Mercedes' New Push-Pull Steering Wheel So Effective, Formula 1 Bans it Almost Immediately

Here’s an interesting bit of UI design: A push-pull steering wheel that confers a competitive advantage.

Since the car was first invented, the steering wheel had a single job: To turn the front wheels. And with the exception of the tilt/telescoping feature used in modern cars to set ergonomic preferences, the only motion a steering wheel was capable of was rotating in one direction or the other.

However, recent in-cockpit footage of Mercedes/AMG Petronas Motorsport driver Louis Hamilton revealed something curious: He can clearly be seen pulling the steering wheel towards him in a straightaway, and pushing it back in prior to turning. What the heck function does that confer?

Gearheads watching the footage quickly figured out what trick the steering wheel was being used for. With the steering wheel in its default position, the front wheels remain parallel to each other. When Hamilton pulls the steering wheel towards him, the car responds by “toeing in” the front wheels, making them point in towards each other, in pigeon-toed fashion. When he pushes the steering wheel away from him and past the default position, the front wheels “toe out.”

Why would you want to do this? In a nutshell, monkeying about with the front wheel alignment on-the-fly helps drivers with multiple things: Maintaining a straight line on an imperfect surface, achieving faster turns, and equalizing wear.

Precisely how this is works is best understood with some video assistance:

Mercedes developed this DAS (Dual-Axis Steering) technology, as it’s called, to give them a competitive advantage. When Mercedes’ rivals learned what it did, it “left them wide-eyed,” according to Autosport.

Sadly for Mercedes, they’ll only have a single racing season to test it out. The FIA (Fédération Internationale de l’Automobile), Formula 1’s governing body, strives for fair competition. Apparently the DAS presents an unfair advantage, because the FIA just banned it for the 2021 season.

Tie-Dye Ultimate Set

Packed with everything needed to tie-dye your preferred garment, FAO Schwarz’s ultimate set comes with 18 colored dyes, six pairs of protective gloves, a plastic tablecloth, rubber bands, and a bag to store it all in. Whether you’re a first-timer looking to experiment or a seasoned veteran working to perfect a specific pattern, opportunity for creativity abounds with this kit.

Interview: High West Master Distiller Brendan Coyle on The Future of American Single Malt Whiskey

Utah’s pioneering liquor producer rises above cult status with no signs of slowing

Park City’s Main Street serves as a quaint, historic backdrop for locals and visitors alike, and the great outdoors that surround the mountain town are full of adventure and breathtaking panoramas year long. Perhaps less expected, in a state with some of the strictest alcohol regulations, is the steady rise of Park City’s homegrown whiskey. Since its 2006 debut, with a 250-gallon still and saloon inside a landmark building downtown, High West has snowballed into a revered brand with a sprawling flagship distillery in nearby Wanship, complete with event spaces, a shop, and a world-class bar and restaurant (quite like the Park City Saloon, but larger and with a sheen of newness).

High West’s roster also includes a prix-fixe restaurant next to the original location, as well as a decked-out roving “caboose” bar along with yet another bar and shop inside the Salt Lake City airport. Most recently, High West ventured into the not-yet-regulated American single malt category—a fitting Wild West of sorts, its future foggy yet promising. High West Master Distiller Brendan Coyle gives us an inside look at the brand’s expansion, its latest release, and the future of American single malt’s landscape.

Tell us a bit about your work as High West’s Master Distiller and the background that led you here.

I originally started my career in the brewing industry, but went on to complete a Master’s Degree in Brewing and Distilling Sciences from Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh, Scotland. It was after I returned to the US that I met the founder of High West and joined the project as a managing partner and Master Distiller as the company was being formed.

What inspired you and High West as a whole to venture into the single malt space?

I’ve always had a special place in my heart for single malts, which began back when I lived in Scotland for two years during my degree. Not long after we started High West, we began development work on single malt recipes knowing one day we wanted to bring one into our portfolio. That was nine years ago, so it’s been a long time in the making.

Can you share a bit about what makes yours different from the other American single malts currently on the market?

We stayed true to our High West roots with this product as well, so producing a number of different recipes and dialing in a well-balanced and complex blend was the focus. You’ll find character from three different types of cooperage (new fresh charred, used, and wine-finished), a variety of malt types, and even a slight peated finish to it. Quite complex, with many layers.

High West’s distillery has been continuously updating and expanding its equipment and capabilities. Can you tell us a little bit about that? What are some of your recent updates and what can we expect in the near future?

We just finished up a multi-million dollar expansion [in which] we added capacity at just about every stage of the process—everything from grain intake and milling, to a semi-automatic bottling line. Dialing in the efficiencies are the focus now as we move toward becoming a 24/7 operation, although quality will always lead the decisions for us, as they have from the beginning.

Generally speaking, what does the near future hold for High West as a brand?

We’re becoming grown up now and with that comes focus. We’re still going to innovate but at the same time we’ll be streamlining our portfolio, pushing our winners forward and pulling a few products back to “distillery-only” releases. Our American Single Malt will no doubt be a focus in time, as we’d like to grow it a lot more, and eventually have it as a nationwide offering.

After a long day at work, what do you like to pour for yourself at home?

A Double Rye old fashioned is hard to beat!

What’s your go-to order at any of High West’s bars/restaurants?

Check out the Dead Man’s Boots cocktail at any one of our locations. Refreshing and spicy! A truly unique rye whiskey and ginger beer-based cocktail.

What are your thoughts on the future of the American single malt landscape as a whole?

I think it’s safe to say the category is here to stay, but it needs better definition, which the industry is working on. The big milestone will come when the TTB recognizes it as a defined category within their regulations, which will tell us distillers what we can and cannot do within the boundaries of the category. From then on, I think you’re going to see a lot of stylistic variations, because that’s what Americans do best: we innovate. Different malt types and kiln levels in the mash bills will be plentiful. The consumer will vote with their dollars on what they ultimately like, and I think the most successful distilleries will be the ones who have a wide variety of recipes within their inventory to satisfy the preferred blend types that emerge.

Images courtesy of High West

New Balance’s newest sustainable kicks are created from leftover surplus material!

New Balance’s Test Run Program, to be honest, is quite interesting! It is dedicated to testing and experimenting with new and innovative performance footwear. The latest result of this program is Seth Maxwell’s Test Run PRJ 3.0. Created at the New Balance Global Design Center, the shoe was created by leveraging and utilizing surplus materials.

The bold colorful sneakers are made from recycled materials, basically leftover scraps from other New Balance products! An existing sole was taken and a sustainable upper built was crafted around it. Since each pair is a combination of different recycled materials, each shoe is completely unique. Every element of the shoe is built using surplus factory-floor materials. The sock liner, cushioning pellets, upper mesh, and webbing all use leftover cutoffs. The Ecostep Vibram outsole contains 30% recycled material.

Pink, yellow, green, blue and red are some of the brights colors visible in the sneakers. The limited-edition sneakers are completely quirky, vibrant and fun, and not to mention super sustainable! In a time and age, where everyone is getting eco-conscious, it’s critical for the sportswear industry to reduce their carbon footprint as well. With the Test Run PRJ 3.0, New Balance has taken a step forward in the right direction. They’re a must-have for all sneakerheads!

Designer: Seth Maxwell for New Balance

Waterloo International Terminal was "made to fit the cleaning machine" says Nicholas Grimshaw

Waterloo International Terminal by Grimshaw

We continue our high-tech architecture series with this exclusive video interview in which British architect Nicholas Grimshaw describes the painstaking level of detail required of his landmark station project.

The International Terminal at Waterloo station in London is an elongated, four-platform railway concourse with a snaking glass-and-steel roof, which Grimshaw‘s eponymous architecture practice designed in 1994.

Grimshaw submitted the project in response to a competition by British Railways Board. The brief called on architects to design an extension for the existing station.

Waterloo International Terminal by Grimshaw
Waterloo International Terminal was designed by Grimshaw in 1994

“Waterloo was looked upon as one of the best things you could get at the time – the best job you could land, so to speak,” Grimshaw told Dezeen in an interview at his home in London.

The coveted project accommodated the cross-channel trains that ran between London and Paris until 2007, when the service was moved to St Pancras International.

Grimshaw, who also designed the radical housing block at 125 Park Road, saw off stiff competition from other award-winning architects including fellow high-tech architect Norman Foster.

“I can’t remember all the architects – there’s a shortlist of about 10 or 12, starting with the king himself Norman Foster,” he said. “Everybody had a go at it.”

Waterloo International Terminal by Grimshaw
The building is a long, asymmetrically arched roof that houses four train platforms

The new terminus occupies a slither of land on the west side of Waterloo station, replacing what was originally platforms 20 and 21. Due to its central London location and proximity to surrounding buildings, the site was severely restricted.

“The site was a nightmare,” said Grimshaw. “It was a completely irregular shape.”

The new terminus slots into the existing stone building and follows the curve of the train tracks, eventually extending to twice the length of the main station.

The plot tapers from 55-metres-wide to 35-metres-wide, which created a whole host of design challenges, particularly for the roof.

“We really concentrated on making everything adjustable because we were well aware of all these surveying problems,” said Grimshaw.

“We had to try and make it a simple repetitive structure on an irregular site, which wasn’t easy.”

Waterloo International Terminal by Grimshaw
The intricate detailing of the building is down to the irregularly shaped site

In response to these constraints, Grimshaw created an asymmetrical curved roof that could expand or compress to fit any site regardless of its shape.

“[The roof structure] were sort of telescopic tubes slid inside each other,” said Grimshaw.

“We made the roof shrinkable and it had to also be manoeuvrable in plan so that we could fit the site. So in that sort of way it could have gone on other sites and we could have adjusted it to make it work.”

Waterloo International Terminal has glass roof panels that allow the building’s steel structure to be clearly visible from the platforms below.

Waterloo International Terminal by Grimshaw
Thanks to the telescope-like main structure the building could be adapted to fit any site

The terminus is an exemplar of high-tech architecture – a style that emerged in the 1960s and is characterised by the celebration of a building’s structure and the use of industrial materials.

“It was like a great machine which sat on the ground and then sort of nestled into the ground,” said Grimshaw.

Ticket services and the departure lounge were concealed underground, beneath the railway tracks, in order to optimise the platform space above.

Since its completion the building has won several awards including the RIBA Building of the Year award (the predecessor to the Stirling Prize) and the European Prize for Architecture, better known as the Mies van der Rohe Award.

Waterloo International Terminal by Grimshaw
Services were hidden beneath the building between the railway viaducts

“I think people thought that [it] was quite ingenious and quite thought-through in a really meticulous way,” said the architect. “Even if you weren’t an architect or an engineer, you could see that it would work.”

Grimshaw attributes this to the fastidious amount of detail that informed the design.

“They were very impressed with the fact that we rang up and said: ‘what was the diameter of the cleaning brush on the cleaning machine?’ Because we wanted to make the the corners of the building fit the cleaning machine”.

“I don’t know what detail the competition asked for but they got quite a lot from us,” he laughed.

Waterloo International Terminal by Grimshaw
The terminal was completed a year ahead of schedule

The International Terminal at Waterloo was completed a year ahead of schedule – before the Channel Tunnel that serviced the station was ready. The building was largely pre-fabricated, which accounted for the speed of its construction.

“It was made in big steel components and they were bolted together off-site put in a numbered sequence on the roof,” said Grimshaw. “And all the secondary components were being made while the main structure was going up.”

“Proof of the pudding was that we were finished a year early,” said Grimshaw.

The terminal underwent a tumultuous few years of closing and re-opening until 2019, when it reopened to the public on a permanent basis.

This movie was produced by Dezeen as part of our high-tech architecture series, and is the last of our video interviews with notable high-tech architects.

High-tech architecture illustration by Jack Bedford
Our guide to high-tech architecture explores the style

Emerging in Britain during the late 1960s, high-tech architecture was the last major style of the 20th century and one of its most influential. Characterised by buildings that combined the potential of structure and industrial technology, the movement was pioneered by Foster, Rogers, Grimshaw, Patty and Michael Hopkins and Renzo Piano.

Photographs are by Jo Reid and John Peck, Michael Dyer, Paul Childs and Peter Cook. Drawings are by Grimshaw. Images and footage are courtesy of Grimshaw. Illustration is by Jack Bedford.

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Compact house in Vietnam contains planted courtyards

Nhà Đâu Đau by Landmak Architecture

Raised courtyards filled with plants are cut into the facade of a house in Nam Dinh, Vietnam, designed by Landmak Architecture.

Called to Đậu Đậu House, the architects designed the home as a compact cluster of miniature dwellings.

Nhà Đâu Đau by Landmak Architecture

Built on a small plot of nine by 11 metres, the four-storey home sits opposite a busy traffic junction.

Landmak Architecture arranged the floor plans so the house is turned in on itself to minimise disruption and noise.

Nhà Đâu Đau by Landmak Architecture

“We created a box block with a minimalist front and started sculpting the window and loggia positions to get the light for the rooms inside”, said the studio.

“Then we ‘dropped’ within this minimalist and modern box a more traditional space with many roofs and small gates, like curling a street into a vertical direction.”

Nhà Đâu Đau by Landmak Architecture

The floor plan of each level is roughly divided into communal living and study spaces towards the front.

Bedrooms, bathrooms and staircases are set to the rear.

Nhà Đâu Đau by Landmak Architecture

On the ground floor, the entrance opens directly into a large living space, which opens onto a landscaped winter garden with a pool.

This space leads via a thin steel staircase to a mezzanine kitchen and dining area, framed by an elongated arched window in the facade.

Nhà Đâu Đau by Landmak Architecture

To ensure adequate light and ventilation throughout, the winter garden is one of a series of small planted voids have been cut out of the home’s form.

These voids create both courtyard and balcony areas.

Nhà Đâu Đau by Landmak Architecture

The winter garden space sits at the bottom of one of the largest of these voids.

It is a double-height space overlooked by a first-floor bedroom, visible through openings made in the staircase.

Nhà Đâu Đau by Landmak Architecture

Sliding glass doors separate these green spaces from the interiors.

This allows the home to be opened up to the elements while maintaining privacy behind the deep reveals in the home’s facade.

Nhà Đâu Đau by Landmak Architecture

The third floor is designed as the children’s space, painted with blue shapes and cartoons, including a ceiling fan made to look like a plane.

It connects to a hammock that stretches over the top of the winter garden void alongside a daybed area.

Nhà Đâu Đau by Landmak Architecture

Thresholds between rooms are marked by details that bring a street or yard-like feeling to the interiors, such as small sections of overhanging roof or gate-style wooden structures that encase distinctive arched openings.

On the fourth floor, a study, altar room and bathroom and sauna surround a tropical garden space and balcony, sheltered by a high parapet.

Nhà Đâu Đau by Landmak Architecture

Landmak Architecture was founded in 2008 nu Tien Vinh and Truong Tuan Chung.

The use of planted areas to bring light and air into homes is a strategy frequently used by Vietnamese practice Vo Trong Nghia, which recently took a similar approach of folding a cluster of smaller spaces into one interconnected form for Thang House.

Photography is by Trieu Chien.


Project credits:

Architects: Landmak Architecture
Architect in charge: Ta Tien Vinh, Phung Manh Toan
Design team: Lai Hung Quyet, Nguyen Khac Tue, Nguyen Ha Hoai Ly, Truong Quang Dao, Ngo Thi Ngan Ha, Doan Thi Huong, Dang Quynh An, Nguyen Manh Hung, Trinh Trong Quyen.
Structural engineers: Tran Dang Huynh
Home decor: Lava Furniture
Materials: VIET Ceramic, Xingfa window

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Volvo builds a four-truck tower for epic ad

Forsman & Bodenfors is behind the stunt, which features in a ridiculously over-the-top film from the car manufacturer. If the sight of a 15-metre high, 58-tonne moving truck tower isn’t impressive enough, there’s dry ice, a prowling wolf, lightning and a Vangelis soundtrack to amp it all up a bit further.

Volvo president Roger Alm, who’s inexplicably perched at the very top of the four trucks, is the cherry on the cake.

It’s knowingly ridiculous, and that’s precisely what makes it so enjoyable – much like Volvo’s Epic Split ad, featuring Van Damme.

However it’s not visual trickery. Volvo did actually spend a month designing and carefully constructing the tower, as revealed by a making-of film. “It is unreal to see it like this, I wouldn’t dare go up there,” notes a jovial Volvo Trucks engineer in the video.

Behind the entertainment factor, there is a point to it all – to emphasise the sturdiness and reliability of Volvo’s Trucks and their dynamic steering technology.

It’s proof that vehicle adverts don’t have to rely on empty jargon and the same, stale format. There’s plenty of room for playfulness and humour as well, if brands are prepared to take the risk.

Credits:
Agency: Forsman & Bodenfors
Art directors: Mattias Berg, Josefin Roxeheim
Copywriters: Olle Langseth, Hampus Elfström
Designer: Jerry Wass
Production company: Bacon
Director: Andreas Nilsson

The post Volvo builds a four-truck tower for epic ad appeared first on Creative Review.

Diego Faivre gives extension cables a Memphis makeover

Diego Faivre gives extension cables a Memphis makeover

Eindhoven graduate Diego Faivre has coated electrical plugs in brightly coloured, patterned clay, in a bid to inject some fun into these “boring and forgotten” objects.

Where normally extension leads are hidden from view, Faivre hopes to present them as design objects in their own right, as canvases for his Memphis-tinged colour palette.

Diego Faivre gives extension cables a Memphis makeover

“I needed an extension cord for my degree show, and I genuinely just found it really ugly,” he told Dezeen.

“So I started coating it in this air-drying clay almost without really thinking about it. I only realised later how much it resonated with people because they are genuinely the most unloved objects in our house. So it became a game to try and give them more excitement, to draw attention to them.”

Diego Faivre gives extension cables a Memphis makeover

To comply with electrical standards and ensure the safety of users, Faivre either sources pre-made extension leads from the hardware store, or works on people’s existing products.

He uses a special type of clay that remains pliable once dry, and applies it starting from the cord before moving on to hard shell, avoiding contact with any of the electrical components.

Diego Faivre gives extension cables a Memphis makeover

“It’s only towards the end of the process that I start having fun with the patterns and the colour contrast, adding them peanut by peanut,” explained the designer.

“The coating can also act as a protective layer and allows me to hide little imperfections. In a way I work like a physiotherapist, massaging objects to give them a second life.”

In case of electrical overload or overheating he claims that, because the clay consists mainly of organic matter, it doesn’t burn. Instead, it simply carbonises and turns slightly darker.

The plugs are costed up according to Faivre’s Minute Manufacturing system, whereby every minute of production time costs £1. That means a product’s final price is a direct reflection of the amount of time it took to make it.

In this way, he hopes to draw attention to the mismatch between the human labour involved in making a product and its final price within a system of mass production.

Diego Faivre gives extension cables a Memphis makeover

“When I was younger, I worked in a metal factory in France for nine months,” he said.

“I was paid €0.15 (£0.13) a minute producing items that didn’t reflect the human effort behind them or the human touch. I wish the people I worked with could’ve put something of themselves into what they were making. That’s why the idea of Minute Manufacture revolves around bringing personality into boring and forgotten objects.”

Diego Faivre gives extension cables a Memphis makeover

The project has also seen Faivre cover a range of other unloved objects, from found furniture to doorstops, with his signature colourful clay.

Elsewhere, designers have attempted to make plugs more appealing by turning them into a playful chain of wooden spheres and cubes or hiding their messy cables underneath a minimalist red lid.

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Why is women-only networking still a thing?

There’s been a surge in female-focused clubs, co-working spaces and events, but what do women in the creative industry actually get out of it, and is it fixing anything?

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Double-height extension brings light to Melbourne's Lantern House

Lantern House by Timmins+Whyte Architects

Architecture practice Timmins + Whyte has added a double-height gabled extension to a 19th-century house in Melbourne, illuminating its formerly light-starved living spaces.

Originally built in 1876, Lantern House formerly had a dark and poky interior that meant its owners – a young couple with two children and a dog – were longing for a home with an open-plan layout.

Lantern House by Timmins+Whyte Architects

A low-ceilinged extension that had been added to the property in the 1980s was also proving redundant.

“Our clients wanted to live, cook, gather, lounge, read and socialise in one sunny, externally connected space,” said Timmins + Whyte Architects, which was tasked with expanding the home.

Lantern House by Timmins+Whyte Architects

After demolishing the existing extension, the practice created a contemporary double-height addition that’s clad entirely in white steel beams.

It has a glass-fronted rectilinear base and a gabled upper volume wrapped with expansive windows that cast stripes of light into the interior. They can also be seen glowing from street level as night falls.

“The extension has been designed to play with light, it allows the space to bathe in it and controls it,” explained the practice.

Lantern House by Timmins+Whyte Architects

The luminous quality of the new extension is what lent the project its name of Lantern House.

It’s also meant to be a subtle reference to Japanese tōrō’s – traditional lanterns made from stone, wood or metal that would be used to illuminate the pathways of Buddhist temples.

“Our client’s husband is Japanese and the garden landscape has stepping stones that create a path from the courtyard to the house, and back out to the rear yard and pool – so it seemed fitting,” the practice’s co-director, Sally Timmins, told Dezeen.

Lantern House by Timmins+Whyte Architects

Designed to have a calming, “unfussy” ambience, the inside of the extension has been decked out with an array of neutral hues and materials.

The ground-level kitchen suite is crafted from Tasmanian oak wood and has a soft-gold extractor hood above the stove.

Lantern House by Timmins+Whyte Architects

A touch of colour is provided by the stone splashback and countertop, which has murky green and dark-blue veins running through it.

Adjacently lies a timber dining table, and a couple of cream-coloured lounge chairs.

Flecked concrete has been applied to the floors, while pale bricks have been used to form a short partition wall – it’s punctuated with a large niche that accommodates a double-sided fireplace.

Lantern House by Timmins+Whyte Architects

Part of the timber-lined ceiling has been cut away to create a soaring void that offers views of the extension’s roof and mezzanine level, which contains two bedrooms and an additional bathroom.

The void was also an attempt by the studio to create an indoor feature that matches the grandiose nature of the home’s front facade, which is covered by ornate ironwork.

Lantern House by Timmins+Whyte Architects

Timmins + Whyte is based in Collingwood, an inner suburb of Melbourne.

The city is host to a number of striking home extensions – other examples include one by architect Matt Gibson, which is shielded by metal-mesh curtains, and another by Austin Maynard Architects, which is topped by a zigzag roof.

Photography is by Peter Bennetts.


Project credits:

Architect and interior designer: Timmins + Whyte
Builders: Barkers Burke Constructions, Robin Riotto
Landscape design: Mud Office
Landscape construction: Josh Norman Landscapes

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