A minimalist icon by Mies van der Rohe is becoming even more minimal thanks to a series of vinyl screens installed over its ornate marble walls, making the full-size building look like a blown-up miniature model.

Spanish architects and artists Anna and Eugeni Bach are behind this temporary Mies Missing Materiality installation at the Barcelona Pavilion, installing white vinyl screens to compliment the simplicity of the steel-and-glass structure.

Like the marble panels, dividing lines in the applied surfaces create a ‘mirroring’ effect, evoking a sense of symmetry across the horizontal axis like a reflective plane floating in space.

“This simple act turns the pavilion into a 1:1 scale mock-up, a representation of itself that opens the door to multiple interpretations about aspects like the value of the original, the role of the white surface as an image of modernity, and the importance of materiality in the perception of space,” say the designers. In a way, the building is more “Modern” than ever (Le Corbusier would likely approve).

“The installation turns this paradox into an experience. It helps visitors to consider these ideas and many more through their own experience in a pavilion that will lose all trace of its materiality for a few days to assume all its representative potential.”

Purists may see this as architectural sacrilege, but the it will be taken back down after just one week in late November (and it’s worth noting that the pavilion as it stands is already a recreation, not the original from the Barcelona Expo of 1929). It is also not the first of its kind – this structure is no stranger to strange installations by artists including Ai Weiwei.

In 1377, nearly a century before the famous Gutenberg Bible was printed in Germany, the Jikji anthology was made using movable metal type, then bound and and protected for centuries to come.

A new installation outside the Cheongju Art Centre in South Korea celebrates this historic achievement, acting as a shelter for public performances in the open plaza.

It also hints at a larger exhibit inside: an array of architecture, art, design and digital media that traces the history and impact of movable type on literacy and publishing.

The pavilion itself, folded and stitched together with red twine, forms a canopy that mimics the properties of an open book “being pushed down onto a flat surface,” explains its creator Ron Arad. “The thickness increases where the pages fan out, and the metal binding of the structure is derived from a traditional spine.”

The Jikji is the abbreviated title of a Korean Buddhist document, whose title can be translated roughly as “Anthology of Great Buddhist Priests’ Zen Teachings.” It collects teachings of Buddhism passed down for generations.

Printed during the Goryeo Dynasty in the 14th Century, it is the world’s oldest extant book printed in an essentially modern fashion. Prior printing techniques in China used ceramics to generate volumes, but none of those works survive.

While other copies of the content still exist thanks to wood engravings in temples, only the final volume of the original metal-printed Jikji remains. It is preserved by the Manuscrits Orientaux department of the National Library of France.

The fact the a movable metal type process was used to create the anthology was only rediscovered in the early 1900s in the West when this last book was examined.

Johannes Gutenberg, meanwhile, was the first to create type pieces from a particular alloy of lead, tin, and antimony—and these materials remained standard for over 550 years as printing evolved in Europe.

Two perfect rectangles of sea and sky are framed like paintings within a surreal wooden observation structure, inviting visitors to experience coastal Denmark from a new perspective. ‘New Horizon’ is a sculpture by Paris-based firm Atelier 37.2 created for the 2015 Sculpture by the Sea festival, drawing in guests from a forested path right to the edge of a hill overlooking the water.

The accordion-like structure stretches in two angled sections, one open to the surrounding woods and the other an enclosed room filled with a chaotic assemblage of planks. This room looks dramatically different depending on the time of day, with sunlight streaming in and highlighting the space itself in the morning. As the sun makes its way to the other side of the sky, the space darkens, putting the focus squarely on the framed viewpoints.

As the artists themselves describe it: “Playing with classical perspective deconstruction, from the inside the horizon line disappears. Experience the landscape as two monochromatic ever-changing Rothko paintings.”

Stacked books form the structural columns of this remarkable structure while support beams in between serve as shelves for even more volumes that can be borrowed, all scanned and donated by the Internet Archive. Even the roof is formed of reading material, featuring fluttering book pages suspended from support wires. Like Free Little Libraries, this huge book repository offers its wares to anyone who wants to take a novel to read and (optionally) return, in turn letting each person who interacts with it to permanently shift its shape.

Opening in one month at the Bay Area Book Festival, this temporary building is made to dissolve – the act of removing books from its shelves will change the way it looks and how light passes through its emptying walls. Reading benches in and around its twelve alcoves provide spaces for retreat or interaction.

The title of this project, Lacuna, is also an obscure word referring to missing pages or sections of a book. Its creators FLUX Foundation have a great deal of experience building robust but interactive public art and architecture, including large-scale projects for Black Rock City (as part of the Burning Man festival). Over 200,000 books were actually donated by the Internet Archive, but the remaining 150,000 volumes will be saved for future similar projects.

The Book Festival will also feature talks and readings by hundreds of authors as well as other structures and exhibits. More on the design and its inspiration: “Lacuna is a temple to books. Each of the twelve alcoves of Lacuna are formed by pillars created out of stacked books. Connecting these pillars are shelves filled with books. Above, fluttering book pages attached to guy-wires create a thatch-like roof, creating a space in which visitors literally, and figuratively, inhabit the interiority of books and their contents. “

A creative response to a new legal loophole, this structure is designed specifically to test the limits of a Swedish planning law allowing buildings under a certain size to be constructed without prior structure-specific approval.

Jägnefält Milton of Stockholm worked with Arup engineers to work within the confines proposed by the legislation, which include dimensional limits of 25 square meters and 4 meters in height.

The intent, though, is not to push the limits but to respect their intent and create a low-footprint, eco-friendly pavilion that respects its environment.

The design calls for using the timber cleared from the site to construct the structure and use a tension system of structural anchors to maximize views, minimize outside materials and take advantage of a large stone on the site.

Supported off the ground, the lower platform is mirrored by a roof of the same organic leaf-like shape and a fabric cover can be deployed around the entire building to provide some privacy as well.