This first in a five-part series on Glasgow’s Riverside Museum offers an overview of Zaha Hadid Architects' first major public commission in the United Kingdom. Follow Buildipedia throughout the month of March to read in-depth coverage of the building's various design and engineering systems.

Glasgow, Scotland, was built on the River Clyde. Having access to the Atlantic Ocean facilitated Glasgow’s ability to trade and, eventually, fostered the growth of a shipbuilding industry. This aspect of the area’s history is commemorated in a Transport and Technology Collection that is now housed in the Riverside Museum of Transport and Travel designed by Zaha Hadid Architects. The £74 million ($120 million) museum opened in June of 2011 and is Hadid’s first major public commission to open in the United Kingdom.

With sensitivity to Abu Dhabi’s local culture, climate, and architectural heritage, SOM designed a medical campus that creates a "city within a city."

Visiting the hospital for any length of time can be a difficult experience for patients and their families, what with adjusting to new surroundings, being separated from loved ones, or just missing the familiarities of home. That is why the designers of the Sheikh Khalifa Medical City have put hospitality and psychological well-being at the forefront of their medical campus design.

A tale of two buildings, and an Art Deco heritage that almost didn’t happen in Cincinnati.

If you were to glance at an original 1929 sketch of Cincinnati’s Union Terminal, a masterpiece of Art Deco architecture and one of the last great train stations built in America, you’d be confused. That’s because the building was originally envisioned as neoclassical. “The sketches were almost gothic looking, and the design was thought to be cold,” says Scott Gampfer, director of the library and historic collections at the Cincinnati Museum Center. “The Cincinnati Union Terminal Company and the Cincinnati Public Works Department were not entirely satisfied with the look that was presented. They wanted to project the idea of modernity,” he says.

Madrid’s Matadero, or slaughterhouse, has been renovated to serve as a social and cultural space, but remembrances of its macabre past remain.

One part of a renovation project has nothing to do with heavy machinery, building materials, or even endless CAD documents. It’s that challenging moment that occurs with every repurposing plan, when planners must decide exactly what percentage of the original building will stay and what should be discarded. How much of the building’s original essence is relevant within the new design?

Find out, step by step, how to create two very different DIY coat racks using both natural and recycled materials. Watch {Re}habitat, Rachael Ranney’s online video series, to learn how adaptive reuse can add fun and function to your space.

I am constantly looking for ways to create new and inexpensive storage for my small home. Throughout the winter and spring months here in the Midwest, my house is always cluttered with a flurry of coats, gloves, and other cold weather gear. Installing a coat rack near your front door will add storage capacity to your entryway and can help you to clear up some of the chaos.

Jeff Wilson shares his views on how the ordinary DIYer can perform acts of patriotism while improving things around the house!

It’s not often that you pick up a hammer, get back to work on that DIY home improvement project, and consider it an act of patriotism, but that’s exactly what we should be doing – each and every one of us.

A traditional industrial building type is adapted to create a modern, sustainable facility in Mexico.

The Mexican government recently developed a new Research and Technology Innovation Park (Parque de Investigación e Innovación Tecnológica or PIIT) in Monterrey.  An automotive company that manufactures chassis for heavy trucks and pickups selected a 100,000 sq. ft. parcel within the research park as the site of its new building – a research lab, office, and industrial testing facility. Brooks + Scarpa Architects, based in Los Angeles, designed the structure.

What is the best way for a construction observer to train? Learning from a professional on site may be ideal, but other good sources of information include public agencies and the documentation they make available.

Columnist David A. Todd, P.E., CPESC, has 37 years of experience in the architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) industry and has performed much construction administration during that time. He will answer questions from our readers or from his own practice and will provide answers based on his understanding of the construction process.

Construction documents technology uses in-progress photos and video footage to offer a significant improvement over the traditional method of producing "as-built" drawings.

Construction documentation technology has multiplied the advantages of the traditional “as-built” process, in which a red pen and the memory of the construction superintendent were the primary tools. Along with (or instead of) a set of marked-up drawings as a final contract deliverable, a more comprehensive construction journal is possible with the new construction documentation technology, which electronically captures the “as-built” process and cross-references electronic drawings to digital photographs.

The NAHB International Builders' Show is the place to go to check out the latest building products. Jeff Wilson attended the 2012 show in Orlando and here shares his favorite finds.

There's nothing like escaping the Midwest and going to Florida in the middle of winter. That’s what I got to do recently in Orlando at the National Association of Homebuilders’ International Builders’ Show 2012. While I attended as a host and presenter for LP Building Products, I also got a chance to check out the booths and exhibits.

A Spanish Renaissance building in Houston gets a much needed restoration and is finally completed, according to the architect’s original intent, more than 80 years after the first stone was laid.

The Julia Ideson Building has been a Houston landmark since it opened in 1926. Designed by architect Ralph Adams Cram of the Boston firm Cram and Ferguson, the Spanish Renaissance structure served as the Houston Central Library until 1976 and has long been regarded as one of the city’s most prominent public buildings. The library’s first director, Julia Ideson, was also regarded as one of Houston’s most prominent citizens.