Competition: to celebrate United Nude’s tenth anniversary, Dezeen has teamed up with the footwear brand to give readers a chance to win one of five pairs of the company’s signature Möbius shoe.
Architect Rem D Koolhaas designed the Möbius shoe in 1999 while he was still at university. The form of the shoe is made from a single strip, which twists around the foot like a Möbius band to create the sole, heel, foot-bed and upper.
As he explained to Dezeen in a recent interview, he was persuaded to start his own brand to produce the shoe because it “didn’t look like anything [else] out there”.
Koolhaas launched United Nude in 2003 and the company now sells over 200,000 pairs of shoes a year.
In 2013, ten new colours and two new heel heights for the Möbius shoe were released to mark United Nude’s tenth anniversary.
We have five pairs of Möbius shoes to give away and winners will be able to choose their preferred colour, height and size.
To enter this competition email your name, age, gender, occupation, and delivery address and telephone number to competitions@dezeen.com with “Möbius shoe” in the subject line. We won’t pass your information on to anyone else; we just want to know a little about our readers.Read our privacy policy here.
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Competition closes 20 August 2013. Five winners will be selected at random and notified by email. Winners’ names will be published in a future edition of our Dezeen Mail newsletter and at the top of this page.
Dezeen competitions are international and entries are accepted from readers in any country.
With one large window facing the street, Magazin looks out onto one of Amsterdam’s newest design districts. The artisanal shops lining the long street of Czaar Peterstraat seem to have appeared almost overnight, although locals will…
Lacy Kuhn est une américaine étudiante en design qui a imaginé ce packaging très réussie pour le projet de céréales au miel « Beehive Honey Squares ». Très bien pensée, cette création drôle et bien pensée pour le National Cereal Corporation est à découvrir en images dans la suite de l’article.
Portuguese studio LIKEarchitects used hundreds of metal paint cans to build this temporary Andy Warhol museum inside a shopping centre in Lisbon.
The miniature museum occupied the atrium of Lisbon’s Colombo Shopping Mall for a period of three months earlier this year and was used to display 32 original artworks by the late American pop artist.
The LIKEarchitects team was keen to avoid the neutral white walls of typical gallery spaces and instead opted to build a space using some of the everyday household objects that Warhol fetishised in his paintings.
“Campbell’s Soup Cans is a well-known artwork that is based on the idea of sublimating everyday objects, regardless of their original function, and transforming them into tangible icons of the collective imaginary,” architect Diogo Aguiar told Dezeen.
“This premise by the artist was very important to our conception phase, when we had the idea of constructing a museum using familiar components, more specifically cylindrical cans,” he added.
Using 1500 cans, the architects built a sequence of four rooms and organised them thematically. Entrances were positioned at both ends, so shoppers could easily stroll right through.
Eight rows of cans generated the height of the installation and the lowest three rows were filled with sand to give stability to the walls.
The Temporary Andy Warhol Museum is a cultural space within a commercial space. It was designed to host the exhibition ‘Andy Warhol – Icons | Psaier Artworks and the Factory’, which was opened between April 11 and July 11, in Colombo Shopping Mall, in Lisbon, and included a total of 32 original works by the American artist.
The museological space avoids the idea of having neutral white exhibition spaces and relates to the exhibited artworks through the creation of a strong visual context that uses the artist’s imaginary. The museum recreates an environment that is both pop and industrial, through an unusual materiality resulting from the use of metal paint cans. The expository structure, set in the central plaza of the mall, features an abstract exterior that is extremely appealing and assumes an iconographic character with clear links to the Pop Art.
The interior was designed as an enclosed introspective space, entirely defined by continuous walls, benefiting from a transparent cover in plastic screen. This cover has the dual function of allowing light to enter from the exterior and assuring the visual relationship between the two confronting spaces (museum/shopping mall). This solution captures the curiosity of visitors, calling for a visit to all those wandering in the higher galleries of the commercial space.
A fluid succession of four exhibition rooms, thematically organised, results in a new pathway that challenges the organic symmetry and rationality of the shopping mall main square. The two entrances to this small museum, one in each extremity, are located at strategic points in order to maximise the attention and flow of the people walking around its perimeter.
Like the Andy Warhol’s artwork the museum reflects the consumer society, but in a literal way, through the raw aluminium sheet of cylindrical cans. Other strands, which were patent in the work of Andy Warhol, were also fundamental in the creation of the architectural space – the repetition (silkscreened) or the idea of sublimating everyday objects, regardless of their original form or function, and transform them into tangible icons of the collective imaginary.
Used as a constructive element, the metallic paint can is the modular element which determines the metric of entire project, defining dimensions and drawing the voids – doors – that allow the entrance in the space.
The structural stability of the building was solved by filling the first three rows of cans with sand – foundations – guaranteeing the stability of the walls and giving greater strength to the cans which are more accessible to the public.
Having received more than 100,000 visitors, the Temporary Andy Warhol Museum sought to contribute to the dissemination and promotion of art, free and accessible to all visitors.
Architects: LIKEarchitects Location: Centro Colombo, Lisbon, Portugal Project Year: 2013 Team: Diogo Aguiar, Teresa Otto, João Jesus and Laura Diaz Curatorship: Maurizio Vanni Production: SOTART Principal Use: Museum Area: 75m2 Dimensions: 15.5m x 12.70m x 3.30m
American luxury car-maker Lincoln, a division of the Ford Motor Company, is transforming. Long known for their plush sedans, the Lincoln Motor Company is making a push from their…
Focus sur Antoni Tudisco, un artiste et créatif allemand âgé seulement de 21 ans et qui réalise des visuels modélisés en 3D très impressionnants. Maîtrisant pleinement les différents outils et logiciels qu’il a à sa disposition, une large sélection de visuels colorés est à découvrir dans la suite de l’article
News: the three-legged, leaf-shaped side table that sparked a revolution in self-assembly furniture over 60 years ago is returning to Ikea stores next month.
Scandinavian furniture giant Ikea is relaunching the 1956 Lövet table, which they have re-engineered and renamed Lövbacken.
The original design was conceived when Ikea designer Gillis Lundgren was unable to fit the table in his car. By sawing off the legs, Lundgren inadvertently created flat-pack furniture.
Emily Birkin, country sales manager for Ikea UK and Ireland, said that customers are increasingly interested in buying furniture with a story attached to it. “We decided to bring back a popular piece that not only comes steeped in history but combines retro styling with modern convenience,” she said.
“We wanted to pay tribute to the timeless appeal of the original Lövet whilst retaining its simple and practical assembly,” Birkin added.
The brown Lövebacken table features a leaf-shaped tabletop made from poplar veneer and has three detachable beech legs with gold-coloured accents on the feet. It measures 77 centimetres in length, 39 centimetres wide and stands at a height of 51 centimetres.
The table returns to stores in the UK, Netherlands and other select countries from August 2013.
Return of the Table that started the “flatpack revolution”
IKEA brings back the company’s first piece of Flatpack Furniture with launch of LÖVBACKEN side table
Home furnishings company IKEA, is re-launching the original piece of furniture that kick-started the flatpack revolution. The LÖVBACKEN side table, originally sold by IKEA as the LÖVET in 1956, will be making a come-back into stores in August 2013 as the new IKEA catalogue is sent to 13,157,000 households in the UK.
The LÖVBACKEN takes its inspiration from the LÖVET or ‘the leaf’, the company’s first product to be sold in a flat pack rather than fully-assembled. Almost 60 years on, the table has been redeveloped and re-issued by IKEA as the LÖVBACKEN, enabling everyone to own a piece of design history.
Created by the same team responsible for the main IKEA range – which now numbers 9,500 different products – and of which there are 90 occasional (or side tables) tables, LÖVBACKEN is faithful to the original design right down to its measurements. One tweak to the design will see the original use of jacaranda for the first LÖVET table top replaced with a stained poplar veneer on MDF for the LÖVBACKEN.
Whilst photography of the original LÖVET exists, the original designs were thought to be have been missing until IKEA designers rediscovered them in the company’s archives.
According to IKEA folklore the LOVET was being used in an IKEA catalogue photography session but its three-legged, leaf shape proved too cumbersome for designer Gillis Lundgren to fit into the car. To solve this, Lundgren sawed off the legs and, at that moment started a flatpack, self-assembly revolution.
The LÖVBACKEN side table captures the beauty of mid-century modern with its poplar veneer patterned table top and skinny solid beech legs tipped with gold-coloured foil. At 51 cm high, it’s just the right size to pair with an armchair or alongside a sofa.
Emily Birkin, Country Sales Manager, IKEA UK and Ireland said:
“Most people will have a piece of furniture that they’ve either built or put together somewhere in their house. But until now, not many will know the incredible story about how it all began with a simple little table.
“We know from our research that people are becoming more and more interested in buying pieces of furniture that have a story attached to them, so we decided to bring back a popular piece that not only comes steeped in history but combines retro styling with modern convenience.
“We wanted to pay tribute to the timeless appeal of the original LÖVET whilst retaining its simple and practical assembly. By working together with our customers and enabling them to be a part of the production process, we’re able to make good design affordable to everyone. Now everyone can own a design classic.”
The LÖVBACKEN is part of the IKEA 2014 range and is available for just £40 in tinted, clear lacquered poplar veneer. The new range launches in the new IKEA catalogue in August 2013.
Product news: this chair by Milan design studio Skrivo features layers of thin cushions based on children’s story The Princess and the Pea.
The Stack chair by Skrivo for Italian brand Contempo Italia was inspired by the Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale, in which a princess proves her royal status because she’s sensitive enough to be disturbed by a pea in her bed despite many layers of mattresses.
“The concept behind the Stack easy chair comes from the idea of having cushions in constant motion that look like they have been stacked randomly on top of each other,” says Skrivo.
The overlapping cushions can be mixed and matched in a wide variety of fabrics and leathers. “The cheerful effect of the overlapping upholstered cushions that sit on a metal frame conveys the idea of stability, comfort and aesthetic delightfulness reminiscent of childhood memories,” the designers explain.
The backrest is bolted to two upright metal tubes in a contrasting colour, which bend and slot through four wooden legs to create side rails under the seat.
Wanders‘ Dressed watch has an outwardly understated design, but features an embellished decoration on the reverse side of the case that is hidden when the watch is being worn.
“We made these very simple, beautiful watches with an interesting surprise,” Wanders explains. “The design of the watch is pretty straightforward: the band makes a really simple connection to the core of the watch and we kept the dial very simple.”
However, the hour hand of the watch features a decorative “little twist”, Wanders goes on to explain, before turning the watch around to show that “on the back there is a fantastic decoration, which is very hidden.”
Wanders hopes that his design will stand the test of time. “[We made] something that is, I hope, an evergreen, something that lasts forever,” he says. “Because I think that’s what watches are, they are about time.”
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