The world’s most popular doll, with a hot-pink blueprint tube and a hard hat: friend or foe to a profession already suffering from a pronounced gender gap?

Sherman chats with his neighbor Sakhawat Ullah, the mason who built his front stoop.

Small Talk print by One Must Dash, $56–$88. The Swedish design duo draws from a rich Scandinavian tradition of simple, powerful graphics in this poster inspired by the art of small talk.

Benjamin Pardo and Jeffrey Osborne talk onstage while Nasir Kassamali listens from the the first row.

The doors are set on a track by Häfele and pivot 90 degrees.

Comprising 11 modules, this green-roofed prefab was built in 90 days in a factory near São Paulo and then transported to the site in three shipments on flatbed trucks.

Sherbanuk (left) and Campbell sit by the outdoor fireplace, which adjoins the screened-in porch.

Education was a key focus of designer Bruce Mau's talk. Photo courtesy Compostmodern.

Clayden and Sam Cutler, both former tour managers for rock bands, talk music in the spacious, uncluttered living room that opens onto the balcony.

The facade of a house in Belgium consists of "knitted bricks." “In this part of Belgium, 90 percent of the houses are built with brick,” says architect Tom Verschueren. “It’s a classic material that we tried to use in House BVA in a totally different way.”

Professor Rebecca Ginsburg will talk on February 16th at the Columbia University School of International and Public Affairs.

Part of the goal of the take-out window is to get people talking about political and social issues.

Lee Buchanan of Lee Build created a screen of white ash slats beside the kitchen as well as the entry. "The stairs are beautifully integrated into the kitchen so the kids and I are always talking and someone is always sitting on the bottom steps,

The family was drawn to this home for it's 90-foot double-wide lot, mature trees and park-like setting.

Burnt Cedar playfully interacts with the landscape—including the 60- to 90-foot Jeffrey and Ponderosa pines that populate the lakeshore.

Set next to protected wetlands and close to the beach, House for Hermes is located about 90 minutes south of Melbourne.

This uber-green dwelling not only walks the walk, it talks the talk.

After successfully reconfiguring his own tiny New York City apartment, Robert Garneau, partner at Architecture Workshop PC, reinvented a 400-square-foot studio for neighbors just a few floors down. Called the Pivot Apartment, the highly efficient residence now serves multiple functions, thanks to a central modular unit that can be arranged to create distinct stations for living, sleeping, and entertaining.

The modules were built to 90% completion inside a factory—fittings, fixtures, tiles, and more were installed before the units were trucked to the site and placed atop the foundation in five hours.

The undulating wood-and-steel structure is engineered to hide a 90-foot steel structural beam that supports the cantilevered canopy and creates the illusion of a floating pavilion from the front.

The recessed, padded bench also makes it so people can linger and talk to the cook.

The entire property consists of 90,000 square meters, or about 22 acres, on the island of Milos in Greece. Each of the five corrals are defined in the landscape by a white border.

Architect Christopher Beer helped his DIY-friendly former roommates Karen and Grant Jack create a mixed-use dwelling in a town located about 90 miles south of Auckland.

The Dwell team took a hike up to a few waterfalls—talk about a view!

Fresh air is important and 90 percent of the air that goes in your lungs is indoor air. Airmega makes sure that the indoor air you breathe is as clean as it can be.

Because the night air cools the walls in summer, the home has no air-conditioning—though daily highs often rise into the mid-90s and above. Photo by: Kirk Gittings

Located on owner Lucas Steyn’s family farm in Botrivier, South Africa—about 90 minutes from Cape Town—Copia is an eco-retreat comprised of two shipping container cabins.

A guest room in this repurposed barn in the English countryside lets the ceiling do the talking. Photo by Christoffer Rudquist.

Back/road view of second floor cantilevered over first floor at 90 degree angle. Carport to the left and dining area to the right under the eaves.

Lake Poisson Blanc, some three hours from Montréal and 90 minutes from the Mont Ste. Marie ski resort, is the remote backdrop for Naturehumaine Architects’ compact and monochrome cabin embedded on a slope, a meditation on white.

PC-16: Section BB.

PC-14: North Elevation.

PC-15: East Elevation.

PC-12: South Elevation

PC-13: West Elevation.