Photo: HOK Architects

Spring is in the air—from the magnolia trees bursting into bloom in Brooklyn to the daffodils carpeting the Upper West Side, the last traces of a protracted wet winter are quickly vanishing. The old proverb, April showers bring May flowers, is proving true once again! In the spirit of the times (and the logical corollary to our April post, Architecture in the Rain), we’ve compiled a group of buildings whose forms are indebted to flowers, literally. From geometric inspiration to cultural responsiveness, these projects strut their stuff (petals?) across the globe. Click through to see them all!

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“Green lawning” buildings isn’t anything new in contemporary architecture. In fact, it’s been going on for at least a decade, when, reacting to a revitalized sustainability movement and discussion over sustainable building practices, architects en masse began cloaking their structures in thin grass carpets. This, of course, was (and is) less a viable strategy for reducing construction’s environmental impact than a spray-on aesthetic to spread the green gospel all over the world.

A-n-y-w-a-y, here’s a great example of a much more nuanced and grassroots — ha — type of green lawning. Act_Romegialli‘s “Green Box” takes an old, rusted garage and turns it into a whimsical, flowering studio. The architects outfitted the structure with a lightweight steel frame, itself lined with a multi-layered mesh on which deciduous plants grow with abandon. The twisting vines, leaf-bearing shoots, and blooming flowers screen the large windows from the sun’s harsh rays, acting like natural brise-soleil. A diverse set of materials, like reclaimed wood planks, textured concrete walls, and old stone, add to the already-lush surroundings. Click through for more!

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The first factoid about Holland our grade-school minds absorb is its production of tulips. Tulips and canals—that’s Holland. Or it was for a couple of years, at least. Of course, the semi-glossy pages of our reductionist “world history” books lied (as they usually do), and we would find out later how Holland is much, much more than its colorful, bulbous exports. Still, tulips did indeed factor greatly in the development of Holland’s horticulture and even economy, where the flower sowed the seeds of Europe’s possibly first (popped) speculative bubble.

But onto more aesthetic matters. Tulips were always prized for their delicate form and bright colors, the vast polychromatic range of which was never faithfully depicted in our history books of yore. French photographer Normann Szkop‘s tulip “project,” on the other hand, capture the bulbs in all their true technicolor glory. Click through for more!

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Phil the Groundhog at the Garden Shed; All Photoshop work: Peter Levins

The frost of winter is on the thaw, and spring will come early this year! At least, that’s our take on the results from this year’s Groundhog Day. No, the furry little prognosticator—that would be Phil—will not see his shadow this coming Saturday (Feb. 2), and that’s that.

So what better way to welcome the new season than with the best of “spring architecture”? It’s something we just made up, but by which we mean houses that photograph real well in the springtime, when flowers are coming into bloom, the sky is blue, and the sun hasn’t reached its greatest intensity yet. We’ve gone ahead and added Phil in there just to be festive, so see if you can spot him in the following 10 projects. Click through for the slideshow.

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Image by Nacasa & Partners

Set in the Tokyo suburb of Setagaya, ‘Breeze’ is a series of terrace-style apartments set within enormous poured-concrete petals. These petals act to protect the units from northern views and light, while creating a buffer zone that incorporates second-floor access. The units open up on the southern façade with a terraced garden and city views, while bedrooms within are graced by light courts that provide privacy and a quiet environment. Continue.

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