If light is „the prime animator of space“, the most essential determinant in articulating the experience of design, than Stefan Wieland‘s lamps appear to challenge that hierarchy. Part of a larger collection of objects designed by the Frankfurt-based artist, these suspended lighting fixtures seek to overtake the senses and dominate the room. Spontaneous and deliberate at the same time, they have an almost synesthetic affect: they make you smell colors and taste sounds. Even the curious names of the lamps – Dark Kisses Melt Smoothly, The White of My Eyes, etc.- entail an abundance of tactile and visual associations describing an imagery that draws from emotions and senses, rather than ideas. Fragmented plates embrace the light in a sensuous movement that feels uninhibited. The luminaires are but moments captured in a perpetual child-like play, an act of improvisation freed from the imperative of making a definite design. Read the rest of this entry »

Cell Cloud Installation, designed by Helbert Suarez and Remi Melander and manufactured by Barcelona-based System Design Studio, was exhibited at the 2012 Tent London. It is a modular divisional wall, suspended in the air, transformed into a 3 dimensional honeycomb structure that combines digital fabrication with organic geometry.

Description from the designers:

Cell Cloud is a formation of the random and organic geometry of the patterns of “marine clouds,” a structure shaped like honeycomb. Similar patterns are observed in flocks of birds, the growth of crystals, social networks and many ecosystems.

Using technologies of digital fabrication, two structures are created that seem to float, suspended as clouds. These are formed by inter connecting modules. As one moves around the structure, the perception of the cloud changes, recreating it from two-dimensional to three-dimensional, according to the position of the observer.

Designer: Helbert Suarez & Remi Melander (Spain)
Manufacturer: System Design Studio (Spain)
Material: polypropylene
Colors: blue hues Read the rest of this entry »

An innovative outdoor sculpture at Washington University School of Architecture: This is a class project with mixed media (plywood and plastic), under the direction of Joe MacDonald of Urban A&O. It is an organic shape of concave shapes that play with light and shadows.

Designed, fabricated and assembled by Zephyr Anthony, Andrew Davis, Kyle Fant, Xiaoshuang Hu, Allyson Justmann, Andrew McCready, Kelly Peoples, Xiaofei Ren, Bo Sheng, Jordan Smith, Benjamin Stephenson, Duo Yu, Thomas Watkins.

This research and design studio focused on parametric explorations or reticulation: division, marking, and assembly with the intention of forming programmatic and structural networks. They were seeking creative architectural solutions based on material properties, formal geometry and the spatial implications of a full scale installation. Students worked as a team when they approached the fabrication component of the studio. Read the rest of this entry »

Time Tension Wood is a construction system design by Taylor Gilbert based on a technique used by the Native American Indians for making bows. By applying consistent tension to freshly cut wood, the wood will slowly and gradually bend as it dries. Once the wood is dry after 3-5 months, the structure is permanent, and the ropes can be removed.

The system consists of brass brackets and ropes with a simple tension mechanism that are used to easily connect and manipulate freshly cut wooden poles. These components can be used to make a variety of objects and structures from a coat rack and tabletop supports to space dividers and small-scale architecture. Since this method relies on the natural properties of the wood in a slow process, there is no need for steam, heat, or any special equipment. Almost any kind of wood can be used, so the majority of the material can be sourced locally. Read the rest of this entry »

Using mathematical trigonometric functions as an aesthetic device, Loop_3 installation is a topologically differentiated territory of force fields. With the curvature being its main structural and expressive element, the installation explores the rationality of complex shapes. The project was designed and realized by Loop_3 design team, a group of students of the Faculty of Engineering, Università di Bologna, for the 1^st Architectural Biennale of Thessaloniki, entitled “Architecture and the City in South-Eastern Europe”.

Relying the immanent mathematical nature of disciplines such as art, economy, philosophy and others, the installation uses mathematics for tracing systemic paths that create their own expressive language. Read the rest of this entry »

The pavilion designed by Ramboll Computational Design is based on a form-found surface based on a mathematical idealisation of the traditional Antoni Gaudi or Frei Otto approach but modified to a more realistic form using our original research. The shell is discretised into a planar three-valence mesh using an innovative algorithm, thereby allowing the free form surface to be constructed with flat panels. These panels are connected with custom made stainless steel hinges and the structure works as a fully pinned structure with no bending capacity between the panels. The structure is designed to withstand accidental loads, self-weight and additional dead loads, such as lighting fixtures. Edge stiffeners resist buckling of the free edges. Read the rest of this entry »

Designed and built in collaboration between Chalmers University of Technology and Röhsska Museum of Design in Copenhagen, the Archipelago Pavilion is a network of seating structures that inhabits the cortyard in front of the Museum. The structure provides shaded seating inside and creates shaded spaces around it to place existing chairs and tables. The structure was built on site by 33 architecture students.

The pavilion was parametrically designed in Grasshopper and Rhino and built from 2 mm thick laser-cut steel sheets. Exactly 133 pieces of steel were joint together with 1535 joints with a total of 3640 bolts holding it together. Inside the pavilion visitors can lie comfortably on the surface, thanks to the steel’s possibility to stay cool when shaded. The intricate web of spaces resembles clusters of small islands in an archipelago. The perforation on the roof spreads out an organic pattern resembling the one you would see from a tree in the forest. Read the rest of this entry »

The Crush Collection, designed by Fredrikson Stallard, features a series of  low tables and chaises inspired by the sensuous form of crumpled metal sheet. These include an extended chaise created from black painted steel rods and upholstered in a sleek ultra-suede skin; glass unit tables containing polished metal sheet in black, gold and silver which creates tantalizing reflections of the surrounding space; and low tables draped with a sheet of polished metal that spills luxuriously on to the floor. Read the rest of this entry »

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The building was designed by MAD Architects, as proposal for the international competition for the future National Art Museum of China in Bejing. Their concept is based on an elevated public square which is protected by a floating mega volume above.

The original structure of the National Art Museum of China (NAMOC) built in 1962, houses one of the country’s largest art collections and has played host to some of the influential exhibitions as recorded in contemporary Chinese history. The current plans are to move the institution into a new building, situated within a designated ‘art district’ on the central axis of the 2008 Olympic site. Read the rest of this entry »