CRA-Carlo Ratti Associati

06/09/2026

The garden gnome is an object most Italians would rather not be caught owning.

Carlo Ratti, in Il Sole 24 ORE, argues it deserves better: descended from the Roman Lares agrestes, mass-produced in Thuringia at the moment the word kitsch was coined, and standing guard on the threshold between house and garden long before irrigation sensors and CCTV arrived to do the same job.

A sentinel on a ten-euro salary, with a hundred and fifty years of unbroken service.

Per saperne di più, leggi l'articolo completo qui sotto, a destra.

06/09/2026

Every summer, more structures go up along the Italian coast than any architecture firm on earth could manage. The tools cost less than an espresso. The workforce holds no licences whatsoever.

Writing in Wallpaper* magazine, Carlo Ratti argues that the bucket and spade challenge our obsession with permanence. We pour concrete, lock down data and design structures to last for ever. A child builds for three hours, admires it for five minutes, and the tide erases everything.

The joy was in the building. The tide was always going to win.

Read more:

Exploring objects that define the Italian summer, architect Carlo Ratti turns his attention to the bucket and spade, which allows everyone to be a builder

02/09/2026

A sea view for everyone.

Designed by CRA-Carlo Ratti Associati in collaboration with developer Jeff Greene, MiMar rises 25 stories above West Palm Beach, folding outward in a zig-zag that turns every residence toward the Atlantic. On the coast the view is the asset, and it is almost always distributed by price. Here the geometry distributes it evenly across the building.

MiMar is a vertical neighbourhood. Affordable housing represents 40% of all units, and amenities are gathered on a landscaped podium terrace, creating shared spaces for interaction and collective life.

The same folds that orient each residence toward the ocean also mediate its exposure to the sun, with balconies deepening as the building rises to shade the residences below.A sea view for everyone.

31/08/2026

In the eleventh instalment of ‘Objectify’, architect Carlo Ratti turns his attention to the garden gnome, the design feature where house and garden meet

14/08/2026

10/08/2026

09/08/2026

Something appears through the heat haze on Italy's Autostrada del Sole. A stray truck? A billboard? A giant frog mid-leap?

All three, more or less. In Wallpaper* magazine, Carlo Ratti's summer series Objectify pulls over at the bridge Autogrill — the motorway restaurant slung across both carriageways, and a type that drew in some of post-war Italy's greatest architects and engineers, from Angelo Bianchetti to Pier Luigi Nervi.

Architect Carlo Ratti investigates how the Autogrill bridge attracted some of post-war Italy's greatest architects and engineers

24/07/2026

An origami opens over AGO Modena.

A seven-metre model of AGO Modena’s future kinetic roof has appeared in Piazza Sant’Agostino, offering the city a first encounter with one of the project’s defining architectural elements.

Designed by CRA with Chuck Hoberman and Articulated Artworks, the structure reproduces the roof’s origami inspired geometry through three independently operated sections. Visitors can activate the model themselves, setting it in motion and experimenting with the different configurations it can create.

As it opens and closes, the installation shows how the future courtyard will adapt to changing light and weather — transforming into a flexible setting for exhibitions, performances, gatherings, and everyday activities.

The model marks the countdown to the opening of AGO Modena on 11 December, when the former Sant’Agostino Hospital will begin a new chapter as a cultural hub for visual arts, digital culture, research, education, and public programmes.

22/07/2026

A high-rise on high heels.

Designed by CRA-Carlo Ratti Associati in collaboration with GS E&C, the climate-adaptive tower rises above Seoul on slender stilts, lifting its residential volume to respond to a city facing growing flood risks and rising temperatures.

At ground level the landscape is designed to absorb and slow stormwater, reducing pressure on the city’s drainage system while preserving existing trees and creating a new shared space. Higher up, mandatory refuge floors are transformed into elevated communal gardens, bringing nature into the everyday life of the tower.

Its façades follow the path of the sun, with photovoltaic panels to the south and vertical louvers to the east and west, allowing the building to shift with the changing light throughout the day.