Zealand The Fonterra Centre, Auckland, New Zealand Auckland University of Technology Sir Paul Reeves Building , Auckland, New Zealand NZI Centre, Auckland, New Zealand The following statistics helped Jasmax achieve 14th place in the 30 Best Architecture Firms in New Zealand: Featured Projects 3 Total Projects 21 13. Condon Scott Architects © Condon Scott Architects Condon Scott Architects is a boutique, award-winning NZIA registered architectural practice based in Wānaka, New Zealand. Since inception 35 years ago, Condon Scott Architects has been involved in a wide range of high end residential and commercial architectural projects throughout Queenstown, Wānaka, the Central Otago region and further afield. Director Barry Condon (ANZIA) and principal Sarah Scott (FNZIA) – both registered architects – work alongside a highly skilled architectural team to deliver a full design and construction management service. This spans from initial concept design right through to tender management and interior design. Condon Scott Architect’s approach is to view each commission as a bespoke and site specific project, capitalizing on the unique environmental conditions and natural surroundings that are so often evident in this beautiful part of the world. Some of Condon Scott Architects’ most prominent projects include: Sugi House, Wānaka, New Zealand Wanaka Catholic Church, Wanaka, New Zealand Mount Iron Barn, Wanaka, New Zealand Bendigo Terrace House, New Zealand Bargour Residence, Wanaka, New Zealand The following statistics helped Condon Scott Architects achieve 13th place in the 30 Best Architecture Firms in New Zealand: Featured Projects 4 Total Projects 17 12. Glamuzina Paterson Architects © Glamuzina Paterson Architects Glamuzina Architects is an Auckland based practice established in 2014. We strive to produce architecture that is crafted, contextual and clever. Rather than seeking a particular outcome we value a design process that is rigorous and collaborative. When designing we look to the context of a project beyond just its immediate physical location to the social, political, historical and economic conditions of place. This results in architecture that is uniquely tailored to the context it sits within. We work on many different types of projects across a range of scales; from small interiors to large public buildings. Regardless of a project’s budget we always prefer to work smart, using a creative mix of materials, light and volume in preference to elaborate finishes or complex detailing. Some of Glamuzina Paterson Architects’ most prominent projects include: Lake Hawea Courtyard House, Otago, New Zealand Blackpool House, Auckland, New Zealand Brick Bay House, Auckland, New Zealand Giraffe House, Auckland, New Zealand Giraffe House, Auckland, New Zealand The following statistics helped Glamuzina Paterson Architects achieve 12th place in the 30 Best Architecture Firms in New Zealand: Featured Projects 4 Total Projects 5 11. Cheshire Architects © Patrick Reynolds Cheshire Architects does special projects, irrespective of discipline, scale or type. The firm moves fluidly from luxury retreat to city master plan to basement cocktail den, shaping every aspect of an environment in pursuit of the extraordinary. Some of Cheshire Architects’ most prominent projects include: Rore kahu, Te Tii, New Zealand Eyrie, New Zealand Milse, Takanini, New Zealand The following statistics helped Cheshire Architects achieve 11th place in the 30 Best Architecture Firms in New Zealand: Featured Projects 3 Total Projects 3 10. Patterson Associates © Patterson Associates Pattersons Associates Architects began its creative story with architect Andrew Patterson in 1986 whose early work on New Zealand’s unspoiled coasts, explores relationships between people and landscape to create a sense of belonging. The architecture studio started based on a very simple idea; if a building can feel like it naturally ‘belongs,’ or fits logically in a place, to an environment, a time and culture, then the people that inhabit the building will likely feel a sense of belonging there as well. This methodology connects theories of beauty, confidence, economy and comfort. In 2004 Davor Popadich and Andrew Mitchell joined the firm as directors, taking it to another level of creative exploration and helping it grow into an architecture studio with an international reputation. Some of Patterson Associates’ most prominent projects include: Seascape Retreat, Canterbury, New Zealand The Len Lye Centre, New Plymouth, New Zealand Country House in the City, Auckland, New Zealand Scrubby Bay House, Canterbury, New Zealand Parihoa House, Auckland, New Zealand The following statistics helped Patterson Associates achieve 10th place in the 30 Best Architecture Firms in New Zealand: Featured Projects 5 Total Projects 5 9. Team Green Architects © Team Green Architects Established in 2013 by Sian Taylor and Mark Read, Team Green Architects is a young committed practice focused on designing energy efficient buildings. Some of Team Green Architects’ most prominent projects include: Dalefield Guest House, Queenstown, New Zealand Olive Grove House, Cromwell, New Zealand Hawthorn House, Queenstown, New Zealand Frankton House, Queenstown, New Zealand Contemporary Sleepout, Arthurs Point, New Zealand The following statistics helped Team Green Architects achieve 9th place in the 30 Best Architecture Firms in New Zealand: Featured Projects 5 Total Projects 7 8. Creative Arch © Creative Arch Creative Arch is an award-winning, multi-disciplined architectural design practice, founded in 1998 by architectural designer and director Mark McLeay. The range of work at Creative Arch is as diverse as our clients, encompassing residential homes, alterations and renovations, coastal developments, sub-division developments, to commercial projects. The team at Creative Arch are an enthusiastic group of talented professional architects and architectural designers, with a depth of experience, from a range of different backgrounds and cultures. Creative Arch is a client-focused firm committed to providing excellence in service, culture and project outcomes. Some of Creative Arch’s most prominent projects include: Rothesay Bay House, North Shore, New Zealand Best Pacific Institute of Education, Auckland, New Zealand Sumar Holiday Home, Whangapoua, New Zealand Cook Holiday Home, Omaha, New Zealand Arkles Bay Residence, Whangaparaoa, New Zealand The following statistics helped Creative Arch achieve 8th place in the 30 Best Architecture Firms in New Zealand: Featured Projects 5 Total Projects 18 7. Crosson Architects © Crosson Architects At Crosson Architects we are constantly striving to understand what is motivating the world around us. Some of Crosson Architects’ most prominent projects include: Hut on Sleds, Whangapoua, New Zealand Te Pae North Piha Surf Lifesaving Tower, Auckland, New Zealand Coromandel Bach, Coromandel, New Zealand Tutukaka House, Tutukaka, New Zealand St Heliers House, Saint Heliers, Auckland, New Zealand The following statistics helped Crosson Architects achieve 7th place in the 30 Best Architecture Firms in New Zealand: A+Awards Winner 1 A+Awards Finalist 2 Featured Projects 4 Total Projects 6 6. Bossley Architects © Bossley Architects Bossley Architects is an architectural and interior design practice with the express purpose of providing intense input into a deliberately limited number of projects. The practice is based on the belief that innovative yet practical design is essential for the production of good buildings, and that the best buildings spring from an open and enthusiastic collaboration between architect, client and consultants. We have designed a wide range of projects including commercial, institutional and residential, and have amassed special expertise in the field of art galleries and museums, residential and the restaurant/entertainment sector. Whilst being very much design focused, the practice has an overriding interest in the pragmatics and feasibility of construction. Some of Bossley Architects’ most prominent projects include: Ngā Hau Māngere -Old Māngere Bridge Replacement, Auckland, New Zealand Arruba, Waiuku, New Zealand Brown Vujcich House Voyager NZ Maritime Museum Omana Luxury Villas, Auckland, New Zealand The following statistics helped Bossley Architects achieve 6th place in the 30 Best Architecture Firms in New Zealand: Featured Projects 6 Total Projects 21 5. Smith Architects © Simon Devitt Photographer Smith Architects is an award-winning international architectural practice creating beautiful human spaces that are unique, innovative and sustainable through creativity, refinement and care. Phil and Tiffany Smith established the practice in 2007. We have spent more than two decades striving to understand what makes some buildings more attractive than others, in the anticipation that it can help us design better buildings. Some of Smith Architects’ most prominent projects include: Kakapo Creek Children’s Garden, Mairangi Bay, Auckland, New Zealand New Shoots Children’s Centre, Kerikeri, Kerikeri, New Zealand Gaia (Earth) Forest Preschool, Manurewa, Auckland, New Zealand Chrysalis Childcare, Auckland, New Zealand House of Wonder, Cambridge, Cambridge, New Zealand The following statistics helped Smith Architects achieve 5th place in the 30 Best Architecture Firms in New Zealand: A+Awards Finalist 1 Featured Projects 6 Total Projects 23 4. Monk Mackenzie © Monk Mackenzie Monk Mackenzie is an architecture and design firm based in New Zealand. Monk Mackenzie’s design portfolio includes a variety of architectural projects, such as transport and infrastructure, hospitality and sport, residential, cultural and more. Some of Monk Mackenzie’s most prominent projects include: X HOUSE, Queenstown, New Zealand TURANGANUI BRIDGE, Gisborne, New Zealand VIVEKANANDA BRIDGE EDITION Canada Street Bridge, Auckland, New Zealand The following statistics helped Monk Mackenzie achieve 4th place in the 30 Best Architecture Firms in New Zealand: A+Awards Winner 2 A+Awards Finalist 4 Featured Projects 4 Total Projects 17 3. Irving Smith Architects © Irving Smith Architects Irving Smith Jack (ISJ) has been developed as a niche architecture practice based in Nelson, but working in a variety of sensitive environments and contexts throughout New Zealand. ISJ demonstrates an ongoing commitment to innovative, sustainable and researched based design , backed up by national and international award and publication recognition, ongoing research with both the Universities of Canterbury and Auckland, and regular invitations to lecture on their work. Timber Awards include NZ’s highest residential, commercial and engineering timber designs. Key experience, ongoing research and work includes developing structural timber design solutions in the aftermath of the Canterbury earthquakes. Current projects include cultural, urban, civic and residential projects spread throughout New Zealand, and recently in the United States and France. Some of Irving Smith Architects’ most prominent projects include: SCION Innovation Hub – Te Whare Nui o Tuteata, Rotorua, New Zealand Mountain Range House, Brightwater, New Zealand Alexandra Tent House, Wellington, New Zealand Te Koputu a te Whanga a Toi : Whakatane Library & Exhibition Centre, Whakatane, New Zealand offSET Shed House, Gisborne, New Zealand The following statistics helped Irving Smith Architects achieve 3rd place in the 30 Best Architecture Firms in New Zealand: A+Awards Winner 2 A+Awards Finalist 1 Featured Projects 6 Total Projects 13 2. Fearon Hay Architects © Fearon Hay Architects Fearon Hay is a design-led studio undertaking a broad range of projects in diverse environments, the firm is engaged in projects on sites around the world. Tim Hay and Jeff Fearon founded the practice in 1993 as a way to enable their combined involvement in the design and delivery of each project. Together, they lead an international team of experienced professionals. The studio approached every project with a commitment to design excellence, a thoughtful consideration of site and place, and an inventive sense of creativity. Fearon Hay enjoys responding to a range of briefs: Commercial projects for office and workplace, complex heritage environments, public work within the urban realm or wider landscape, private dwellings and detailed bespoke work for hospitality and interior environments. Some of Fearon Hay Architects’ most prominent projects include: Bishop Hill The Camp, Tawharanui Peninsula, New Zealand Matagouri, Queenstown, New Zealand Alpine Terrace House, Queenstown, New Zealand Island Retreat, Auckland, New Zealand Bishop Selwyn Chapel, Auckland, New Zealand The following statistics helped Fearon Hay Architects achieve 2nd place in the 30 Best Architecture Firms in New Zealand: A+Awards Winner 2 A+Awards Finalist 3 Featured Projects 8 Total Projects 17 1. RTA Studio © RTA Studio Richard Naish founded RTA Studio in 1999 after a successful career with top practices in London and Auckland. We are a practice that focuses on delivering exceptional design with a considered and personal service. Our work aims to make a lasting contribution to the urban and natural context by challenging, provoking and delighting. Our studio is constantly working within the realms of public, commercial and urban design as well as sensitive residential projects. We are committed to a sustainable built environment and are at the forefront developing carbon neutral buildings. RTA Studio has received more than 100 New Zealand and international awards, including Home of The Year, a World Architecture Festival category win and the New Zealand Architecture Medal. Some of RTA Studio’s most prominent projects include: SCION Innovation Hub – Te Whare Nui o Tuteata, Rotorua, New Zealand OBJECTSPACE, Auckland, New Zealand C3 House, New Zealand Freemans Bay School, Freemans Bay, Auckland, New Zealand ARROWTOWN HOUSE, Arrowtown, New Zealand Featured image: E-Type House by RTA Studio, Auckland, New Zealand The following statistics helped RTA Studio achieve 1st place in the 30 Best Architecture Firms in New Zealand: A+Awards Winner 2 A+Awards Finalist 6 Featured Projects 6 Total Projects 16 Why Should I Trust Architizer’s Ranking? With more than 30,000 architecture firms and over 130,000 projects within its database, Architizer is proud to host the world’s largest online community of architects and building product manufacturers. Its celebrated A+Awards program is also the largest celebration of architecture and building products, with more than 400 jurors and hundreds of thousands of public votes helping to recognize the world’s best architecture each year. Architizer also powers firm directories for a number of AIA (American Institute of Architects) Chapters nationwide, including the official directory of architecture firms for AIA New York. An example of a project page on Architizer with Project Award Badges highlighted A Guide to Project Awards The blue “+” badge denotes that a project has won a prestigious A+Award as described above. Hovering over the badge reveals details of the award, including award category, year, and whether the project won the jury or popular choice award. The orange Project of the Day and yellow Featured Project badges are awarded by Architizer’s Editorial team, and are selected based on a number of factors. The following factors increase a project’s likelihood of being featured or awarded Project of the Day status: Project completed within the last 3 years A well written, concise project description of at least 3 paragraphs Architectural design with a high level of both functional and aesthetic value High quality, in focus photographs At least 8 photographs of both the interior and exterior of the building Inclusion of architectural drawings and renderings Inclusion of construction photographs There are 7 Projects of the Day each week and a further 31 Featured Projects. Each Project of the Day is published on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram Stories, while each Featured Project is published on Facebook. Each Project of the Day also features in Architizer’s Weekly Projects Newsletter and shared with 170,000 subscribers.     We’re constantly look for the world’s best architects to join our community. If you would like to understand more about this ranking list and learn how your firm can achieve a presence on it, please don’t hesitate to reach out to us at editorial@architizer.com. The post 30 Best Architecture and Design Firms in New Zealand appeared first on Journal.