Before 2007, people living in the rural Burera district of northern Rwanda had little access to a health-care facility or doctors.

The evolution of Finnish architecture is most clearly manifested in the nation's residential projects, especially social housing, the most regulated form of building construction.

When the Jardim Edite favela was scheduled for demolition by S'o Paulo's city authorities, most of its 800 families had little expectation that they would be allowed to remain in their neighborhood.

The beachfront city of Santa Monica, California, with its stylishly laid-back restaurants and hotels, plus freeway access to downtown Los Angeles, may not seem the obvious place for affordable housing.

The 28th Street YMCA opened in Los Angeles in 1926 on an upbeat: the Spanish Colonial Revival building offered the African-American community a sparkling recreational facility with an indoor pool and affordable accommodations for young men who were migrating from other regions (and prevented by color barriers from staying at ordinary hotels).

Behind the eye-catching design of the 969,000-square-foot Rey Juan Carlos Hospital in the Madrid suburb of M'stoles, Spanish architect Rafael de La-Hoz has created a therapeutic atmosphere, organizing the building around accessible atria that help orient patients and immerse them in a protective, inward-looking environment.

When Hungarian-born Eva Zeisel died in 2011 at the age of 105, she left behind a legacy as one of the most influential ceramic artists and designers of her generation.