Whether taking an automobile for a spin or attending workshops at the Apple Store, test drives have helped the modern consumer understand innovation.

A London-based firm whips a Victorian-era gymnasium in London back into shape as a modern mecca of Mittel-European cuisine.

Walking through Louis Kahn’s Center for British Art—where sunlight streams in from skylights, and concrete, wood, metal, and stone combine in precise yet monumental ways­—leaves one yearning for the days when museums, quite honestly, weren’t so sterile.

“I am interested in the idea of an ‘essential architecture’ in the tropics,” says Panama City–based architect Patrick Dillon, who was born to American parents and raised in the Canal Zone.

Australia didn’t get the memo. Its contribution to the 15th Venice Architecture Biennale, which opens to the public Friday, is a celebration of swimming pools.