Debarati Pal
A masterpiece of Catalan Modernisme, this concert hall was designed by Lluís Domènech i Montaner for the Orfeó Català and inaugurated in 1908, earning UNESCO status in 1997.
Known locally as Wat Rong Suea Ten, this contemporary Buddhist temple pairs cobalt-blue walls with gold detailing and a large white Buddha, while continuing to function as a place of worship.
Viennese architect Josef Krawina and artist Friedensreich Hundertwasser reimagined social housing here with 52 apartments, uneven floors, private terraces and around 250 trees woven into the architecture.
At more than 150 acres, this temple complex is among the world's largest, with 21 monumental gopurams covered in vividly painted sculptures representing centuries of South Indian temple architecture.
These nine colourful homes feature spherical rooms, uneven floors and brightly coloured surfaces, reflecting Shusaku Arakawa and Madeline Gins' belief that challenging domestic environments could encourage longer lives.
Five towering concrete prisms rise from a traffic circle at the entrance to Ciudad Satélite, their red, blue, yellow and white surfaces forming one of Luis Barragán's best-known collaborations with Mathias Goeritz.
Perched above Sintra, this former royal residence brings together Gothic, Moorish, Manueline and Renaissance influences in a striking red-and-yellow scheme; the palace has been part of a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1995.
A functioning waste-processing facility hardly resembles conventional infrastructure here: Friedensreich Hundertwasser gave the plant striped towers, irregular forms and vivid colours, completed in 2001 after his death.
Detroit's 1929 “Cathedral of Finance” showcases the craftsmanship of the Great Lakes region through nearly two million orange-toned bricks and terracotta tiles.