Nearly 200 architects and architecture students attended the day-long event—featuring Jeanne Gang, Thomas Robinson, Kevin Carmody and Andy Groarke, and Dillon Pranger—at the Illinois Institute of Technology’s Crown Hall.
The practice’s ‘Kumma’ concept was selected in a high-profile international competition that brought in 624 proposals—roughly a fifth of them from Finnish firms.
Seeking to avoid a gut renovation, the 2009 Design Vanguard preserves period touches while updating a stately 1892 structure under a breakneck timeframe.
The floating public plaza is making a transatlantic journey to Belém, Brazil, where it will serve as a focal point of the upcoming COP30 climate talks in November.
Updating the limestone-clad 1905 structure required serious interventions, including inserting a sky-lit central staircase to directly connect the garden level with the rest of the house.