Y House by TOFU

Y House by TOFU

Here’s another house by Osaka studio TOFU Architects (see their N House in our earlier story), this time located in Fukui, Japan, and completely wrapped in a material normally used for roofing. 

Y House by TOFU

Called Y House, the tall narrow building has a sloping roof and staggered façade clad in an aluminium-zinc alloy.

Y House by TOFU

There are three storeys at the front of the house but the sloping roof means there are only two floors at the rear of the building.

Y House by TOFU

The living space is located on the second floor, with a large window providing views of the surrounding fields and mountains.

Y House by TOFU

The spare room sits in the eaves at the very top of the house, with a little glazed section in the middle of its floor, allowing views into the level below.

Y House by TOFU

Photographs are by Dan Imai.

Y House by TOFU

All our stories on Japanese houses on Dezeen »

Y House by TOFU

More residential architecture on Dezeen »

Y House by TOFU

Here’s some more information from the architects:


Y-HOUSE

This is small house for the young couple in Obama, Fukui, Japan. There is a vacant lot around the site.

Y House by TOFU

So, by creating a large window on the second floor, it is possible to see paddy fields, mountains, sky and feel to spread over a floor area.

Y House by TOFU

This plan has high ceilings and large living with cross sections of two small rooms. By the relationship between great room and small room, we created many different places in the small house.

Y House by TOFU

Click above for larger image

The house is wrapped with galvalume, the black masses standing quietly in vacant lot are familiar with the countryside.

Y House by TOFU

Click above for larger image

Architects: TOFU
Location: Obama,Fukui,Japan
Project Architect: Fumiya Ogawa+Tomonobu Higashino

Y House by TOFU

Click above for larger image
Site Area: 253.24 sqm
Project Area: 80.46 sqm
Project Year: 2010


See also:

.

N House by
TOFU
Long Tall House by
Spacespace
Fiscavaig Project by
Rural Design

Black & Grey Tattoo

Our interview with ink doyenne Marisa Kakoulas on her grayscale tattoo magnum opus

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Originating on the streets and in prisons, tattooing’s shades-of-gray genre initially often told the stories of tribal affiliations and conquests or were homages to the deceased. Methods of inking spanned readily available tools and homemade machines could be as random as “a guitar string, cassette motor, Bic pen tube and India Ink,” explains Marisa Kakoulas, co-author of the heavyweight book on the subject “Black & Grey Tattoo“.

The three-volume tome explores how the artform evolved in technique, materials and popularity, as well as how scale and scrutiny increased with time. Released several months ago, the box-set took a year to put together, which Kakoulas says was mostly spent “researching artists and attending international tattoo conventions,” a process that was “exhausting but lots of fun.”

We asked Kakoulas—who also founded the tattoo blog Needles and Sins—to lend a little more insight into the style she describes as “art that has a buttery shading on the skin that can appear almost organic on the body.”

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What schools of Black & Grey tattoo exist today?

There are various sub-genres of the Black & Grey style, and we rather unscientifically broke down the material we collected into three volumes: “Traditional Black & Grey,” “Dark/Horror” and “Realism.” It’s not a particularly easy division as there’s cross-pollination among them. The reason we divided it this way is to show how tattoos with similar stylistic elements are interpreted differently by artists around the world.

The first volume, “Traditional Black & Grey,” is somewhat of a misnomer as it’s simply called “Black & Grey” in the tattoo community. But now that greyscale tattooing has moved in different artistic directions, the “traditional” label is used to set it apart from its offshoots. It’s been referred to as “LA style” as many credit the city as the birthplace of the style as an art form. It’s other street name has been “fineline” or “single needle” because a sole ink-dipped tip is used to create anything from three small dots ([signifying] “Mi Vida Loca”) to full back pieces of religious iconography. And there is indeed a lot of Christian imagery among these tattoos. Jack Rudy is one of the godfathers of this style who, with his mentor Good Time Charlie, refined black and grey and brought it to a higher level of artistry.

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“Dark/Horror” delves into personal demons relayed on skin. “Paul Booth“, the “Dark Lord of Tattooing,” is considered one of the great masters of this style. An interview with Paul is featured in this volume, and in it he discusses why people get these tattoos as well as how his own demons have driven his art. Other tattoos here pay homage to horror in pop culture—everything from Frankensteins to even famous tattoo artists (including Paul himself) rendered as zombies.

“Photorealism” encapsulates work that takes photorealistic art and translates it on the body. While the other volumes also feature realism, this chapter concentrates on portraiture, scenery, and even fantastical images rendered in true-to-life tableaux. This style of tattooing has really invigorated the tattoo community with the possibilities of mastering a difficult art on a difficult canvas.

What other projects are you working on?

My next project for Edition Reuss is another large-format hardcover on comic and cartoon tattoos, and the work we’re amassing now is wild. A lot of art that looks like it was ripped from a child’s nightmare, plus tons of sexy cheesecake illustrative work. Very trippy. That will be available Spring 2011.

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I’d also like to express my gratitude to all the superb artists and collectors in these books. The work is part of a collective mission to present tattoo as a fine art, in the most artful way. I’d also like to say, on behalf of this tattoo collective that, “Yes, we have a good idea of what we’ll look like when we’re old and wrinkly—and we’re okay with that.”

Co-authored by Kakoulas and Edgar Hoill, “Black & Grey Tattoo” sells online from Edition Reuss either as individual volumes (€98 each) or as one massive collection for €248. In the U.S. the book is available directly from the author (contact marisa [at] needlesandsins [dot] com) for $350 including shipping.


IKA Trailer

Découverte du trailer de ce film d’animation “IKA”, réalisé seul par un ancien étudiant de Supinfocom Romain Jouandeau. IKA est un jeune orphelin livré à lui même qui va affronter ses démons et ses peurs à travers un voyage initiatique. Une bande son réalisée par Mario Sogno.



ika1

Previously on Fubiz

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The Google Art Project Launches

This morning Google launched the Art Project. Basically the search giant brought their street view technology into museums around the globe, allowing you to walk around the museums, zoom in on artworks and discover the various environments as if you were actually there. Talking about making use of their technology in a proper way.  Check out Google Art Project here.

499 – Clapham Common, Ground Zero of the Saints


Long gone are the days when Clapham was a small, rustic village well beyond the gates of medieval London. Also gone, but less long, is the era of Clapham as a fancy suburb fashionable with the upper classes, whose rows of mansions skirted the windy expanse of Clapham Common. We’re talking late …

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NYIGF 2011 :: Menu A/S

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At this year’s New York International Gift Fair there was the typical mix of the good, bad and the ugly. A standout from the Accent on Design section of the fair this year was Menu A/S, a Danish homewares design company that was founded in 1979 to supply steel products to the catering industry. Since then, Menu has collaborated with an impressive group of Scandinavian and international designers to produce highly functional and beautifully designed tools for living. This season, the brand introduced some great pieces to help you transition from Winter to Spring.

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The Glass Kettle Teapot, designed by Norm Architects, can be placed directly on your stovetop and includes a retractable tea egg attached by a silicon “string” that is built into the cap of the kettle. Once your tea is steeped to your liking, simply pull the string and the tea egg secures to the top of the kettle — minimizing post-steeping drips and mess.

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Ant Farm Inventor Milton Levine Dies at 97

Sad news for those who enjoy living vicariously through arthropods. Ant farm mogul Milton M. Levine (of the Uncle Milton’s Ant Farm Levines) died last month at the age of 97, but not before selling his burgeoning scientific toys companyracing tarantulas, anyone?—to private equity firm Transom Capital for $20 million or so, which happens to be about a dollar for every Ant Farm ever sold. Treat yourself to Dennis Hevesi‘s splendid New York Times obituary of the industrious Levine, who came up with the idea for an Ant Farm after spotting a mound of ants during a Fourth of July picnic in 1956. “We should make an antarium,” he told his his brother-in-law and business partner, E. J. Cossman. And so they did. The new product, complete with farmhouse, windmill, and rarely used bridge, sold briskly, but the business wasn’t without its pitfalls, explains Hevesi:

…the plastic cases arrived uninhabited. A coupon had to be mailed back to the company so that a vial containing 25 worker ants could arrive several weeks later. Because federal law prohibited shipments of queen ants across state lines, no mating ensued on the farms, so another vial of ants had to be ordered within several months—unless the owner dug some up outside.

Now they tell us! (We accused more than one young Ant Farmer of animal neglect.) Meanwhile, the urban-themed upsell was also a struggle for Uncle Milton Industries. “For maturing ant farmers, the company later introduced ‘Executive Antropolis,’ a mahogany-framed farm-cum-desk-set with a black and gold Manhattan skyline,” writes Hevesi. “It never sold as well as the original models.”

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Google Art Project: Best Art Project Ever?

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I’ve always wanted to see Botticelli’s Birth of Venus in person at the Uffizi Gallery in Florence and now, thanks to Google, I can. Launched today, Google Art Project is like a google maps tour of the inside of 17 of the world’s most respected museums including the Tate Britain (London), State Hermitage (St. Petersburg), Palace of Versailles and hometown favorites the Metropolitan Musuem and the Museum of Modern Art. Each museum allows navigation through specific galleries through interactive floorplans. There is even a piece of work available as a 1GB download for each museum. In the example below, the detail view of Chris Ofili’s No Woman No Cry is accompanied by the backstory about working with the artist.

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Space Lego Smiley Helmet Cufflinks

Literally wear Lego love on your sleeve with spaceman head cufflinks

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For the dapper dork Etsy seller Gr0gimann‘s Space Lego Smiley Helmet cufflinks are a way to subtly show off your inner fanboy. Taking a pressed button-down to another galaxy and sure to spark a conversation or two, these cute, happy explorers are made from authentic plastic Lego spaceman heads affixed to silver-plated hardware.

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Available in five colors, each set comes with a drawstring gift bag and proceeds help Gr0glmann “pay for school.” You can snag a pair from the seller’s Etsy shop or Nuji for $17 a pair.


N House by TOFU

N House by TOFU

This cedar-panelled box in Shiga, Japan, is a family house by Japanese studio TOFU architects.

N House by TOFU

Called N House, the exterior is clad in cedar panels in three different shades.

N House by TOFU

A second-floor terrace has been created by cutting out a cube-shaped portion from the volume.

N House by TOFU

The traditional layout of a family house has been reversed, with the bedrooms and bathrooms arranged on the ground floor, while the living spaces and an extra bedroom are on the second.

N House by TOFU

Photographs are by Yohei Sasakura.

N House by TOFU

More Japanese houses on Dezeen »

N House by TOFU

More residential architecture on Dezeen »

N House by TOFU

The following informations if from the architects:


N-HOUSE

This residence is located in villa subdivision areas in Otsu, Shiga, Japan.

N House by TOFU

There are  rich natural environments with Lake Biwa in thesoutheast and Mount Hira in the northwest,so in the first stage,we have decided to use cedar panels as exterior materials.

N House by TOFU

The exterior wall is colored with three colors and attached gradation patterns,therefore the abstract wood texture comes and gives us a massive impression.

N House by TOFU

As Forest side,we have arranged a semi-outdoor terrace inside,so that there could have an coherent exterior space.

N House by TOFU

Also in the living room, we observed the sky and forests around it and we have made graceful sunlights come in various directions through the windows.

N House by TOFU

Click above for larger image

Architects: TOFU
Location: Otsu, Shiga, Japan
Project Architect: Fumiya Ogawa+Tomonobu Higashino
N House by TOFU

Click above for larger image

Site Area: 240.01 sqm
Project Area: 107.23 sqm
Project Year: 2010


See also:

.

V21K07 by
Pasel Kuenzel Architects
Casa 205 by
H Arquitectes
Ogaki House by Katsutoshi Sasaki + Associates