What’s Happening: The Uruguayan architect passed away in 2023, but his namesake studio recently revealed visuals of the last building he ever designed—the oceanfront multifamily complex Médano El Pinar, whose low-slung build and ample sustainable features are refreshingly understated.

The Download: Rafael Viñoly was renowned for his landmark cultural buildings around the world, none of which adhere to a particular architectural style besides an occasional inclination to enclose giant airy spaces under glass. The Uruguayan-born modernist was perhaps best-known stateside for 432 Park Avenue, the supertall condominium on Manhattan’s Billionaire’s Row that, at 1,400 feet tall, transformed the New York City skyline and briefly reigned as the world’s tallest residential tower. Even in his later years, the restlessly innovative Viñoly, who died this past year at age 78, continued to play an active role in his firm, which recently unveiled visuals for his final design.

Perched above a public beach only 15 minutes outside Montevideo, the low-slung Médano El Pinar’s pale timber cladding mimics nearby sand dunes and, thanks to the camouflage effect, is almost completely invisible from the ocean. The high-end multifamily complex will contain 120 beachfront units ranging from one to five bedrooms, each benefiting from floor-to-ceiling glass windows and private open-to-the-sky gardens afforded by gradual setbacks. The setup guarantees no apartment sits atop another, forging an ambiance of a private home, and adds to the sustainability factor with green roofs.

That’s far from Médano El Pinar’s only sustainable feature. The complex aims to become the region’s first nearly Zero-Energy Building thanks to a combination of ubiquitous cross-ventilation, rainwater recapture, solar panels, and locally sourced carbon-sequestering building materials. For an architect fixated on “unglamorousness” who deliberately eschewed his peers’ propensity to create buildings in service of the architect’s ego, Médano El Pinar becomes a fitting swan song—as well as a gift to his hometown.

In Their Own Words: “Our employees, partners, and clients have really taken on the mantle of his work and his passion for the social contribution architecture can make,” Román Viñoly, Rafael’s son and a director at his firm, told Dezeen shortly after his death. “They’re really driving the work forward. And that’s something that’s really important for me to do.”

Surface Says: Viñoly’s biggest statement in recent memory may have been a slender supertall that emerges from the skyline like a giant phallus, but Médano El Pinar feels refreshingly understated. Hopefully, it’s a preview of the firm’s next act.

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Noel Hayden, a tech founder with a background in online gaming, may seem like an unlikely candidate to open a high-design boutique hotel in the center of London. But decades before Hayden was a tech bigwig, he earned his hospitality stripes at Mon Ami, a southern coastal vacation property operated by his circus-performer-turned-hotelier parents in the U.K. While Mon Ami shuttered in the mid-‘80s, its theatrical spirit—magicians, comedians, musical acts—lives on at the Broadwick Soho.

Hayden tapped hospitality design impresario Martin Brudnizki to bring the retro-glam vision to life, drawing inspiration from Jazz Age opulence, Italian escapades, and English eccentricity. Named after Hayden’s mother, the property’s subterranean boîte Dear Jackie has a sultry allure thanks to lipstick-red silk walls and handcrafted plates by artist Michaela Gall. Arriving via servers donning polka-dot playsuits, chef Harry Faddy’s Italian crowdpleasers span sea bass crudo to lemon risotto with prawns and baby squid to a deliciously airy tiramisu for dessert.

Britt Moran and Emiliano Salci are famously low-key, but the Milanese masters behind Dimore Studio have been keeping busy. Their presence was felt all around town during Milan Design Week, and not only at the two restaurants—Trattoria del Ciumbia and the landmark Grand Hotel et de Milan’s ornate Caruso Nuovo—they recently finished. Attracting major crowds was their usual transformation of a historic Via Solferino apartment, which the duo completely draped in a dark fabric to forge the atmosphere of a pitch-black tent during a star-studded night. Arrayed throughout are vignettes of the studio’s furnishings that—owing to the lack of a true domestic backdrop, or any at all—are afforded the space to truly exert themselves. The nocturnal mood befits the offering of leopard-print daybeds, scarlet velvet armchairs, and gilded room dividers, which glimmer in the cosmos and float with an air of ‘70s decadence.

Touches from that era pervade Interni Venosta, the duo’s brand-new collection of made-to-order furniture in partnership with Tuscan manufacturer Fabbri Services. Echoing the visionary spirit of the late Italian designer Carla Venosta, it blends timeless Milanese elegance with the linear minimalism of seminal American artists Donald Judd, Carl Andre, and Walter De Maria. The initial line encompasses a septet of objects, from a classically framed glass coffee table to a Space Age ceiling lamp, all crafted with luxe materials like brushed steel and walnut. It quickly became one of last week’s most anticipated debuts, owing in no small part to its photogenic location: the quaint plaster workshop of Gipsoteca Fumagalli e Dossi in Brera, where a smattering of in-process maquettes bring Dimore’s rigorous touch into focus.

The Venice Biennale is now well underway, but the art-world notables who arrived for the opening last week were treated to Miles Greenberg’s newest performance work, Sebastian. Within the Byzantine splendor of Palazzo Malipiero, onlookers marveled at the virtuosic artist’s sinuous movements, as five custom silver arrows protruded from his body. The debut was curated by Klaus Biesenbach and Lisa Botti as an addendum to “Elective Affinities,” an exhibition that draws an artistic dialogue between modernist works from Museum Berggruen-Neue Nationalgalerie and the historical collections of Gallerie dell’Accademia.

Greenberg’s arrow-pierced skin, covered in black pigment, melted off progressively with a continuous drip of cane sugar syrup, resonating poignantly with the Gallerie’s own imagery of Saint Sebastian and Venice’s use of the Blackamoor motif. The physicality of his works and their emotionally evocative nature has garnered international acclaim. Sebastian is no exception: at the conclusion of his grueling eight hours perched on a boulder, Greenberg’s mother (who wore custom Cerruti 1881 by Daniel Kerns) arrived to help him remove the arrows.

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Surface Says: To this day, Liaigre embodies its founder’s timeless elegance with a deft eye for contemporary art, furnishings, and interior styling.

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