Years ago in McAllen, Texas, an old abandoned 124,500-square-foot Walmart superstore was renovated and put to new use as the largest single-floor public library in the United States. Across America, many malls have emptied out and thousands of abandoned big box stores sit empty, including hundreds of former Walmarts. Some, though, are getting creative new leases on life, becoming community markets, indoor tracks, gaming spaces, museums and more.

In McAllen, aisles that used to divide shoppers have been adapted or replaced to serve the community. The old Walmart is packed with computer labs, public meeting spaces, a cafe, an art gallery, a used bookstore and more. In other small towns and suburbs around the United States, the generic promise of all-in-one convenience big box stores once offered is being realized in new and site-specific ways.

Designers at the research and development lab of KTGY Architecture + Planning in Los Angeles have particularly inspiring aspirations for old shopping centers: plug-and-play modular prefabs that subdivide big empty boxes into transitional housing for the homeless. This is not the first time architects and designers have attempted creative solutions to this pervasive problem, but it’s notably ambitious.

The firm’s Re-Habit project involves housing as well as support spaces and services fit into unused spaces in big boxes or individual shopping outlet stores like Sears and JCPenney. Self-supporting communal residences, where occupants rotate chores like working in the kitchen or keeping the dining hall clean, are coupled with facilities to providing training and potentially even employment.

Where some might see empty space, others see opportunity. The large, flat roofs of big box stores, for example, are ideal for rooftop gardening, open-air recreation and solar panels — these kinds of uses would pair well with a project like Re-Habit. Many big boxes have outdoor plaza areas (not to mention giant parking lots) that could accommodate small pop-up shops and food carts, too.

Adaptive reuse in the realm of big retail is forward-thinking but also proven concept. Big boxes have been turned into commercial gyms, corporate offices, schools, churches and (yes, this is true) even a SPAM Museum. Whatever the project, it takes vision and resources to turn such dauntingly huge structures around as well as an understanding of the potential pitfalls and unique opportunities of this peculiar building typology.

Such large-scale conversions tend to work best when they take advantage of big box assets and work within their limitations. Generally, big box stores reside in huge buildings that are located in prime spots, often along highways, which makes them accessible but can also make them hard to fill up. They generally have a lot in common, like orientations that lend themselves to being sectioned into bays and limited natural light, features that can work well for things like libraries. Often, though, the best option is simply whatever best fits community needs, which is often a mixed-use program that can more effectively fill out a bigger interior.

Big retailers may be more prevalent in suburbs, but there are some prime urban examples as well. A series of converted Sears plants in major US cities offer a range of realized visions for what big old commercial buildings can become. In Minneapolis, for instance, a massive mail-order Sears plant and retail store was abandoned by its makers for years before being turned into the Midtown Exchange, a busy structure full of restaurants, stores, offices, condos and apartments. It took a lot of players to make this work, including invested city officials and both public and private funding from various sources.

Often, these conversions speak to the character of the cities in which they are located. In Seattle, a place known for its coffee, the city’s old Sears plant now houses the Starbucks headquarters. In Los Angeles, land of Hollywood, a deserted Sears was used for film shoots during its derelict years but is on its way to becoming a residential and commercial hub. Boston and Memphis have converted Sears projects, too — uses are mixed in both cases.

While the individual projects vary, each city has something in common having turned a similarly monumental structure into something new. These various projects fill in gaps and address needs that are fundamentally local. Together, they represent a series of blueprints that other cities can look to, whether they have Sears plants themselves or are simply looking for ways to deal with big old commercial spaces.

Existing examples can provide paths forward, but other architects have grander visions, too, some of which have yet to be tried. Designers could, for instance, build around big boxes on all sides, then turn the central old structures into community hubs or parking lots or productive green spaces. Another option is to tear down sections of roofs and facades, dividing big boxes up into smaller and more manageable units while leaving structural supports intact.

There is no one-size-fits-all solution for disused spaces, but cities, towns and sururbs looking for inspiration have both real-world examples and conceptual designs to draw on. In some sense, the core recipe never changes — for any big transformation project, municipal officials, citizens, developers and designers will always have to come together to find best-fit solutions on a case-by-case basis.

Modernism sought to bring a healthy uniformity to architectural design, in part through with clean lines and material minimalism. New technologies like air conditioning also allowed for an unprecedented level of global standardization in terms of temperature-controlled spaces. Of course, this often meant disregarding local traditions that had been successful for centuries (or longer). Among the regional strategies that got lost along the way was a seemingly small but critical factor: the variable heights of rooms humans build and occupy.

As a vernacular design critic who goes by Wrath of Gnon explains, “Before the International Style (modernism) in architecture, our ancestors knew how to adapt the room heights according to the climate, achieving maximum effect (comfort) for the least effort (energy). Today we trust in the grid and so build 8-9 ft rooms from Bermuda to Reykjavik.”

Ideally, the, in warm climates you want higher ceilings because “as hot air rises the difference in temperature at floor level and ceiling level in a tall room can be as much as 4 degrees [celcius] all other things being equal. Here, a comfortable looking gentleman in an 1817 room in Rome,” height around 15 feet. In Brazil, 15-foot homes were typical historically.

Conversely, in colder climates, lower ceilings meant higher temperatures. “Here are log houses from Russia and Sweden. The efficiently constructed fireplace created an interior draught that sucked fresh air in and expelled smoke, dust. Fans or mechanical ventilation not needed.”

In Japan, “with hot summers and relatively cold winters, a different technique was called for. Wooden houses allowed for perfect fine tunings of openings depending on exact climate and orientation. This traditional room built to maximize airflow, livable in summers without AC.”

In short: choosing the right materials, heights and orientations for a climate makes a big difference. “By building with nature and climate instead or regardless of it, by adapting our waking hours to the rhythm of the sun we can achieve remarkable levels of comfort—even superior—compared to what we have today in our modern homes built to international, industrial standards.”

The Denver International Airport has long been a hub of conspiracy theories, a number of which seem to be confirmed by signs put up by the DIA on walls blocking off areas under renovation.

Some theories hold that the DIA is the home base of the Illuminati, New World Order or Reptoids, citing everything from the layout of the airport and its runways to various bizarre murals, sculptures and engravings (argued to be secret codes or alien messages).

There have also been questions about extensive excavations of areas that seem to serve no obvious purpose, not to mention an array of really disturbing artworks (from militaristic paintings to giant glowing-eyed horse).

Tapping into this legacy, new marketing billboards reference lizard people, alien overlords, UFO sightings and other occult and extraterrestrial phenomena — maybe (OK: absolutely) this means the conspiracies are a fun joke, but of course, some will think they’re just hiding in plane sight.

To address the needs of a visually impaired client, architects in Thiene, Italy, worked from the start to integrate a custom wayfinding system into the structure and layout of this home, including a creative set of tiles with varied textures to guide the owner from room to room.

The owner, who had lived in one place for 55 years until this point, was understandably concerned about learning to navigate a new environment, working with So & So Studio (images by Stefano Calgaro) to make the transition easier and more intuitive.

The first step was to create a central corridor to minimize any confusing maze effects that a more complicated layout might create. All entrances and exits are located along this spine, as are primary places like the kitchen and bedroom.

The architects worked with the client to map out her routines and paths, organizing their design around these regular activities. Potential hazards like thresholds were also avoided.

Perhaps the most stunning part, though, is the glyphic alphabet encoded in the floors — textured stones create patterns designed to be read and followed by the client, a built-in system for wayfinding. A guest might notice these standing out and think them a simple visual queue, when in fact they work for the sightless as well as the sighted.

When Le Corbusier designed his Brutalist Unité d’Habitation structures in Marseilles and Berlin, the architect imagined these as models for the future of vertical urban living. But, as they say in war: his plans didn’t survive contact with the enemy.

Completed in 1958, the Berlin version in particular was altered internally prior to construction, meaning that the original layouts and details Corbu had it mind were largely left on the drawing table, replaced instead by cheaper, German-drafted plans. At least until German-American architect Philipp Mohr (images Didier Gaillard-Hohlweg) bought a unit in the building.

He purchased a condo that, at the time, “was all entirely white and looked more like a prison, or the typical 1980s German social housing, than anything Corbusier had ever designed.” Even the ceiling heights were out of alignment with the original design.

Mohr went beyond restoring the 1958 format format, studying historical design documents at the Foundation Le Corbusier and the Cité de l’Architecture et du Patrimoine in Paris to see past what was actually built.

With the big picture in hand, he set about studying colors, lighting, finishes, plans and other details of Corbu’s to replicate his original vision as much as possible.

Having finished the renovation, Mohr believes the space is better for it. “The colours are timeless and very soothing and inviting,” Mohr says. “The use of wood and natural finishes is comfortable and homely. The proportions are pleasing and the relationship to views and light is positive and uplifting.”