Landscape architect Lynn Kinnear, founder of Kinnear Landscape Architects who collaborated on projects including the Stirling Prize-winning Burntwood School, has died aged 64.
Lynn Kinnear (above) was the designer of numerous playgrounds including Drapers Fields. Photo by Adrian Taylor
Born in Edinburgh in 1960, Kinnear studied at Heriot-Watt University before going on to work at architecture studios including SOM and Gillespies, before establishing her own studio in 1991.
She was diagnosed with cancer in 2017 but continued to run her practice until 2023.
In a thirty-year career, Kinnear designed numerous playgrounds including Drapers Fields and Normand Park as well as parks, public squares and playspaces for schools including Chobham Academy in Newham and Daubeney School in Hackney.
Normand Park was another park designed by Kinnear. Photo by Tim Soar
Burntwood School received the Stirling Prize in 2015 – one of many awards won by Kinnear, who also received the Landscape Institute President’s Award for her Brentford High Street project and the Landscape Institute Award for Walthamstow Wetlands.
Reflecting on her work at Burntwood School, AHMM co-founder Paul Monaghan told Dezeen that the landscape design was “a key part of the project’s success”.
“She quickly developed our idea of a school where the outdoor spaces were seen as teaching rooms and her concepts included a sculpture court, a village green and a contemplation garden which all offered special places for the girls at the school,” he said.
“She was very collaborative, but also stuck to her ideas, which were always strong.”
Kinnear designed the landscaping for Burntwood School. Photo by Tim Soar
“Our final project with her was at Tower Hamlets Town Hall now housed at the old Royal London Hospital in Whitechapel,” Monaghan added. “It was only finished last year but it provides a new front door to the borough.”
“Lynn was unable to deliver this on site but her strong design remains a shining example of someone who kept things simple but bold and made it look easy.”
Along with her work through her studio Kinnear Landscape Architects, she also commissioned the Blue House in London by architecture studio FAT, where her then partner Sean Griffiths was co-founder.
Kinnear commissioned the Blue House. Photo by Edmund Sumner
The project is one of FAT’s most significant works and remained Kinnear’s home until she died.
“Lynn was an amazing person who touched many lives and places in all of her capacities as a mother, a friend and as a brilliant landscape architect – one of the most important of her generation,” said Griffiths.
“She leaves behind a tremendous legacy of wonderful places including natural environments, school playgrounds, parks, public square and streets apes that will be enjoyed by generations to come.”
For our Social Housing Revival series, we look at how the fate of UK social-housing estates has become an urgent topic as councils grapple with the housing crisis and challenges of preservation.
Regeneration of social housing estates – which typically involves demolishing post-war estates and replacing them with new housing that increases the overall number of units but reduces the proportion of social-rent homes – has become a highly contentious issue in Britain.
Politicians, councils and housing associations undertaking regeneration projects argue that they are an effective way of increasing overall housing supply while improving living conditions for tenants.
But regeneration schemes are often highly controversial, with some opponents claiming they can amount to social cleansing as long-standing residents are moved elsewhere.
Anti-demolition campaigns have frequently drawn the attention of the architecture community – most notably the unsuccessful attempts to save Robin Hood Gardens in east London, razed in 2017.
Anti-demolition campaigns failed to save Robin Hood Gardens (also top). Photo by Luke Hayes
Now, as concerns about the UK’s housing-affordability crisis continue to grow, author and journalist Anna Minton believes changing public sentiment about social housing may be turning the tide against further estate regeneration.
“The stock has been decimated and people would love to live in it,” said Minton, a vocal critic of estate regeneration. “I think it’s lost its bad reputation – people think, ‘if only houses were available on council estates in the way they used to be’.”
“There is a renewed interest because affordable housing and the housing crisis is right at the top of the political agenda in a way that it wasn’t before,” she told Dezeen. “This big push on estate regeneration – I think it has kind of peaked.”
Eamon McGoldrick, the managing director of trade body National Federation of ALMOs – council-housing management companies – added that local authorities may be less inclined to demolish social housing as they spend increasingly large portions of their budgets responding to rising homelessness.
“Lots of councils have got long homelessness queues, they’ve all got waiting lists,” he told Dezeen.
“If we knock [an estate] down, we lose those 200 units or 500 units while we replace them, and that could mean a lot of people in temporary accommodation while the new homes are built,” he added. “That could be five or 10 years apart.”
“Mixed bag of feelings” over council estates
Among those fighting to preserve council estates is architectural charity the Twentieth Century Society, whose list of at-risk buildings includes the Alton Estate in southwest London and Central Hill in Lambeth, London.
Like Minton, the charity’s director, Catherine Croft, believes that people are increasingly seeing the value in existing council estates.
“I think people often have a real mixed bag of feelings about this,” she told Dezeen.
“In a lot of cases, they’re very aware that [the buildings] haven’t been invested in, that they haven’t had the maintenance that they deserve, and they can feel incredibly frustrated about that, and forgotten and neglected.”
The Balfron Tower renovation forced out council tenants. Photo by Getty Images
“But I think they’re often really appreciative of the space standards – particularly of the post-1960s, ’70s and ’80s housing, which have large living areas, plenty of storage and often balconies,” she added.
“And often the public areas of those estates were designed incredibly carefully to provide pleasant settings for the building and fun places for recreation.”
“Lots of design faults” in post-war housing
However, that’s not the case for every estate. There have been particular concerns over estates constructed using large-panel systems (LPS).
“The main problem for local authorities is there was massive council house-building in the 1960s and ’70s and a lot of it was high density – quite a lot of it was concrete, large-panel system construction,” McGoldrick said.
“I think, to be honest, there were a lot of design faults in them – I think that is accepted, especially with the large-panel system.”
In many cases, the construction of LPS buildings led to damp and mould problems inside flats. In cash-strapped councils, these problems got worse over time due to a lack of maintenance.
“Some of the workmanship wasn’t very good, sometimes the bolts weren’t connected – also, inherently, they were great big lumps of concrete, and they get cold,” McGoldrick added.
Grenfell put spotlight on council estate maintenance
And while the argument for renovation over demolition has been made more strongly in recent years, the retention of council housing hasn’t always been without issues.
A recent example is the Balfron Tower in Poplar, east London, designed by architect Ernö Goldfinger and built in 1967.
Seventy-two people were killed in a fire at Grenfell Tower after a botched refurbishment project. Photo by Getty
Meanwhile, at Grenfell Tower in North Kensington, the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea decided to invest in refurbishing the existing building and keep it as council housing to disastrous effect.
In June 2017, a fire at the block killed 72 people after spreading rapidly across cladding that had been installed as part of upgrades intended to improve the building’s thermal efficiency.
“The Grenfell tragedy was born through, ‘this is a cold tower block, heating bills are high, so let’s clad it in insulation,” McGoldrick said. “The idea was fantastic, the execution of the works and the products obviously wasn’t.”
However, Minton argues that the Grenfell disaster has since had an impact on changing people’s views of council estates.
“When the tower burnt down, for the first few weeks or so, the media was saying this was a ghetto, a terrible council block – and there was just a complete backlash; people were saying ‘it wasn’t like that at all, it was a genuinely mixed community that people loved living in’,” she said.
“It shone a light on what it was really like, rather than the narrative that is so often painted by the media.”
Regeneration “shouldn’t be a dirty word’
The picture also varies considerably across the country. Kevin Garvey, South West regional lead at housing-association trade body the National Housing Federation, argues that there are areas where regeneration can be a valuable tool in boosting local economies.
“Regeneration has a really important role to play in different parts of the country and it shouldn’t necessarily be a dirty word,” he told Dezeen.
“There’s absolutely an argument there for the sector to be looking at regeneration as a particular avenue, particularly where the cost of dealing with those homes – hard-to-retrofit homes, hard-to-treat homes – where the cost of doing that actually exceeds the value of a particular home as an asset.”
The key, he says, is ensuring that the interests of the people living in the affected homes are properly taken into account.
“Acting in the interest of the business and acting in the interests of the people that live in these homes, that needs to be weighed up and considered as part of the process around regeneration,” Garvey said.
Changing financial picture
Social landlords often claim that tearing down and rebuilding ageing estates is cheaper than the cost of renovation. Funding for social housing is in perennially short supply, something that Croft says has to be take into account when considering whether to demolish or retain.
“It is hard to find the money, not just for renovation and restoration projects, but perhaps even more critically for ongoing maintenance,” Croft said. “That’s so unglamorous but absolutely critical.”
But here too, the situation may be changing. One major cost of regeneration is purchasing homes set to be demolished from home-owners on the estate.
There have been infamous examples of people being forced to sell their homes for paltry sums and consequently having to move far out of the area – most notably at the Heygate Estate in Southwark.
“There have been some very high-profile public inquiries,” said Minton. “When it becomes clear that residents homeowners will fight councils and will have to get a lot more in compulsory purchase, it stops making so much financial sense for councils.”
Planning guidance is likely to have an increasing focus on retention. Photo by Rumman Amin
Then there is the debate over sustainability. As the building industry increasingly focuses on issues around embodied carbon, retaining existing buildings has become a priority.
“It’s absolutely something that housing associations factor into their thinking – we can’t talk about a net zero economy and net zero on decarbonizing the home, without thinking about that embodied carbon aspect to any regeneration that takes place,” Garvey said.
Advances building technology can also make upgrading existing buildings more effective. The Twentieth Century Society, for example, has been working with a new window solution for the Golden Lane Estate in the City of London, putting in vacuum glazing rather than double glazing to help insulation.
“It’s a much narrower sandwich and that means it’s much easier to fit into existing window frames,” Croft said.
Regardless of politics, practical considerations like these could mean under-threat estates are safe for some time yet.
This article is part of Dezeen’s Social Housing Revival series exploring the new wave of quality social housing being built around the world, and asking whether a return to social house-building at scale can help solve affordability issues and homelessness in our major cities.
Local architecture office Studio Morphogenesis has used dusty pink coloured concrete to build a waterside mosque that sits on a sloping site in Dhaka, Bangladesh.
Named after the land owner’s late mother, the Zebun Nessa Mosque is situated in the rapidly growing industrial outskirts of Dhaka. It was constructed to serve as a spiritual sanctuary and communal space for local workers.
The Zebun Nessa Mosque is situated in a busy industrial compound in Dhaka
“We wanted to frame the view towards the water,” Studio Morphogenesis partner Saiqa Iqbal Meghna told Dezeen.
“This creates a sense of calmness for the devotees as they enter the space from a busy industrial surrounding to a serene atmosphere merged with the body of water.”
The mosque is elevated on a plinth due to the sloped terrain it sits upon
Perched on a gradually sloping landscape, the studio adopted vernacular construction methods used to build residential structures in the region.
The process involved using a “dig and mound” approach, where structures are elevated on high plinths to deter overflow during heavy monsoon rains.
The pink colour palette is intended to soften the surrounding harsh industrial aesthetic
The mosque was constructed using pink concrete to soften the harsh industrial surroundings. The dusty pink hue references the earthy pink and red tones of historic Mughal, Sultanate and Indo-Saracenic architectures.
The concrete was coated with lime plaster mixed with red brick powder, as a nod to traditional weather-proofing methods used in Bengal.
The warm hue of the rusted pink concrete contrasts the interior, which features a cooler turquoise palette for the flooring.
In contrast to conventional mosques that feature enclosed prayer spaces, the qibla – which marks the direction Muslims face during prayer – is defined by a large, arched opening that allows a clear view of the surrounding waterbody.
The qibla is marked by a large, curved opening that frames views of the water
According to Meghna, the mosque was designed as a “breathing pavilion” to optimise natural light and airflow. Its thick concrete walls are perforated with small rectangular voids to provide ventilation and allow light to gently emanate through to the interior.
“The perforations create an interplay of light seen in old Islamic architectures that are adorned with intricate ‘jali’ works,” said Meghna.
“The filtered light that seeps through the small perforations also resembles hanging lanterns of old mosques.”
The perforations resemble hanging lanterns in older mosques
The prayer hall’s semi-open configuration was designed to further enhance natural ventilation, while providing shade from direct sunlight.
“[The building] celebrates the seasonal attributes of the tropical climate,” Meghna said. “Wind flow becomes a gentle breeze, while rainfall soothes and heals the atmosphere.”
The prayer hall’s semi-open design improves air circulation and offers shelter from direct sunlight
The mosque is devoid of glass surfaces with the exception of the translucent glass mihrab – a niche indicating the qibla direction, which is the focal point of prayer halls in mosques.
According to the studio, the building’s plan evolved from simple geometric shapes, with a square outer wall that envelops a central circular volume to create four enclosed courtyards on each side.
The courtyards feature endemic plants and tree species, including Shimul trees and Chhatim trees, which were chosen for their revered status in Bangladesh.
A curved, square outer wall wraps a circular volume to create four enclosed courtyards
The building was topped with a shallow, thin shell dome that shelters the prayer hall and is supported by a single peripheral beam.
“The floating dome evokes the structural ingenuity of covering large spaces without intermediate supports, seen in mosque architecture in the Islamic world,” Meghna said.
The mezzanine is a dedicated space for women worshippers to pray or socialise
An essential aspect of the project’s objectives was to engage female workers by providing designated areas for prayer and communal activities.
Accessed via an external steel staircase, the mosque features a crescent-shaped upper floor that serves as a gathering space and prayer area specifically for women, fostering a sense of belonging and empowerment among women workers.
“I feel blessed as lead architect to design a mosque named after a pious woman, where women workers are addressed equally with importance and care,” said Meghn.
The mezzanine is accessed via an external steel staircase
Outside, red cement and locally sourced broken brick pieces were carefully laid to create the mosaic-style flooring and ramps, which references traditional craftsmanship of the local area.
The outdoor ablution area transitions into a turquoise mosaic floor to evoke a sense of purification during the act of cleansing before prayer.
The outdoor ablution area features a turquoise mosaic floor to symbolise purification
Studio Morphogenesis was founded by Meghna in 2014. Its projects include places of worship, residential towers and offices that blend local traditional crafts with contemporary design and technology.
Other mosques in Dhaka include the Mayor Mohammad Hanif Jame Mosque, which features an open-air prayer space, as well as the Bait Ur Rouf Mosque, distinguished by its perforated brickwork and light wells.
Architect: Studio Morphogenesis Lead architect: Saiqa Iqbal Meghna Partner in charge and design team member: Suvro Sovon Chowdhury Associate project architect: Muntasir Hakim Other team members: Shahla Karim Kabir and Minhaz Bin Gaffar Construction: IDS Adress Maker Structural consultant: TDM Metal stair structural consultant: Faysal Anwar Electrical consultant: Eyashin Ahamad Plumbing consultants: Shafiqul Bari and Shah Newaz Kabir Glass mihrab artist: Wakilur Rahman
Norwegian studio Gartnerfuglen Arkitekter has completed a home named Årestua in a remote area of Telemark, referencing traditional log cabins to create a feeling of “natural minimalism”.
Årestua stands on a small, sloped forest clearing and takes its name from the Norwegian word for a log cabin that would historically be organised around an open fire.
Årestua is modelled on traditional log cabins
Drawing on these cabins, Gartnerfuglen Arkitekter split the home into five volumes, giving rise to four “outhouses” organised around a skylit central living area with a fireplace.
Between the volumes, the studio has placed small outdoor spaces with benches to provide views of the surrounding landscape.
Wooden logs line the walls
“The way the volumes of the cabin are arranged provides different sheltered spaces on all sides, each with its own qualities,” studio co-founder Astrid Rohde Wang told Dezeen.
“We wanted the central space to have a sort of grandeur with the high ceiling height of about four metres and a roof light,” she continued. “It is an open, sacred room where the extended family can meet and interact for generations to come.”
The home is made up of five volumes
Årestua’s organisation provides separation between this central living area and the more private bedroom and study spaces, which step down in level and are shielded by slatted wooden screens.
In the tallest volume is a small lookout-style mezzanine with a large window, accessed by a ladder.
“The organisation reduces the need for designated circulation space, as all rooms are connected to the central room – the ‘bonfire’ of the home,” explained Wang.
The home’s walls are made using large sections of sawn logs, positioned on a concrete base that is left exposed throughout to offer the look of what the studio calls “natural minimalism”.
Windows of different sizes frame views of the surrounding landscape
Large wooden cabinets, some of which also serve as room dividers, help to compartmentalise the home, while different-sized windows frame views of the landscape, including an area of corner glazing.
“Although minimalism maybe isn’t what strikes you in the photos of the spaces, it is there in the simplicity of the log construction with an ancient history, in the natural surfaces and the windows just being left as cut logs,” Wang told Dezeen.
The rooms are connected by the central volume that contains a fireplace
There are a few designs in the smartphone market that have become synonymous with the brands they represent. Although some phones followed in its footsteps, Apple wholeheartedly embraced the iPhone notch for several generations. Samsung’s S Pen is something very few manufacturers have imitated, and Nothing’s Glyph lights have made dynamic LED lighting a thing on smartphones. And then there’s Google’s camera design, which has been dubbed by some as a visor, that gave the Pixel 6 onward a visually unique character. Unfortunately, brands and designs change, and it seems that the Pixel 9 trio will bid farewell to that distinctive design, though its replacement is admittedly a bit less egregious than other leaks would have us believe.
Truth be told, the “visor” camera design on the recent Pixel phones isn’t exactly the sleekest and most elegant design around, but it has enough elements that make it interesting and distinctive without being obnoxious or garish. It also has the side effect, intentional or otherwise, of raising the phone at an angle without making it wobble. Based on leaks confirmed by these unofficial renders, we might have seen the last of that design and will behold another variation that may be even more controversial than the original design on the Pixel 6 from 2021.
Google Pixel 9
Google Pixel 9
Instead of a raised strip that goes from edge to edge, the Pixel 9 phones will instead have a long pill-shaped camera bump that still spans the entire width of the phone. But unlike blurry leaked photos of prototype models, these renders show a better picture of what is allegedly the final design of that camera bump. It will follow the same two-tone theme as the Pixel 8 before it, giving it a bit of style and visual interest.
Google Pixel 9
It will definitely not be everyone’s cup of tea, especially those who have regarded the visor design to be the signature mark of the Pixel phones from the past three years. But more than just brand identity, this capsule-shaped bump also has the effect of making its thickness even more noticeable and abrupt, as if someone just glued a large chunk of metal and glass onto the back of the phone. The Pixel 8’s camera bump is just as thick, but the curved edge and smoother curves give the impression that it is thinner than it really is.
Google Pixel 9 Pro XL
Another detail coming out from these leaks is that Google will launch three models this year instead of just two. That will be the Pixel 9, Pixel 9 Pro, and Pixel 9 Pro XL. The “XL” model hasn’t been seen since the Pixel 5 XL in 2020, so it will be interesting how Google will position these three phones in the market.
Dezeen Showroom: designer Anna Vonhause opted for an “eye-catching industrial-style” when developing the Vank Long furniture collection for Polish brand Vank.
Vank Long comprises an armchair, sofa, pouffe and bench, designed by Vonhause with black-metal frames and rounded cushions in a variety of colours.
Vank Long is an “industrial-style” furniture collection
The focal point of the collection is the armchair, which can be made with a matching footrest and features ribbed cushioning that have a scalloped appearance when viewed from the side.
Each piece can be used independently or combined with others from the collection to form larger seating arrangements.
The armchair has curved seat cushions
According to Vank, Vonhausen designed the collection using the principles of the circular economy, meaning the products are built with fasteners and connectors that ensure easy disassembly and reuse of components at the end of their life.
The upholstery also makes use of waste leather and latex salvaged from textile industry.
Material: textile industry waste, limited-edition zero waste natural leather dead stock and organic latex filling Dimensions: 860 x 600 x 600 millimetres (armchair)
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The LEGO Group and NASA have collaborated on some interesting sets in the past. Yes, the ace space agency pioneering some of the most ambitious space missions has lent its expertise to create the NASA Mars Rover Perseverance model priced at just $100. They’ve bettered the rover released in mid-2023 with this beefier version that’s not a replica of any existing rover, rather, a fictional two-seater space vehicle released as a part of the Technic line-up.
This gave the design team more freedom to explore the possibilities without being too logical, or go all out and make it too sci-fi. According to Aurélien Rouffiange the design manager, “When you look at this vehicle, we want you to say, ‘Okay, that can happen.’ That is where we wanted to set the limit.” The result is a stunning 1,599-piece LEGO set that’ll be a treat to put together and flash on your living room shelf or work desk.
The six-wheeled rover comes with an expanding truck bed, dual working crane, living quarter and loads of scientific equipment and logistics canisters to complete the feel. If you want to take it for a spin on rugged terrain, the NASA team has engineered a working suspension on this one. Calling this a campervan for space adventurers won’t be an overstatement, it’s that extensive. The open living space inside has ample space for a treadmill and shower for two astronauts to survive. Gosh, it already feels like I’m penning down the design logs of a sci-fi series…
The realism and attention to detail are something purists will appreciate. Right from the crew containers to store trash, Mars rocks or science samples to water oxygen and hydrogen. There’s even a fuel cell generator to recharge the batteries. Aurélien reassures that Hydrogen will be the future of drivetrains and NASA wants kids to learn that at a very early age. To keep things close to reality, the wheels are inspired by the rocker-bogie suspension found on the Curiosity and Perseverance rovers in operation on the red planet. The tires are colored gray to make them look like metal, just like the real Rover tires.
Based on the NASA team’s input the wheelbase of the vehicle had to be kept a bit short to make it a convincing iteration for any alien planet exploration. So, the LEGO team made a contracting chassis that can be configured at will. Aurélien added, “You can still drive it around in this compact mode, but, of course, it is not meant for that.” On the lighter side, NASA wanted a toilet for sure and the design team had to include the space for it!
British design studio Seymourpowell has put cheap electronic goods under the spotlight with Un-Made, a project imagining four possible ways to design for quick disassembly and recycling.
As part of the project, Seymourpowell devised four automated disassembly mechanism concepts using an electric toothbrush as an example for their animated graphics.
Each of the mechanisms could be built into a product during manufacturing and then activated in a factory at the end of the item’s life.
Un-Made suggests automated disassembly mechanisms for an electric toothbrush
The first Un-Made concept is a pin mechanism. Similar to the action of opening a SIM card slot on a smartphone, it involves poking a pin into a small, sealed pinhole on the rear of the product to release the internal components.
The second concept is a vacuum mechanism. It involves placing the product into a vacuum, causing closed cell foams and air-sealed features within it to expand and bust the external housing open.
Third, there is a piston mechanism that works by pushing a piston through a cap on the bottom of a device and forcing all of the internal components upwards until they emerge through the top.
The first concept includes a pin-triggered release mechanism
The final concept involves using UV glue – a type of adhesive that deactivates under ultraviolet light. In this concept, the product is placed into a specially lit chamber to release the clamshell construction.
The Un-Made project was led by Eddie Hamilton, a senior industrial designer at Seymourpowell, who was driven to make the work after researching what electric toothbrush to buy for himself.
“Inevitably I went for the cheap one, at which point Amazon smugly pointed out they’d sold 10k+ of that model last month alone,” said Hamilton.
Another mechanism uses a vacuum to burst open the product’s external housing
“As an industrial designer, I spend time obsessing over the product I’m working on, typically thinking of it in isolation,” he added.
“But one thing I occasionally fail to remember or adequately picture is the true scale of that product once manufactured. 10,000 units sold per month seems vast.”
Using Amazon’s bestsellers list, Hamilton ascertained that fabric shavers, steam irons, wireless doorbells, wireless computer mice, digital tyre inflators and USB-C adaptors were all items selling in their thousands each month, at a price of less than £20.
While designing products so they can be repaired is important, the associated expense may not be something that customers can justify for small items sold at this price point, Hamilton said.
“Even if we change societal attitudes, the bottom line is whether you should open that cheap toothbrush to replace a failing battery when you only paid £24.99 for it two years ago,” he said.
“I’m optimistic for some product categories to get the ball rolling, namely expensive and bulky items. But I’m also a realist that we need alternative strategies adjacent to repair. This is where we must design for disassembly.”
In Hamilton’s view, disassembly and recycling is a worthy “next best option” to repair for cheaper objects, as it keeps the materials in a circular material flow.
The piston mechanism disassembles a product by pushing its components up and out
The Un-Made design team took inspiration from Agency of Design’s Design Out Waste project, which looked at three strategies for keeping a toaster out of landfill. But they particularly wanted to explore just how efficient the disassembly process could be made through automation.
The cheaper and easier the process, they say, the more motivation there is for companies to pursue this approach and recover the components and materials inside their devices.
“A huge part of the reason e-waste ends up in landfill is because of product complexity and the inherent challenges involved in their disassembly,” Seymourpowell lead designer Alex Pearce told Dezeen.
“To date, because e-waste has been considered too time-consuming and costly to disassemble – there has been no (commercial) incentive strong enough to make it a viable option.”
The fourth Un-Made concept uses UV light to dissolve the glue holding the device together
The materials inside even cheap devices are valuable, Pearce points out, particularly when there are supply shortages or when it comes to rare-earth minerals.
“When you consider that more gold exists within a ton of e-waste than within a ton of gold ore dug from the ground, a straightforward economic imperative becomes clear for companies who are able to recover and reuse these materials,” said Pearce.
Seymourpowell imagines disassembly taking place either at the manufacturer’s facilities following a take-back procedure, or potentially at a public recycling centre if disassembly processes have been sufficiently standardised.
The London-based studio is known for its innovative product and transport designs, as well as concepts that challenge current norms. Recent projects from the studio have included the two-in-one reusable Bottlecup and a spaceship cabin for Virgin Galactic.
Architecture studio Linehouse has wrapped a food market in a Shanghai laneway neighbourhood around a central atrium informed by Victorian greenhouses.
Named Foodie Social, the 2,000-square-metre food market is located within the Hong Shou Fang community – a residential area in Shanghai’s Putuo district known for its classic “longtang” laneway architecture.
The food market is in a two-storey grey brick building in Shanghai
The entrance to the two-storey market was framed by a double-height arrangement of stacked recycled red bricks, with a corten steel canopy added to provide shelter.
The same recycled red bricks sourced from demolished houses in China can also be found on the interior walls, stacked to create three dimensional patterns.
The glass pitched roof is lined with a gently curved metal truss
A large glass door can be pulled open on warm days, with patterned paving from the laneway outside extending to the interior of the market, fully connecting the interior and exterior.
The interior of the market was designed to resemble a greenhouse, with shops and cafe’s arrranged around a central, double-height atrium.
The glass pitched roof above the atrium was lined with gently curved metal truss, in reference to Victorian greenhouses, with three large fans hanging from the metal truss to improve the air circulation.
Some vendors are designed to be retractable to allow flexibility
A cafe in the atrium, which contains an olive tree planted into the ground, integrates a metal staircase that leads to the upper floor.
A area describes as a “stage” is located by the staircase with a series of undulating balconies wrapped around the atrium on the upper floor.
Various typologies of food vendors are arranged in the open atrium on the ground floor, some of which are designed to be retractable, allowing flexibility for different types of vendors as well as a large open event space to be formed at the centre.
“This new typology brings together the local with more curated food offerings in a contemporary yet humble and sustainable way,” explained Linehouse‘s Shanghai team who are responsible for the design.
Recycled red bricks can be found both on the facade and interior walls
Smaller snack shops were positioned on the ground floor, while larger restaurants occupy the upper floor.
Each stall was assembled from a kit of parts, so that the vendors are able to create their own signage and layout, but maintain a consistent material and lighting palette.
Larger restaurants are located on the upper floor
Linehouse is a Hong Kong and Shanghai-based architecture and interior design studio established in 2013 by Alex Mok and Briar Hickling. The duo won the emerging interior designer of the year category at the 2019 Dezeen Awards.
It’s easy to take for granted how much space things take up in the kitchen until you find yourself suddenly running out of places to put stuff. Some kitchen appliances and furniture might be non-negotiable, but other tools and fixtures could probably do a bit of rethinking. Some of them might be redundant, while others don’t even have to be out of the closet all of the time, especially when they’re not in use. A dish or draining rack, for example, doesn’t serve a purpose once all the tableware has been stored away, but most of them still take up precious space anyway. Not to mention, you can’t easily bring a dish rack with you when you go camping because of their very fixed forms. This rather novel rack, however, fixes all those problems by implementing a collapsible design that will let you easily put the draining rack away once its job is done.
Truth be told, there aren’t a lot of things in the kitchen that can be put away after use aside from tableware, utensils, and cookware. That’s why there’s always a need to optimize the space being occupied by tools and equipment, which requires a bit of creative thinking and design. You won’t always be drying wet plates and pots, for example, so having a permanent draining rack might not be the greatest idea for some kitchens. In theory, it’s something that you should be able to take out and put away as needed, just like other tools, but the convention just so happened to use rigid designs made of plastic, metal, or wood.
This collapsible draining rack throws that convention out the window to save you space in the kitchen and make it more convenient to have meals outdoors. It uses a patent-pending spring system that gives the rack an accordion-like design, allowing you to expand it to a full 14″ (36cm) length or shrink it down to just 1.2″ (3cm). The best part is that the mechanism is so easy and smooth that you can do that in just a second.
It’s a simple design change, but one that has massive implications. You don’t have to reserve space in your kitchen for a draining rack and can use any flat surface as an ad hoc area. Once you’re done, simply collapse the rack and then shove it in a drawer. It also means it’s easy to transport so you can have the same experience while camping outdoors. The rack is so light and slim that you can actually carry it in your pocket. You don’t even need a flat surface since the rack’s design lets it conform to curved or uneven objects like tree trunks and boulders.
Despite that form-changing design, this collapsible draining rack is still made for durability and reliability, with SUS304 stainless steel parts that are resistant to rust and scratches. The shape that each wire rod takes is intentionally simple to reduce the chances of dirt accumulating in hidden nooks and crannies. And if you’re not that confident in your manual washing skills, the collapsed rack can just as easily be cleaned inside a dishwasher. Whether you’re drying plates or pots indoors or outdoors, this accordion-like collapsible draining rack delivers a simple yet effective tool that gets out of the way once its job is done.
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