Vietnam Authorities plans to build a new building for Vietnam's National Exhibition and trade fair center. From 9 designs the developer company VIN Group selected the master plan and architectural concept of the Hamburg architectural firm "GMP". The design for the main building of the trade center follows the motif of an open lotus flower - Vietnam's national flower - and, with this shape, is intended to become the unique and unmistakable landmark of the city. The new building to be built on the 128 hectare site, which benefits from good transport connections and is located to the north of Hanoi on the way to the international Noi Bai airport; in the east-west direction it is divided by a river. With a gross floor area of more than 600 thousand square meters, the future National Exhibition and Trade Fair Center to the north of the river will be embedded in a green park landscape which extends to the southern side of the river. The entrance to the trade fair will be marked by two high-rise hotel and office blocks, which are placed on either side of the access area and which are visible from afar. The first building phase includes the Trade Fair Center, which consists of a conference center and 8 exhibition halls. All buildings are grouped in circular fashion around a central open space, which is designed as a water feature with "islands" and bridges. The entrance hall is placed to the south and the support-free halls, with an exhibition area of 10 thousand square meters each, are linked with each other by a ring-shaped building called the "Concourse". Delivery yards are situated between the various exhibition halls, from where trucks can drive into the sides of the halls; the gates on the sides also serve as connections between the halls. In this way it is possible to combine several areas or separate them from each other, ensuring flexible use and making it possible to organize several trade exhibitions at the same time. In later building phases, six trade fair halls are planned both in the west and the east, which will be combined to a square overall layout shape and connected to the central buildings of the first phase via glazed connecting galleries. In addition, a trade exhibition building for regular trade exhibitions is provided in the eastern part of the site; the building is circular in plan and is placed on its own so that it attracts attention from the motorway and main road.

Apple hasn't even finished construction on its first spaceship-style campus, but it's reportedly signed a lease on a second one, reported the Business Insider. The new futuristic project has already named Central & Wolfe. The campus will be built in Sunnyvale, just five miles south of the first spaceship in Cupertino. The so-called Central and Wolfe campus designed by the architecture firm HOK is being developed by Landmark Investments. Though the deal has not been confirmed, but the transactions have been completed. Apple has leased, not purchased, the property, and it's still unclear when construction will begin, reported the Quartz. The Central & Wolfe campus will span 18 acres, replacing nine buildings of a business park built more than 40 years ago. When construction is completed the site will look radically different, as the old buildings will be replaced with three connected and almost completely circular main edifices. Each of these three new buildings will have a central atrium, and more than half of the campus is considered open-air. (And that's not even including the optional rooftop gardens.) There will also be, of course, all the amenities we've come to expect from these massive Silicon Valley campuses. Included in the plans: an on-site bank, a cafeteria, a fitness center, a coffee bar, a conference center, a 500-person outdoor amphitheater, food truck access "in and around the quad," a barbershop, athletic fields and courts, a bike repair shop, and a general store. There will also be 2,582 total parking spaces, but only 12 of them will be on the surface of the campus - 1,170 spots will be underground, and the other 1,400 are located in an above-ground garage.

Italy has earmarked over US$ 20 million to rebuild the arena floor in the Colosseum where gladiators once fought wild beasts, Culture Minister Dario Franceschini announced. The idea is that the arena could be used once more to house events and perhaps even re-enactments of spectacular Roman-era shows, while the area below where the beasts, scenery and props were kept would be turned into a museum. The planned arena reconstruction will not affect 48-meters high Colosseum walls, which continue to break down. The biggest amphitheater built during the Roman Empire, the Colosseum stands 48.5 meters high. In Rome times, up to 80 thousand spectators would throng there to see gladiator greats such as Carpophores -- who reportedly defeated a bear, lion, leopard and rhinoceros in one battle -- or cheer on mock sea battles held in the flooded arena. It now welcomes over six million visitors a year. Besides the Italian Government, in Colosseum restoration are engaged also philanthropists. Long-delayed repairs, funded to the tune of US$ 27.8 million by Italian billionaire Diego Della Valle, began in 2013 and are expected to be finished in early 2016. The Colosseum undertaking is just one of the country's US$ 89 million cultural maintenance projects, which includes US$ 20 million to update the Uffizi Gallery in Florence, $7.7 million to update Turin's Polo Reale museum, and $5.5 million to expedite the progress of Pisa's forthcoming museum of ancient ships.

A pioneering 3D-printed house just popped up in Xian, China - and Chinese company ZhuoDa "built" the two-story villa in less than three hours. Made up of six 3D-printed modules, the house was assembled like LEGO bricks before a live audience who were then invited to explore the interior. The modular fireproof home can withstand a magnitude-9 earthquake and is made from a special construction material the company is keeping secret. The company completed approximately 90 percent of the construction in an off-site factory before shipping the modular pieces to the installation site. This efficient and timesaving process dramatically reduces construction costs to just US$ 400 - US$ 480 per square meter. According to An Yongliang, the developing engineer at Zhuoda, the 3D-printed villa only takes about 10 days to produce from initial construction to final assembly, while it typically takes half a year to build a traditional villa. The house is capable of withstanding high-magnitude earthquakes because the modules, each weighing over 100 kilograms per square meter, bear weight independently. The steel-framed structure home can also be filled with heat-insulating materials. The Zhuoda Group has filed over 22 patents on their technology and is keeping their top-secret material under wraps. However, the company's vice president Tan BuYong has revealed that the new material is sourced from industrial and agricultural waste, is fireproof and waterproof, and is free from harmful substances such as formaldehyde, ammonia, and radon. After the structural framework was 3D-printed, the company applied decorative sheet textures to each module before final assembly. Homeowners will be able to choose from a variety of decorative textures, such as jade, marble, wood, and granite. Herbs can even be embedded into the walls of the house for "built-in aromatherapy". The buildings can withstand wear for at least 150 years. On January 2015 a Chinese company WinSun has successfully 3D printed a five-story apartment building and a 110 square meters villa from special print material. China's newest mansion is not only made from recycled materials, but the sprawling 110 square meters home was made with 3D printing. The luxury mansion was 3D printed in layers, using recycled stone and construction waste.

Beijing will undertake a major restructuring of the capital government as part of a broader plan to create a giant urban corridor in northern China, reported The New York Times. The new super city will link 130 million people across Beijing (22 million residents), Tianjin (14 million residents) and Hebei (72 million residents). Jing-Jin-Ji, as the region is called ("Jing" for Beijing, "Jin" for Tianjin and "Ji," the traditional name for Hebei Province), is meant to help the area catch up to China's more prosperous economic belts: the Yangtze River Delta around Shanghai and Nanjing in central China, and the Pearl River Delta around Guangzhou and Shenzhen in southern China. The new city would be spread over 212 square kilometers, almost size of Belarus. It would be 7 times larger than Armenia, 85 times larger than Moscow and 2 times larger than its neighbor South Korea. The new super city is intended to be different in scope and conception. A huge expansion of high-speed rail to bring the major cities within an hour's commute of each other. But some of the new roads and railways are years from completion. For many people, the creation of the super city so far has meant ever-longer commutes on gridlocked highways to the capital. Infrastructure has also lagged. Until recently, high-speed rail failed to connect many vital cities around Beijing, while many roads did not link up. Planning reports say the area has 18 "beheaded" highways - major arteries built in one of the three districts but not linked to others. One highway ends at a bridge over the mostly dried-out river dividing Yanjiao from Beijing, and has remained unfinished for years. The new super city will link the research facilities and creative culture of Beijing with the economic muscle of the port city of Tianjin and the hinterlands of Hebei Province, forcing areas that have never cooperated to work together. To unload the capital's center, the Chinese authorities intend to move administrative buildings, 1,200 factories and 50 hospitals of the city in unpopulated areas of Hebei Province. This will help to redirect the people into new areas, and will reduce the population density in the historic part of Beijing. Also in the new super city will be built 18 new highways and an extra underground line. The plan has been debated for decades, but only began to be implemented in recent months as part of an effort by President Xi Jinping to reform the Chinese economy and get government approval on July 2015. The idea is to reduce the sort of duplicative, polluting enterprises like coking and steel that dominates the greater Beijing area and other large urban centers, and in their place create a more modern economic structure.