From the early piecemeal community stadium to the commercial giants constructed today, the history of football is intertwined with the history of the stadium. Architects and venue specialists at Foster + Partners consider how a stadium’s redesign can positively impact the wider community, honour the cultural and historical significance of the local team, and celebrate the world’s number one sport.

From the ancient observation of Vitruvius, via the practical, analogue applications of the Olgyay brothers in the twentieth century, to digital tool application and environmental engin­­­­­eering at Foster + Partners today, the ‘bioclimatic’ approach captures a longstanding philosophy and methodology for designing more sustainable, climate-appropriate, and comfortable architecture. Environmental Designer, Neva Beskonalki, investigates.

Researchers have paid increasing attention to the relationship between urban development and the ‘urban heat island’ (UHI) – literal hot spots in cities that are growing in reach and scale. Luisa Amann, Sustainability Designer, explores how urban development has altered heat distribution, often burdening the most marginalised members of a population.

Though the artisan practice of stereotomy has dwindled, its principles have not expired. Architect Fabio Tellia makes a case for the enduring relevance of the art, by illuminating ways in which stereotomy’s core principles are translated today in a range of Foster + Partners projects.

Climate resilience experts within Foster + Partners and the broader design sector discuss how architects, engineers, and urban planners can create projects that are adaptable, long-lasting, and quick to recover.

Landscape architecture has long understood the importance of sustainable and ecological design. In a roundtable discussion with +Plus, the Foster + Partners’ Urban Design and Landscape team consider how landscape and architecture are closely connected – throughout our built environment and within the collaborative ways that we design it.

Adaptive re-use is a growing field in architecture that finds new purposes for existing buildings. Spanning disciplines and techniques, negotiating history and contemporaneity, it is a particularly hybridist design approach. Several adaptive re-use projects by Foster + Partners reveal the complex demands and possibilities of working with existing buildings.

Following the devastating earthquake that hit the Hatay Province of Türkiye in 2023, Foster + Partners was invited to provide a vision for the reconstruction of the city of Antakya. Letizia Garzoli and Eleni Gklinou discuss how their research informed the design framework for rebuilding the city and its communities.

Art and architecture have long been in conversation, with collaborations between their practitioners resulting in highly original and innovative work.

Robotics is a field that has advanced rapidly in the past decade, and which holds significant potential to transform key areas of healthcare and architecture.

In conversation with architects who have worked on-site across projects and regions, +Plus Journal considers the interdependence of design, engineering, and manufacture in construction, and the lessons that are learned in the act of building.

Members of the Design Communications team at Foster + Partners reflect on their place in the practice of drawing in the Foster + Partners studio, and its ability to question what might be possible for a design.

As the construction stage of The Whiteley, a major heritage redevelopment near Hyde Park, nears completion, the architectural team reflect on how Foster + Partners has integrated the London landmark’s textured history with contemporary principles and an ethic of sustainability.

Foster + Partners Industrial Design works closely with and extend the architectural aspects of the practice. Over the years, the team has developed a sustainable, materially-conscious approach to industrial design, which can be observed in their recent collaborations with German hardware manufacturer, FSB, and English furniture maker, Benchmark.

Neuroarchitecture is a field that emerges at the intersection of neuroscience, technology, and architectural design. Vittoria Falchini, Workplace Consultant at Foster + Partners – who specialises in neuroarchitectural psychology – explains the frameworks it can provide, the observations it can make, and how neuroarchitecture can steer us towards more considerate design.

For centuries, the library has mediated knowledge by providing space for its storage, retrieval, and exchange. How can this mediative nature be discussed in architectural terms? And how, given the dramatic shifts in our production, consumption, and attitude towards knowledge, might the library be evaluated today?