Let’s say you’re lost in the wilderness, exhausted from a mountain excursion, about to freeze your a$$ off in the snow. What would be better than happening upon a warm, cozy shelter to protect you from the elements? How about one that’s architecturally AWESOME. That’s precisely what the Huba shelter is- a life-saving sanctuary designed with an entirely new style we’re dubbing “alpine chic.” Check out the interior!
The concept, designed as an independent eco-friendly energy system, aims to improve the development of mountain tourism regions, upsizing their infrastructure while promoting the use of renewable energy. It benefits from natural water and wind resources in the mountain climate, harnessing the energy to power a heater, lighting and pump for showering with collected rain water. The modular design is compact and light enough to be air lifted to remote regions and is composed entirely of recycled plastics and fragments of wind-fallen trees. Inside are two hanging beds (hidden in the walls) and a washbasin. The dynamic character of the interior is created by many intersecting planes and no right angles. Small windows running throughout the entire building break up the walls with narrow streams of light. Frosted glass provides privacy inside and allows users to feel comfortable. LED lights at the ceiling provide illumination after sundown. Better yet, the entire system is mapped in an online app for easy access. Users can even book online for an overnight stay!
Designers: Michal Holcer & Malgorzata Blachnicka
– Yanko Design Timeless Designs – Explore wonderful concepts from around the world! Shop CKIE – We are more than just concepts. See what’s hot at the CKIE store by Yanko Design! (Alpine Chic Shelter was originally posted on Yanko Design)
Forget the iPhone 5S! We’re so excited about this design (and the fact that it’s almost available) that we can barely breathe! TableConnect literally makes your iPhone or iPad about the size of a full grown man. With full multitouch capability, you can access all your apps, photos, videos, movies and more with the swipe of a finger (or even a full hand). Hit the jump to see it in action!
– Yanko Design Timeless Designs – Explore wonderful concepts from around the world! Shop CKIE – We are more than just concepts. See what’s hot at the CKIE store by Yanko Design! (iphone for GIANTS! was originally posted on Yanko Design)
Complex wooden lattices provide a stage set for archery competitions and boxing matches at this pair of university buildings in Tokyo by Japanese studio FT Architects (+ slideshow).
Located on the campus of Tokyo’s Kogakuin University, the two structures are both dedicated to sporting activities and called for column-free spaces built from low-cost materials.
Katsuya Fukushima and Hiroko Tominaga of FT Architects used locally sourced timber for the construction of both buildings.
They said: “We have salvaged the purity of traditional Japanese timber composition, simply made up of horizontals and verticals, which has been somewhat disregarded ever since the advent of modernism in Japan.”
“Small timber sections, normally reserved for furniture making, were chosen for the archery hall, and timber members deemed defected because of insect damage, for the boxing club,” they added.
A simple bolt-and-nut assembly was used for both frameworks, but required meticulous accuracy to ensure that each grid is made up of only perpendicular elements.
Archery Hall and Boxing Club, Kogakuin University, Tokyo
Structure & Space – medium-span, column-free
The project consists of two buildings, an archery hall and a boxing club, standing a few hundred metres apart on the grounds of Kogakuin University in west Tokyo.
The formal rituals of Kyudo (Japanese archery) and the very physical nature of boxing may appear worlds apart. However, surprisingly, the two built facilities share a number of commonalities.
The University’s brief was for low-cost structures made of locally sourced timber to provide accessible and inspiring spaces for the students. By chance, both facilities called for a column-free space of 7.2m by 10.8m, a size that is comparable to a sacred hall in a traditional Japanese temple. In order to achieve this span, without columns and using low-cost methods of timber construction, it was necessary to come up with an innovative timber solution. We began the project by investigating a number of structural forms that would be appropriate for each sport.
Underlying Principles
Through collaborative exploration with timber experts, from researchers, manufacturers to suppliers, we derived at timber materials that are not commonly associated with structural or architectural usage. Small timber sections, normally reserved for furniture making, were chosen for the archery hall, and timber members deemed defected because of insect damage, for the boxing club.
We have salvaged the purity of traditional Japanese timber composition, simply made up of horizontals and verticals, which has been somewhat disregarded ever since the advent of modernism in Japan. Delicate lattice frame composed of slender ties beams and posts for the archery hall, and a bolder, stepped frame, was employed for the boxing club. Here, timber, a historical material, has been reanalysed and transformed into a new building material.
Contrast/Complement
The two structures have been constructed employing a simple, lo-tech method of bolt-and-nut assembly. However, due to the scale of the space and simplicity of construction, the execution had to be meticulous, in order to produce spaces that are out of the ordinary.
For each building, the main subject is the 7.2m x 10.8m space and the timber structure, merely its backdrop. The powerful presence of the timber structure emphasises the stark transparency of the void below. The whole is only achieved by the juxtaposition of these two contrasting and complementing qualities.
Departing from the same starting point, the two buildings have arrived at a shared architectural theme via two different structural and spatial solutions.
Completion: 2013 Location: Tokyo, Japan Principal use: archery hall (Japanese archery=Kyudo) and boxing club Total floor area: archery hall 106.00 sqm, boxing club 92.75 sqm Structure: wood Architect: FT Architects/Katsuya Fukushima, Hiroko Tominaga
A little while ago I invited fiends and bloggers to be a guest pinner for one of my boards … Christine from House Of C starts this new guest pin series … she added some crazy good looking kitchens to Bloesem's Kitchen board … here just a few of my favorites but there are more than 150 pics to get ideas from.
I'm so glad Christine found the String kitchen for me .. I am a big fan of String and never thought of creating a kitchen with it. Such a simple but great idea … and probably one of the most affordable solutions for a kitchen! Another plus … you can bring this kitchen along with you whenever you deside to move house ….
In a tribute to International Peace Day (September 21st), British artists Jamie Wardley and Andy Moss of Sand in Your Eye took a team of 60 volunteers to Normandy beach over the weekend to sketch the outlines of 9,000 soldiers figures into the sand. The installation was created to commemorate the people who lost their lives on June 6th, 1944 and is appropriately titled “The Fallen 9,000.”
According to design website Colossal, what started with the artists and 60 volunteers grew to an effort including 500 local residents who jumped in to help after seeing what was going on.
The end result was fleeting and was washed away by the tide after a couple of hours. But these photos most definitely do the project justice:
This is site is run by Sascha Endlicher, M.A., during ungodly late night hours. Wanna know more about him? Connect via Social Media by jumping to about.me/sascha.endlicher.
