This week on Dezeen: photo and video sharing app Snapchat transformed the way journalists and visitors explored the world's biggest architecture exhibition in Venice this week.

Dezeen's coverage of the Venice Architecture Biennale on Snapchat included exclusive previews of the best pavilions, behind-the-scenes footage of parties and even humorous portraits of famous architects – including Norman Foster (main image) – overlaid with animal features.

Some of the most popular pavilions on Snapchat included Slovenia's wooden library, Australia's swimming pool (above) designed to symbolise a "space for healing racial and cultural tension", and the British Pavilion, which presented sharing technologies as a potential solution to the housing crisis.

Speaking to Dezeen in Venice, Vietnamese architect Vo Trong Nghia revealed that he makes his staff meditate every day to help them "resist cravings and improve concentration", while Peter Zumthor observed a resurgence in handmade architecture at the event before describing computers as slaves.

After building a Chanel store facade from stronger-than-concrete glass bricks, MVRDV revealed its transparent kitchen in Venice. Also at the event, a team of architects created a room of architectural evidence from Auschwitz, showing how the Nazi concentration camp was purposefully designed as a killing factory.

In other architecture news this week, Rem Koolhaas accused architects of having a communication problem and Alejandro Zaera-Polo filed a lawsuit against Princeton University for libel and breach of contract. The legal action comes after he was asked to step down as head of its architecture school over allegations of plagiarism.

David Chipperfield Architects presented further revisions to its plans for the Nobel Center in Stockholm, while Richard Meier unveiled his all-black design for an apartment block in New York.

We published images showing the inside of Herzog & de Meuron's extension to the Tate Modern art gallery and looked ahead to the London Festival of Architecture 2016, which kicks off next week.

In one of this week's most popular stories, we explored new virtual reality tools that could revolutionise the way architects design buildings, while Keiichi Matsuda released a kaleidoscopic vision of the future where augmented reality has blurred real and virtual worlds.

Sticking with technology, Google announced that it is going to start shipping its modular smartphone and teamed up with fashion brand Levi's to create an interactive denim jacket.

Not only were the Dezeen team reporting from Venice this week, but we also hit the streets of London for Clerkenwell Design Week, where Herman Miller launched its range of office chairs aimed at fidgeters and Loll presented a range of bright-coloured garden furniture made out of discarded milk bottles.

Tom Dixon converted a church into a co-working and restaurant, while Flea Folly Architects created a wooden installation designed to reference the monastic past of London's St John's Gate for the event.

Popular stories this week on Dezeen included Apple's new store in San Francisco, a light-filled Porto townhouse and a mixed-use building in Iran featuring a wave-like roof.

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