Thursday, February 4th, 2010
A proposed 239-unit development in San Francisco’s Hayes Valley has yet to come to fruition, leaving an ugly, empty lot in its place. Seeing this, a group of enterprising citygoers have decided to turn the lot into Hayes Valley Farm, an education and research project sponsored by the San Francisco Parks Trust.
Posted in Green Designs, Just Interesting, Sustainable Energy | No Comments »
Friday, September 25th, 2009
The question, “what will our cities of the future look like?”, is a question that has captured the imagination of many minds, at many times.
After all, here we are in the 21st century, a millennium ahead of us for testing and witnessing just how far the lines between science fact and science fiction will blur.
At the ground level in little ole Aotearoa we all have reason to despair at a lack of focus on our urban futures and the design of those urban futures. We don’t do “urban” as well as we need to.
A suggestion for Auckland’s Queens Wharf
Abstract from Urban Logic’s Article in the Idealog Magazine
Delaying the doing is a fine art. The tools are many and varied. Take time for a lavish display of consultation; commission a report or, even better, commission a scoping study for a possible report. Form a working party, a subcomitteee, perhaps a Commission (that’ll be productive). Wait while facts are found, legislation is passed, funds are freed or an election is held. If that doesn’t work, urban planners everywhere have another option: hold a design competition. Invite the world to enter. Now you have years before anything needs to be done.
Read the full article here at Idealog.co.nz
Posted in Architecture, Engineering, Green Designs, Just Interesting, Landscape Architecture, Landscape Art, Sustainable Energy, Transport, Urban Design | No Comments »
Saturday, July 25th, 2009
Hungary-based design team Urban Landscape Group recently completed an extraordinary summer project that allows visitors to float down the Danube in a portable pool! Dubbed Barge Beach Budapest, the sandy sailing island acts as a contemporary Turkish bath and open air pool situated in the waterways between the river’s edges. The pop up beach is constructed from three recycled barges and provides residents with a brand new public space to bask in the sun.
Posted in Just Interesting, Landscape Architecture, Urban Design | No Comments »
Tuesday, May 12th, 2009
We need new leadership from architects, planners and designers.
Yes, we need them to design better buildings, streets and public spaces. But what we may need most from them has little to do with the act of design itself. That’s because we need a massive change in the very way buildings and places are planned, regulated and seen by the public. We urgently need people to re-imagine their cities in very directly political ways, and no one else is as prepared for that job as the talented few who’ve been trained to understand form and space and place.
Posted in Architecture, Engineering, Green Designs, Just Interesting, Landscape Architecture, Landscape Art, Sustainable Energy, Transport, Urban Design | No Comments »
Monday, May 11th, 2009
They say that money doesn’t grow on trees. Well, in Kaunas it grows on buildings. A curvaceous, luminous, 10-floor office building designed in the form of a LTL 1,000 banknote, Office Center 1000 is being touted locally as one of the Baltic region’s most daring and original construction projects.
Despite what you might think, this is not a temporal installation. The image of the LTL 1000 banknote is brought onto this 10-story building using special enamel paint. During the process the paint turns into a ceramic print that lasts forever. Jonas Plenta, marketing manager of Urmas, the company behind the project, insists that the new structure is not simply a mighty monument to the power of money.
Posted in Architecture, Just Interesting, Landscape Architecture, Landscape Art, Urban Design | No Comments »
Monday, May 11th, 2009
Here & There is a project by S&W exploring speculative projections of dense cities. These maps of Manhattan look uptown from 3rd and 7th, and downtown from 3rd and 35th. They’re intended to be seen at those same places, putting the viewer simultaneously above the city and in it where she stands, both looking down and looking forward.
and uptown from 3rd Avenue and 7th Street...
What’s going on?
(more…)
Posted in Just Interesting | No Comments »
Sunday, May 3rd, 2009
It’s still the subject of (extensive) debate whether the electric and magnetic fields (EMFs) produced by appliances, cell phones and high-voltage wires contribute to human illness and cancer. For an academic overview, check out the Human Radiation Effects Group, by Professor Denis Henshaw of the University of Bristol. For a visual illustration, look no further than FIELD by artist Richard Box. It’s a grid of fluorescent light bulbs planted into the ground beneath a series of power lines. When the bulbs glow, it’s not because of a series of buried wires, or a battery– they light up using the ghost power radiating from the wires overhead.
Posted in Just Interesting, Landscape Architecture, Landscape Art | No Comments »
Tuesday, April 28th, 2009
An interesting new study (.pdf) confirms a long-held suspicion of politicians and, more importantly, anyone working in the field of climate change awareness: Americans are only worried about global warming abstractly.
Posted in Green Designs, Just Interesting, Sustainable Energy, categories | No Comments »
Monday, April 6th, 2009
We all love the idea of prefab homes – the simplicity of ready-made, to-go houses, and yet most of the time when we sit down to really study the plans with respect to our own lives and dreams, there’s just something lacking. We want prefab-style homes, but designed exactly to our lives and needs. If you’re like us, then you might enjoy checking out a new prefab designer: Stillwater Dwellings, based out of Seattle, WA. This new firm has many traditional prefab homes ready to go, but also allows you to design your own from their pre-designed modules.
Posted in Architecture, Just Interesting, Landscape Architecture, Urban Design | No Comments »
Friday, April 3rd, 2009
First rule of ant traffic: no overtaking
Ants never overtake. Not ever. Instead they form into platoons in which all the ants move at the same speed. Increase the density of ant traffic and the platoons simply join together to form larger groups. This is how the velocity remains the same while the density increases.
Alexander John and colleagues at the University of Cologne in Germany have discovered lessons from ant traffic that can be incorporated in traffic planning. This is just one of the applications gleaned from biomimicry.
Ant Traffic
Posted in Just Interesting, Transport | No Comments »
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