Hasta La Ideas

Dezeen Wire: Vienna Design Week is underway and Dezeen are covering the festival live from Vienna. Highlights include a machine that draws Spirograph-style patterns in quartz sand by Philippe Malouin, a collaboration between Tomas Alonso and one of the city’s oldest silver companies and a wooden treehouse by Konstantin Schmolzer that’s constructed alongside the vertical garden inside Jean Nouvel’s Sofitel hotel. 

Austrian designer Thomas Feichtner has been awarded the National Design Prize 2011 for product design and presents a chair with a seat suspended at the centre of a cubic oak frame. Watch a movie about it’s manufacture on Dezeen Screen.

Speakers at a series of talks on the theme of Change includes writer and critic Sophie Lovell, founder of Cape Town media company Interactive Africa Ravi Naidoo, London designers Doshi Levien and Berlin designer Jerszy Seymour.

You can watch a preview movie on Dezeen Screen and check out photos of the opening in our album on Facebook.

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Dezeen Wire: planning permission has been granted for Stanton Williams‘ proposed transformation of the Musée des Beaux-Arts in Nantes. The comprehensive renovation of the existing museum and construction of a new 5800m2 extension is due to begin in October with completion scheduled for autumn 2013.

See our previous story on a laboratory at Cambridge University by Stanton Williams.

Here is some more information from the architects:

Stanton Williams’ Musée d’Art in Nantes receives planning permission

Stanton Williams’ €49million scheme for the Musée d’Art in Nantes, has received planning permission. In autumn 2009, the practice won an international competition to transform the Musée des Beaux-Arts in Nantes, one of the leading regional galleries in France. Phase 1 of the project will start on site in October 2011 and is due for completion in autumn 2013.

The museum will be comprehensively renovated, while an adjacent site will house a new 5800m2 extension for the display of twenty-first century art, as well as administrative and curatorial facilities and an external sculpture court. It will be known upon completion as the Musée d’Art de Nantes.

The project aims to transform the image of the museum from a closed and introverted institution to one which engages fully with its urban context, whose presence in the cityscape will be more strongly asserted.

The design strategy creates an architectural and cultural promenade whilst also improving the relationship between the museum and its setting. Visitors will begin their journey in a series of improved public spaces around the museum, with sculptural installations taking the museum into the street. Visual connections will be created between the refurbished galleries of the original museum, drawing visitors through the spaces.

The new building responds to its context through its materials and scale. Above a marble plinth, marmarino plaster is used to create a smooth effect akin to that of the local stone, resulting in a monolithic quality and a sense that the building has been carved from a single block of stone. Large openings provide glimpses into the galleries from the street, animating the museum’s setting. Reflecting local practice, a consistent materials palette is used inside and out. The result will be a building, which defines a new image for the museum, yet is firmly rooted in its surroundings.

When complete in 2013, the new and refurbished buildings will shape a new identity for the museum, clearly expressing its different functions. The treatment of their elevations, in terms of scale, massing, and the provision of openings, will relate the museum better to its context, offering a welcoming setting for the Grand Musée d’Art.

Patrick Richards, Director at Stanton Williams explains: “The new museum will offer state of the art facilities to exhibit the museum’s impressive collections of art and allow to expand the ambitious program of exhibition that have helped the muséum to establish a strong reputation as one of the leading museum in France and abroad. The natural daylit galleries of the Palais have been the inspiration for the new extention with it’s dramatic light wells and transluscent marble facade.”

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Dezeen Wire: design critic Nicole Swengley writes about the increasing number of designers engaging in socially responsible or philanthropic projects, including Yves Behar’s See Better to Learn Better reading glasses (see our previous story here) and Max Fraser’s Joy of Living exhibition (see the story here and an interview with Max here) – The Wall Street Journal

Dezeen Wire: the Design Museum has submitted plans for the redevelopment of the former Commonwealth Institute building by architect John Pawson. The application concerns proposed alterations to the Grade II listed building’s interior, including the creation of a new central atrium, mezzanine level and basement.

The second part of the listed Building Consent is due to be submitted late in 2011 and work is scheduled to begin on site in early 2012.

Here is some more information from the Design Museum:

NEW DESIGN MUSEUM – LISTED BUILDING CONSENT APPLICATION SUBMITTED

Plans by John Pawson to transform the interior of the former Commonwealth Institute, a Grade II* listed building in Kensington & Chelsea, into a new home for the Design Museum were submitted to the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea for planning approval today.

This listed building consent represents the first of two stages to approve the fit out designs for the museum’s interior. This application seeks to:

• Determine the exact size and location of the openings in the first and second floor slabs that will form the new central atrium.
• Create a second opening in the second floor slab.
• Create a new intermediate mezzanine level to replicate the original dais.
• Create a new basement.

These changes will preserve stunning internal views of the roof and the distinctive ‘swept’ roof and will improve the quality of access in the public spaces. With this application, the Design Museum moves closer towards securing its future in west London and giving a new life to an important example of post-war British architecture, regarded as second only to the Festival Hall in significance. The museum is working with English Heritage to ensure that the remodelled interior maintains the essential qualities of the original architecture in its new home, the Design Museum will reflect the building’s history of innovative educational activities and exhibition display.

Planning permission for the overall site was granted in July 2010, for a scheme developed by Chelsfield Partners and the Ilchester Estate in collaboration with the Design Museum. The architect for the planning scheme is Reinier de Graaf of Rem Koolhaas’ firm The Office of Metropolitan Architecture (OMA).

The Design Museum aims to submit the second part of the detailed listed Building Consent late in 2011.

Deyan Sudjic, Director of the Design Museum comments, ‘This is an important step forward for the museum. Exploring the most appropriate way to bring a landmark building from the recent past back to life has been a fascinating and rewarding process’.

John Pawson adds ‘The Commonwealth Institute is 50 years old, but the form still feels daring.  The sense of vertical expansion when you step into the heart of the building is exhilarating no matter how many times you experience it. Our work is about preserving and enhancing this spatial experience for new generations of visitors’.

Mark Wenlock, Partner, Chelsfield Partners, explains, ‘This submission marks the start of an exciting phase for the development in which works will start on site early next year.’

John Pawson was selected for the project from a shortlist of architects including David Chipperfield, Tony Fretton, Stanton Williams, Caruso St John, Haworth Tomkins and the Dutch practice, Claus en Kaan.

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Dezeen Wire: here’s a roundup of the most interesting London Design Festival events that caught our eye when we weren’t busy at Dezeen Space last week.

Some of the most memorable events of the week involved performances and interaction. An enormous red dress hosted concerts in the East End, Paul Cocksedge transformed old records into amplifiers and Noma Bar’s dog-shaped cutout machine produced instant punched artworks.

At the main hub at the V&A AL_A’s Timber Wave provided a dramatic entrance and the Bourollec brothers’ soft landscape in the Raphael Court offering a place to rest weary feet.

At Designjunction, Another Country showed new furniture and a range of utilitarian accessories and New Zealand brand Resident launched their first collection. Meanwhile, the second edition of Tramshed featured Studioilse’s furniture with removable baskets and new products and furniture by Benjamin Hubert for De La Espada (look out for our story on Dezeen soon).

Popular talks and presentations included a discussion on the state of British manufacturing at Tom Dixon’s Dock, Marcel Wanders’ presentation at the V&A (see our story on his new collection for Marks & Spencer here) and a lively Pecha Kucha at Designjunction, which will be available soon on Dezeen Screen.

We explored the new exhibition at the Ligne Roset Westend showroom for Dezeen Screen, where you can also see interviews with the exhibitors at our micro-exhibition Dezeen platform.

See all of our London Design Festival stories here.

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