Hasta La Ideas

October starts the mad dash to the end of the year. For those of us in the business of making physical things for sale, so begins the marathon season of craft fairs, ramped-up marketing, 24-hour online selling and the retail frenzy of Christmas. It’s an important time of year—when a year can turn from loss to profit—but it’s also an exhausting one when the joy of creating and making is overshadowed by the reality of selling.

I’m not a good saleswoman. When UPPERCASE was a physical store from 2005-2009, I’d just let people wander in and do their thing. I’m not one to initiate small talk or sales talk, preferring to let the products sell themselves on their own merits. Sure, I’d be pleasant and answer questions and have conversations, but it was always an effort on my part. It felt unnatural to me, as nice as a customer was. When I closed my retail shop at the end of 2009, it was a relief. Not just from the financial strain of carrying the cost inventory and paying the magazine’s print bills, but that I could turn “off” for a while. I took a year of maternity leave before I returned to the shop and opened the doors, but this time solely as a publishing office.

That year at home with my new baby and running my magazine was one of tremendous growth. Maternity leave was profitable, even with shouldering the cost of rent on a space that I didn’t use for those months working from my basement with my baby at my side. It was proof that an online business of selling magazines, subscriptions and books could be viable enough to support my family. I’m so grateful that, a few years on, this remains true. 

My intent is always for the magazine to stand on its own merits and not need me to “sell” it overtly. Sure, I have to ask for subscriptions and support here in the newsletter and on social media—it’s vital to do so—but really I want the magazine to sell itself. Right now, Issue 23 is being packed up and prepped for shipping today, all set for its October 1 release. I hope you’ll see for yourself how lovely it is.

I’m looking ahead to 2015 and issue 24, to be released in January. I’ll have to have content finished up next month for design in November, printing in December. This will mark 6 full years of UPPERCASE magazine. If my time developing UPPERCASE magazine were a college education, I’d have a Master’s degree by now! 

I’m often asked how I get so much done in a day, as a one-person magazine company. Honestly, it depends on the day and where we are in the magazine’s cycle. My day is always a juggle of what is imperative and what I want to be doing, with the must-do always winning out. What I have learned, though, is that time cannot be controlled. It is basically unmanageable. Time is disobedient—it won’t stay put when you ask. So the way around this is that you have to be everything that time is not: you have to have discipline and set deadlines. You have to control how much time you spend on a task. You have to create a checklist of goals and dates. You have to stay strong in the current lest you be swept away.

Musing on the number 24 and the passage of time, I’m curious about your 24-hour day. What do you have to do in order to make time for being creative? What’s your day like? Submit your day in creativity here.

This message was originally published in my weekly e-newsletter—view the full graphical and extended version here. To receive the newsletter every Tuesday, sign up and I’ll send you a free download of the UPPERCASE Surface Pattern Design Guide. Oh, and if you’re brand new to the newsletter, there’s a welcome discount code for you, too. Thanks!

Creativity exists throughout the world. Global centers like Paris, London and New York have long served as geographic and cultural gatekeepers for the fine art world, but the internet is gaining momentum on democratizing the international scope of contemporary art. In Africa, the…

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The Red Dot Awards winner’s page is usually a fun look at some out-there ideas. But among this year’s batch of winners, it’s the oh-man-that-is-so-doable concepts that caught our eye. To rethink something simple that already exists can often be far harder, we think, than envisioning a blue-sky solution.

In the Personal Hygiene category, Chen Wanting’s clever Tiya Convenient Floor Drain makes perfect sense for anyone who’s ever had to remove long hair from a conventional shower drain.

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These timber and bamboo huts were designed by Agora Architects to offer temporary accommodation to refugees arriving in Thailand from across the Burmese border (+ slideshow).

The Mae Tao Dormitories are located in the Thai village of Mae Sot, a few kilometres from the border of Burma – the south-east Asian country that has been embroiled in civil war since the 1940s.

Working pro-bono, Thai studio Agora Architects developed a design for low-cost and easy-to-assemble residences to house some of the 800 immigrants currently residing at the CDC School.

“The lack of space and, in many cases, the need for immediate accommodation for new students has forced the school to present a new model of temporary low-cost dormitories that are easy to assemble and can be built by using as many recycled materials as possible,” explained Jan Glasmeier, one of Agora Architects’ three co-founders.

With initial funding from the Luxembourg embassy in Bangkok, the architects designed a gabled timber-frame structure that can be clad with locally sourced materials – in this case bamboo and thatching.

So far, Agora Architects has completed five of the dormitories. The area is set at 75 square metres, allowing enough space for up to 25 people in each one.

Like much of the local architecture, the structure was designed to be built from recycled timber, which accounts for around 70 per cent of the overall cost. But according to the architects, this material could be resold at around 80 per cent of the price if the building is no longer required.

“The quality of available timber, mainly teak, at the Thai-Burma border is told to be one of the best in the world,” said Glasmeier.

“However, the price of the timber has risen by over 300 per cent in the last few years due to the deforestation and the illegal trafficking along the border. Thus recycling timber has become popular among the local people in order to reduce the cost of the new buildings,” he said.

Lengths of bamboo form the walls, floors and ceilings of each unit, while the rooftops are covered in a thatch made from dry leaves.

“Although these materials are not intended to last over two years without any pre-treatment, they are easily available every season and the cost is affordable and stable for the local people,” said Glasmeier.

Internally, a sunken central walkway spans the length of each building to create a simple passage between entrances at both ends.

“The interior layout ensures an open and airy space that offers semi-privacy and includes storage space for the students,” added the architect.

The first of the five dormitories was put together in just four weeks, costing approximately £1,300. The buildings can also be dismantled and reassembled in a new location if necessary.

Construction is now nearing completion on a clinic designed by Agora Architects to accompany the dormitories.

The post Teak and bamboo structures accommodate
Burmese refugees in a Thai village appeared first on Dezeen.

Le photographe espagnol Ibai Acevedo capture des moments intimes passés avec ses amis dans de très grands espaces, souvent au milieu de routes égarées ou de la nature. Ses modèles posent devant des points de lumières éblouissantes qui apportent une dimension d’étrangeté à ses photos.