Maryse Bastié Middle School Reconstruction / Tectoniques ArchitectsSave this picture!© Maxime Verret•Dole, France Architects: Tectoniques Architects Area Area of this architecture project Area:  8248 m² Year Completion year of this architecture project Year:  2025 Photographs Photographs:Maxime Verret More SpecsLess Specs Save this picture! Text description provided by the architects. Built in 1974 by Jouven and Phelouzat (who also designed the neighboring hospital), the existing college is located on the south-western outskirts of the city center, in a suburban fabric that combines facilities, business parks, multi-family housing, and single-family dwellings. It is made up of several buildings arranged in an orthogonal system with no relationship to their surroundings. This functionalist architecture, poorly maintained, is now in a state of disrepair. The fragmentation of the buildings and successive additions have rendered the whole complex illegible and dysfunctional. The existing college is symptomatic of an ordinary heritage dating back to the 1970s, which has largely fallen into disrepute. Its transformation is now a necessity to meet contemporary environmental challenges. This implies taking a fresh look at it, as a heritage to be taken care of, an available resource rather than a clean slate. In addition to bringing the building up to standard and renovating its heating system, the project aims to clarify the formal and programmatic layout of the entire site in order to relieve congestion at the 550-student school, while increasing its capacity to 600. The project strategy must also take into account the need for a construction site on an occupied site, and therefore for phasing.Save this picture!Save this picture!Save this picture!Tectonique's approach is to make the right diagnosis without preconceptions. It's a question of working with, repairing, and revealing the qualities of what's already there, in this case, the rationality of the constructive system that enables the structure's adaptability. The new image is thus a result, not an assumption. The intervention seeks to relieve the complexity inherited from the existing situation, in order to offer optimal operation over the long term. This is achieved through the simplicity and straightforwardness of the architectural and constructive features. First, the multiple additions are eliminated. The extension then extends the existing building using the same system, to the east to add a teaching block and half-board facilities, and to the west to reconnect the SEGPA section, which was previously isolated. The volume is also raised by one floor to create additional classrooms. This reconfiguration establishes a hierarchy between the previously very equivalent buildings, creating a more homogeneous and coherent whole.Save this picture!Save this picture!Save this picture!The courtyard has been relocated to the south, on the side facing the town, which is served by a new forecourt with a canopy that doubles as a bicycle storage area. The entrance hall has been repositioned along the axis, at the barycentre of the plan, redefining a clear sequence from the public space. It opens onto a vast atrium with a monumental stepped staircase leading directly to the Culture and Knowledge Centre in its northern extension (in phase 3). This space redefines the centrality of this fragmented complex. It acts as a ball-and-socket joint between the various wings, providing better orientation within the building thanks to its openness to the landscape and its height. The exposed structure reveals the juxtaposition of different construction periods. The existing building is constructed using a "Stribick" prefabrication process, based on concrete floor caissons previously concealed beneath a false ceiling. These caissons are sandblasted. Revealing this structure characterizes the ambience, improves inertia, and makes the building's construction intelligible. The existing framework is envisaged as a generating system for the extension. The new parts reinterpret the coffered floors, using a timber solution of identical proportions. This relationship between the two construction methods blurs the distinction between old and new.Save this picture!Save this picture!Save this picture!The project is based on an ambitious environmental approach that favors the use of local resources, whether through the massive use of Jura wood (640 m3) or the valorization of local know-how. Previously rightly described as a "thermal sieve", the building envelope has been considerably improved thanks to external thermal insulation using wood wool. Timber construction, which is largely prefabricated and minimizes nuisance, is also an appropriate response to the problem of a phased construction site on an occupied site. The facades are clad with green standing seam aluminum cassettes, evocative of Jura metal gables and the forest character of the region. The south-facing facade is enhanced by large sunshades suspended from a slender metal structure. These overhangs protect the facades and shelter the exterior longitudinal walkway. The composition of horizontal bands alternates aluminum and wood cladding, interspersed with wide windows. This new envelope unifies the existing and the new.Save this picture! Project gallerySee allShow less Project locationAddress:Dole, FranceLocation to be used only as a reference. It could indicate city/country but not exact address.About this office MaterialsMaterials and TagsPublished on May 21, 2025Cite: "Maryse Bastié Middle School Reconstruction / Tectoniques Architects" 21 May 2025. ArchDaily. Accessed . <https://www.archdaily.com/1030329/maryse-bastie-middle-school-reconstruction-tectoniques-architects&gt ISSN 0719-8884Save世界上最受欢迎的建筑网站现已推出你的母语版本!想浏览ArchDaily中国吗?是否 You've started following your first account!Did you know?You'll now receive updates based on what you follow! Personalize your stream and start following your favorite authors, offices and users.Go to my stream

With Prince of Persia, Resident Evil, Minecraft Legends and more, Argos' latest sale on PS5 titles is well worth a look for all kinds of gamer — here are our picksTech17:19, 21 May 2025Updated 17:35, 21 May 2025This article contains affiliate links, we will receive a commission on any sales we generate from it. Learn moreLost Crown was one of the best games of 2024While yesterday we showed you a great deal on the Xbox Series S/X wireless controller, this time we're switching our focus to PlayStation, which is still out in front in the current generation of consoles (and gaining another exclusive from Team Green).Argos has a deal going right now which offers a pair of PS5 games for just £25, and while you may be expecting shovelware, there are some absolute bangers in here.From Far Cry, to Dragon Ball, Assassin's Creed to Warhammer, there's plenty to keep you busy this summer, and with some of them coming in at £20 on their own, it's a big saving, too.Here are some of the best games we've found.Resident Evil 3 is a fun, if short, adventureYou can find the full list at Argos here, and you'll just need to look for that red '2 for £25' label.While there are some kid-friendly titles like Peppa Pig World Adventures and a Fortnite Transformers pack if you're keen, there are some bonafide great games on offer, too.Far Cry 6, for example, is the latest in the open-world shooter series and features Breaking Bad and The Mandalorian star Giancarlo Esposito as its main antagonist Anton Castillo, while you can also grab fellow Ubisoft titles like Assassin's Creed: Valhalla, Skull and Bones, or Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown—the latter of which was one of the best games of 2024.Fishing with a side of cosmic horror? Count us inElsewhere, madcap multiplayer restaurant game Overcooked's All You Can Eat edition is included, as well as spooky fishing game Dredge.Sticking with horror, Resident Evil 3 and Resident Evil 4 Remake are included, meaning you can grab both for £25. In fact, Resident Evil 4 Remake is at its lowest price, while elsewhere Resident Evil 2, Resident Evil 7, and Devil May Cry 5 are part of the deal which means you can add even more games to your Capcom collection.Kids obsessed with the Minecraft movie? We can relate, but thankfully not only is Minecraft included, but Minecraft Legends is, too.Article continues belowRounding up the games that go well together are three Dragon Ball games you can pick and choose between. There's 2D fighter Dragon Ball FighterZ, the action-packed Dragon Ball Xenoverse 2, and the retelling of Goku's story with Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot.For the latest breaking news and stories from across the globe from the Daily Star, sign up for our newsletters.‌

The lifespan of a games console has extended a lot since I was a child. In the 1990s, this kind of technology would be out of date after just a couple of years. There would be some tantalising new machine out before you knew it, everybody competing to be on the cutting edge: the Game Boy and Sega Genesis/Mega Drive in 1989 were followed by the Game Gear in 1990 and the Super NES in 1991. Five years was a long life for a gaming machine.Now, it’s more like 10. The Nintendo Switch 2 will be released in a couple of weeks, more than eight years since I first picked an original Switch up off its dock and marvelled at the instant transition to portable play. Games consoles often feel like they mark off particular eras in my life: the Nintendo 64 was the defining console of my childhood, the PlayStation 2 of my adolescence, and the Xbox 360 of the first years of my career, the first console launch I ever covered as a (ridiculously young) journalist. The Nintendo Switch came along just a few months after my first child was born, and for me it has become the games machine of that era of harried early parenthood.When I reflect on my experiences with the Switch, I remember snatching moments in Breath of the Wild’s Hyrule while the baby napped beside me; hiding on the veranda of a French villa to play the odd Splatoon match on our first family holiday; and trying to make a mint on my Animal Crossing turnip trades while walking my second baby around the house in his sling, trying to get him to sleep (he never did). When they got old enough, the first games I played with my children were on the Switch. We all played Pokémon Sword and Shield together, and most recently my youngest made his way through the surprisingly entertaining Princess Peach Showtime with only minimal assistance from me.Hello to the moo … The Nintendo Switch created a unique gaming space all of its own. Photograph: Justin Lane/EPAOver the last eight years, my living room TV became dominated by things like Bluey and Moana and most recently (god help me), Alvin and the Chipmunks, and I no longer have the hours of uninterrupted gaming time in the evenings. The Switch gave me some of that that time back, though, letting me dip into games whenever I had a moment – which gave me vital stress relief, a route back to myself during some of the most challenging years of my life. Eight years is a long time, enough for anyone’s life to change beyond recognition. In that time I’ve lost people, moved cities, gained new friends, too. And, of course, we all went through the pandemic. Animal Crossing: New Horizons became perhaps the defining game of that time, and I am not the only person for whom the Switch was a blessed oasis, a way to connect when we were starved of in-person interaction.Things have changed for me since 2017, as they probably have for you. Consoles feel like companions, especially perhaps the portable ones like the Switch and the Game Boy, which we literally carry with us wherever we go. My kids are older now, enjoying all the Switch games that I enjoyed when they were very small – and it does seem as if the Switch 2 will neatly mark another new stage, for me and for them.I recently gathered together all the Switch consoles, games, controllers and accessories in my house and my office for an audit, from the battered day-one unit that serves as the family console to the untouched OLED Zelda special edition my partner got me and the variably functioning spare JoyCons accumulated over time. It’s not quite time for them to join the other old consoles under my bed, each in a clear plastic box with all of its cables, ready to be dusted off when the time comes; the Switch 2 will take its place in my rucksack and in my office, but I won’t be upgrading the family console for some time yet. I don’t really wantA little sentimentality is forgivable at the end of an era. In a couple of weeks all the talk will be about the new console, how it’s selling, whether it’s worth the money, what the best Mario Kart World strategies are, and how it compares to its record-breaking predecessor. For now, I’m not thinking much about what the Nintendo Switch meant for the gaming industry; instead I’m thinking about what it meant to me.What to playBe who you wanna be … there are many lives to choose from in the latest RPG, Fantasy Life i: The Girl Who Steals Time. Illustration: Level5/Have you ever heard of Fantasy Life? It was a bit of a cult hit on the Nintendo 3DS in 2014, a cosy-feeling role-playing game that let you switch between 12 different professions, so you would be blacksmithing one minute, fighting monsters another and cooking things up the next. The sequel – Fantasy Life i: The Girl Who Steals Time – is out today after years of delays.You can now be an artist or a farmer as well as a magician, carpenter, fisherman, alchemist or whatever else you fancy, and also it adds time travel into the mix. It’s an intriguing amalgamation of the Animal Crossing/Harvest Moon style of Japanese life simulator, and the Dragon Quest/Ni no Kuni flavour of unthreatening role-playing game, and I’m looking forward to exploring it. An especial shout-out to the members of one of my group chats who have been eagerly awaiting this for more than a decade.Available on: Switch/2, PS4/5, Xbox, PC Estimated playtime: skip past newsletter promotionSign up to Pushing ButtonsFree weekly newsletterKeza MacDonald's weekly look at the world of gamingPrivacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.after newsletter promotionWhat to readBroom broom … the home delivery system in Crescent County. Illustration: Electric Saint A couple of interesting games hitting Kickstarter this week: Crescent County, a colourful witch-delivery game with broom-racing and plenty of small-town drama; and a ghost story set in Paisley just outside Glasgow, named after its Chinese takeaway Crystal Garden. If you have a few minutes, have a go at this satirical simulation text game You Are Generative AI, which casts you as an increasingly self-aware AI large language model answering random questions that people cannot be bothered to research or think through themselves. I got three different endings and one of them made me genuinely quite sad. Developers at Bungie, makers of Destiny and the forthcoming shooter Marathon, have been dealing with an alleged plagiarism scandal after unattributed designs from an artist called Antireal were found in promotional screenshots and art from Marathon. Bungie is blaming the mistake on a former employee. VG247 has a rundown. After half a decade, PlayStation 5 sales are neck and neck with PlayStation 4’s results at this point in its life cycle, at 78m – despite the fact that its price has actually increased, due to the wild times in which we live. Video Game Chronicle gets into the numbers. What to clickQuestion BlockWhat’s in a name? … playing a video game using Nintendo’s Wii U controller. Photograph: Jae C Hong/API’ve had several good suggestions for the name of reader Travis’s book-club style video game club: Select/Start (thanks Alex), Long Play (from Eva), and Doki Doki Videogame Club (niche reference there, Chris). Especial props to Kenny, however, who went hog wild and came up with several, including these three beauts: Go Forth and Multiplay, Concurrent Players and Let’s Console Each Other.Lucas also had a great suggestion for last week’s questioner: “Your bookclubber should look at itch.io for crazy little free games to play and discuss with their friends! The indie folks sharing their games there would probably love the attention/feedback of a games book club.” (You Are Generative AI, which I mentioned earlier, is on Itch, along with just hundreds of other shortform games worthy of discussion.)And we’ve just about got room for another (timely) question, this time from reader Ali:“I’ve always admired Nintendo for coming up with different names for each console, as opposed to Sony going for the sequential naming convention and Microsoft jumping from 360 to One to Series (?). My opinion has somewhat changed now that the successor to the Nintendo Switch is called Switch 2. Do you have any thoughts on console names?”It’s true that Nintendo usually goes for completely new names for each console, except arguably the series of Game Boys, the NES and Super NES, Wii and Wii U, and now Switch and Switch 2. And yes, this is the first time they’ve gone for a number. I’d say this is down to how badly the company did with the Wii U, whose confusing name surely contributed to how badly it flopped. But I think it reflects the more conservative and cautious mood of the games industry as a whole in 2025, as it comes to the end of decades’ worth of unsustainably rapid growth. Or maybe it’s because Nintendo’s president Shuntaro Furukawa used to be an accountant.If you’ve got a question for Question Block – or anything else to say about the newsletter – email us on pushingbuttons@theguardian.com

Deloitte UK is reducing some bonuses. Peter Dazeley via Getty Images 2025-05-21T16:42:47Z Save Saved Read in app This story is available exclusively to Business Insider subscribers. Become an Insider and start reading now. Have an account? Staff in one of Deloitte's four UK divisions will get lower bonuses after missing profit targets. The firm will also promote fewer staff this year, according to an internal email seen by BI. The promotions move was demotivating and has "dampened" the office mood, a Deloitte employee said. Deloitte told employees in one of its UK consulting divisions to expect lower annual bonuses following weaker-than-expected financial performance.Richard Houston, a senior partner and chief executive of Deloitte UK, wrote in a companywide email on Tuesday that employees in the technology and transformation (T&T) consulting division would receive an average of 80% of their annual bonus.Partners in the division will also face a drop in annual rewards, Houston said in the memo seen by Business Insider.The news was first reported by The Financial Times.The T&T business had "faced a particularly challenging year and fell materially short of its performance goals," Houston wrote. Richard Houston is chief executive of Deloitte UK. Liam McBurney/PA/Getty Images Bonuses have always been linked to individual and firm performance. However, for the 2025 financial year, they will also take into account performance variations in each of Deloitte's four business lines.The shift means that workers in Deloitte's other three business lines — which cover deals, tax and legal, and audit and assurance services — will retain their full bonus.Those three divisions have either exceeded targets or, in the case of the audit and assurance branch, had still increased profits in the 2025 financial year, Houston wrote.Deloitte will also promote fewer employees than in previous years, Houston said.The firm would promote 5,500 employees, or about 25% of the UK workforce, at the start of the next financial year, he said. The previous year 28% were promoted, Houston said.A Deloitte consultant in the T&T division said the news about promotions was demotivating and had "dampened" the mood. The person added that their division had taken "a beating."It's "not the best feeling since T&T functions have historically pulled the firm forward in times of crisis," the employee added.Deloitte UK's total profits for its 2025 financial year, which ends on May 31, would be "slightly ahead of last year" but "below our original plan," Houston wrote."At the start of FY25, we expected greater economic stability and a gradual return of growth opportunities. But an early election, geopolitical complexity, and unexpected economic headwinds — like changes in trade policies — have continued to cause market uncertainty," he said.Deloitte's global revenue climbed 3.1% to $67.2 billion in the 2024 financial year, which marked a sharp slowdown in growth compared to the 14.9% increase in 2023.The firm's UK arm has reorganized its business divisions and laid off workers as it grappled with an industrywide slowdown in demand for consulting services that has hit revenue growth.Cost-cuttingIn October 2024, Deloitte UK cut its spending on staff travel and expenses by more than 50%.Houston addressed the cost-cutting measures in Tuesday's email, acknowledging "it has not been easy" for teams to be unable to meet in person for much of the year.He said the efforts to manage costs had "made a significant difference" and had directly contributed to bonuses for the 2025 financial year.A Deloitte UK spokesperson told BI: "Amid ongoing market uncertainty, we are pleased to be able to recognize our people for their hard work with salary increases, bonuses, and promotions this year. This is alongside other benefits such as fully funded private medical insurance, recently enhanced family policies, and our commitment to offering flexibility and choice in our ways of working."Have a tip? Contact this reporter via email at pthompson@businessinsider.com or Signal at Polly_Thompson.89. Use a personal email address and a nonwork device; here's our guide to sharing information securely.

SAP News Sapphire 2025: SAP mints business AI flywheel with Palantir on board SAP CEO Christian Klein put economic and geopolitical uncertainty at the centre of the opening keynote at the supplier’s global Sapphire event in Orlando By Brian McKenna, Enterprise Applications Editor Published: 21 May 2025 17:32 Christian Klein, SAP’s chief executive officer, put economic and geopolitical uncertainty at the heart of the opening keynote at the supplier’s global Sapphire event in Orlando. The European version of the event will be held in Madrid next week and is likely to repeat the same themes. Like other enterprise software suppliers, such as Oracle and Salesforce, SAP is invoking a trinity of capabilities for the artificial intelligence (AI) age, in its case applications, data and AI. Klein said SAP has the “broadest suite of applications in the [IT] industry”, the “semantically richest business data”, and AI that already makes SAP itself 30% more productive. Klein said the concept of a “flywheel”, making this troika go round, is driving SAP’s thinking and its offer to customers. British readers attuned to the increasing involvement of the controversial supplier Palantir in the NHS will have taken note of SAP’s announcement of a partnership with the firm, which the main Sapphire 2025 press release said would “facilitate joint customers’ cloud migration journey and modernisation programmes”. “Seamless connectivity between Palantir and SAP Business Data Cloud will enable customers to build a harmonised data foundation across their enterprise landscape. Together, the companies will responsibly deliver essential outcomes and support customers, including the US government, to quickly adapt to changes and disruptions,” it said. In the keynote, Klein hailed the Palantir partnership as building out the Business Data Cloud (BDC) platform that SAP announced in February 2025. “BDC is the crystal ball we need for these times of uncertainty. “Palantir is the maker of powerful data analysis software, and with SAP Business Cloud, our shared customers now benefit from real-time data integration and joint AI use cases.” Palantir chief executive Alex Karp said, in a video during the keynote: “We use Ontology [a Palantir product] to manage large language models and Foundry to reconcile data. The combination of those products and SAP’s will, we believe, be extremely valuable for our collective clients and partners.” Foundry is Palantir’s data integration platform and Ontology is an element of it for building digital twins. Klein said, in the press statement: “With the expansion of Joule, our partnerships with leading AI pioneers, and advancements in SAP Business Data Cloud, we’re delivering on the promise of Business AI as we drive digital transformations that help customers thrive in an increasingly unpredictable world.” Joule is SAP’s generative AI assistant technology, which it says can “accompany business users throughout their day, in and out of the SAP application universe, to find data, surface real-time insights and streamline workflows. Joule’s new ubiquity includes an action bar powered by WalkMe that studies user behaviour across applications, turning the assistant into an always-available, proactive AI that can anticipate users’ needs before they arise – always adhering to SAP’s strict ethical AI guidelines”. The supplier also announced a collaboration with Perplexity, described as “an AI-powered answer engine company”. This is said to enhance Joule’s ability to draw on structured and unstructured data to solve complex business problems. Alongside SAP’s knowledge graph technology, SAP said Joule could now instantly answer questions with “structured, visual answers – such as charts and graphs – grounded in real-time business data within SAP workflows. For example, a user could ask the tool how recent external events might impact their business and get a forecast based on both current events and the company’s own business data”. WHO IS THIS QUOTE FROM? It is from the release. SAP also announced more Joule Agents spanning customer experience, supply chain management, spend management, finance and human capital management. The supplier also introduced an “operating system for AI development”. Called AI Foundation, it is said to give developers a single entry point for building, extending and running custom AI systems. The supplier will, no doubt, endeavour to say what these and other announcements will mean for SAP customers in Europe next week in Madrid, from 26-28 May. Read more about Sapphire SAP will focus on Joule, agentic AI and Business Data Cloud at Sapphire; experts say it should also show how it can help customers deal with real-world issues. SAP Sapphire 2024: AI in all its forms – but not only AI. 2023: SAP Business AI and sustainability dominate Sapphire. In The Current Issue: UK critical systems at risk from ‘digital divide’ created by AI threats UK at risk of Russian cyber and physical attacks as Ukraine seeks peace deal Standard Chartered grounds AI ambitions in data governance Download Current Issue Microsoft entices developers to build more Windows AI apps – Cliff Saran's Enterprise blog Red Hat launches llm-d community & project – Open Source Insider View All Blogs

“Woodrush, Viola, Golden Saxifrage, Field Horsetail, Marsh Marigold, Lesser Celandine, Sedge (Frylet, Violen, Gullpudran, Åkerfräknet, Kabelöken, Svalörten, Starrgräset)” from the portfolio ‘Dornach Nature Studies’ (1919), watercolor, pencil, and ink on paper from a portfolio of 46 drawings, sheet: 19 5/8 × 10 9/16 inches. All images courtesy of The Museum of Modern Art, New York, shared with permission A Unique Portfolio of Hilma af Klint’s Botanical Drawings Communes with Nature’s Spiritual Side May 21, 2025 Kate Mothes With the Industrial Revolution in full swing at the turn of the 20th century, jobs and opportunities attracted people to burgeoning cities. New technologies were being developed at breakneck speed and discoveries within the natural sciences introduced people to invisible yet potent concepts like radio waves and X-rays. During this period of social transformation, philosophical or occult religious movements like Spiritualism and Helena Blavatsky’s Theosophy offered ways to not only connect within a like-minded community but to explore the afterlife—the so-called spirit world—and the very fabric of the universe. “Sunflower (Solrosen)” from the portfolio ‘Dornach Nature Studies’ (1919), watercolor, pencil, ink, and metallic paint on paper from a portfolio of 46 drawings, sheet: 19 3/4 × 10 9/16 inches For Hilma af Klint (1862–1944), like many who sought refuge and inspiration in these belief systems, a spiritual link to her surroundings united her with the natural world during “a period of massive change…as people from all levels of society were searching for something new to hold on to,” Johan af Klint and Hedvig Ersman wrote about the Swedish artist’s spiritual journey. Now on view at The Museum of Modern Art in New York, Hilma af Klint: What Stands Behind the Flowers highlights the institution’s recent acquisition of a phenomenal, 46-leaf portfolio called Nature Studies. During the spring and summer of 1919 and 1920, af Klint recorded Sweden’s seasonal flora, from lilies of the valley and sunflowers to violets and cherry blossoms. Beyond traditional botanical studies, the artist incorporates her characteristic abstractions and diagrams, surrounding each rendering with esoteric annotations and geometries. “One has to think of the realm of the nature spirits as the realm of thought; these entities hover around us, some like driving winds, others like soft summer breezes,” af Klint once said. “Lily of The Valley, Water Avens, Common Milkwort (Liljekonvaljen, Fårkummern, Jungfrulinet)” from the portfolio ‘Dornach Nature Studies’ (1919), watercolor, pencil, ink, and metallic paint on paper from a portfolio of 46 drawings, sheet: 19 5/8 × 10 5/8 inches Grids with unique color relationships or energetic spirals accompany renderings of field woodrush or marsh marigold, and tree specimens are paired with dotted checkerboards. “Through these forms, af Klint seeks to reveal, in her words, ‘what stands behind the flowers,'” the museum says, “reflecting her belief that studying nature uncovers truths about the human condition.” What Stands Behind the Flowers continues through September 27 and is accompanied by a catalogue that is slated for release on Tuesday. Find your copy on Bookshop, and plan your visit to MoMA on the museum’s website. “Yellow Star-of-Bethlehem, Lungwort, Coltsfoot, Nailwort, Pasqueflower (Vårlöken, Lungörten, Hästhoförten, Nagelörten, Backsippan)” from the portfolio ‘Dornach Nature Studies’ (1919), watercolor, pencil, and ink on paper from a portfolio of 46 drawings, sheet: 19 5/8 × 10 9/16 inches “Common Lime (Linden)” from the portfolio ‘Dornach Nature Studies’ (1919), watercolor, pencil, ink, and metallic paint on paper from a portfolio of 46 drawings, sheet: 19 5/8 × 10 5/8 inches “Tulip (Tulpanen)” from the portfolio ‘Dornach Nature Studies’ (1920), watercolor, pencil, ink, and metallic paint on paper from a portfolio of 46 drawings, sheet: 19 5/8 × 10 5/8 inches Next article

Pictured Above: The living room designed by Geoffrey De Sousa featuring the Fold Sofa by John Pomp Studios in Terra Mohair and a pair of Todo Modo Chairs by Jean-Michel Wilmotte.There’s no shortage of inspiration at this year’s San Francisco Decorator Showcase, where 20 top-tier designers reimagine 28 spaces inside a sprawling 9,400-square-foot, five-level Pacific Heights mansion—all in just fourteen weeks. “Each year, the San Francisco Decorator Showcase brings together an extraordinary roster of the region’s most talented interior and landscape designers,” said Geoffrey De Sousa, Chair of the Showcase Design Advisory Board and one of this year’s featured designers. “This year's designs push creative boundaries while honoring the home's architectural heritage. Visitors can expect an immersive, inspiring experience curated by the very best in the business.”As with any good showhouse, we look to these rooms not just for their spectacle but for take-home inspiration. This year's showcase delivered in spades. Design-forward trends we’ve been predicting were on full display—like the sculptural seating silhouettes in De Sousa’s artfully curated living room and Navarra Design Inc.’s modern, mood-rich library. Nash Design Group’s “Global Nest” featured a boldly pink toilet in its ensuite, proving playful color is officially bathroom-approved. And ceiling lighting—often the final frontier in residential design—took center stage in JKA Design’s rooftop listening lounge. Outdoor areas were just as captivating, with Katharine Webster and Strata Landscape Architecture crafting lush, livable escapes.But what makes a showcase truly compelling are the new ideas. With tight timelines and unique parameters, this kind of project challenges designers to think on their feet—and go big. “The transformation of the Showcase home is nothing short of remarkable,” said Stephanie Yee, Executive Director of the Showcase. “Behind the scenes, our designers pour their talent, creativity, and countless hours into bringing their visions to life—all under incredibly tight deadlines.” The results? Jaw-dropping. From painterly wall treatments to custom furniture that could moonlight as movie set pieces, this year's home left us buzzing about where design is headed next.The San Francisco Decorator Showcase is open through May 26 and benefits the financial aid program at San Francisco University High School. If you’re in the Bay Area over Memorial Day weekend, consider this your must-do. Tickets are available via Eventbrite—and don’t miss the live music night on May 23.Can’t make it in person? Don’t worry—we’ve rounded up the 10 must-see trends straight from the halls of this extraordinary home.For even more design inspiration:

This article contains spoilers for Arcane season 2. Netflix and Riot Games created one of the most acclaimed video game adaptations of all time with the original animated series Arcane, set in the world of League of Legends. After premiering in 2021, the series returned for its climactic second season in 2024, concluding the fiery saga of sisters Vi (Hailee Steinfeld) and Jinx (Ella Purnell) and the fate of the fantasy city of Piltover and its undercity Zaun. The first season dialed up this sibling rivalry to explosive proportions, as Jinx’s reckless antics threatened the fragile peace in place. The second season only ups the complicated family dynamics between its main characters, expanding the scope and depth of familial strife while escalating the consequences and actions as roles are subverted and reversed throughout the story. Whereas Jinx was branded a terrorist in the first season, the second season sees the unpredictable, explosive figure being regarded by Piltover’s populace as a freedom fighter against its totalitarian rule. Meanwhile, Vi grows increasingly erratic and volatile in her own life in the wake of tyranny’s rise, making the two sisters’ inevitable reunion all the more awkward. For showrunner Christian Linke, this narrative inversion proved to be “really fun to think about.” “It’s a really complex moment, when Jinx can say ‘Maybe you’re the baddie,’” Linke says. “So much of the show is about seeing the world through the lens of the other side. I think that is the quintessential moment for them, when they have to question how they see their sibling, at which point, they have a very loaded perspective of each other.” This reconciliation in the face of a common enemy leads to the sisters reuniting with their long-lost father Vander (JB Blanc), now resurrected as the feral werewolf-like monster Warwick. Leaning into the inherent horror offered by prominently featuring such a bloodthirsty creature, Warwick’s inclusion also underscored Arcane’s tendency to go to the extremes, in regards to tone and visceral action. More than just presenting another adversary, Vander’s transformation into Warwick also gave the show the opportunity to highlight more of Vander’s backstory as he reunites with his adopted daughters in the mines he worked in as a human. “He went back to this familiar place from his past and he didn’t know why because it got twisted for him,” writer Amanda Overton observes. “That mining room is the first time that [Vi and Jinx]  got to see their father figures as brothers. It just reframed everything for the family dynamics for them.” The season also features a surprise interlude with Ekko (Reed Shannon) traveling to a parallel reality where he acquires a time-reversal device crucial to the series’ final battle. More than just giving Ekko this game-changing item, the episode’s lighter tones and depictions of familiar faces gave Arcane the chance to explore elements that the creative team felt were more romantic and more fun in certain aspects. Overton reflected that more than making Ekko the one to turn the tide in the climax, it restored his faith in Zaun’s potential as well as Powder, the innocent person who Jinx used to be. “In his own world, he lost that faith,” Overton says. “He lost that vision. He had a vision of Zaun that was very similar to that and he lost his faith in it. He needed to see that it was possible in order to fight for that again and also to believe in Jinx again – Powder again.” This complexity and conflict between familial figures isn’t isolated to Vi and Jinx, but also between Jayce Talis (Kevin Alejandro) and Viktor (Harry Lloyd), who see each other as brothers. Though Viktor recognized the destructive potential of Hextech, the technology he and Jayce created, Jayce not only didn’t follow through on Viktor’s wish for him to destroy it, but used the unstable tech to resurrect Viktor. This turned Viktor into a figure poised to use his connection to Hextech to inadvertently destroy Zaun and Piltover, placing him in direct conflict with Jayce over the fate of the city. “A lot of season one was about creating the dream technology that could change the world,” Linke says. “When it gets turned into weapons and they lose control, that’s when Jayce and Viktor react very differently. They’re also a little bit shocked by the other’s reaction to that. We always knew that there would be a different conclusion when they’re confronted with this reality that humans will use this technology for their own motives and for their selfish goals” Join our mailing list Get the best of Den of Geek delivered right to your inbox! “That was also the fabric of season two, the things that you can’t see and that you can’t control,” Overton adds. “That’s why Viktor, when he goes down to the Undercity, he does his part to make that his little utopian commune. He’s trying to make what the topside has down here and try to compress that gap. It’s beautiful and wonderful, but even that goes awry for him. They always intended the right things, had great intentions, and could not see the consequences of those actions.” A beautiful narrative expansion of the world of League of Legends, Arcane ends on a high and hopeful note, amidst all the conflict and loss to get there. And from its vibrantly animated cities to its memorable and nuanced characters, the Netflix original series has once again set the bar for what video game adaptations can and should be. Available to stream on Netflix, Arcane lives up to the hype as one of the most engrossing and heartfelt animated series around. Both seasons of Arcane are available to stream on Netflix now.

Join our daily and weekly newsletters for the latest updates and exclusive content on industry-leading AI coverage. Learn More Well-funded French AI model maker Mistral has consistently punched above its weight since its debut of its own powerful open source foundation model in fall 2023 — but it took some criticism among developers on X recently for its last release of a proprietary large language model (LLM) called Medium 3, which some viewed as betraying its open source roots and commitment. (Recall that open source models can be taken and adapted freely by anyone, while proprietary models must be paid for and their customization options are more limited and controlled by the model maker.) But today, Mistral is back and recommitting to the open source AI community, and AI-powered software development in particular, in a big way. The company has teamed up with open source startup All Hands AI, creators of Open Devin to release Devstral, a new open-source language model with 24-million parameters — much smaller than many rivals whose models are in the multibillions, and thus, requiring far less computing power such that it can be run on a laptop — purpose-built for agentic AI development. Unlike traditional LLMs designed for short-form code completions or isolated function generation, Devstral is optimized to act as a full software engineering agent—capable of understanding context across files, navigating large codebases, and resolving real-world issues. The model is now freely available under the permissive Apache 2.0 license, allowing developers and organizations to deploy, modify, and commercialize it without restriction. “We wanted to release something open for the developer and enthusiast community—something they can run locally, privately, and modify as they want,” said Baptiste Rozière, research scientist at Mistral AI. “It’s released under Apache 2.0, so people can do basically whatever they want with it.” Building upon Codestral Devstral represents the next step in Mistral’s growing portfolio of code-focused models, following its earlier success with the Codestral series. First launched in May 2024, Codestral was Mistral’s initial foray into specialized coding LLMs. It was a 22-billion-parameter model trained to handle over 80 programming languages and became well-regarded for its performance in code generation and completion tasks. The model’s popularity and technical strengths led to rapid iterations, including the launch of Codestral-Mamba—an enhanced version built on Mamba architecture—and most recently, Codestral 25.01, which has found adoption among IDE plugin developers and enterprise users looking for high-frequency, low-latency models. The momentum around Codestral helped establish Mistral as a key player in the coding-model ecosystem and laid the foundation for the development of Devstral—extending from fast completions to full-agent task execution. Outperforms larger models on top SWE benchmarks Devstral achieves a score of 46.8% on the SWE-Bench Verified benchmark, a dataset of 500 real-world GitHub issues manually validated for correctness. This places it ahead of all previously released open-source models and ahead of several closed models, including GPT-4.1-mini, which it surpasses by over 20 percentage points. “Right now, it’s by pretty far the best open model for SWE-bench verified and for code agents,” said Rozière. “And it’s also a very small model—only 24 billion parameters—that you can run locally, even on a MacBook.” “Compare Devstral to closed and open models evaluated under any scaffold—we find that Devstral achieves substantially better performance than a number of closed-source alternatives,” wrote Sophia Yang, Ph.D., Head of Developer Relations at Mistral AI, on the social network X. “For example, Devstral surpasses the recent GPT-4.1-mini by over 20%.” The model is finetuned from Mistral Small 3.1 using reinforcement learning and safety alignment techniques. “We started from a very good base model with Mistral’s small tree control, which already performs well,” Rozière said. “Then we specialized it using safety and reinforcement learning techniques to improve its performance on SWE-bench.” Built for the agentic era Devstral is not just a code generation model — it is optimized for integration into agentic frameworks like OpenHands, SWE-Agent, and OpenDevin. These scaffolds allow Devstral to interact with test cases, navigate source files, and execute multi-step tasks across projects. “We’re releasing it with OpenDevin, which is a scaffolding for code agents,” said Rozière. “We build the model, and they build the scaffolding — a set of prompts and tools that the model can use, like a backend for the developer model.” To ensure robustness, the model was tested across diverse repositories and internal workflows. “We were very careful not to overfit to SWE-bench,” Rozière explained. “We trained only on data from repositories that are not cloned from the SWE-bench set and validated the model across different frameworks.” He added that Mistral dogfooded Devstral internally to ensure it generalizes well to new, unseen tasks. Efficient deployment with permissive open license — even for enterprise and commercial projects Devstral’s compact 24B architecture makes it practical for developers to run locally, whether on a single RTX 4090 GPU or a Mac with 32GB of RAM. This makes it appealing for privacy-sensitive use cases and edge deployments. “This model is targeted toward enthusiasts and people who care about running something locally and privately—something they can use even on a plane with no internet,” Rozière said. Beyond performance and portability, its Apache 2.0 license offers a compelling proposition for commercial applications. The license permits unrestricted use, adaptation, and distribution—even for proprietary products—making Devstral a low-friction option for enterprise adoption. Detailed specifications and usage instructions are available on the Devstral-Small-2505 model card on Hugging Face. The model features a 128,000 token context window and uses the Tekken tokenizer with a 131,000 vocabulary. It supports deployment through all major open source platforms including Hugging Face, Ollama, Kaggle, LM Studio, and Unsloth, and works well with libraries such as vLLM, Transformers, and Mistral Inference. Available via API or locally Devstral is accessible via Mistral’s Le Platforme API (application programming interface) under the model name devstral-small-2505, with pricing set at $0.10 per million input tokens and $0.30 per million output tokens. For those deploying locally, support for frameworks like OpenHands enables integration with codebases and agentic workflows out of the box. Rozière shared how he incorporates Devstral in his own development flow: “I use it myself. You can ask it to do small tasks, like updating the version of a package or modifying a tokenization script. It finds the right place in your code and makes the changes. It’s really nice to use.” More to come While Devstral is currently released as a research preview, Mistral and All Hands AI are already working on a larger follow-up model with expanded capabilities. “There will always be a gap between smaller and larger models,” Rozière noted, “but we’ve gone a long way in bridging that. These models already perform very strongly, even compared to some larger competitors.” With its performance benchmarks, permissive license, and agentic design, Devstral positions itself not just as a code generation tool—but as a foundational model for building autonomous software engineering systems. Daily insights on business use cases with VB Daily If you want to impress your boss, VB Daily has you covered. We give you the inside scoop on what companies are doing with generative AI, from regulatory shifts to practical deployments, so you can share insights for maximum ROI. Read our Privacy Policy Thanks for subscribing. Check out more VB newsletters here. An error occured.

Congress may stop California from implementing its first-in-the nation rule banning the sale of new gas powered cars by 2035.A Senate vote expected as soon as this week could end the nation’s most aggressive effort to transition toward electric vehicles as President Donald Trump’s administration doubles down on fossil fuels.California makes up roughly 11% of the U.S. car market, giving it significant power to shape purchasing trends. Vehicles are one of the largest sources of planet-warming emissions.The Republican-controlled Congress is targeting three California waivers that set stricter emissions rules than the federal government. The House voted to block them first blocked them several weeks ago, and Senate Majority Leader John Thune said his chamber would take up a similar effort this week, even though the Senate Parliamentarian and the U.S. Government Accountability Office say California’s policies are not subject to the review mechanism used by the House.Thune said California’s “are an improper expansion of a limited Clean Air Act authority and would endanger consumers, our economy, and our nation’s energy supply.”California Gov. Gavin Newsom and state air regulators say what lawmakers are doing is illegal and they will likely sue if the measure advances.Here’s what to know: Why can California set its own standards? The Environmental Protection Agency has let the state adopt stricter emissions for decades, and other states can sign on to those rules.California has some of the nation’s worst air pollution, and the waivers date back to efforts in the 1960s and 1970s to fight smog in Los Angeles.President Donald Trump rescinded California’s ability to enforce its standards during his first term, but President Joe Biden’s administration restored it in 2022. What do the standards do? Newsom, a Democrat, announced plans in 2020 to ban the sale of new gas-powered cars by 2035. State air regulators formalized the rules in 2022, and the federal government allowed them to move forward last year.The rule requires automakers to sell an increasing number of zero-emission cars, pickup trucks and SUVs over the next decade. Electric vehicles would have to make up 43% of new sales by 2027, 68% by 2030 and 100% by 2035. People would still be able to buy used gas-powered cars, plug-in hybrids or hydrogen-powered vehicles.California passed another rule in 2020 to phase out the sale of medium- and heavy-duty diesel vehicles, including box trucks, semitrailers and large pickups. Depending on class, zero-emission trucks will have to make up 40% to 75% of sales by 2035. The Biden administration approved that policy in 2023.The third regulation targeted by Congress would reduce smog-forming emissions from trucks. The rule revamped a testing program to ensure heavy-duty vehicles comply with emissions standards and set stricter standards to limit pollution from nitrogen oxides and particulate matter, which pose public health risks.New York, Colorado and New Mexico are among the states that announced plans to follow all three of the policies. What do the auto and trucking industries say? Several automakers, including Honda, Ford and Volkswagen, signed deals with California to follow some of the state’s tailpipe emission standards. But the companies have not committed to complying with the 2035 mandate on gas-powered cars and did not respond to requests for comment on the Senate’s upcoming vote.The National Automobile Dealers Association urged the Senate to pass the measure.“Banning gas and hybrid cars is a national issue that should be decided by Congress, not an unelected state agency,” Mike Stanton, the group’s president and CEO, wrote in a letter.The Safe Roads Coalition, which represents towing and truck companies, said the medium- and heavy-duty truck rule is unfeasible and should be blocked.“While transitioning combustion engines to electric is well-intended, unworkable regulations threaten roadside services for millions of American motorists,” said Josh Lovelace, the group’s national director. Can the grid handle more electric vehicless? Thune, the Senate majority leader, said the nation’s grid can’t handle California’s plans. It is a concern shared by other critics, who point to California’s struggle several summers ago to maintain consistent power during a heat wave.“Our already shaky electric grid would quickly face huge new burdens from a surge in electric vehicles,” he said in a statement announcing the vote.Newsom’s administration argues the state is on its way to building out an electric grid and charging infrastructure that can support many more electric vehicles. Broadly, California has a goal of net-zero greenhouse gas emissions across the economy by 2045.But the state remains far short of what is eventually needed. California has about 84,000 public electric vehicle chargers in the state but needs 1.2 million by 2030 to support the EV transition, according to the California Energy Commission. The Trump administration directed states earlier this year to stop spending money approved under Biden to help build electric vehicle charges across the U.S. More than a dozen states are suing the federal government over the effort.Newsom has also recently touted the state’s growing battery storage capacity. Neither the commission nor the California Air Resources Board responded to questions about how much the state’s electric grid must grow to support the power demand expected from the state’s transition. But the state has said it needs at least four times more wind and solar power to meet 2045 energy demands and that the grid must grow at an “unprecedented rate.”Timothy Johnson, a professor of energy and the environment at Duke University, said most regions of the U.S. can generate enough power or add enough to meet EV charging demand, but local power lines and transformers could be overloaded. How are other states responding? Eleven other states, plus Washington, D.C., have adopted California’s plan to phase out new gas-powered cars, according to the air board. Several more have adopted the state’s previous zero-emission vehicle standards.But some of those states are already backing away.Republican Vermont Gov. Phil Scott last week paused enforcement of electric vehicle sales targets that follow California’s, saying the pace wasn’t realistic. In Delaware, Democratic Gov. Matt Meyer has said he wants to rescind the state’s EV mandate. Other states still appear to be moving ahead. Associated Press writers Mary Clare Jalonick, Matthew Daly and Alexa St. John in Washington contributed. Austin is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues. Follow Austin on X: @sophieadanna —Sophie Austin, Associated Press/Report for America