MOST COMMENTED
Making SMART smarter.
With SMARTcar ROADSTER sales plummeting, Merecedes-Benz may want to take a cue from the custom jobs found over at UK based smartsRus. A site dedicated to providing sales as well as a platform for those involved in the Smart Car culture.
Established back in 2002 by Paul Holmes and Liam Wilkinson, smartsRus has quickly become a major cog in the world of SMART.
Now obviously the A-Team custom has caught my attention, but just one thing though....can I smash through a chain link fence with it ?
Link: smartsRus
Gardens for the new emergent times
Spanish born garden designer Fernando Gonzalez is the principle and founder of Metagardens, a gardens design firm based in London. Fernando says that “the boundaries between the artificial and the organic are more blurred than ever before” and his innovative design practice seeks to address these challenges of the digital age through both built and experimental projects. Through computational techniques and an exploratory approach to design it proposes to go beyond the ordinary and conventional.
We live in a post-human environment where the relationship between the biological and the machine is more of a symbiosis than of contradiction. Our cybernetic culture sees Nature as something manufactured far away from ‘naturalistic’ theories that dream with a romantic and uncontaminated environment outside of our culture or, even worse, as a return to the past. But while the rest of the artistic disciplines are mutating to adapt to the new challenges garden design practices and theories are still based in outdated ideas incapable of dealing with the complexity of the new situation.
Link: Metagardens
Exhibition exploring the common principles that underlie both fashion and architecture
An exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA) in Los Angeles running November 19, 2006 through March 5, 2007.
This exhibition explores the common visual and intellectual principles that underlie both fashion and architecture. Both disciplines start with the human body and expand on ideas of space and movement, serving as outward expressions of personal, political, and cultural identity. Architects and fashion designers produce environments defined through spatial awareness—the structures they create are based on volume, function, proportion, and material. Presenting the work of international fashion designers and architects, the exhibition examines themes such as shelter, identity, tectonic strategies, creative process, and parallel stylistic tendencies including deconstruction and minimalism.
Link: MOCA
Antony Gormley's iron men installation has found a permanent home on Crosby Beach, Liverpool
Intrigued by the work of Gormley, I went to visit Crosby beach and its new permanent residents [100 of them along a 2mile stretch] few weeks ago with a good friend of mine, for a bit of sunshine and a bit of photography.
Walking on the beach amidst this iron men crowd, it feels they are another part of us, the permanent element of our existence which keeps looking on for questions and answers. You feel compelled to stand side to them and look forward, trying to understand, to visualise what it is they are waiting for, or what it is that they are trying to make us see.
Link: Antony Gormley
Location: L+L Maps - 'Another Place'
The Short and Simple Story of the Credit Crisis
This video was created as part of Jonathan Jarvis's thesis work in the Media Design Program at the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, California.
I'm totally sick of the pervasive references to the economy in the media and advertisements, but this is worth a look.
Link: Jonathan Jarvis
Via: NPR
One-of-a-kind loft is up for rent
Adjustable hanging light fixture
You can not only adjust the height of this clever little light fixture by Swiss designers Caroline Felix and Valentin Brun, but also the length as well.
It's like one of those old adjustable coat racks from your grandmother's house, but the application of this common expanding system is just cool.
Link: Gopf Furniture
Contemporary gardens as art and frame
The gardens and landscape of the Getty Center are easily the largest and most easily accessible example of contemporary landscape design in the Los Angeles area, if not the western United States.
The Getty Center complex spreads like an Italian hill town on the slope of the Santa Monica Mountains and is interwoven with a vast array of garden and landscape environments, all set within a vast sea of native chaparral and oak trees. Within the complex itself are two typologies of landscape: the architectural landscape designed by the Olin Partnership and the legendary Emmet L. Wemple, and the commissioned work of art that is the flowing sculptural Central Garden by artist Robert Irwin with Spurlock Poirier.
Continue to the next page for a brief photo tour and further description of the landscapes.
Landscape Firm: Olin Partnership
Landscape Firm: Emmet Wemple and Associates
Central Garden description: Robert Irwin
Landscape Firm: Spurlock Poirier
Architecture Firm: Richard Meier & Partners
Book: Robert Irwin Getty Garden
Book: Seeing the Getty Center Buildings & Gardens
Garden descriptions: Landscaping at the Getty Center
SF architect brings eco-friendly, modernist design to the average home buyer
The prefabricated Glidehouse by architect Michelle Kaufmann is being featured at the Sunset Magazine Celebration Weekend. Several Glidehouses have already been sold and will be heading for sites across the west.
Via: SFGate.com
Link: Glidehouse
Link: Construction Resource Group
"Doesn't this sort of look like that one thing in the DWR catalog?"
One of the themes I've noticed while lurking on the forums over at Dwell is the number of times people ask where they can get DWR styling at IKEA prices. A valid request as I'm sure the majority of the population still wonders who exactly the WR in DWR is meant for.
I live near an IKEA. I'm not too far from a couple DWR showrooms as well. I spend hours and hours paging through the DWR catalog when it comes in the mail. Considering my "knowledge" of both, the one thing about IKEA is it's so easy to spot their furniture, especially when you walk into someone's house/apartment and it looks like a page out of their catalog or like one of their showrooms.
Link: Design Within Reach
Link: IKEA
Durfee Garden and Bartlett Court on the University of Massachusetts Amherst Campus, and the Plastic Garden
We were taken with these modern gardens by landscape architect Dean Cardasis, Associate Professor at University of Massachusetts, Amherst and the Director of the James Rose Center. The playful yet refined use of built elements of the Durfee Garden and the Plastic Garden create special outdoor spaces year-round. Bartlett Court is a contemplative garden that highlights the geology and traditions of New England with a serene style reminiscent of Japanese gravel gardens.
Link: Dean Cardasis
Visit: UMass Amherst
The architectural potential of translucency
"Panelite materials are translucent, lightweight, and modulate both light and vision. Providing light transmission, visual privacy, and aesthetic flexibility, they are suited to a wide range of applications including walls, ceilings, furniture, and exterior facades."
Link: Panelite
Nice style that is easy on the wallet
We like these simple glass pendant lamps from West Elm, purveyors of mix-and-match contemporary home furnishings and accessories. West Elm is kind of like a modern Pottery Barn... nothing that knocks your socks off, but when you are looking for clean contemporary design on a budget, it is nice to have some options.
Link: West Elm Oblong Glass Pendant
Link: West Elm Cone Glass Pendant
The greatness of Ted
"Founded on the Oregon coast by a guy named Ted, this small handscreened wallpaper company flourished in the Age of Aquarius.
Many years later, some young designers seeking striking wallcoverings discovered Ted's greatness- just days before the designs and equipment were to be destroyed. Knowing what had to be done, these young designers headed west to save Ted's legacy...
Relocated to the Bywater District of New Orleans, Flavor Paper continues to produce the greatness of Ted."
Featured print: Cycloid
Screens: 3
Colors Achieved: 3 to 7
Screen Repeat: 48 inches
Pattern Repeat: 48 inches
Side-to-side Match:
straight across
Link: Flavor Paper
Found in: Dwell
Deere hosts exhibit of modern buildings to celebrate the 40th anniversary of their landmark building
The company is hosting an exhibit at their Saarinen designed headquarters in Moline, Illinois entitled Structures of Our Time: 31 Buildings That Changed Modern Life. It is a special architectural exhibit celebrating buildings that have received the American Institute of Architect's 25-Year Award. The Deere Administative Center was one of Saarinen's last designs. The surrounding pastoral landscape setting was designed by Stu Dawson of Sasaki Associates.
Link: John Deere & Company
Link: Eero Saarinen bio (via USNPS)
Link: Sasaki Associates
Via: Quad-City Times - "Deere’s World Headquarters is centerpiece of new exhibit"
Via: Quad-City Times - "Landscaping was dear to their hearts"
Mid-century modern home in the Lone Star state
Now this is a nice house with beautiful integration of interior and exterior spaces adapted to the local climate. The home was built in the 1957 and was recently restored and updated by Austin, Texas based Steinbomer & Associates Architects. We're not sure who designed the landscaping, but we think that it is nicely integrated with the architecture and is perfectly suited to the local environment. The project included the addition of a master bedroom and a wonderful trellised courtyard with a translucent wall facing the street.
Link: Steinbomer & Associates Architects
Landscape: John Wilder [Thanks Gregory!]
Suspended Fireplace
The Fireorb is a wood-burning suspended hearth with a 360 degree rotation field. It's fabricated by spinning steel according to a CAD-governed form. The Fireorb can be used in any space: living room, bedroom, greatroom. The dimensions of the Fireorb are 26.5" x 36.5" while the lenght of the flute can be fitted to accomodate almost any space.
[Thanks, Andrew]
Designer: Doug Garofalo, AIA
Link: Fireorb
Handles, pulls and locks design by Pierluigi Cerri
Here is a beautifully designed line of handles from Italian handle maker Valli & Valli. The design speaks for itself... very nice.
Designer: Pierluigi Cerri
Link: Valli & Valli Fusital Collection
Santiago, Chile based Architect
It is always interesting for us to "discover" to work of an architect outside of our usual sphere of influence (our sphere based from Los Angeles, California).
We recently came across the work of Chilean architect Felipe Assadi and were impressed with the quality of work produced by his five person firm. We think that his work holds its own compared with work by European and American architects with whom we are better acquainted and certainly deserves some attention.
Link: Felipe Assadi
Victoria Gardens: the illusion continues in Rancho Cucamonga
Victoria Gardens is not a ground breaking step in the evolution of malls. The idea borrows from New Urbanist concepts fused with the concepts or retail design explored by John Jerde. Similar to Jerde’s work, Victoria Gardens is, to borrow the words of Margaret Crawford, "between the commercial and the artistic, the popular and the pure, and, of course, the high and the low."
But Victoria Gardens is no City Walk, its ambitions are much less hyper-realistic, and perhaps this is what sets it apart from many other themed malls that we have seen. But the result is a somewhat duplicitous place that insists it is one thing when it is actually something else.
Link: Victoria Gardens
Reference: Downtown Mauled - Part I
Striking and simple solution by Lekker Projects
We've said it before, but we must say it again: it is the simple solutions that we often find to be the most elegant.
In this case, Lekker Projects, a small environmental design firm with offices in Shanghai and Singapore, was faced with the problem of correcting bad Feng Shui while creating a distinct signage element for the 88 Xintiandi Hotel in Shanghai. The solution was to use Chinese roof tiles (the symbol of the hotel) in an inventive way to create a simple but striking result. The form of the tiles are instantly recongnizable, but their application is inspired.
Firm: Lekker Projects
Link: 88 Xintiandi
Low-cost housing
The feature article this month at Domus highlights a group of Chilean architects and their system of designing low-cost housing.
The M7 prototype is the result of a slow process of research and development, begun in 2001 by the Chilean architects’ cooperative URO1.ORG. Its aim was to find modular construction solutions that would allow users to freely configure and construct their own small-scale architecture. The weekend home, located at Tunquén on a green plateau facing the Pacific Ocean, was used as an experiment to study a variety of possible materials and to perfect assembly methods based on extreme simplicity and practical economy.
Full article available at Domus.
Firm: URO1.org
Via: Domus (Registration Req'd)
Design and Green meet beer
Now, we always like beer... and during the holiday season we're all about "holiday cheer" if you know what we mean. So imagine how excited we were today to see TWO different blogs about beer over at our friends MoCo Loco and Treehugger. We just couldn't resist the chance to jump in with a beer blog of our own. Heck, how often do we get to talk about beer at Land+Living?!
First, MoCo shows new beer packaging by Philippe Starck for 1664, a European lager by French brewer Kronenbourg. The packaging includes a bottle in the shape of a traditional pilsner/lager glass (pssst... Harry, it's beer, not champagne), the can has a screw top and then there is, of course, a pilsner/lager glass to pour the beer into.
Next Treehugger points us to an article at Satya Magazine where Brooklyn Brewery co-founder Stephen Hindy talks about social responsibility, green design and his organically brewed Brooklyn Sustainable Porter.
YAY BEER!
Link: MoCo Loco - 1664
Link: Kronenbourg
Designer: Philippe Starck
Link: Treehugger - Brooklyn Sustainable Porter
Link: Satya Magazine - A Brewery Grows in Brooklyn
Link: Brooklyn Brewery
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
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
Textures and colors
I stumbled across the website of Nani Marquina just by chance while doing some random Google searches. Their collection features rugs and cushions (along with a pair of slippers) by several designers. However it was their rugs that caught my eye with their bold geometric shapes and aesthetic lines.
Nani Marquina's rugs are handmade with 100% New Zealand wool. Their rugs are not crafted with child labor and they are a member of Care & Fair, an organization that fights against illegal child labor in the manufacturing sector of handknotted carpets.
Link: Nani Marquina
Link: Care & Fair
Link: Mocoloco
New York Times features Allied Works project in near Sun Valley, Idaho
If you are familiar with Land+Living, you know that we can't resist modern mountain architecture, and this just leaves us begging for more.
An article by Christopher Hawthorne in the NY Times features a modern residence in Ketchum by Portland, Oregon based Allied Works. The firm's website features only one teeny-tiny image of this project, but thankfully the Times has a slideshow accompanying their article.
Allied Works managed to sneak an aggressively contemporary house into Sun Valley, where the architectural style might be called hunting-lodge chic on steroids.
Enjoy.
Firm: Allied Works Architecture
Article: NY Times - Sun Valley Surprise: Chalet So Spare
Originally posted 2/16/2005
UPDATE: Allied Works has updated their website and now offers some detailed text and amazing images of the house including sketches and models in design development, construction shots and the completed project. We've added a few images, including a reduced plan by request. Please visit Allied Works' website for much more.
Inspired by nature
Amenity Design is a Los Angeles based studio with a main goal of creating "beautiful, yet useful everyday objects of high quality that reflect the warmth and beauty of nature." The premiere line of bedroom linens consist of three different designs: Twig (featured at right), Leaf, and Drift.
Their duvets are made from 400 thread count fabric and are 100% cotton.
Update - 2/21/05: Grace over at Design*Sponge is serving up scoops, so I'd like place an order for 2 of my favorite scoops. Mmmmmmm! I promise I won't spill any on the sheets. :-)
Link: Amenity Home [Thanks, Gwen!]
Simple, yet impressive
Based on the date of our last entry in the kitchen category -- and the, *sigh*, general lack of entries -- it would appear that we've been neglecting one of our favorite rooms in the house. Well, now that we've found this wonderfull kitchen island from Time & Style, we're hoping that will change. This island features a built-in range and sink with all plumbing and gas lines built into the legs. An extendable top board is included and a pull-out counter is also available as an option. Materials include stainless steel and walnut.
Link: Time & Style
Architecture, landscapes and installations
Québec based architect Pierra Thibault designs a wide range of projects on a variety of scales. Always central to his work is an understanding of context and the dialogue between design and environment.
The interrelation of landscape, site history and cultural context allows for the development of distinctive solutions that give birth to buildings rich with meaning, atmosphere and heightened sensory awareness.
Link: Pierre Thibault, architecte
