With an overt nod to Habitat 67 in Montreal by Moshe Safdie (similarly made up of many smaller modules, as show below), this new, undulating, mixed-use megastructure has been approved for construction in Toronto, Canada.

The King West Street development from Bjarke Ingels’ firm BIG looks like a series of rolling hills, or in the words of the architect: “peaks and valleys.” The firm has overtly called it “Habitat 2.0” informally as well.

“With King Street West, we wanted to find an alternative to the tower and podium you see a lot of in Toronto and revisit some of Safdie’s revolutionary ideas,” said Ingels in statement  “But rather than a utopian experiment on an island, have it nested into the heart of the city.”

The structure ranges from a few up to sixteen stories with balconies and terraces for all residents, aimed at maximizing natural light. “The topography of the peaks and valleys provides terraces for larger units, while others have balconies stacked along the building’s perimeter,” explains BIG.

“Each pixel is set at the size of a room; rotated 45 degrees from the street grid to increase exposure to light and air. An undulating design allows light to reach neighbouring King Street all year round.” In the middle, a central courtyard can be shared and used for urban farming, too.

Driving into Motor City, the beautiful and towering 18-story Michigan Central Station is hard to miss — it is both a Beaux-Arts Classical landmark (standing out even in a city rich with historical architecture) but also a famous abandonment, which became emlematic of the city’s decline, at least until now.

This train station operated on and off from dedication in 1914 to its final closure in 1988, a literal and symbolic victim of Detroit’s own automobile boom and suburban flight. Purchased nearly 100 years ago by Henry Ford, the building passed through many hands in the subsequent decades, before being purchased again by the Ford Motor Company this year for redevelopment.

With designers from Snohetta, Ford is turning the structure into a hub for its autonomous vehicle development and deployment, making it an anchor for the company’s Corktown campus. Following restoration and renovation of the structure, originally designed by the same architects behind New York’s famous Grand Central Terminal, the mixed-use first floor concourse will be reopened to the public with restaurants and retail.

More on the restoration: “As Ford envisions the future of mobility, Ford and Snøhetta will rethink existing cities in addition to creating new urban spaces and mobility systems through responsible and sustainable urban planning, product design, and business practices. New and innovative roadways, parking facilities, and integrated pedestrian connections are just some of the design considerations that will highlight the positive impact of Ford’s future mobility technologies. Ford plans to implement the first City of Tomorrow study in Corktown, with other cities in mind for the future.”

For years, the building was a mecca for urban explorers who would enter illegally to explore and photograph the ruin, as well as a feature in numerous films and television shows. Going forward, it will once again become a kind of urban transportation hub, but one of a very different nature.

Michigan native and area resident George Gregory attended the public press conference outside the station announcing the plan, and noticed some changes on the site. “The fence is bigger and about 250 yards further back,” he observed, and the building looks better, presumably in part because the previous owner “put in new windows … and made other changes.” Leading up to the announcement, “rumors have abounded for weeks,” says Gregory. “Local real estate prices have skyrocketed. An abandoned hotel in the area has a For Sale sign on it.”

Designed for Astana, the cold capital city of Kazakhstan, this ‘white roof’ 1,000-foot ski run wraps around an apartment tower, bringing winter sports right to residents’ doorsteps.

Despite the length of winters, this urban setting offers little by way of local options, forcing citizens to drive for hours to the closest ski destinations, at least until now.

The slope is designed to wrap around the roof of the building, taking advantage of curves and grade changes all the way down and potentially usable with Snoflex (artificial snow) all year round.

Incorporating 421 domestic units, this 21-floor design by Shokhan Mataibekov Architects was recognized as a finalist in the 2015 World Architecture Festival and is now seeking funding.  Additional shops and restaurants on the ground floor would serve both skiers and apartment dwellers. Upon completion, it would be the first such mixed-use skiing center of its kind in the world.

Finding new life as a combination of retail and housing space, this stunning structure’s new look works with the existing building envelope and floor plates while breaking down visible divisions between stories.

Located in Bangkok, Thailand, the refab is now home to four siblings above and their family-run jewelry store on the first floor.

Idin Architects (photos by Spaceshift) kept the framework, difficult to remove as it touches adjacent structures, but renovated the interior and added an entirely new facade that seems to defy floors as it wraps up the front.

Each family occupies two stories of the 7-floor building, with elevators connecting all of the different units in the back and an enclosed rooftop patio above.

A central lightwell (occupied in part by a slow-growing tree) and other internal features reconnect the different are as well while maintaining separation and privacy for each family unit.

The inventor of the suburban American mall as we know it came to hate the effects of his creations, evolving from the creator of this building typology to its most vocal critic. Architect Victor Gruen’s first mall was Southdale, built in 1956 and located in Edina (a suburb of Minneapolis) only miles away from the Mall of America, now the largest indoor shopping center in the United States. Later this month, you can learn more in person about the man and legend at the upcoming Gruen Day celebration, hosted by Tim Hwang of the Bay Area Infrastructure Observatory and Avery Trufelman, producer of 99% Invisible’s episode ‘The Gruen Effect‘.

The episode (embedded above) takes its title from that phenomena we all have come to associate with malls: a compulsion to consume, driven by dazzling displays and careful product placements in stores designed to sell. Gruen had loftier aspirations and nobler inspirations, however, when he first began to illustrate the problem of suburbs and conceive of malls as the solution.

More than just shopping centers, these were to be all-in-one ‘third spaces’ – places in addition to home and work where people could walk, interact and socialize. Following the model of European city centers, he also envisioned them as mixed-use architecture, blending commercial with residential and office spaces, perhaps even including public services like medical centers, libraries and daycares.

Recognizing American reliance on automobiles, Gruen hoped to lure people with ample parking to these centers of activity, then recreate for them the experience of tightly-packed urban streets, vibrant and full of everyday life. Walking into Southdale, you would never guess that this was a first attempt, given its resemblance to other malls around the country.

The shortcomings of this plan were, as we now know, numerous, including but not limited to the privatization of public space. One cannot protest in a mall or walk its halls at any time day or night, and skylights are not a replacement for open skies. Indeed, while malls were popular for a time, the public has fallen out of love with them – the last full-sized shopping center was built nearly a decade ago and there appear to be few if any new ones on the horizon.

In some ways, the Mall of America in Bloomington, MN, built in the 1990s and currently being expanded, embodies more of what Gruen envisioned for malls, containing at its center a series of recreational spaces, rides and amusements, and flanked on its sides by places to stay (albeit temporarily – hotels not homes). People even walk and jog its halls in the early hours before stores open, much as they might on city streets – some even get married within its walls.

Perhaps, though, the relative success of this venture is tied in part to the location – the Minneapolis area is almost unbearably cold for most of the year, then quite hot and humid in the summer, making it a perfect place for a temperature-controlled alternative to being outside.

As for Gruen: he eventually returned to Vienna and rejected his work on American malls, advocating for urban renewal in city centers. Meanwhile, interested Bay Area readers will want to get tickets for Gruen Day, taking place in one of Gruen’s earliest malls and featuring speakers, tours, and (of course) food courts, and read more of this story (and many others) at 99% Invisible (illustration by Victor Gruen, poster by the BAIO and photographs via LIFE Magazine, MallsofAmerica and MNopedia).