"In these conditions, how can we be optimistic?" asks Anab Jain

Superflux co-founder Anab Jain has been awarded this year's LDF Design Innovation Medal. In this interview, she argues speculative design can still be a source of hope even in dark times.

It's yet another 32-degree day in London's alarming summer of 32-degree days, and Jain has been telling her colleagues about her childhood in India.

It was a time of national emergency, with food rationing due to drought and crop failures, water for only one hour a day, stifling heat – and yet, young Jain was happy.

"I still had the best childhood, in a way," she said.

"It makes me think a lot...

Sejaca House / G+A Architect

The house rises on a green hill, built entirely of red brick and concrete that give it a strong architectural character and a natural connection to the surrounding landscape. Its form is cubic and clean, reflecting a minimalist modern aesthetic, while the facades with decorative perforations create a play of light and natural ventilation.

Jonathan Anderson and Anab Jain among winners of London Design Medal

JW Anderson founder Jonathan Anderson has won this year's London Design Medal for his work "blending high fashion, art and craft".

While Anderson won the London Design Medal, the award scheme's highest accolade, Superflux co-founder Anab Jain was named winner of the Design Innovation Medal.

This year's Emerging Talent Medal was won by Mimica founder Solveiga Pakštaitė, while the Lifetime Achievement Medal awarded to academic Christopher Frayling.

The four design medals are awarded each year during London Design Festival (LDF), which starts this week.

"This year's medal winners demonstrate the transformative power of design, from Jonathan Anderson's work blending high fashion, art and craft, to Sir Christopher...

"Industry in Germany is no longer open to what design can do" say Currents Berlin organisers

As Currents festival kicks off in Berlin, founders Laura Ewert and Jasmin Jouhar tell Dezeen why they hope the event will finally bring the local design community the recognition it deserves.

Running from today until 12 September, Currents was conceived as a "very Berlin" event – decentralised and community-curated, with minimal corporate sponsorship.

Much like Copenhagen's 3 Days of Design, it is funded almost entirely bottom-up by the brands and studios taking part.

"The concept is not really new, but it's also very Berlin," Ewert said. "We are used to creating something out of nothing. There is an empty room, then 10 people...

Chinese Love Poetry | Illustrated Book by NUINUI Books

National Open Competition for Architecture, Urbanism, and Landscape Architecture for the UFC Center for Arts, Culture, and Events

The Federal University of Ceará (UFC), in partnership with the Institute of Architects of Brazil – Ceará Department (IAB/CE), has launched the National Public Competition for Architecture, Urbanism, and Landscape Design for the UFC Arts, Culture, and Events Center, a project that will occupy one of the most symbolic sites on the Fortaleza waterfront. Registration has been open since August 13 and will continue until October 6, 2026, with the final deadline for proposal submissions on October 21, 2026.

The new cultural space will be built on the site formerly occupied by the São Pedro Building, the former Iracema Plaza Hotel,...

Orms plans to add rooftop swimming pool to London's BT Tower

Architecture studio Orms has submitted a planning application to transform the BT Tower in London into a hotel with a rooftop swimming pool for American hotelier MCR.

Orms will restore the Grade II-listed BT Tower, the adjacent podium and 1930s Howland Building, and convert the complex into a hotel with ground-floor shops, bars and restaurants, if the application is approved by the London Borough of Camden.

A publicly accessible swimming pool will be built on top of the podium, which will be overlooked by the iconic BT Tower structure.

Six rising talents on London's design scene

The British capital is bursting with emerging designers casting off convention and doing things their way. Ahead of London Design Festival, here are six names to have on your radar.

Tessa Silva

The stitcher: Tessa Silva started her career crafting vases from a clay-like material made from waste skimmed milk and chalk, which she developed over three years and fed through a sausage stuffer to create distinctive lumpy vessels. Asymmetric, swollen forms have been something of a throughline in Silva's constantly expanding portfolio ever since.

Her current focus is Smock,...

Digital Worlds and the Limits of Frictionless Space: Rethinking Scale and Materiality

Historically, the way we design has been closely linked to the way we build. Architecture moved through physical testing, trial and error, projection drawings, mock-ups, and physical models: each introducing a new layer of abstraction, but still remaining tied to material, scale, and construction. The introduction of CAD significantly changed this dynamic. At first, it was largely understood as the computerization of precise geometry for construction. Over time, however, digital tools moved earlier into the design process, replacing sketching, physical trial and error, model-making, and other forms of thinking that had once kept scale and material close at hand.

Dezeen Awards 2026 Regional Showcases spotlight 50 projects in the Americas

Dezeen has announced the 50 projects featured in the Top 50: Americas list as part of the Regional Showcases for Dezeen Awards 2026.

Launched as a new initiative for the 2026 edition of the awards programme, each Top 50 list celebrates the best projects in three regions globally: Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA), Asia Pacific (APAC) and the Americas.

The projects in the Regional Showcases have been selected by Dezeen's editors. Each Top 50 list highlights both the variety of creative excellence and the nuanced differences in output across the 91 countries that entered Dezeen Awards this year.

This year's Top 50:...