Hasta La Ideas

Japanese studio Tatsuya Kawamoto + Associates has created a house in the city of Ichinomiya, Japan, with exaggerated eaves that shelter an outdoor living space and garden.

The dwelling, named Imaise House, is situated on a private side road in a densely populated district. It is shortlisted in the urban house category of Dezeen Awards 2021.

Imaise House is designed by Tatsuya Kawamoto + Associates with an overhanging roof that extends to the very limit of the site’s boundary, which is formed by the edge of the road.

“We aim to get the maximum spatial volume by taking in the surrounding environment of the private road, where the front road is an individual property and planning a space in which the inside and outside are seamlessly continuous,” explained studio founder Tatsuya Kawamoto.

The studio’s main objective when designing Imaise House was to achieve high earthquake resistance while creating large, open living spaces.

Rather than adopting the typical approach of placing an open-plan living area above a cluster of cellular rooms, Kawamoto chose to create a series of timber “gate-frames” that support the sloping roof.

Each frame spans the entire eight-metre width of the plot, ensuring that the open floor area is as generous as possible while achieving the stability required for earthquake protection.

The walls vary in height and support the pitched roof, which extends out at the front of the house. Its large eaves are interrupted by openings through which trees protrude.

“In order to make effective use of the limited premises, it is expected that the life of the resident will gradually ooze out into the area under the large roof by extending the eaves to the front roadside and creating an external space continuously,” Kawamoto added.

The six wooden frames are arranged linearly from the front to the rear of the site and have been evenly spaced to bring a sense of rhythm to the interior.

Imaise House’s main living space occupies the majority of the ground floor and comprises a lounge, kitchen and dining area that looks out onto the sheltered garden.

Curtains incorporated into each of the frames can be closed to separate the open space into different zones.

Private spaces, including a bathroom and a traditional Japanese-style room with tatami flooring, are accommodated at the rear of the building.

Stairs lead up to a pared-back bedroom positioned beneath the ridge at the tallest point of the house. Internal windows allow daylight to enter the bedroom and provide a visual connection to the living space below.

Other Japanese houses with large overhanging roof include the Kasa House in Kariya by Katsutoshi Sasaki + Associates, where the eaves are used to shelter four covered gardens.

In Nara, FujiwaraMuro Architects used an oversized roof supported by large wooden beams to shade the interiors of the House in Gakuenmae.

Photography is by Takashi Uemura.

The post Extended eaves shelter garden of Imaise House by Tatsuya Kawamoto + Associates appeared first on Dezeen.

This week on Dezeen, we announced that the Kingston University London – Town House designed by Grafton Architects was the winner of this year’s Stirling Prize.

Designed to act as “the university’s front door,” the six-storey building in Kingston Upon Thames features a series of open-plan communal spaces arranged around a statement central staircase and fronted by a distinctive colonnade.

Architect Norman Foster, who was the head of the 2021 RIBA Stirling Prize, commended the Town House for its versatility, calling it “the future of education.”

Private family investment firm Hennick & Company has become the largest shareholder within Foster’s eponymous architecture office Foster + Partners.

“Towards the end of last year, we started to explore long-term structures for the practice that would respond to the challenges and opportunities of growth and encourage the next generation of leadership and this partnership is the culmination of that process,” Foster said.

The office was founded by Pritzker Architecture Prize winner Foster in 1967.

Italian architect Stefano Boeri has completed his first “vertical forest” in the Netherlands, in the form of a 70-metre-tall tower with protruding balconies that features over 10,000 plants.

Called Truro Vertical Forest, the project is a social housing tower in Eindhoven. The tower follows a number of similar plant-covered designs by Boeri, including the recent Palazzo Verde housing complex in Belgium.

In New York, the city’s council has approved mass timber for use in the construction of buildings that are up to 85 feet tall.

Meanwhile in the UK, timber architecture expert Andrew Waugh has claimed that rules restricting the use of wood in architecture projects are hindering the switch to low-carbon building methods.

As the Dubai Expo continues, we rounded up ten must-see pavilions from the event.

Three thematic pavilions designed by architecture studios Grimshaw, AGi Architects and Foster + Partners are among the highlights, as well as national pavilions by Santiago Calatrava, JKMM and Es Devlin.

Popular projects this week included a Mies van der Rohe-informed house in the Cotswolds, a ranch for an artist in Washington and a house on a four-metre-wide site in Vietnam.

Our lookbook this week focused on interiors with window seats.

This week on Dezeen is our regular roundup of the week’s top news stories. Subscribe to our newsletters to be sure you don’t miss anything.

The post This week we revealed this year’s Stirling Prize winner appeared first on Dezeen.

Architecture firm SOM has designed a limestone-clad building patterned with symbolic palm leaves for the Permanent Mission of the United Arab Emirates to the United Nations in Manhattan.

The building represents the United Arab Emirates’ (UAE’s) diplomacy to the United Nations (UN) and is located in Manhattan’s Turtle Bay neighbourhood, close to the UN headquarters.

The Permanent Mission of the United Arab Emirates to the United Nations is an organisation set up by the UAE to champion the UN and is headed by ambassador Lana Zaki Nusseibeh.

Indiana limestone, sourced from the same quarries that provided the facades for the Empire State Building and the Rockefeller Center, clads the diplomacy building.

The 10-storey tower was designed to blend with the scale of the rest of the neighbourhood while also representing the UAE.

SOM added palm leaf motifs to the building’s canopy and entrance as an international symbol of peace.

As the tower rises, the facade’s vertical elements attenuate to cater to privacy and light-related needs within the building, which also echoes the narrowing spine of a palm leaf.

“The palm is represented by the tapering limestone piers extending skywards from the second floor to the roof,” SOM design partner Chris Cooper told Dezeen.

Visitors enter the building via a 40-foot-tall (13-metre) double-height hallway that was designed to echo a courtyard in a traditional Middle Eastern house.

“On the interior, the concept of hospitality blends Middle Eastern tradition with diplomatic decorum,” continued Cooper.

“The space brings guests and staff together in an environment that is dignified, understated, and symbolic of international exchange.”

Split into three zones, the building’s first two storeys house the entry hall and event spaces, while floors three to six feature an amenity level and staff offices.

Levels seven and eight are reserved for executive areas, and at the top portion of the building, there is a roof terrace with impressive views of the Dag Hammarskjold Plaza below and the East River beyond.

“The layout of each floor of the building is inspired by the principle of the central courtyard, with a central reception and gathering space that is accessible from the elevator lobby,” explained Cooper.

“These spaces choreograph the visitor’s progression through the building – heeding the hospitable nature of Middle Eastern culture.”

Throughout the building, interiors pay tribute to the Middle East. Conference rooms include a traditional geometric pattern known as mashrabiya, which features in every UAE diplomatic office around the world.

Lebanese designer Nada Debs created the interiors for the building’s entry hall with a palette of natural materials intended to evoke serenity, such as Northern Canadian limestone.

Amenity spaces were designed with flat-cut American walnut and Calacatta marble, while executive spaces house Majlis areas for entertaining guests.

“In designing the mission, we endeavored to integrate Middle Eastern and local motifs, symbolising the power and importance of cross-cultural exchange and rooting the building in New York City’s architectural traditions,” said Cooper.

SOM is an American firm founded by Louis Skidmore, Nathaniel Owings and John Merrill in 1939. The office was recently chosen to design a mass-timber Olympic village for the Milan 2026 Winter Olympics.

The photography and drawings are courtesy of SOM.

The post SOM designs UAE diplomacy building with Middle Eastern motifs in Manhattan appeared first on Dezeen.



Popular DIY and science YouTube channel, The Q took his viewers through the process of replacing his bicycle’s traditional rubber tires with a set of airless ones put together with an old PVC pipe and some nuts and bolts.

We’ve seen airless tires on construction vehicles, like backhoes and skid steers, and smaller vehicles like golf carts and lawnmowers. No one wants a flat tire while mowing the lawn or playing golf and the chance for a flat tire is far higher in places like construction zones and building demolition sites. It makes sense that some vehicles prioritize airless tires and some don’t, but what about bicycles?

The Q, popular science and DIY YouTube channel, asked the same question and looked no further than an old PVC pipe and some nuts and bolts to answer it. Before constructing his airless tires, The Q was sure to pick a PVC pipe that had enough density to support a rider and ride well on different terrain. Settling on a ½” thick PVC pipe, The Q then sliced the PVC pipe into two-inch wide rings. From there, the DIY YouTuber connected all of the rings into a single link after drilling three holes into each and joining them together with nuts and bolts.

The Q then drilled corresponding holes into the rim of the bike, linking those holes with the ones previously drilled into the PVC rings. Reinforcing that layering with nuts and bolts, The Q repeated the process for two more rows, resulting in a triple overlay of PVC rings. With the main job complete, The Q finalized the project by carving the top layer of rubber from the bike’s original tire before laying it over the rows of PVC rings and gorilla gluing all of the pieces together. From there, the airless tires were ready to hit the road.

While The Q admits that the overall construction could benefit from slight modifications, the bike’s airless tires are fully functional and can ride smoothly over varying terrains, from sand to grass, and from pavement to gravel.

Designer: The Q

A German startup called Personomic hopes to revolutionize bicycle grips. With standard offerings “you often have to deal with numbness, tingling or pain that can really ruin the cycling experience,” they write. “Until now, bicycle grips have only been offered in standard sizes, developed with an average-sized hand in mind. Therefore, these grips only constitute a compromise. For many people it is mostly a bad one, because every hand is different.

“In addition, the vast majority of bicycle grips are made of rubber and start to become sticky after a short time. This is caused by the plasticizers contained in the material, which dissolve from the handle due to UV radiation and sweat.”

Personomic therefore creates plasticizer-free, silicone bike grips created to fit your precise hand shape. Their procedure has you photograph your own hands; their software, they claim, can reproduce the shape of your hand in three dimensions. They then create a 3D-printed mold in which they cast your custom silicone grips.

“The force is distributed evenly across your hand and there are no pressure peaks that compress the nerves — similar to an orthopaedic insole. The enlarged surface with the wing also supports your wrist and prevents hyperextension, one of the main reasons for numb or tingling fingers.”

You can choose from different textures and colors, and choose to have the handles “engraved” (i.e. the letters of your choice can be printed into the mold).

Here’s a look at their process:

The reviews from test subjects on Facebook have been effusive, and the company has successfully crowdfunded the next round of production. If you’re interested, buy-in starts at €69 (USD $81) and the campaign is here.