Hasta La Ideas

Send your friend a Pigeon Post. Hilarious!Place your message in the supplied pouch, put the stamps o..(Read…)

“Big Waffles,” a 2010 painting by Mary Ellen Johnson

Lately Larry Gagosian has been the subject of even more media scrutiny than usual, fueled by assorted lawsuits (Ronald Perelman, Jan Cowles) and high-profile artist defections (Damien Hirst, Yayoi Kusama). New York magazine accompanied Eric Konigsberg‘s investigative profile with a photo-illustration (by hitandrun) that attempted to depict the uberdealer as Hirst’s famous diamond-studded skull, although it succeeded only in evoking Jambi the Genie. Well, meka leka hi meka hiney ho, haters, because Gagosian has something delicious up his well-tailored sleeve. Never underestimate a man who knows the power of waffles.

In March-ish (our best guess after peeking into the construction site earlier today), Gagosian will open a restaurant downstairs from his Upper East Side gallery. Designed by Annabelle Selldorf, the eatery will be managed by nearby Sant Ambroeus, so fingers crossed that they bring on Mucca to mastermind the menu design. There will be waffles–and wine, and chili, and fun!–as Gagosian revealed in an interview with Peter Brant that appeared in the December 2012/January 2013 issue of Interview:

It will be a neighborhood restaurant. Bill Acquavella already reserved a table. He was one of the first to say, “I want to have my own table.” So that’s good news. We’re going to try to have it be a destination for people who like wine and try to get wine companies to bring us special wines. We’re going to have international cuisine. We’re going to have waffles for breakfast because I love the waffles at the Beverly Hills Hotel. I put some things on the menu that you can’t get in every restaurant, things that I like. I love chili, so we’ll have a good chili. We’ll have a couple of Armenian dishes. But we’re going to have fun with it. I could have done a menu by consensus, but so many people were telling me what to do that I finally said, “Screw it. This is what I want.” I just want to be able to go down there and have a good time and be able to entertain my friends.

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Image by Reuters, via SMH

Cycling has long been regarded as a sustainable alternative to fossil fuel-based modes of transportation, but in rapidly modernizing Chinese cities, the boom in the latter has discouraged the prevalence of the former. Beijing, for one, is notorious for its poor air quality, which typically hovers at the threshold of being a full-fledged public health hazard. Hence, a Chinese millionaire is now hawking canned air at 5RMB (80¢) a pop¹ in a highly publicized campaign to raise awareness about the oppressive atmosphere of the capital city (so to speak).²

Yet the bicycle remains an inexpensive, efficient and altogether practical option for many of the city’s 20 million residents, perhaps now more than ever before, considering that automobiles clog major thoroughfares around the clock (lest we forget the infamous ten-day traffic jam from last August). Beijing-based artist Matt Hope has come up with a clever solution: he’s rigged up a homemade 5,000V air filter to his bicycle, and it’s pretty rad:

(more…)

The “Oktopus” toilet plunger is a concept designed by Art. Lebedev Studio."“O..(Read…)

Italian studio Park Associati has overhauled a 1960s office block in Milan and added new glass and burnished aluminium facades (+ slideshow).

The six-storey Palazzo Campari block was recently purchased by financial services firm Morgan Stanley, who wanted to adapt the fifty-year-old building and bring it up to modern standards. “The client wanted to turn a very inefficient building, very expensive to maintain, into a very efficent building,” the architects told Dezeen.

Park Associati re-planned the building with a more flexible layout by rationalising routes through the building and opening up the ground floor to accommodate additional uses.

“The aim of the new scheme is to provide a maximum level of flexibility in terms of the division of the internal spaces, with a sense of uniformity given by the system of the internal lighting and improved access and circulation,” said the architects.

The original facades were replaced to create a more energy-efficient envelope. Along Via Turati the new elevations feature perforated and pressed aluminium panels that are back-lit by night, while the walls along Via Cavalieri are dominated by glazing.

A landscaped courtyard is still concealed at the heart of the building and has been reworked with strips of planting and circular paving patterns.

Other recently compelted office renovations include a 1950s office in Hamburg adapted by J. Mayer H. and an updated Art Deco building in London by David Adjaye.

See more office architecture »

Photography is by Andrea Martiradonna.

Here’s some more information from Park Associati:

Building refurbishment for “La Serenissima” offices
Via Turati, Milano

The building known as “Palazzo Campari” was designed in the 1960s by Ermenegildo and Eugenio Soncini in the heart of Milan and was one of a series of buildings that emerged during the economic boom years, representing a new aspect of corporate identity for Italian industry. It was originally characterised by the burnished colour of the metal structure of the facade, tinted glass of the curtain walling and the brown metallic paint used for the smaller block in via Cavalieri given over to residential use.

When it was built, it was considered to be modern and technologically advanced, even experimental. Today however, many of its undeniably attractive aspects have become outdated with regards to current standards of building construction. For this reason the new owner, aware of its quality and evocative presence, decided to bring in architects to redesign the complex.

With respect to the original layout, the aim of the new scheme was to provide a maximum level of flexibility in terms of the division of the internal spaces with sense of uniformity also given by the system of the internal lighting and improved access and circulation.

Other elements central to the design were the use of additional space at ground floor level as well as an overall reworking of the structure of the elevations, made much more open and vibrant especially on via Turati and part of via Cavalieri.

With the elevations pulled back with respect to the original boundary it has been possible to eliminate cold bridging – at the time not considered – the useful floor area has been shifted allowing new spaces to be built at ground level, now given over to tertiary use.

The landscaped courtyard meanwhile, the heart of the original scheme, has been retained and reworked into a bright new design.

The new elevations are the main feature of the design. On via Turati boxes in perforated and press-formed aluminium in a burnished colour (lit up at night) are used in a rhythm that enables the elevation to be reworked also to ensure maximum flexibility in terms of the division of the internal spaces.

In the courtyard a close relationship has been created between the interior and exterior; on via Cavalieri the original lower elevation that is in direct relation with the nearby Cà Brutta, appears sleek and flat, with predominant use of grey for the glazed surfaces, smooth and reflecting its historic surroundings.

Client: Morgan Stanley Sgr S.p.A.
Location: Via Turati 25-27, Via Cavalieri 4, Milano
Schedule: 2008 – concorso, 2008 – 2010 Progettazione, 2010 – 2012 Cantiere
Gross Floor Area: Slp 7988.84 mq
Construction Cost: 11.000.000 Euro
Architect: Park Associati (Filippo Pagliani, Michele Rossi)

Project Team: Marco Panzeri, Project Manager, Alice Cuteri, Andrea Dalpasso, Marinella Ferrari, Stefano Lanotte, Marco Siciliano, Paolo Uboldi, Fabio Calciati (rendering)
Site supervision, Structural, Mechanical and Electrical Engineering: General Planning
Design Team: Giovanni Bonini, Loris Colombo, Walter Cola, Luca Dagrada, Franco Pesci, Paolo Rossanigo, Roberto Villa, Luigi Zinco

Artistic Site Supervision: Park Associati, Arch. Marco Panzeri
Project Management: ECHarris Built Asset Consultancy
Landscape Project: Marco Bay Architetto
General Contractor: Mangiavacchi e Pedercini S.p.A.

Above: ground floor plan – click above for larger image and key

The post La Serenissima office refurbishment
by Park Associati appeared first on Dezeen.