Hasta La Ideas

New York studio Ennead Architects has renovated the Cathedral Church of St John the Divine in Manhattan by adding a batten-seam copper dome that “could last another 100 years”.

Ennead Architects was tasked with renovating the terracotta dome of the cathedral, which was first built in 1917 by Spanish-American architect Rafael Guastavino and features the largest Guastavino tile dome in the world. By some accounts the church itself is the largest in the United States at 120,555 square feet (11,200 square meters).

Ennead Architects, which has worked with the cathedral for the past 30 years, was charged with creating a shell to fit around the dome, which is 133 feet (40.6 metres) in diameter, to protect it from the elements.

The renovations included placing a copper dome on top of the tile and replacing the previous exterior of the dome to ensure that the space between the metal and stone wouldn’t trap water.

“Initial conversations suggested patch work for a quicker fix, but this was soon rejected as water leakage became too big of a problem,” associate principal Kevin Seymour and senior associate Charles Brainerd at Ennead told Dezeen.

“With the insulation layer causing water to remain trapped between the exterior of the dome and the layer itself, our team landed on a long-term solution of completely replacing the roofing layers of the dome.”

The design took into account the number of renovations that were deployed to deal with the sagging dome and the associated water damage since its construction.

“Due to its large scale, the Cathedral’s Guastavino Dome has undergone multiple modifications throughout its life to control excessive movement, cracking, and water infiltration,” said Seymour and Brainerd.

These included adding steel rods in 1916, masonry repairs in 1970 and renovating an exterior arch in 2012.

In order to ensure that the copper’s expansion and contraction caused by shifts in the weather didn’t harm the dome, the team removed the old sodden insulation, gave the tiles time to dry and reinstalled spray foam insulation.

The hope is that as the copper oxidizes it will match some of the surrounding buildings as well as the statue of the angel Gabriel on the apse.

Restoration of the tile itself was also part of the project. Building Conservation Associates, Inc. and James R. Gainfort AIA Consulting Architects PC were brought on to assess the damage to the classic tile and missing or damaged tiles were replaced by customised tiles created by Ohio-based Sandkuhl Clay Works.

“With proper maintenance, it could last another 100 years,” said the studio.

“The dome was meant to temporarily cover the cathedral crossing until a massive tower could be built above it,” said dean The Very Reverend Patrick Malloy, noting that the Statue of Liberty could fit underneath the dome.

“As the New York Times recently reported, the ground under the cathedral actually could not bear the weight of the proposed tower, so the dome is, de facto, the permanent roof of a large section of our enormous building.”

“Now, cleaned and repaired, it glows.”

Ennead’s work with the cathedral has included its “long-term architectural vision” as well as maintenance and repairs to the structure as well as a multi-year renovation to the Cathedral School.

Other work on religious buildings by high-profile architecture studios includes the rebuilding of The St Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church at the site of the World Trade Centre by Santiago Calatrava.

The photography is by Demian Neufeld. 

The post Ennead Architects places copper dome on New York cathedral in time for Easter appeared first on Dezeen.

Vegan and gluten-free, this Chipotle Sauce from family-owned Bitchin’ Sauces is bold, zingy and smoky with a touch of heat. Made with almonds, lemon juice, soy sauce, nutritional yeast, smoked paprika and other spices, it’s perfect on everything from tacos to crudités to breakfast sandwiches.

Designer Leah Ring set up her interdisciplinary studio Another Human in 2017, and since then has been wooing residential homes in California with her unique, fresh, and sunny design pieces. She loves sculptural furniture and leaves no chance to create them. And a sculptural furniture collection that she recently designed for her studio is the Doodle. The Doodle is Ring’s latest collection that looks exactly as it sounds – a bunch of scrappy doodles brought to life. Each piece is one-of-a-kind – hauntingly similar to its predecessor, yet painstakingly unique as well.

Designer: Leah Ring for Another Human

If you look closely the furniture pieces look like contorted pieces of paper clips. It looks like the result of an idle day at work, where one does nothing except twist and play around with paper clips, creating unique contraptions that look like absurd bits of metal, rather than functional pieces of stationery. Ring’s intention behind every piece was to make it look like a blind contour drawing brought to life in three dimensions. Nickel-plated steel arching was hand-bent and welded together, around a cast resin  – resulting in an abstract-looking table and a pair of chairs that don’t look like they could stand by themselves, and yet they do! The cast-resin tabletop on the table looks gravity-defying.

Ring described the design process behind the Doodle collection as “free and exploratory”. And, indeed it does seem like it. The final pieces look like dynamic and quirky pieces of art, that you would find in an art show, than in a furniture store. But that’s exactly what makes this collection so unique! In a world where furniture has been shoved into a humdrum and mundane box, the Doodle Collection is Ring’s rebellion against boring and anticipated design languages. The pieces are quite different as compared to previous furniture designs launched by Another Human, which indicates Ring’s own expansion and experimentation as a designer.

The Doodle collection is definitely not for everyone, and you won’t see it in an office or restaurant. But for the brave-hearted furniture connoisseurs who love to experiment and add an element of fun to their homes, the Doodle designs would be an exciting addition to their living space.

The post Experimental + playful furniture collection made from plated steel looks like pieces of contorted paper clips first appeared on Yanko Design.

On April Fool’s Day, Technabob suggested Microsoft would bring back the dreaded Clippy as the face of their ChatGPT-driven Bing AI.

Titans of CNC machined this crazy isogrid aluminum skateboard.

Industrial Designer and outdoorsman Tony Richardson designed the Rux, a flexible, fold-flat outdoor gear container system.

Knifemaker Meton makes a variety of beautiful “worry coins,” a modern machined variant of “worry stones” (think old-school fidget spinner).

Danish furniture designer Jonas Herman Pedersen devised an unusual lid for this A Line Storage Bench series.

This non-disposable Hit Flyswatter by industrial designer Christian Steiner will last forever. It’s made by GoodGoods, an Austrian company that employs the disabled for manufacturing.

Design/architecture expert Barbara Glasner’s “Most Touched” book showcases over 1,000 door handles from around the world.

Hi-tech Swedish solution to affordably light bike paths at night: You summon an LED drone via an app, then it follows you as you cycle.

Engineer Harry Blakiston Houston designed a low-cost, easy-to-build temporary window replacement for bombed-out buildings in Ukraine. His organization, Insulate Ukraine, has installed hundreds to date.

University of Michigan architectural researchers have devised this “Shell Wall” method of 3D-printing concrete, which reduces weight sharply and uses computational design to satisfy structural requirements.

The Study is a folding, link-able table series by Stockholm-based furniture design studio Karlsson & Björk.

Years ago programmers engaged in a hilarious, informal “Intentionally terrible UI/UX designs for worst volume slider” contest.

Makita’s versatile DCU600 powered cart runs off of 18V power tool batteries and offers three different loading platforms.

Industrial design consultancies Produktive and AWS Designteam collaborated to design this Ottobock Shoulder exoskeleton, for those doing overhead work. It’s lightweight, comfortable, size-adjustable, offers a full range of motion and is purely mechanical, requiring no power or batteries.

Belgian architect Bert Masselus designed this Join Table, a hideaway twist on the picnic table.

Meta’s Head of Industrial Design has a sense of humor! With his Cone of Light, ID’er Peter Bristol mashes up two objets d’esign by Eero Aarnio and Konstantin Grcic.

Industrial designer Phil Saunders explains his design of the unusual ASUS tablet carry system, which allows you to interact with the device while it’s slung in front of you.

Industrial design consultancy Myra designed these AmbiCare QuietFrames, which are “visual noise canceling glasses.”

Furniture designer Hemmo Honkonen’s surprising Audible Cabinets mechanically produce music when opened or closed.

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A new study published in Science Advances reveals that there’s an ancient sunken ocean floor in between the layer of the Earth’s mantle and its core. Scientists from the University of Alabama discovered this through global-scale seismic imaging that was collected over years, indicating ultra-low velocity zones (ULVs) or places with strong wave speed reduction, along the core-mantel boundary (CMB). “Analyzing 1000s of seismic recordings from Antarctica, our high-definition imaging method found thin anomalous zones of material at the CMB everywhere we probed,” says Dr Edward Garnero who co-led the study. “The material’s thickness varies from a few kilometers to 10s of kilometers. This suggests we are seeing mountains on the core, in some places up to five times taller than Mt. Everest.” Researchers believe these mountains to be former oceanic sea-floors that sunk to the CMB. The presence of “mountains” sheds light on how heat escapes the Earth’s core, as material from the ancient ocean floors could have become swept back up to the surface through hot spots and volcanic eruptions. Learn more at Earth.com.

Image courtesy of Argonne National Laboratory/Flickr