James
Urban regeneration is Manchester U.K.
This project adjacent to Manchester’s city center aims to regenerate the former Cardroom housing estate, which itself was an urban renewal effort in the 1970's to reclaim an abandoned industrial sector. Poor planning contributed to the demise of Cardroom Estate, but a bold new framework by Alsop hopes to learn from the past while looking forward.
The area has been re-dubbed New Islington, and a new splashy flashy website (as noted at Archinect) details the concept for the new project and history of the neighborhood. Sustainability and context is the name of the game.
Link: New Islington
Designer: Alsop
Developer: Urban Splash
Reference: Urban Splash (Land+Living)
Handcrafted organic furniture
Now, this is not the usual kind of design that we feature here ad Land+Living. To be honest, I'm not a "rustic style" kinda guy. But a few things swayed me to feature Roundwood none-the-less.
First, the quality of the craftsmanship is obviously very high. Second, the organic designs are artful and well conceived. Third, there is a wonderful "found" quality to the work and nice use of materials. And finally, the designer is based at Lake Tahoe, and I really miss living there...
Cline, the artist/craftsman behind Roundwood, lists Dr. Suess and Salvador Dali among his heroes, and it is easy to see that free-form candor in his work. Cline makes all kinds of furniture from beds to chairs as well as custom interior finishing work.
Link: Roundwood - [Thanks, C Louise!]
Several people injured during midnight opening event for a new Ikea store outside of London
People get really crazy about Ikea... way too crazy... tragically crazy in this case. Reading about this incident near London reminded me of an Ikea experience of my own, though not nearly so disastrous.
Several years ago my wife and I drove 3 hours to get to, what was then, our closest Ikea store in Emeryville, California. The store had just been opened for a couple of weeks, and was the first store in Northern California. Upon our arrival just after store opening at 10:00 a.m., we were greeted by a full parking lot and a mass of people flooding into the store - apparently crowds would wait outside the store more than an hour before opening each day.
Everywhere inside there were people pushing through crowds and franticly wading through merchandise as if it were a contest. And there were lines... long lines: to place our order; at the concession stand; at the register; and at the service warehouse desk waiting for our purchase to come out. We had just a few items on our list that day and had planned to spend some time in the city after we were done… but it didn’t happen.
Five hours later, we emerged from the store… tired, hungry and beaten by the experience. We loaded the car and started the long drive home.
And at the end of all that, we had come to a conclusion: no, it was not worth all of the hassle. But what other choice did we have to get reasonably well designed items that we could afford?
Press release: Ikea - An incident at the opening of IKEA Edmonton
Article: BBC - Crush chaos at Ikea store opening
Image from Waxy
Artek, Alvar & Aino Aalto
Anthony's Swedish crush reminded me of a Scandinavian fascination of my own... so today, I'll pay tribute to the Aalto legacy.
I have been inspired by the work of Finnish architect and designer Alvar Aalto since early in my architectural education. His work continues to be a strong influence in the design world; everywhere from architecture to consumer products (Ikea owes a heck of a lot to Aalto).
Muchos Aalto linkage for your browsing pleasure, and more Aalto talk follows.
Link: Alvar Aalto Foundation
Link: Artek
Visit: Alvar Aalto Museum
Link: Aino Aalto (book available through Aalto Museum)
Link: Iittala (Aino Aalto glassware)
Link: Alvar Aalto Houses (CD-ROM by Opulens)
Link: Baker House (MIT student project website)
Web Exhibition: Aalto Chairs
Web Exhibition: Paimio Sanatorium
The Steps to Green Architecture
Eric Corey Freed is a San Francisco based architect and founder of organicARCHITECT, a firm dedicated to the design and creation of buildings that embody ecological & social responsibility.
Eric's forthcoming book, The Inevitable Architect: The Steps to Green Architecture, shows other architects how to become green.
Free downloads from the book are available on his website. Chapters titles include: Green Building Specifications, Green Guidelines for your Home, How to Sell Your Clients on Green Buildings, etc.
Link: organicARCHITECT - The Inevitable Architect: The Steps to Green Architecture
Via: Enviropundit
"The Kids Are Alright in Green Housing Competition"
The winners of the Cradle-to-Cradle Home Competition have been selected and Metropolis magazine reports on the winning student entries. Their designs are scheduled to be built starting in May 2005.
The first prize student winner, Sean Wheeler transformed recycled billboards and train cars into the comfortable, flexible “pMod”: a portable, modular dwelling that combines the upgradeable adaptability of the PC with pleasingly domestic elements like roof gardens, courtyards, and porches.
Article: Metropolis - The Kids Are Alright in Green Housing Competition
Link: Cradle-to-Cradle Home Comptetition Winners
Reference: "Cradle To Cradle To Washington" (Land+Living)
Sustainable fencing/screening/cladding
Bamboo is becoming increasingly used as an alternative wood flooring material, but it's most obvious (and traditional) use is somewhat overlooked in contemporary design.
Of course, bamboo fences are a Japanese design cliché, but Mark Mortimer has taken on bamboo as a material, not a design theme. His Auckland, New Zealand based company Bamusero produces bamboo fencing, furniture and special projects and employs various techniques to expand the possibilities of the material. Why not use bamboo as an architectural cladding material? Nice work!
Link: Bambusero
Via: Grow-a-Brain
A gallery of midcentury homes in Long Beach by Cliff May... and a guy who can help you buy one
We love midcentury... mm mm mmmmm. Especially here in Southern California where architects such as Cliff May explored the concept of indoor outdoor space with wonderful results.
Realtor Doug Kramer of Long Beach, California bills himself as a specialist in midcentry modern properties... and, what the heck... he's got some good stuff on his website including a gallery of some restored/remodeled homes, as well as some decent history and general info.
Link: The Long Beach Cliff May Ranchos (from Doug Kramer's Ranchostyle.com)
Via: Archinect (nice find, Alan)
Also: Amazon - Western Ranch Houses by Cliff May
Related:
The World of Eichler Design (Land+Living)
Originally posted 1/25/2005
UPDATE: Doug Kramer strikes again! And this time with a nicely designed and updated website with even more midcentury design... Cliff May and beyond!
Link: SoCal Modern [Thanks, Raena!]
Virtually located - "brings the Yellow Pages to life"
This is an interesting concept, a web-based directory where you can actually see the block where a business is located, and browse the surrounding neighborhood. You got to wonder if this will actually work (especially fiscally). But I really like the idea of being able to find what else is located in the surrounding neighborhood, and seeing it is pretty cool too.
Link: A9.com
Via: Urban Cartography - Hotlinking the Yellow Pages
A garden and bridge linking two halves of a mall
More from my trip to Orange County, this time at the throne of consumersim *gasp* a mall. They have the Gap and Hot Dog on a Stick, and hey look! They have good design too!
This is a pedestrian bridge built in 2000 connecting two parts of a large shopping mall designed by a collaborative team of Kathryn Gustafson (Gustafson Guthrie Nichol), Ellerbe Becket and Anderson & Ray.
It is an interesting solution to a utilitarian need; a pedestrian connection across a parking lot and busy street, and the mediation of a change in elevation. The bridge is called the "Bridge of Gardens," a ridiculous name probably dreamed up by the mall, but that name does at least hint towards the marriage of landscape, engineering and architecture.
I have seen this published before, but never with more than a couple small images... so check it out... I went overboard on the pics just for you.
Firm: Gustafson Guthrie Nichol - Landscape Architecture / Art
Firm: Ellerbe Becket - Architecture
Firm: Charles Anderson (formerly of Anderson & Ray) - Landscape Architecture
Firm: HNTB - Structural Engineering
Link: South Coast Plaza
Noguchi landscape in Costa Mesa, California
Designed by the famed American sculptor Isamu Noguchi with landscape architect Ken Kammeyer in 1980, this is a remarkable work tucked between office two towers and a parking garage.
I was in Orange County yesterday and I made a point to seek out this famous garden which I have overlooked many times before. I knew that it was hidden away somewhere amongst the office towers and car-oriented avenues, and the discovery of this calm pedestrian space upon exiting a typical parking garage was at once calming and mind-blowing.
So now, at least ten years after I was made aware of this landscape, I have finally been there... and I took lots of pictures for your perusal. This description of the garden is is far more in depth than our synopsis.
| Visit: | South Coast Plaza Town Center |
| | 611 Anton Blvd |
| | Costa Mesa, California |
| UPDATE 5/5/10: The landscape architect leads tours twice per year; contact Ken Kammeyer for upcomming dates. [Thanks, Ken!] |
Link: Noguchi Museum - California Scenario
Landscape Architect: Kammeyer and Associates
Reference: Isamu Noguchi Stamps (Land+Living)
Reference: The Isamu Noguchi Garden Museum (Land+Living)
New Ash Green: 60's housing in the U.K.
Not all 60's housing experiments/designs were created equal, especially when it comes to large scale developments. But when it's good, it's good. We've previously featured some good stuff in California, and here is a tasty morsel in Great Britain.
This website (with small but enticing images) is a wealth of information about this "unique housing project in Kent, its original developer SPAN and their consultant architect Eric Lyons."
Link: Span Kent, New Ash Green
Via: Things
Rethinking the Post-Industrial Landscape
Continuing in the vain of landscape architecture and reclaimed sites...
Around the world abandoned industrial sites, landfills, waterfronts and other tainted lands provide opportunities and challenges. Vancouver is seeking to turn an industrial waterfront into a residential district, Sydney transformed polluted wastelands into their Olympic Park, and outside of London Stockley Park reclaimed an ancient manufacturing site.
Manufactured Sites explores the "reclamation of land and the integration of innovative technologies and design strategies in their redevelopment and regeneration" from the perspective of landscape design professionals, including a chapter/project by Peter Latz. Editor Niall Kirkwood is an Associate professor of landscape architecture, Director of the Masters in Landscape Architecture degree programs, and founder and Director of the Center for Technology and Environment at Harvard GSD.
Editor: Niall Kirkwood
Link: Amazon
Related: Westergasfabriek (Land+Living)
Interventions on industrial sites and ill defined open spaces
Landscape architect Peter Latz, based in Kranzberg, Germany, practices what he preaches; defining and reclaiming the landscape with an eye on ecology and social needs.
The practice of Latz + Partner focuses on "the renewal of destroyed and often contaminated sites, - a new balance in the traffic infrastructures and - the spatial and material framework of ecological programmes." Their work tackles gritty urban and industrial sites with attention to expressing the history and character of the land.
The website may be a bit cumbersome to navigate and dense, but it is packed with information and images just waiting to reward the focused browser. Plus, you can take your pick of German, English or French text... In Ordnung; all right; bien.
Link: Latz + Partner
Public art is... apparently... private?
Related to our continuing concern with the privatization of public space, here is an interesting situation featuring Anish Kapoor's Cloud Gate sculpture in Chicago's Millennium Park.
According to a post at New (sub)Urbanism, photographer Warren Wimmer was prevented from photographing this piece of public art.
Fascinating.
Link: New (sub)Urbanism - Copyrighting of Public Space
Reference: Chicago's Millennium Park (Land+Living)
Reference: It's a Crocker etc. (Land+Living)
A Los Angeles architect who beat me down
Once upon a time at SCI-Arc, I encountered Barbara Bestor sitting on my jury for a crit while pursuing my Masters degree in Architecture. Crits are like defending yourself against a crime that you know you have committed, and I recall that Barbara found me to be particularly guilty. Well, she may not have been enamored of my design that day, but I am quite impressed with the work shown on her website.
In her 30's, Barbara Bestor has established herself in a profession that is hard to break into at a young age, especailly as a woman in a profession (even in 2005) skewed towards men. Based upon my experience with her and what I have seen of her work, I can see how she has done it... she is tough talking and opinionated but refined, talented, knowledgeable, and skilled at producing wonderful results with small budgets.
Link: Bestor Architecture
Grab your pruning shears and get ready to party in April 2005
The American Society of Landscape Architects has declared April 2005 as National Landscape Architecture Month. The theme will be Design for Active Living, highlighting ways landscape architecture and community design affect daily activity levels, and, in turn, overall health.
Link: ASLA - Landscape Architecture Month
Home decor and accessories from Rios Clementi Hale Studios
notNeutral is... well... not neutral. And not ashamed of it. A division of Los Angeles multi-disciplinary design firm Rios Clementi Hale Studios, notNeutral offers "confident, hip and streetwise products that express individuality and choice." It's kind of like the anti-Pottery Barn.
Their products offer a broad range of dinnerware, pillows, vases, children’s furniture, and home accessories of all kinds. It's funky groovy stuff, as if four decades of design and style have collided... and it works.
They have their own retail store on Melrose in Los Angeles, a web store, and are carried by specialty retailers.
Link: notNeutral
An courtyard garden space for a Boston condominium complex
This garden occupies the inner court space of an old printing house in Boston that has been converted into residential condominium units. The design solution, by Salem, Massachusetts based Landworks Studio, creates usable communal space while at the same time providing privacy and varied views for the inner condo units.
In contrast to the regularity of the existing structure, the landscape architects employed a concept of fragmentation; in the plantings, pathways, materials, topographic undulation, etc. Groovy lighting elements transform the space at night with a yellow green glow emanating from the benches and a fiber optic web amongst the bamboo. The design provides an stylish contemporary foil to the historic building.
Link: Landworks Studio
Land+Living in the New York Times
We've hit the big time now. Will you still love us when we're in our "carbohydrate, sequined-jumpsuit, young-girls-in-white-cotton-panties, waking-up-in-a-pool-of-your-own-vomit, bloated-purple-dead-on-a-toilet phase?" Because, you know, it's all just a matter of time now.
Land+Living gets a quick mention in an article by Lockhart Steele about design blogs in the New York Times Home & Garden section. And it has already gone to our heads. So, what are you waiting for? Go read it already!
EDIT - Oh, and we should mention, while the article implies that our focus is landscape design, you can see that we cover a wide range of topics. That said, we are dedicated to covering landscape design, objects and ideas.
Article: NY Times - Hot Off the Web: Gossip and Guidance (alternate link)
Constructing the Contemporary Landscape
Exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art, New York City running February 25 through May 16, 2005.
Groundswell: Constructing the Contemporary Landscape presents twenty-three landscape-design projects that reveal the surge of creativity and critical debate in the design of public spaces, from small urban plazas to large parks for post-industrial sites to long-range plans for entire urban sectors. In the last twenty years, the most significant new landscapes have been designed for sites that were reclaimed from conflict, degradation, or abandonment. The projects, located throughout North America, Europe, Asia, and the Middle East, were selected for their outstanding design and to show a variety of scales, contexts, materials, and types of spaces found in the contemporary landscape.
Link: MoMA - Groundswell
Up to our ankles in brown stuff and white stuff
Sorry for the unannounced sabbatical. So, we have some catching up to do here at L+L... and one of us has some plumbing to replace. Ah, the joys of home ownership.
The other of us has no such excuse... just snow blind from snowboarding in the Eastern Sierra... and now drawn to Snow Design and all things frozen and icy. Hmmm... Julie Snow Architects...
Well, at least one excuse makes for better images than the other.
Back to our regularly scheduled programming soon... after we shake the brown and white stuff.
Modern design meets New Urbanist living
While I appreciate the concept of the tower in the park, the reality of many modernist urban developments can be quite dismal. And while I agree with the principles of the New Urbanism, I feel that many New Urbanists are too hung up on the "white picket fence" trappings of traditional style.
But even Andres Duany provides a retort to this perception, and has designed a project that (at least partially) proves it. "Aqua breaks the mold of what many people perceive TND to be, but that’s a misconception. New Urbanism is not style-based. Aqua makes that clear."
Aqua is mid-sized infill project (8.5 acres) on Allison Island in Miami Beach. It is the site of a former hospital and the project reuses an existing parking garage/office building.
Orginally posted 1/17/2005
New article: Slatin Report - Chilly Design, Hot Aqua
Link: Aqua | Allison Island - hehe... aqua.net ;-)
Article: The Next American City - New Urban Meets Modern in South Florida
Article: HousingZone.com - Andres Duany & Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk: Home/Work (2002)
Firm: Duany Plater-Zyberk & Company
Via: Planetizen
Australian landscape firm
Staying Down Under for the moment, we move from lamps to landscapes.
We ran across this site for landscape designer Kristen Martin of Erskineville, New South Wales some time back. Unfortunately there is not much on the website... but we keep coming back to it.
Though the website may not be very informative or well designed and the images are few and mostly small, something in those little images speaks to us. It doesn't blow your socks off, there is just some nice understated, yet high quality design work shining through.
So please, pay a visit, won't you?
Link: Kristen Martin Landscape Architects
A lamp from Down Under
Lamp shades are often kind of an afterthought. Well, what we mean is that they just sort of hover there with out any attention to the connection between the shade and the rest of the fixture. There is the kind where you screw on the little decorative doohickey to hold the shade on the bracket, and then there is the kind that clips directly on to the light bulb. These are just simple, yet not interesting, solutions to a "problem."
Now, we like simple solutions, and here's one by Melbourne designers Marcel Sigel and Alana di Giacomo. The blown glass shade is formed to the shape of the light bulb, and it simply sits on the bulb... it traces the bulb... and it also seems to poke a little bit of fun at the traditional lamp shade. The base of the lamp is nice as well, but in our opinion, the shade is quite elegant and is really the ticket here.
Designer: Zuii
Contemporary public spaces; innovative architecture, landscape, and urban design
Exhibit at the National Building Museum in Washington, DC running January 15 through May 15, 2005.
If a democracy is defined by the character of its discourse and public debate, the success of that democracy must be measured by the quantity and quality of its public spaces, the venues where citizens gather for cultural and civic interaction... a range of projects from memorials to new types of urban plazas and parks, from Macon, Georgia, to Melbourne, Australia, to Johannesburg, South Africa.
Featured designers include: Will Alsop, Elizabeth Diller and Ricardo Scofidio, Craig Dykers, Peter Eisenman, Zaha Hadid, Walter Hood, Marion Weiss and Michael Manfredi, Peter Walker, Michael Van Valkenburgh, Rafael Viñoly and Norman Foster.
Originally posted 1/9/2005
Link: National Building Museum
An efficient bathroom remodel
Red glass tile wraps from floor to wall to ceiling in this efficient bathroom by husband and wife design team Adam and Lisa Christie of Portland, Oregon based Prototype Architects. The side walls are covered in waterproof cement plaster, and the fourth wall features a floor to ceiling mirror.
The entire bathroom is conceived as one continuous space, rather than little compartments. The floor surface is open and uninterrupted thanks to the wall mounted sink and toilet. Custom designed stainless steel fixtures include towel bars and shelves, and the large trough sink which is hung in front of the mirror wall and features two double-jointed kitchen faucets.
A stunningly clean and efficient space.
Firm: Prototype Architecture
"Not a mall, it's a lifestyle center"
In twenty years they won't want you to say "lifestyle center." Anyway, more about the lifestyle center trend in the news.
The number of lifestyle centers has quickly accelerated, from just 30 in 2002 to 120 at the end of 2004. Between 10 to 20 new centers are slated to open each year for the next two years. By contrast, only eight new regional malls are expected to open by 2006, according to ICSC.
Link: CNNmoney - Not a mall, it's a lifestyle center
Reference: It's a Crocker (L+L)
Reference: "Lunching With the Caruso of Retail" (L+L)
Off-the-shelf glass and aluminum structure kit house
We've had a little dryspell in our prefab news, but the drought is over... more prefab for you junkies.
Designed by Los Angeles area architects Linda Taalman and Alan Koch, the concept is a high design, customized (with funky outFiTs) 1000 square foot kit house that takes only 8 weeks to construct. "The iT house is made up of a series of off-the-shelf parts which are internationally distributed by industry partners or locally available as typical standard construction." Two houses have been commissioned and will be build this year.
Link: iT House
Firm: TK Architecture
Could "sustainability planning" actually harm long term sustainability?
A paper by Peter Gordon of the University of Southern California takes an interesting look at sustainable planning and policy and suggests that long term sustainability may be hampered by some current "solutions."
Perhaps a bit academic for L+L? Nah... it pays to be informed. Take a break from the eye candy and read up.
Link: Sustainability Planning: First, Do No Harm (500k PDF file)
Link: USC Urban Initiative
Via: Planetizen
