Two years ago, Princeton University selected Adjaye Associates to spearhead the design of its new campus museum. The firm’s founder and principal, David Adjaye, was well-poised for the task—he had recently completed the acclaimed National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington, DC, and broken ground on a new building for the Studio Museum in Harlem. Adjaye’s primary task at Princeton involved opening up the current complex’s inward-looking feel while integrating the vast 144,000-square-foot structure into a campus largely defined by Gothic Revival architecture.

Adjaye responded with a three-story building, defined by a series of nine interlocking cubes, that provides six ground-floor entrances to welcome visitors from all directions. He describes the scheme as “a space of genuine inquiry where the exhibition of diverse practices, learning as a synthesis of knowledge, and cross-cultural connections weave together into a singular experience that encompasses a multiplicity of ideas and people.” He achieves this by democratizing the collections—all exhibition space will be located on the second floor, thus eliminating hierarchies up and down. “Like at most museums, European art was always the premier thing,” he tells the Art Newspaper. “They had extraordinary collections like the American Indian in a far corner. Now it’s at the heart of the museum.”

Adjaye also devised intimate bronze-and-glass spaces, dubbed “lenses” and interspersed among the gallery pavilions, that will offer vantage points for viewing Princeton’s wooded campus. Those same materials appear on the facade, which alternates with rough and polished stone surfaces that nod to the university’s architectural styles. In addition to gallery space, the building will house the university’s department of art and archaeology, a grand hall, classroom spaces, creativity labs, and a rooftop cafe. When the complex opens, in 2024, Adjaye hopes it’ll feel like “an old friend” to students and not another “hall of sacred objects.”

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So why now? Much like the world at large, the design industry has been turned upside down over the past year. Design fairs, often the premier stage to launch new products and collections, face an uncertain future. COVID-19 has ushered in a new normal, forcing us to fully embrace remote experiences. Interest in home design is surging as people rethink their living arrangements and adjust to the remote work paradigm shift. The e-commerce revolution has entered an exciting new phase, but with it comes the perils of fast-consumerism. Design Dose will take a more thoughtful approach, one that reflects our core values at Surface: provide intel to our audience, delight the senses, and—above all else—champion great design.

When: Sept. 29–Nov. 15

Where: Serpentine Galleries, London

What: The timber industry is easily one of the world’s largest in terms of revenue and impact on everyday life, giving rise to clothing, furniture, paper, fuels, and fertilizers, among other products for everyday consumption. But trees are often felled in biodiverse and fragile ecosystems, which are increasingly at risk. Continuing the Italian duo’s investigations into design’s ecological and political responsibilities, this research-focused show re-evaluates our relationship with trees and asks how we can better understand the connections between objects and the conditions producing them.

Though it focuses more on process and ecological matters than finished products, “Cambio” showcases custom furnishings made from a single tree felled during storms in Val di Fiemme, Italy, wood samples loaned from the Royal Museum of Central Africa, smells developed to evoke the wet earth of a forest, and maps of the Amazon rainforest made by Indigenous communities. Founders Andrea Trimarchi and Simone Farresin describe it as “an attempt to expand our understanding of what design can be, going beyond the finished object in order to include its disciplinary boundaries.”

Seeking to revive Europe’s downturned economy, the European Commission (EC) has been piecing together a comprehensive $872 billion recovery fund that includes incorporating a climate-neutral architecture among other green initiatives. In a recent speech, EC president Ursula von der Leyen said that sustainable construction would become “a new cultural project for Europe,” and, interestingly, that the EC will establish “a new European Bauhaus—a co-creation space where architects, artists, students, engineers, and designers work together to make that happen.”

These multidisciplinary efforts, she suggested, would concentrate on the building industry, which has become one of the world’s single largest polluters. Other components of the fund include implementing a European Green Deal, which creates a blueprint for the continent to become fully carbon neutral by 2050 by investing in green technology and reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

Art Basel seems to have learned that when it comes to virtual viewing rooms, less is more. That mantra defines the fair’s third virtual edition this year, which launched shortly after the fair’s marquee Swiss edition would have occurred had it not been canceled due to the coronavirus pandemic. Titled OVR: 2020, the virtual showcase restricts the 100 participating galleries, which include such blue-chip mainstays as White Cube, Lévy Gorvy, and Lehmann Maupin, to present six works at a time; all must have been created in 2020.

The more focused format follows “feedback we received from our audiences in the past months and weeks,” Art Basel global director Marc Spiegler explains to ARTnews, referring to the fair’s virtual Hong Kong edition that launched when the pandemic first broke out. “The viewing rooms that comprise Art Basel’s OVR:2020 represent an incredible force and variety of artistic perspectives, which offer our audiences the opportunity to experience artists’ more recent works, conveying and contending with the lived experiences of our time.” They touch upon vital themes of social justice, racial inequality, the coronavirus, and environmental crises.

If you missed this edition, which closed on Sept. 26, check out our favorite rooms.

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