There’s a new museum opening in Athens this year, but as the Times of London’s Mark Hodson writes, it’s not just another tourist attraction: It’s also “the latest gambit in a 200-year campaign for the return of the Elgin Marbles,” currently housed in the British Museum. 

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German architectural critics are having a field day with the new U.S. embassy in Berlin (pictured), skewering the design as “banal” and “monstrous.” It’s an unfair rap, says University of Maryland architectural historian Jane Loeffler.

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Among the travel-related art hanging on my walls is a poster of this shot taken by Garry Winogrand in 1964. The subject, of course, is LAX’s Theme Building, which opened in 1961 and is among Los Angeles’ most intriguing landmarks. To me, few buildings say more about Los Angeles, a city ever focused on the future, often at the expense of the past, than this Tomorrowland-esque structure. The two women in the photo, I like to imagine, have donned their finest dresses and highest heels for a transatlantic flight, perhaps to Paris or London. The L.A. sun is beaming down on them. The future couldn’t be brighter.

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Historical sites from the temples of Angkor Wat in Cambodia to the Parthenon in Athens are under siege from bacteria, which are blackening, cracking and defacing monuments, The New York Times reports. Can scientists stop them? Many are optimistic, others not so much. “We have to accept that at some moment [the monuments] will disappear,” said Thomas Warscheid, a geomicrobiologist based in Germany. “But we know a lot about how to conserve them for the next 20, 30 years.”

Photo by gbaku via Flickr (Creative Commons).

Eighty ever-shifting floors? Oh, Dubai, you just give and give and give.

A spa in southern Russia has unveiled a monument to enemas. Apparently based on Botticelli’s Venus and Mars, the bronze statue features three cherubs carrying an enema bulb. According to Svetlana Avakova, the sculpture’s artist, “An enema is an unpleasant procedure as many of us may know. But when cherubs do it, it’s all right.” Agreed, Ms. Avakova. Agreed.

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That’s the argument this Der Spiegel piece makes, pondering the architectural clash of civilizations between East and West. I, for one, can live without a Burj Dubai in the middle of Manhattan.

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Photo by matt semel via Flickr (Creative Commons).

Oh, Brad Pitt, is there nothing you can’t do? 

Popular Mechanics picked Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport as one of the 10 pieces of infrastructure in the United States that needs to be fixed now, citing near misses on runways, an ineffective new radar system and the country’s worst record of on-time departures in the first half of 2007. 

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Although the “seven wonders” concept has seen a lot of play in the last year, I was happy to see Condé Nast Traveler take an edgier approach in its April new seven wonders list, which includes one of my favorite spots in Washington, D.C.: Kogod Courtyard.

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Travelers who love architecture and museums are well aware of Renzo Piano’s work. He has 12 museums or additions under his architectural belt—including Paris’ must-see Pompidou Centre, pictured—and several more in the works.

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A press release touts the “water elements, earth tones, red accents and exotic fauna” in a design by “Feng Shui Grand Master” Dr. Chi-Jean Liu. Eater LA and the San Gabriel Valley Tribune have photos, if you want to see the Grand Master’s work for yourself. Me? I just want to see if this influences the next Big Mac Index.

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