Topographies dazzles our eyes and walls with a trompe l’oeil effect that successfully tricks our senses—the seemingly three-dimensional surface is deceptively flat. To create the pattern, designers stacked multiple sheets of paper and tore away portions of the surface by hand, forming canyon-like valleys of various widths and depths. The wallcovering’s name refers to the...

Ammar Kalo practices architecture and industrial design at his namesake studio in Sharjah, United Arab Emirates. His work ranges from architecture, interior design to furniture. The Stratum Chair’s concept and appearance were driven by his desires to “express materiality” and to take advantage of new fabrication technologies. Kalo laminated plywood and CNC milled a complex path...

Though it is frequently lauded as the tallest skyscraper designed by a woman in the world, Chicago’s Aqua Tower is worthy of praise beyond the gender of its architect, Jeanne Gang, a MacArthur fellow and winner of the 2013 National Design Award in Architecture. The key aspects of Gang’s LEED certified design, which explores the...