While it is impossible to predict what architecture will look like in the future, the conditions that will shape the creation of future architecture is relatively clear. The role of the star architect who controls and designs every component of the building is disappearing if not gone. Instead, as Tapscott and Williams (2007) proposes in Wikinomics, the convergence of technology, demographics and global economics is giving rise to a fundamentally new way of creation and organising resources- mass collaboration. Complex products such as software operating systems, medical research and even vehicles are being produced through such means and to a certain degree, so is architecture. Today, various professions and suppliers come together to realise the creation of a building and from a general survey of the conditions affecting architecture, it is clear that the conception of architecture is going to be an increasingly collaborative effort among an even wider group of people.

It is a foregone conclusion that Architecture; both its built form and the process behind its making, is evolving into a totally new creature. With all the rave of web 2.0 and how it will affect our daily lives, surely we will see an impact on the architecture profession. But how EXACTLY will these online technologies affect architecture? What frameworks will be challenged? And what will this mean for architecture firms, architecture schools and the architecture fraternity itself?

Welcome to Architecture school! This week, Five Foot Way brings you a virtual Architecture-Freshman-Crash-Course or, if you like, The-Architect's-Revision Chapter One. These are things that might have slipped past your ears; things that you never really latched onto. Well we say now's the time to grab hold of some of these tips that we've collected over the years... Part one starts here, look out for Part two in the distant future on Fivefootway.com.

Students are the heartbeat of any school; and the La Salle College of the Arts is no different. Five Foot Way got the low-down from Peter, Herman and Nathaniel from the College itself, finding a sentimental longing for the suburban cosiness of their home away from home that was the Mountbatten Campus.

Yes, that’s probably what we’d get at Number 23, Amber Road in Katong, should everything proceed as planned, for AG Capital Pte Ltd to erect a monster of a development in the place of the charming, romantic Butterfly House that now occupies the site.

So what are these 'magical spaces'? Which part of our island makes your heart yearn for days gone by, makes you think of that time when you were 16 or 5; and gives you a warm tingly feeling everytime you set foot there? Are there anymore left of these in Singapore? What's going to become of them?

All of us must have heard of the announcement by Minister Mah Bow Tan on the desire to prepare Singapore for a population of 6.5 million people in 50 years time. Its impact on us as creatures and designers of the urban realm is quite clear - there will be new design and social challenges. Perhaps it is time to look at our role in meeting these new challenges.

The concept of the "white" site was introduced by the Urban Redevelopment Authority of Singapore to give developers more flexibility in development options on certain land parcels sold by the State. "White" sites are sites in which a range of uses are allowed. Why is this important to the architecure fraternity?