+ The Procontra shelving system by Flo Florian and Sascha Akkermann for Confused Direction is a modular set of walnut or oak shelves that provides visual interest as well as storage.

+ The solid cast sterling silver Form Two ring from La Pisette is a representation of a sliced stone, a shape that reduces the idea of a precious gem to its simplest state.

+ Efrain Velez?s Tertulia folding chair does not make use of the typical x- or a-frame configuration, but relies on a curved geometry that can be implemented by using a variety of materials such as wood or stainless steel.

Electrolux Design Lab, established in 2003, is an annual global design competition open to undergraduate and graduate industrial design students who are invited to present innovative, daring ideas and solutions for home appliances.

I recently visited the Coalesse showroom, which just opened in Chicago's Merchandise Mart. Coalesse is, among other things, about image and craft, partnering with iconic designers and brands, creating thoughtful pieces that would look appropriate for both office and home. More interestingly however is their approach to what constitutes an office in the first place.

Technorati Tags: 6030 House, 6040 House, ecosteel, modern design, modern house, prefab house

Technorati Tags: house plans, modern design, modern house

Tom Kundig: Houses

"The form is essentially a cast-in-place concrete box, intended to be a strong yet neutral background that provides complete flexibility to adapt the space at will." - OSKA site

Amidst the exciting of athletic accomplishments at this year’s summer Olympics, a significant achievement for sustainable design was recognized as well. Last week, on Wednesday, August 13, U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson presented Chinese officials with a Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Gold award for the 2008 Olympic village. The world-class development boasts a variety of sustainable features including solar panels, green roofs, and an extensive rainwater recycling system.

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I get regularly asked by people from outside the design (management) community what can design actually do for them and their business. My spontaneous answer for sure is: A lot! - However the tricky part begins right after when it comes to explaining why and how ;-)

Therefore as part of my design management lecturing activities and inspired by Roger Martin’s thinking I try to give my audiences an answer to the question above by starting with a broader illustration what makes Design (Thinking) different from Business (Thinking). Wait, wait this is not a question of black/white, right/wrong, better/worse, but rather an issue of ‘context’ in which problems occur.

Without going into details here I do start my workshops by presenting my audiences different approaches on how to perceive and understand problems on a general scale. From this level at the two ends of a spectrum you can perceive a problem as something that has one, single solution (a Puzzle) while at the other side problems are paradoxes with multiple possible options. The tendency to see problems as puzzles is more likely to be found in business schools while designers somehow unconsciously accept paradoxes as a natural part of their problem solving process.

While this might sound reasonable on paper audiences are indeed interested to see what ‘overcoming paradoxes’ means in terms of design solutions. Well not surprisingly I do show some great everyday examples (no iPhones, iPods, etc. ;-) like for example Orikaso tableware. Fortunately over at Core77 today I’ve found another great YouTube video that shows what you can do with design as a tool to solve paradoxes. Watching this reminds me on how puzzle driven I am too often ;-) Simplicity rules!

• Select building materials or products for permanent installation on the project that have been harvested or manufactured in California or within 500 miles of the project site.
  
• Select bio-based building materials and products made from solid wood, engineered wood, bamboo, wool, cotton, cork, straw, natural fibers, products made from crops (soy-based, corn-based) and other bio-based materials with at least 50% bio-based content.
  
• Employ wood-based materials and products comprising at least 50% of a major building component, such as framing, flooring, or millwork, which are certified by one of five listed sustainably harvested certification programs.
  
• Use materials made from plants harvested within a ten-year cycle for at least 2.5% of total materials value, based on estimated cost.
  
• Use salvaged, refurbished, refinished, or reused materials for a minimum of 5% of the total value, based on estimated cost of materials on the project.
  
• Use materials, equivalent in performance to virgin materials, with post-consumer or preconsumer recycled content value (RCV) for a minimum of 10% of the total value, based on estimated cost of materials on the project.
  
• Use cement and concrete made with recycled products, fly ash, raw or calcined natural pozzolan, blast furnace slag (as a lightweight aggregate) .
  
• Select materials for longevity and minimal deterioration under conditions of use.
  
• Select materials that require little, if any, finishing.
  
• Select materials that can be re-used or recycled at the end of their service life in the project.
  
• Select materials assemblies based on life cycle assessment of their embodied energy and/or green house gas emission potentials.

• If feasible, disassemble existing buildings instead of demolishing to allow reuse or recycling of building materials.
  
• Utilize a Frost-Protected Shallow Foundation.
  
• Use pre-manufactured floor and roof systems to eliminate solid sawn lumber whenever possible.

• CA Boom Home Tours
• Behind the scenes at CA Boom

• Photo Essay: CA Boom V

• In California, Eclecticism Rules

• Kanner Residence | Kanner Architects
  (we were there back at CA Boom 2... just had to say that)
• Felderman Keatinge Residence
• Alan-Voo House | Neil M. Denari
• Red Barn House (for sale with questionable use of "stone")
• House of Sand | lee + mundwiler architects (another one for sale?)
• Modern-Shed on the Prefab Floor | Modern Shed (for sale signs galore!)

DO Research - A favorite Minneapolis-based modernist blog
rosenlof/lucas - the hippest modern landscaping duo going, with a cool blog to boot
Alchemy Architects - you cannot resist the appeal of their weeHouses
Flatpak - I drool over these Eamesish beauties
City Desk Studio - recently in Dwell, awesome Skyway Retreat
Bark Design - I'm in love with Doris
Hive Modular - The B-Line is an instant classic modern prefab

Innovative ways of applying mobile devices give audience worldwide unique perspectives of the event.

Trend Description:

Not being able to launch 3G does not mean this year’s Olympics keeps  the hottest mobile media outside China. A bunch of companies are rolling out their mobile applications for the Games, which, if not becoming popular right away, carry profound meanings for world-level events later on.

Cases:

Twitter’s #080808 Campaign

Twitter’s campaign (pronounced tag 080808) is chalking up good result since the opening ceremony on August 8, 2008. Initiated only two days before the opening of the Games, it claims about 5000 entries coming in on the big day and is updated with an average rate of 1 piece every 0.2 seconds. A secret of its success is the easy way to press the keys of “0? and “8? on mobile phones. No matter who are you are and where you are, as long as you think or experience something related to the Olympics, you can tweet a couple of words starting with�#080808?.

Lenovo Olympics 2008 Application

Levono, one of the top sponsors of the Beijing Games and the official PC provider is NOT gonna lag behind those mobile savvy in playing with new technology. It lined up with Zumobi and rolled out the Lenovo Olympic 2008 Application, with which users of microsoft mobile, blackberries and iPhone can follow up the latest sports news, images and comments during the Olympics. It also contains blog posts selected ramdonly from anonymous athletes and is powered by ads of Lenovo and Intel.

Qik:

Located in California, Qik is a video-sharing company that allows Qikkers to stream their mobile captures directly to the website. Users have access to the service when they buy mobile phones installed with the software and will save money if they have signed up for unlimited data plans. Qik is now encouraging its users to send back footages taken on-the-spot of the Games. It will be  a great fun for journalists and spectators who use proper telephone plans to point their mobile phones directly to what they are experiencing. Check up the Qikker’s footage of the opening ceremony here.

Trend Potential:

Given the fact that 3G is still to come in China, there is no sweeping success for any mobile application in the Beijing Games so far. However, the experience drawn here and business models initiated will remain good cases for later studies.

For the original post and the latest reviews on other Chinese trends please visit our CScout China blog.

If last week’s Transportation Tuesday article on the world’s smallest solar vehicle wasn’t your cup of tea (after all solar is so last year), then hopefully this week’s entry will be more to your taste. The Hydrocar is a pint-sized vehicle that is powered entirely by a hydrogen fuel cell. It would make an excellent office racer or a fun educational vehicle for children - check out it’s kid-friendly angle over at inhabitots!

Smart Toy Hydrocar at Inhabitots >

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Technorati Tags: house plans, L House, modern design, modern house

What a fabulous study in recycling and reclamation. America is dotted with old barns, full of big hardwood timbers you can only buy at very high prices today. I really enjoy seeing someone make good use of these materials. There's an old barn not too far from where I live and every time I pass by it I look at those heavy oak beams and think "hmmm ... what if." Ben and his family have taken that idea to reality, and with a modernist twist.

Ben's site is really great. He does a wonderful job telling the story of what it's like to take on a project like this. He has lot of thoughtful posts about the nature of the project and some of the choices they've made, as well as the inspiration behind it. And besides seeing pics of the house's progress you'll also find video as well as great links to barn home resources.

Ben and his family should be in before year end. I know I'll be following along on Ben's site, watching as things progress. I can't wait to see the finished home!

By the way, Ben is working with JASONOAH Design Build on this project. The firm does some really unique and interesting work. Their theme is "designing and building for healthy, inspirational living." You can't beat that. Very nice. It's awesome to see yet another firm promoting great green design. Definitely check their site, especially their Chatham House. Really nice.

Image credits - Bare Hill Barn House site and JASONOAH Design Build for elevations and renderings (copyright).

Hello and big ups to those of you who have followed along to my rambling this week. Thanks Grace for the opportunity — i love how D*S has created a network of people who make things, arrange things, recover things, collect things, etc. Sometimes I refer to my “internet friends,” and I’ve made many of them through this site and links from this site. I also have realized that I should use the phrase “internet friends” sparingly.

One last thing I’ll leave you with:

Casey Rubber Stamps. Its a shop in the East Village run by a man named Jon Casey. Finding him a few years back was a windfall for us…with his help we got all the rubber stamps that led to our package re-design. He has a catalog with hundreds of unusual drawings that can be made into rubber stamps. He also creates custom rubber stamps with your own ink drawings. I love visiting him, he always has the best stories about bar fights, Ireland, and general shenanigans. (In fact… if or when you go, be sure to ask him about the Mercedes that was lost in the woods.)

Events previously shrouded in formal procedures are being replaced by semi-rehearsed, impromptu interventions that rely on audience participation.

Trend Description

New forms of entertainment are challenging traditional notions of what being an audience member involves. Static seating, ticketing, start times, staging, linear plots, perfectly rehearsed performances and passive audiences are all concepts that new entertainment companies are breaking down.

Audience reward comes in the form of more engaging, personalised and unique performances. As a conference format, this style is guaranteed to keep participants awake and engaged with proceedings. The audience is also kept happy in the knowledge that if they stop enjoying proceedings at any point, they can always leave to find something in the building that they do appreciate.

Cases

Shine Unconference

The content of this London conference is created by its participants, who are signing up to contribute to the program less than two weeks before it starts. Instead of a formal program, attendees are simply encouraged to walk through the space, getting involved with interesting discussions and presentations as they happen. The rough-and-ready Bargehouse space, with its trendy bare brick walls and peeling wallpaper, suits the style of the event to a tee.

Shunt

Every week, a different artist curates Shunt, a bar and performance space under the railway arches at London Bridge. Gigs, dance, performance art and activities such as cupcake decorating sessions can be found as users wander around the space. Some pieces are presented as works in progress, adding to the sense of impromptu entertainment.

Punch Drunk

Punch Drunk is a theatre company that transforms entire five-storey buildings into performance spaces containing forests, feasting halls, dungeons and churches. The audience dons masks and is encouraged to explore the space: perhaps discovering the elaborate sets alone or following a particular actor as they move through the building. Sections of the performance happen simultaneously around the building: no one gets to see all aspects, but this makes every experience unique.

Trend Impact

Audiences are beginning to value substance and engagement over presentation. Gig spaces may soon be expected to have numerous performances and activities happening in the same building at one time, ranging from bands to circus acts to arts and crafts sessions. Customers may also expect to get more involved with their experiences: for example, value could be created by inviting restaurant-goers into the kitchen to create their own sauce for their meal. This trend also means that attendance no longer guarantees presence: if something doesn’t interest your audience, they won’t feel compelled to stick around.

Technorati Tags: house plans, modern design, modern house

Have you ever had the feeling that somebody is watching you? Well, you can definitely get that feeling with these lamps by a French Design Group called 5.5 Designers. These designers are into object cloning which to no one’s surprise was inspired by medical cloning technology. They offer a custom lamp service where they make eyeball lamps based on YOUR eyes. Yes, they clone your eyes! Or to put it in medical terms, you become the “donor”.

What you have to do is fill in a form which is available on their website, indicate which is the predominant eye color and submit a close-up picture of your or someone else’s eyes. The lamps which mirror your eyes are then made to order by glassblower, Livio Serena. The lamps will watch over you or watch over somebody else’s shoulders and totally creep them out! - Via

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Cloned Eyeball Lamps To Watch Over You

Technorati Tags: 6030 House, 6040 House, ecosteel, modern design, modern house

We often cover alternative cars and other vehicles for Transportation Tuesday, and while they are making advances for their respective industries, they still require some type of fuel and are resource intensive in their production, which brings their sustainability into question. So when we can feature a truly sustainable transportation alternative, we jump at the chance. Enter the Dry Leaf skateboard by Lets Evo, a sweet eco-ride that is almost entirely constructed from sustainable materials and socially responsible labor practices.

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