Timber

Snøhetta recently completed an attractive timber maritime center in Denmark. Inspired by wooden boat construction, it's designed to withstand punishing local conditions and lights up pleasantly at night, resulting in its name: the Lantern.

This year has produced a bumper crop of excellent architecture projects. From a sand-dune-shaped building that rises out of the desert, to the world's tallest timber skyscraper, here's our selection of the best buildings of the past 12 months.

Described as a treehouse by designer Madeiguincho, the Columba serves as a summer retreat in rural Portugal. It has space for family meals and packs in some neat features, including a small slide at the entrance and a rooftop deck area.

The World Festival of Interiors has crowned the Pingtan Children Library, by Condition_Lab, as winner of the World Interior of the Year. The low-cost wooden building creates an attractive light-filled space for children to read, learn and play.

Foster + Partners has been given the green light for an ambitious new project in London. The mixed-use development will feature significant sustainable design and, according to the firm, will be one of the city's largest timber buildings.

The SuperHub, by De Zwarte Hond, offers an excellent example of sustainable timber design. The Dutch market hall is topped by a "cathedral-like" ceiling and features a flexible interior layout that should ensure continued use for decades to come.

There has been a huge boom in sustainable timber construction lately. Pritzker Prize winner Shigeru Ban offers the latest example of this trend with an ambitiously tall hybrid timber tower that's currently under construction in Antwerp, Belgium.

Sim-Plex has created a stunning micro-home inspired by Japanese culture called the U. Izakaya House, which boasts clever space-saving storage elements and features a U-shaped kitchen inspired by a traditional Japanese izakaya restaurant at its heart.

Designed to withstand earthquakes and last for 500 years, the PAE Living Building is an impressively green project that has been constructed largely from timber and minimizes its energy usage with tech like solar panels.

The Ascent, by Korb + Associates Architects, has officially been recognized as the new world's tallest timber tower. Located in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, the residential high-rise reaches an impressive maximum height of 86.6 meters.

BIG continues its embrace of sustainable timber construction with the National Juneteenth Museum. It will take the shape of a star and will be dedicated to telling the story of the holiday and hosting exhibitions events on African American freedom.

A high-profile team including BIG, HOK and Buro Happold is creating an ambitious new airport expansion in Switzerland. The building will be constructed from timber and will be focused on maximizing natural light and offering easy navigation.