"Architecture & Design Australia" is a new survey of Australian architecture that takes an expansive look at over 50 buildings, from private dwellings to public monuments, and includes many award-winning projects that have helped shape the energetic state of Australian design today. The world`s smallest continent, Australia has a topography and breadth of landscape that is immense and plays an important part in the dynamic architecture produced. It includes rainforests and vast plains in the north, snowfields in the southeast, desert in the center and fertile croplands in the east, south and southwest. About one-third of the country lies in the tropics and more than one-fifth of its land area is desert. Australia is a place where being an architect can be particularly challenging, from designing a shearing shed to operate within the extremes of 104 degrees Fahrenheit in summer and the sub-zero freeze of winter, to a new zoo concept that blends into the landscape and where visitors are allowed access to all areas of an animal`s care, to the siting of an apartment building along the rugged terrain of the eastern seaboard that clings to the coastline and drinks in the view. It is fair to say that the diversity of the Australian continent shapes the complexity of its architecture, and it is these ingredients that continue to set the scene for the country`s exciting architectural language.