Camera store Photodom just opened its physical shop in Brooklyn, making it the first Black-owned photography retailer in the borough. For those not able to drop by the brick and mortar location (where they also offer film processing and camera repair), there’s still plenty to be found online—from cameras to film and clothing. 50% of the proceeds from their Black Lives Matter collection of apparel and accessories goes to the Photodom Scholarship fund, which donates $1000 each month to support photography projects. This green three-button garment resembles a cashier’s vest, with an embroidered BLM patch in place of a store name. Made for all genders, it’s available from size small to XXXL.
Furniture for micro-apartments, a film about a revengeful stuntman and a game about vertical farming are among the 12 diverse student projects in this school show by PolyU Design.
The featured projects were completed by 16 students studying across the “wide range of undergraduate and postgraduate programmes” at the PolyU Design school, which forms a part of the Hong Kong Polytechnic University.
PolyU Design, Hong Kong Polytechnic University
School statement:
“PolyU Design has been an important hub of design education and research for Hong Kong since 1964. The school thrives on its geographical position in bridging the East and the West, allowing its students to develop their design strengths with a uniquely international cultural awareness at both professional and social levels. In the 2020 Quacquarelli Symonds (QS) World University Rankings by Subject, the school is ranked world’s top 15 in the area of art and design.
“The School nurtures around 1,100 students every year in a wide range of undergraduate and postgraduate programmes, with more than 40 PhD candidates. For our undergraduate programmes, we offer a Bachelor of Arts (Hons) Scheme in Design in five major disciplines. The Master of Design programme includes specialisms in Design Strategies, Design Practices, Interaction Design, International Design and Business Management, Urban Environments Design, while the Master of Science programme specialises in Multimedia and Entertainment Technology.
A view of PolyU Design’s online degree show
“The school provides a high level and well-equipped environment that includes significant research infrastructure with seven laboratories and a variety of first-class technical workshops in the newly completed Jockey Club Innovation Tower, a landmark building designed by the late legendary architect Zaha Hadid.”
“We are the Generation Y. We were born and grew up in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region. We are the creatures of this era without experiencing the change of regimes. There is no doubt that we have our own interpretation of the current era and values in Hong Kong.
“2020 is an authorship project representing our visions. Its aim is to provide an alternative vision for the Hong Kong citizens to coexist with current Hong Kong. It uses the young generation’s vision to elaborate on the Hong Kong values in the Special Administrative Region era (1997-2047).
“2020 is a project using 22 Hong Kong individual values to create 22 conceptual explorations, to clarify that we could influence the society based on individual values, and to figure out Generation Y’s imagination about Hong Kong values and future.”
Student name: Wing Hong Ben Lee Project name: 2020 Project tagline: Exploring the concept of Hong Kong Generation (Y)’s visions to the values of Hong Kong Course: BA(Hons) in Communication Design Tutor: Amy Chow Website:https://www.bdesign85.com/2020-2
Cultural Run by Ka Ki Apple Mok
“Cultural Run, a city hunt competition, aims to minimise the problems of Pakistanis’ unaccepted local identity and misconception and provide a better alternative to existing tours. It hopes to encourage Chinese-Pakistani interactions to enhance the cultural competence of the target audience – Chinese secondary school students and achieve the ultimate goal of ethnic inclusion.
“The word ‘Cultural’ symbolises the cultural competence that participants can gain and ‘Run’ represents the posture of the event. Cultural Run is divided into three phases, which are cultural recognition, cultural experience and cultural integration. Participants have to run to different checkpoints to get marks after doing cultural tasks.”
Student name: Ka Ki Apple Mok Project name: Cultural Run Project tagline: Ethnic Inclusion of Pakistanis in Hong Kong Course: BA(Hons) in Communication Design Tutor: Brian Kwok Website: applemok.com Email:apple2bliss@gmail.com
Guerrilla Planter by Cheuk Sum Sumjai Leung
“In Hong Kong, 80 per cent of food is imported from China and only 8 per cent is produced on local farmland, resulting in low self-sufficiency. Consequently, food supply, green spaces, and a clean air environment will be the main issues of our future.
“The story of how food can be grown in and on existing buildings, transforming their form and the entire streetscape, as well as the relationship between the inventions and characters actions is designed as a game – Guerrilla Planter – which allows to participate, to engage with, play with, and imagine about the possibilities of self-supporting farming and sustainable living.”
Student name: Cheuk Sum Sumjai Leung Project name: Guerrilla Planter Project tagline: An alternative solution of sustainable living and farming in dense area Course: BA(Hons) in Environment and Interior Design Tutor: Anneli Giencke Website: sumjaileung.myportfolio.com Email: sumjaileung@gmail.com
Enfilades Through Time by Ka Siu Lam
“This is a thesis project concerning renovation frequency, material history, and time. Buildings and spaces are often renovated earlier than the end of their useful life. This renovation entails stripping history away, totally replacing it with new material. This project looks for a way to respond to material history and glorify previous work.
“The project contrasts time frames through context and program, infilling a series of old buildings with high-end retail. Material-intensive interventions meant to last for decades contrast with retail spatial programming, in which immediate and continuous exchange is all that matters.”
Student name: Ka Siu Lam Project name: Enfilades Through Time Project tagline: The Lifecycle of Materials in Fast-paced Society Course: BA(Hons) in Environment and Interior Design Tutor: Daniel Elkin Website: https://www.behance.net/gallery/100894087/Enfilade-Through-Time
Kill Danny by Lok Hei Law, Chun Tat Leung and Hau Chung Wu
“Him, a hard-boiled stuntman who is enjoying his peaceful retirement life with his beloved puppy Popo. One morning, as Him was walking his dog and buying his meal, as usual, disaster came – a car rushed into his lovely dog and blended it into a chunk of flesh…
“Here comes the notorious billionaire – Danny. Encountering the siege of gangsters, duelling with the cyborg killer. Can Him take his revenge successfully?”
Revenge story of a Barber by Roy Sam, Karen Chui and Yannes Li
“Facing totalitarian, is violence the only way out? What is waiting for the avenger after the revenge? Salvation, hope, or reincarnation of despair?
“Eight years ago, a barber was prosecuted for drug possession by a police officer and sent to jail. Eight years later, he was released from prison. He followed the leads and found the police officer who charged him. He met the policeman’s daughter by chance and found out she also hated her father. She knew all the crimes her father committed and felt disgusted for what her father did to her.
“They planned a kidnap in an abandoned school and made the officer confessed for what he did. However, the barber could not hold his anger when he heard what was told by him.”
“What would happen if I was living in the future? Technology has emerged in our daily life. We are so satisfied with what the internet can give, but seems we left the ‘real’ behind. A future that is appreciated to live in. Perhaps, an inclusive public transport would be the start to connect to the ‘real’.
“The double-decker bus is one of the important public transports in Hong Kong. However, the problem of increasing special needs users in the future might cause restrain for people to enjoy their journey in the future. Therefore, well-designed, inclusive public transport is important in the future.”
Student name: Hang Tat Henry Hui Project name: Asit Project tagline: A future bus seat and interior design solution for the ageing population in the future Course: BA(Hons) in Product Design Tutor: Chin Scott Website: behance.net/gallery/100738733/Asit-A-future-bus-seat
Sound Universe by Wai Ho Edmond Chan
“Sound Universe uses open-ended play with sound to spark imagination and develop creativity. It encourages exploring and experimenting rather than focusing on the final outcome and result. It uses cues for physical action input and sound output. There is a linkage between the sound, action and form. The simple forms of a circle, rectangle, triangle represent objects.
“Natural sounds are chosen for this project to define the scope and scale of this project. Using a set of themes to generate a picture for the player to imagine different scenarios of the set theme. Each piece represents different sounds and sound effects. To make the module, it needs to start from the main unit than expand the connections of the board.
“Initial play by visual cues for interaction then experiment with different input and combination to create sound and rhythm. Testing with different interaction with the modular boards and create different rhythm.”
Student name: Wai Ho Edmond Chan Project name: Sound Universe Project tagline: Education toy for creative development. Using open-ended play with sound to spark imagination and develop creativity Course: BA(Hons) in Product Design Tutor: Lee Chi Wing Website: behance.net/edmondchanwh Email: edmond.chanwh@gmail.com
Comfor:t:able by Mathis Buchbinder
“More than 37,000 elementary school children in Hong Kong live in subdivided units, single room apartments measuring 10 square metres. For their daily studies, they have to utilise their environment with all its limitations. This leads to unhealthy compromises, mismatched table and chair heights, or crouched corner positions.
“Comfor:t:able is set up in a way to transform formerly unused space in a better way. The chair can be used as a leisure pillow when it’s not in use and the table element has two configurations as well. A sociable small tea table which can be positioned on the bed between two people for leisure activities, and a study table that tucks half away under the bed.”
Student name: Mathis Buchbinder Project name: Comfor:t:able Project tagline: A modular approach to provide adjustable and ergonomical furniture for elementary school students in subdivided units Course: Master of Design
Bukas by Analyn Lao Yap
“This design-led research project looks into the phenomenon of communication and expression in the diasporic family relationship, particularly between Filipino domestic workers and their families.
“The research also looks into material culture and the meaning of the ‘balikbayan box’ metaphor as a design prompt, leading to the creation of design guidelines and concept development for Bukas, a tangible product linked with a mobile interface that facilitates meaningful daily communication for migrant Filipina workers and their families through augmented reality-enabled physical messages contained in a box.
“The inquiry consists of immersive qualitative methods including interviews, cultural probes, and participatory workshops to deepen the understanding of the stakeholders’ mindsets, behaviours, and expressive needs.”
Student name: Analyn Lao Yap Project name: Bukas Project tagline: Material Messages for Filipino Migrant Workers and their Transnational Families Course: Master of Design
RoleRoad by Wing Yiu Yoyo Cheung, Kwok Ching Yahoo Fu and Cheuk Shing Danny Lo
“RoleRoad believes that storytelling through a local persona in a first-person perspective is the best way to immerse yourself in a comprehensive and authentic experience.
“After arriving in Hong Kong and downloading the app, travellers can choose stories of Hong Kong people and become the main character of the story. According to the storyline, travellers will walk through local locations, shops, restaurants, and experience local life from a local perspective. Users can make choices in the story, which affects the route they experience. AR technology is used to cooperate with real-life environments and create interaction to drive the plot. Location detection technology will also be used for triggering specific interaction in precise areas.
“Through RoleRoad, we hope to create new and fun Hong Kong travelling experience to global travellers, promote local brands and facilitate the recovery of Hong Kong tourism.”
Student name: Wing Yiu Yoyo Cheung, Kwok Ching Yahoo Fu and Cheuk Shing Danny Lo Project name: RoleRoad Project tagline: Offering global travellers with local experience packages through a personal roleplay app with interactive technology Course: MSc in Multimedia and Entertainment Technology Tutor: William Liang Website: https://www.behance.net/gallery/103211585/RoleRoad
It’s Time by YiHsiu Krystal Cheng, JingYi Colra Chen, HuiQi Winnie Xie, Xiang Alicia Chen and YuHin Johnny Lam
“A time management application for new graduates and newbies of the workplace to adapt to a new environment in a leisure manner.
“By helping users form the habit of doing time schedule in advance, It’s Time helps users save more energy on overcoming struggles of entering a new environment, which also decrease the possibility of newbies quit from their first job and make users more organised about dealing tasks.”
Student names: YiHsiu Krystal Cheng, JingYi Colra Chen, HuiQi Winnie Xie, Xiang Alicia Chen and YuHin Johnny Lam Project name: It’s Time Project tagline: Material Messages for Filipino Migrant Workers and their Transnational Families Course: MSc in Multimedia & Entertainment Technology
Cast your mind back to the beginning of this year and none of us could have predicted the strangeness that has come to define summer 2020.
Short film app Minute Shorts is tapping into the highs and lows of this year in its latest offline event, a summer film exhibition showcasing the moments that have kept us apart and brought us together during this time.
Running from September 19-20 at Sook in central London, the show features six short films curated by the Minute Shorts team, along with insights from the filmmakers about their making.
Unsurprisingly, a number of the films focus on the negative impact of the pandemic on people. In Pandemic, directing duo Pedro and James speak to friends around the world about the harsh truths coronavirus has forced them to confront, while Movement in Stillness by Anna Fearon explores the mental and physical imprisonment of lockdown through dance.
Others take a more uplifting approach, such as Anthony Rubinstein in There’s Something Going Around, which captures the Great British Public’s keep calm and carry on attitude – exemplified by our commitment to orderly supermarket queues and incessant memes.
Stop motion’s popularity has barely wavered in the century or so since it first appeared. But what makes it such a big hit with creatives and clients, and what does the future hold?
In this series we ask leading creatives to talk about what kickstarted their careers. Here, photographer Benedict Redgrove talks about the significant projects that made him realise the value in his work
The recent news of the demise of the iconic Argos Catalogue – also known as the ‘book of dreams’ – brought with it a whole raft of think pieces about the tragic death of the print catalogue more broadly.
However, diehard print fans can rejoice with the Ikea Museum’s announcement that its new exhibition will mark the 70th anniversary of the Swedish retailer’s own catalogue – and it’s not set to disappear anytime soon.
“The history of the catalogue is also a history about IKEA and democratic design, but maybe most interesting: a history of how our life at home has developed during the last 70 years”, says Anna Sandberg Falk, curator of the exhibition.
Featuring archive materials, letters, photos, facts and figures, Ikea Catalogue Through the Ages is an exploration of the seven-decade history of the retailer’s catalogue, as well as an insight into vintage Ikea furniture more generally.
Visitors can also recreate their own version of the catalogue’s 1973 cover, with the best attempt set to be featured on the cover of this year’s edition.
For Ikea fans who aren’t able to visit the Älmhult museum in person, the retailer announced that it is digitising all of its Swedish catalogues from the last 70 years for people to browse online.
“Older generations will be able travel back into time and reunite with interiors they probably haven’t seen for ages, while the younger ones can have a look at iconic Ikea products in their original environments and hopefully be inspired to find some new objects from the past still waiting to be rediscovered”, says Per-Olof Svensson, the museum’s archive and collection manager.
Find out more about the exhibition and see the full collection of Ikea Sweden catalogues at ikeamuseum.com
TU Delft researcher Bob Hendrikx has created Living Cocoon, a coffin made from mycelium that helps bodies decompose faster while improving the surrounding soil.
Made from mushroom mycelium, the Living Cocoon actively contributes to the body’s composting process after death and simultaneously removes toxic substances from the earth – creating richer conditions for new plants to grow.
The boxy coffin takes one week to grow and then, containing the body of the deceased, takes an estimated two to three years to decompose. In comparison, conventional coffin burials take over ten years to break down in the earth.
The coffin takes seven days to grow
Hendrikx, who is a researcher at the Delft University of Technology, hopes what he calls a “living coffin” can create a closed-loop system for disposing of the dead and repairing some of the damage done by humans to the earth.
“We are currently living in nature’s graveyard,” he said. “Our behaviour is not only parasitic, it’s also short-sighted. We are degrading organisms into dead, polluting materials, but what if we kept them alive?”
“The Living Cocoon enables people to become one with nature again, and to enrich the soil instead of polluting it.”
The coffins help clean pollutants from the soil as they decompose
Described by Hendrikx as “nature’s recycler”, mycelium is the thread-like part of a fungus that typically grows underground. Its function is to feed the fungus by secreting enzymes to break down biological polymers, aiding decomposition and releasing carbon dioxide back into the atmosphere.
“Mycelium is constantly looking for waste materials to convert into nutrients for the environment,” the designer continued. “It does the same with toxic substances, including oil, plastic and metal.”
“For example, mycelium was used in Chernobyl, it is utilised in Rotterdam to clean up soil, and some farmers also apply it to make the land healthy again.”
Living Cocoon takes less than three years to decompose in the earth
As Hendrikx told Dezeen, he first came up with the idea to use the fungus to make a coffin during last year’s Dutch Design Week, where he presented his living home – inhabitable pods made from mycelium.
“A girl walked up to me and asked ‘What if my grandma dies? Can I just leave her there?’,” he explained.
“And that’s when I realised what mycelium could do for us humans, bringing us back into the cycle of life and allowing us to provide food for plants.”
Mycelium secretes enzymes to break down food sources
Each Living Cocoon is grown and formed in seven days. To make the coffins, Hendrikx and his team mix their preferred type of mycelium with an organic substrate in a mould.
The mycelium eats this substrate, creating a three-dimensional structure that grows to fill the shape of the mould it is in.
As the designer explained, the entire production process is passive, meaning it doesn’t require any energy, heat or light.
Growing the coffins doesn’t require light or heat
Developed under Hendrikx’s startup based in the Netherlands called Loop, the Living Cocoons have been tested with the help of funeral cooperatives CUVO, based in The Hague, and De Laatste Eer, based in Delft.
The startup has begun testing its first batch of ten mycelium coffins last week when they were used for a funeral.
The first Living Cocoon funeral has already been performed
Further tests have also been conducted by New York-based biotech company Ecovative, and have shown that the coffin itself is absorbed into the earth within 30 to 45 days, under normal Dutch soil conditions.
The team is yet to fully test the effects of the coffin on soil quality in increasing biodiversity.
“We want to know exactly what contribution it makes to the soil as this will help us to convince local municipalities in the future to transform polluted areas into healthy woodland, using our bodies as nutrients,” said Hendrikx.
Glowing mushrooms could be used as burial markers next
Hendrikx and his team are currently working with light-emitting fungi to find a way of making them grow from the coffin through the soil and up above the earth as a marker of where the body is buried.
This way, illuminating mushrooms can be used in place of the flowers or lights that people typically place on the grave.
Furniture company Another Country has launched its Modern Farmhouse seating collection designed by Fred Rigby as part of Dezeen x Planted collaboration during this year’s London Design Festival.
Created to mark its 10th anniversary, the Modern Farmhouse collection continues the ethos of creating “well-priced furniture with a modern craft heritage” that Another Country began with when it was founded by Paul de Zwart in 2010.
“I was searching for furniture for my country house in Dorset when the idea struck,” said De Zwart.
“I had to refurbish a room and was looking for a certain object – a contemporary but country-friendly, simple three-legged stool that would also work as a side table. Ten years on and my passion for well-made, well-priced furniture with a modern craft heritage has not waned.”
Above: the circular Occasional chair. Top image: the full Modern Farmhouse collection by Fred Rigby
Designed by London-based Rigby, the Modern Farmhouse collection draws upon a desire to give farmhouse furniture a modern makeover.
“The collection was born from a mutual love between our brands of the countryside, namely Dorset, and the idea to create furniture for the ‘Modern Farmhouse’, which draws inspiration from furniture found in old farmhouses and brings them up to date to be used in modern homes,” said the designer.
The collection includes the Settle bench
The three-piece collection, which the brand said is made from 100 per cent sustainably sourced materials, comprises of a settle bench, circular chair and high-backed hallway bench that incorporates coat hook and shoe storage.
“The Modern Farmhouse pieces are designed to be practical in the home, for example, the Settle, could be used in the kitchen against a wall or to break a spacious living room, with concealed storage underneath to hide and clear a space,” said Rigby.
“The same goes for the Hallway Bench, a multi-functioning piece, allowing you to hang coats, store shoes and somewhere to sit when you’re on your way out the front door, or in a back porch area,” he continued.
“The Occasional chair is designed to be small and low, somewhere to sit in your bedroom or to be used to hang clothes off. Cute and useful, and not taking up much space in a room.”
Planted is a contemporary design event that aims to reconnect cities with nature, which will make its physical debut as part of London Design Festival alongside an online trailer for next year’s main event.
The Planted x Dezeen collaboration presents a series of projects by international designers that align with the ideals of the Planted design event.
I wouldn’t really call this Nature-Inspired Design but there’s surely something creative and quirky about how the Saguaro Glasses stack up to look like a majestic tree-like Saguaro cactus, native to the deserts of Arizona (commonly found in cartoons and even the ‘No Internet’ game built into Google Chrome)
DOIY’s Saguaro collection comes as a set of cups, mugs, and tumblers with fluted bodies and cactus-branch shaped handles. Colored in a remarkably eye-catching green, the glassware stack up on each other when not in use, turning your kitchen-counter into the backdrop of a Western movie. When you do need them for sipping something like Orange Juice, or something more appropriate like ‘Green’ Tea, the branch-shaped handles serve as a nifty functional detail, being decorative when you want, and useful when you need them. Don’t worry though, this adorable set of cactoid-crockery doesn’t come with spikes and definitely don’t need watering. Moreover, they’re freezer and dishwasher-safe too. Road Runner and Wile E. Coyote sold separately!
The mixed-use high rise building owned by developers Aria Property Group will include 392 homes, a two-level rooftop garden and a public park at ground level.
Urban Forest will be covered in 1,000 trees
Australian studio Koichi Takada Architects plans to cover the stepped facade with 1,000 trees and 20,000 plants, in a combination of over 250 species native to Queensland.
The architecture studio and developers are attempting to make Urban Forest the “world’s greenest residential building”.
A public park will be positioned at the base of the building
“Urban Forest is probably the greenest we can design with the current ‘greening’ tools and regulations available to us,” said studio founder Koichi Takada.
The architect wants the high-rise building to represent a move away from mass production and towards a more sustainable mode of living, which he said had become more important following the coronavirus pandemic.
“Post Covid-19, I think it’s a great opportunity to pause and rethink and not just adapt, but shift the paradigm from industrial to natural,” Takada added.
“Concrete, steel and glass are very hard and solid industrial materials,” he continued. “Let’s call them dead materiality. We need to be embracing more living materiality, living architecture.”
“One take away from the Covid-19 pandemic crisis is the realisation that we are all living things. We are here to live, not defy death in some way. Our architecture should do the same.”
Tree trunk-style columns will support the building
The main structure of Urban Forest will be made of so-called green concrete, a low carbon version of concrete with 40 per cent less Portland cement in it than traditional concrete. The concrete will be sourced locally to further reduce emissions.
Units will be fabricated as modules to reduce wastage and shorten construction time. Stone or brick elements will be recycled or locally sourced, and all the timber used will be Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certified.
The target for Urban Forest’s is a six-star Green Star rating, the LEED Platinum equivalent of Australia’s building sustainability grading system.
A rooftop garden will hold communal facilities including a pool
At the base of the tower, Urban Forest will be raised up on a series of columns to create a sheltered area for the park. These mushroom columns will be contoured so as to appear organic, as though the high rise is supported by tree stumps.
The columns are also a nod to the local architectural tradition of the Queenslander, a house that is raised up on a platform and surrounded by a shaded verandah. This building style was developed to suit the climate of high temperatures and torrential downpour, providing shady outdoor spaces while minimising the risk of flooding.
The building will be “the greenest we can design” said Takada
Urban Forest will also contain a tourist centre where visitors can learn about the plants on its facade and learn about biodiversity and building design.
In the renders, the apartments have their own verandah-style balconies and access to a rooftop garden complete with a communal swimming pool.
The architecture studio is aiming for a six-star Green Star rating
Construction is due to start in 2021 and complete in 2024.
Sydney-based Koichi Takada Architects was founded by Koichi Takada in 2008. Previous projects include a gift shop for Jean Nouvel’s National Museum of Qatar, which features undulating wooden surfaces similar to those planned for Urban Forest.
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