Word of Mouth: Palm Springs with Gerry McGovern

We tour the modernist oasis with Land Rover's head of design

Gerry McGovern, Land Rover’s Design Director and Chief Creative Officer, first visited Palm Springs 20 years ago and immediately fell in love with the modernist oasis in the Southern California desert. Last week, as guests of the brand, we toured Palm Springs with McGovern, learning about some of his favorite spots. Connecting cars to architecture he remarked, “We don’t need luxury vehicles or fabulous houses, …

Afghanistan’s “Carved” Cultural Center Design

UNESCO has just revealed the winner of a months-long competition seeking a design for a new cultural center in Afghanistan’s Central Highlands region. The competition was launched by UNESCO along with the Afghan government’s Ministry of Information and Culture after the area’s two giant 17th-century cliff-carvings of Buddha were destroyed by Taliban militants. The winning design by an Argentina-based team elegantly “carves” the cultural center …

Lyon’s New Musée Des Confluences

An interdisciplinary museum more than a decade in the making finally makes its debut

Where the Rhône and Saône rivers meet in Lyon is the location of the historic French city’s urban development project, which has been transforming the former industrial wasteland into spaces for residences, offices, shopping and leisure since the early 2000s. One of the leading attractions to this new riverfront is the Musée des Confluences, a unique interdisciplinary institution that merges ethnology, anthropology, the natural sciences, …