News: Piero Ambrogio Busnelli, founder of Italian furniture brand B&B Italia, has died aged 87.
One of the great pioneers of Italian contemporary design, Busnelli founded B&B Italia in 1973, after previously co-founding C&B Italia with Cesare Cassina.
From the outset Busnelli worked with leading designers to create a series of iconic furniture products, including three Compasso d’Oro Award winners: Mario Bellini’s 1972 Le Bambole armchair; Studio Kairos’ 1983 Sisamo wardrobe system; and Antonio Citterio’s 1987 Sity sofa system.
In 1989 B&B Italia was the recipient of the first ever Compasso d’Oro Award to be given to a company. The award was given for “the constant work of integration carried out in order to combine the values of scientific and technological research with those necessary to the functionality and expressiveness of its products.”
The company is based in Novedrate in Italy’s Como province, in a building designed by architects Richard Rogers and Renzo Piano in 1972.
Piero Ambrogio Busnelli was born in Meda on 13 April 1926 and died on 25 January 2014.
Here is a statement from B&B Italia:
Piero Ambrogio Busnelli, founder of B&B Italia, died on 25 January 2014. He was a visionary entrepreneur on the scene of design and an extraordinary ambassador of “Made in Italy” in the world.
The furnishing sector has lost a great interpreter in the history of Italian design, a pioneer who believed in it from the onset by furthering its success in the world with farsighted initiative.
Born in 1926, he grew up in Meda (Milan-Brianza), distinguishing himself from a young age for determination and courage to explore new avenues, especially in the professional framework. His experience as entrepreneur began in 1952 but Piero Ambrogio Busnelli’s dream of an “Industry For Design” came true in 1966, when he created C&B along with Cesare Cassina. A man of great courage and determination, Busnelli never hesitated to leave the handcrafted heritage of his native land for a new industrial culture of design that embraces an all-round approach and focuses on exports throughout the world.
By introducing an extraordinary technology for the production of padded furnishings (cold polyurethane foam moulding) to the sector through his own initiative, and by partnering several widely renown designers (Afra and Tobia Scarpa, Mario Bellini, Gaetano Pesce, Ludovico Magistretti, Marco Zanuso and many others), the company won a series of awards and recorded growing international success.
In 1973 the company’s conversion into B&B Italia marked a momentous change in the life of Piero Ambrogio Busnelli. His insight and entrepreneurial vision take shape and accelerate the company’s race to carry out highly qualifying projects, both architectural (the headquarters were designed by R. Piano and R. Rogers) and in terms of product, with icon items, such as Sisamo, Sity, Domus, Charles and many more. These were projects that contributed to write the history of Italian design, with the contribution of a new generation of designers (Antonio Citterio, Patricia Urquiola, Paolo Piva, Naoto Fukasawa, Jeffrey Bernett and several others).
From the onset, Piero Ambrogio Busnelli built his company by referring to a new industrial model, without ever being daunted by challenges. His innate dynamism and great intuition led him to extend the innovation process and seek other domestic settings, finally also including offices, contract furnishings and cruise liners.
Four Compasso d’Oro Awards acknowledged a series of successful items: Le Bambole in 1972, Sisamo in 1984, Sity in 1987 and, finally, in 1989, the first Compasso d’Oro Award ever assigned to a company, and unquestionably the most appreciated, rewarded B&B Italia “For the constant work of integration carried out in order to combine the values of scientific and technological research with those necessary to the functionality and expressiveness of its products.”
Today the company is managed by the second generation of the family that has been guiding it for many years along the path of international growth.
News: advertising festival Cannes Lions has added product design to the list of creative disciplines awarded at this year’s event.
The festival is introducing product design into its awards programme, the “Oscars of the advertising world” and taking place in the French Riviera this summer, to highlight how important the design of products themselves is to building a brand and promoting it through advertising.
“We are launching product design as a category at Cannes but because the festival is built around great brand communication traditions,” Cannes Lions CEO Phil Thomas told Dezeen. “Over the past few years we have seen a desire and a need from marketers to include product design in their brand communications.”
Thomas pointed to technology companies Apple and Samsung as examples of companies that use the design of their products as an integral part of their branding.
“Brands who are looking for creative communications solutions are no longer just looking for advertising, in fact they don’t even talk in those terms any more,” Thomas explained. “They are looking for the whole brand experience which does of course include design.”
Award winners receive a Cannes Lions trophy
Thomas told us that winning a Lion is considered a major accolade in the advertising world and although there’s no cash prize, he said that there is a lot to be gained from receiving one of the trophies.
“It is a bit like an Oscar,” said Thomas. “If you win an Oscar you are probably going to sell more bums on seats and it is basically a very similar dynamic. If I win a Lion I am going to get more work because I am going to be more famous. That is the fundamental dynamic.”
Thomas hopes that the design sector of the awards will grow to become just as beneficial for the winners in the new product design category.
“We know it will take time for it to build in the product design world,” he said, “We want to prove to people that what we offer is something really interesting for them and that they will join this adventure.”
Designers and agencies will be able to submit their work to be considered for the Cannes Lions awards in four subsections that fall within product design.
Consumer Goods focuses on the visual impact of a brand through design and will cover items such as electronics, lighting, furniture, homeware and fashion.
Wellbeing and Environmental Impact awards will be given to designs that solve problems, including products that benefit medical procedures and the natural world.
The Solution category is based on innovative designs that improve day-to-day life and finally Interface is about how the user interacts with the products and how information is conveyed.
“We are a very global festival so last year we had 35,000 entries into the festival from 94 countries,” said Thomas. “What we are hoping to see is the very best of design from all over the world.”
The festival takes place in the French Riveria resort of Cannes
Cannes Lions began 60 years ago as a festival and awards scheme purely focussed on advertising, but has slowly added other creative fields as the profession has grown to encompass them. The Design section was added recently and already acknowledges graphics and packaging.
This year’s festival will take place from 15-21 June in Cannes, France. Entries will be accepted from 2pm today and the deadline to submit projects will be 28 March.
Here’s the full press release from Cannes Lions:
Cannes Lions now accepting entires – new Product Design category launches
The 61st Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity, taking place from 15 to 21 June 2014, is now accepting entries across all categories. Entries will be judged by an outstanding mix of industry professionals who will come together in Cannes, France, in June to vote and deliberate on over 36,000 entries and ultimately award the best in global creative communications.
Entries can be submitted into 17 categories which are: Branded Content & Entertainment, Creative Effectiveness, Cyber, Design, Direct, Film, Film Craft, Innovation, Media, Mobile, Outdoor, PR, Press, Promo & Activation, Radio, Titanium and Integrated, and new for 2014, Product Design.
Product Design Lions will recognise the applied use of physical products in aiding the communication of a brand ethos as well as its use to have a positive impact on improving people’s lives. The category will be split into four main sub sections:
Consumer Goods
Focus will be placed on its visual impact as well as the use and experience of the brands values through design. Entries in the consumer goods categories will take the following elements into consideration: form, function, problem solving, innovation, production and research. The consumer goods category will include products from electronics, lighting, furniture, homeware and fashion & lifestyle.
Wellbeing and Environmental Impact
Entries will be judged on how effective the solution is in solving real life problems. This award is about making people’s lives better through design or the design process. The entries will not be judged on their results in marketing or sales.
Solution
Focus will be placed on the ergonomic functionality and day to day solutions provided through design. The jury will be looking for a solution which is new or improves something that
Interface
Focus will be placed on the user interfaces’ visual impact, as well as its ease of navigation and ability to convey information.
Commenting on the launch of Product Design, Terry Savage, Chairman of Lions Festivals says: “Brand communication has become such a part of product design that it’s important as a global Festival celebrating creative communications that we now recognise this. Including Product Design Lions as a stand-alone entry category in our awards line up, not only acknowledges this fast growing industry, but helps to set a global benchmark and precedent for the creativity within it.”
Terry continues: “As with all new launches we have taken time to consult with the industry, ensuring that the category meets with the needs and expectations of the sector.” Adding to this, Danish Designer Lars Larsen, founder and head of design at Kilo, says “A lot of communication today utilises product design. By understanding the core business of a brand we are able to follow through with a design. Awarding and encouraging this way of thinking brings the industry closer to clients and the possibility of designing the solutions of the future. Having a platform such as Cannes Lions makes that possible.”
Elsewhere at Cannes Lions, recognising overall performance, a number of Special Awards will be given throughout the Festival week. The Agency of the year, Creative Marketer of the Year, Grand Prix for Good, Holding Company of the Year, Independent Agency of the Year, Lion of St. Mark, Media Person of the Year, Network of the year and Palme d’Or will all be awarded and presented on stage during the four awards ceremonies.
Cannes Lions is now open for entries and submissions are being accepted through the website. As previously announced, the 2014 Festival will see a new-look Cyber Lions category with added Social, Branded Technology and Branded Games sub categories. Significant changes have been made to a number of sub categories, across all entry sections, most notably in PR, Branded Content and Entertainment, Film and Outdoor Lions. Further information on all of the categories, rules and fees can be found here. The deadline for entries is 28 March 2014.
News:Le Corbusier‘s Notre Dame du Haut chapel at Ronchamp has been vandalised, prompting calls for urgent security measures to prevent further damage to one of the Modernist architect’s finest works.
One of Le Corbusier’s hand painted windows at Ronchamp, smashed by vandals
President of the Fondation Le Corbusier Antoine Picon spoke out after vandals broke into Le Corbusier’s chapel of Notre Dame du Haut at Ronchamp, on Friday. He called for the implementation of “emergency [security] measures regarding the site and building”.
The vandals forced entry to the chapel, breaking a hand-painted, glass window signed by Le Corbusier. They then took a concrete collection box, which contained no money, and threw it outside.
The interior of Ronchamp, showing its curved soffit and irregular-sized windows
Picon called on the Association Oeuvre Notre-Dame-du-Haut, which own the chapel, to “better protect the heritage of the twentieth century and that of Le Corbusier in particular.”
He also pointed to the church’s poor structural and cosmetic state, citing in particular “moisture problems, infiltration and poor preservation of masonry.”
Ronchamp was completed in 1955. Le Corbusier designed the chapel for the Catholic church on an existing place of pilgrimage.
Light streams into Le Corbusier’s Ronchamp chapel through windows punctured in thick masonry walls
Its thick masonry walls, irregular window placement and massive curved roof evoke a sculptural quality not previously associated with the sparse functionalism of Corbusier’s earlier buildings. Many critics consider the idiosyncratic chapel Le Corbusier’s finest work.
News: Swiss architects Herzog & de Meuron have revealed designs for the first eight buildings of their 35-hectare masterplan for La Confluence, an extension of the city centre in Lyon, France (+ slideshow).
Herzog & de Meuron are overseeing phase two of the La Confluence regeneration plan, an initiative started by the Greater Lyon authority in 1998 to revitalise a stretch of land at the junction of the Rhône and Saône rivers that before now accommodated little besides industrial warehouses, a wholesale market and a prison.
Lot A3 will be the first completed block of the mixed-use masterplan and comprises a total of eight new buildings, including a 17-storey tower by Herzog & de Meuron and smaller buildings by architects including Christian Kerez and Tatiana Bilbao.
Located within the area dubbed the Market Quarter, the buildings are due to be completed by 2017 and will include a mixture of residences, offices, shops and other public amenities.
“[It] is a pilot project that aims to invent a way of living that is characteristic of the new quartier du marché,” said the architects. “With its remarkable location, the ambition of Ilot A3 is to link different parts of the existing and future city.”
French landscape architect Michel Desvigne is working alongside Herzog & de Meuron on the project.
Scroll down for an overview of the masterplan from Herzog & de Meuron:
Lyon: Nature and the city
The Confluence of the rivers Rhône and Saône are Lyon’s very “raison d’être”. As early as the first century BC the Romans built fortifications at the precise point where the Saône crosses the chain of hills to the west of the city before flowing into the Rhône. Lyon then spread to the east as it developed. Initially on the peninsula bracketed by the two rivers and, once this area was completely occupied, beyond the Rhône and out on to the eastern plain.
Not only did the development of the city follow the logic of the natural environment, but its building types were a reaction to the local topography. The constructions on the hillsides are distinctly different from those at the waterside, and those bordering on the Rhône are different again from those on the Saône. Lyon’s identity is thus founded in this direct relationship between architecture and nature. It was not until the 20th century, when the city was beginning to spread to the plains – with no natural constraints – that generic urban architecture, interchangeable with that of any other city, began to appear.
Urban development of the southern tip of the peninsula therefore offers a major opportunity to write a significant chapter in Lyon’s history, in which urban development is inseparable from the natural environment.
The Confluence: From Marshland to city centre
Apart from a few port infrastructures, the Confluence remained undisturbed for many years, because the river courses were unpredictable and the land unworkable. It was only after the banks were consolidated that the peninsula became stable ground and land with potential for the city, a space for utopias.
It all comes down to the same question, should the island tip be a space for nature or should it be built up? Should it embellish the city, like the naturalist park projects of the 19th century? Should it be glorified by the addition of a monument, as Tony Garnier suggested in his Cineplex proposal in 1924? Should it be gradually covered over by the spreading city, devoured like the north of the peninsula?
None of these radical visions ever came to pass. Instead, the district had the time to develop almost unnoticed. The marché de gros, the gendarmerie, the SNCF, a circus, a prison and prostitution, all based activities here – activities generally relegated to the edges of cities. In recent years, two town planning competitions have been organised and a new bit of the city, La Confluence Phase 1, is now on the point of being built. This includes a hub combining leisure facilities and retail outlets interspersed with generously proportioned green spaces leading to a wide embankment running along the Saône.
The theme of the present project is based on the offering of a new vision on the La Confluence Phase 2 site at the location of the former marché de gros. The fundamental question must therefore be raised once more, can the development of the southern tip of the peninsula, the last reservation within the city, transform Lyon’s image?
Lyon’s image: A city between two rivers
Lyon is characterised essentially by a dense urban fabric along its riverbanks joined by numerous bridges. Both riverfront and types of construction are highly diverse. Along the Saône, the addition of buildings of varying heights creates an expressive frontage underscored by the curving path of the river. A monumental ladder dominates the banks of the Rhône. Colossal solitary edifices like the Hôtel-Dieu or a more recent municipal swimming pool reflect the river’s width. Historical engravings illustrate the importance of water in the life of the city and show how segments of river bracketed by the bridges are like great public squares.
The peninsula itself is characterised by great homogeneity. A single major artery runs through it along which the main monuments and squares lie: Lyon’s town hall and opera, the place Bellecour, the complex infrastructure of Lyon Perrache station, plus a large number of little squares and churches. This axis is the city’s backbone.
The green hills to the west, the Balmes, occupied by scattered buildings, overlook the city and its two rivers. These idyllic hillsides also form part of Lyon’s general image. They provide a picturesque backdrop, a silhouette crowned by the basilica. Most of the bird’s-eye views created during the city’s history were drawn from this vantage point.
The 40 million drivers who pass through the natural space of the Confluence every year on the motorway bridge are confronted with a radically different image. When asked about their memory of Lyon, they answer: a long tunnel. Lyon is perceived as a place of transit. Where every European passes through it at one time or another on the way to the French Riviera.
And since the fundamental question must come back to the fore, we are convinced that the answer is “Yes, some enterprise needs to be undertaken here to change the perception of the city as a whole entity”. The handful of seconds travellers spend on the outskirts of Lyon must stick in their memories. Going beyond the development of a new city district, the aim must be to offer a vision for the Confluence that can redefine Lyon’s image. A new chapter in the natural and urban history of Lyon needs to be written.
Completing the confluence
The development project for the second phase of the Confluence includes two radically different but mutually complementary areas. On the one hand there is the quartier du Marché, a dense city district, supplementing the urban fabric of Lyon on the peninsula and, on the other, the champ, a predominantly green space which itself forms part of the history of the Confluence like an “event”, the meeting up of the Rhône and Saône rivers. The transversale, a series of bridges and boulevards, connects the Confluence with the rest of Lyon beyond the twin rivers.
This is a dense but permeable district comprised of a variety of housing, offices and shops, replacing the former marché de gros.
A network of streets and courtyards has been laid down on the basis of the clear, linear, repetitive structure of the old market. Some of the existing covered market structures have been retained, contributing their deeply industrial character to the identity of the new city district while at the same time providing space at moderate prices available in the short term for very specific developments.
The new buildings present a variety of scales and character – low-rise housing closely linked to the ground level and the remaining halls of the covered market, medium-rise construction containing housing units or offices and some residential buildings, higher in certain cases, offering panoramic views while at the same time freeing open space at ground level.
The identity of the quartier du Marché stems from two quite different free spaces: the relatively narrow streets occasionally widening out, and courtyard gardens forming a continuous, tranquil, semi-public space for pedestrians and environmentally friendly transport modes.
The place Centrale, an almost conventional square with its tall trees, is a grand extension to the place Nautique and provides a venue for public events in front of the Hôtel de Région and the new public service building in the east.
The champ
The southern tip of the Confluence is the green counterpart to the densely built-up quartier du Marché. It offers a type of natural environment that is a genuine novelty in Lyon, and we have named it the champ. Activities in the cultural domain, innovative services, higher education and research are suggested as possible occupants for the champ.
We propose that some of the existing warehouses should be retained, since these would facilitate the implementation of developments of this kind, plus the option of defining a series of plots for new buildings in the vicinity.
The division of the overall area is underscored by tongues of vegetation reminiscent of the marshland conditions previously prevailing in the Confluence. Densely planted trees and a selection of plant species provide ground coverage and create the feeling of a public park on what is largely private land. An expansive network of paths for “environmentally friendly” travel runs alongside the planted areas bordering the individual plots.
The first high-rise buildings for mixed use in Lyon will also be located in the champ – twin, finely proportioned high-rise blocks define the termination of the city’s main artery. From a more distant perspective, they underscore the “natural event” of the Confluence, that is the convergence of two great rivers which were, originally, the city’s very “raison d’être”.
The transversale and the Rhône riverfront
A boulevard and two bridges form what we have termed the transversale, the last crossing point over the two rivers and the peninsula, so typical of Lyon. The new transversale, laid diagonally across a squared-off urban fabric, thus faces the Greater Rhône south of the Confluence.
Ultimately, it is planned to reclassify the A7 motorway and to convert it into a city boulevard connecting the Confluence directly to the city’s historic centre. A new jetty on the quai du Rhône will enhance access to the river for a whole range of leisure activities. The pont des Girondins will be the main artery connecting up Gerland and neighbouring districts on the Rhône’s left bank. In the future, the reduction of the area occupied by the railways will free up still more land for the creation of a continuous green space between the Rhône and the Saône on the Confluence.
News: Russian socialite and gallerist Dasha Zukhova has sparked a racism row after a photograph of her sitting on a chair in the form of an inverted semi-naked black woman appeared alongside an interview on a Russian website.
The photograph, which originally appeared on Buro247, was later cropped by the publication to remove the chair but not before it had circulated widely, sparking furore.
FashionBombDaily editor Claire Sulmers, who broke the story, described the image as an example of “white dominance and superiority, articulated in a seemingly serene yet overtly degrading way.”
This image: Zhukova sits on Allen Jones Remake by Bjarne Melgaard, 2013. Main image: Dasha Zhukova portrait published in Buro247
“We can’t help but be filled with anger and frustration over the onslaught of negative imagery, constant disregard and unabashed bigotry that continues to plague the fashion industry,” wrote Huffington Post’s Julee Wilson.
The timing of the interview, which was published on Martin Luther King Day, added to the furore.
Allen Jones Remake by Bjarne Melgaard in Gang Bust exhibition at Venus Over Manhattan, New York, 2013
Zukhova defended the image in a statement, saying: “This photograph, which has been published completely out of context, is of an art work intended specifically as a commentary on gender and racial politics. I utterly abhor racism, and would like to apologise to anyone who has been offended by this image.”
The chair – an example of forniphilia or human furniture – was created by Norwegian artist Bjarne Melgaard and is one of a series of interpretations of pieces originally created by British pop artist Allen Jones in 1969.
The original chair by Allen Jones, 1969
Jones created a series of three artworks called Hatstand, Table and Chair featuring white, female fibreglass mannequins. The first is standing with arms outstretched; the second crouching on all fours with a pane of glass on her back; and the third lying on the floor with her legs strapped to her chest and a cushion balanced on her thighs.
Korova Milk Bar in Stanley Kubrick’s 1971 film A Clockwork Orange
Jones’ pieces were also interpreted in Stanley Kubrick’s 1971 film A Clockwork Orange, where forniphilic tables and milk dispensers furnish the Korova Milk Bar. Jones allegedly turned down Kubrick’s offer to design the bar for free, forcing Kubrick to commission derivative designs.
Zukhova is girlfriend of Chelsea FC owner Roman Abramovic and owner of the Garage gallery in Moscow, which is being designed by Rem Koolhaas of OMA. Buro247 is owned by her friend Miroslava Duma.
News: three months after leaving online retailer Fab, its co-founder and ex design chief Bradford Shellhammer has announced that his next career step will be to form a rock band with British designer Tom Dixon.
Shellhammer (pictured) will provide lead vocals for the band Rough, while Dixon – who began his career welding live on stage – is to play bass guitar. “We’ve been talking about it for like a year,” Shellhammer told Co. Design.
The duo is hoping to launch during Milan design week in April and is looking for a female designer to join the group. “We’re actively seeking a woman in the design world,” Shellhammer said.
If that’s not enough to keep him busy, Shellhammer has also launched a new retail and design consultancy. Shellhammer.co will offer creative advice and strategies as well as product, interior and graphic design services.
Shellhammer announced he was leaving Fab, the company he co-founded and worked on for four years, in November last year.
From humble beginnings as social network in 2010, Fab grew into a flash sales site claiming 7.5 million members in 20 countries just two years later.
News: Italian architecture and design magazine Abitare is to end the publication of its monthly print edition.
Italian media group RCS will print the final issue in March, though Abitare will continue to publish content online according to Italian news site La Stampa.
The design community took to Twitter over the weekend to express their disappointment about the news.
“Incredibly sad to hear that @abitare will close. Not good times here in Italy,” tweeted writer and curator Joseph Grima, who was a special correspondent for the magazine and edited rival publication Domus from 2011 to 2013.
“Sorry to hear Abitare is closing, but amazed that it has taken so long for a big design/arch mag to go. Credit due for hanging in there,” said V&A senior curator Kieran Long.
Writer and critic Justin McGuirk remarked: “Circa 2007-9 Abitare was really setting the standard. It was the one to beat.”
“Sad to hear that historic magazine @abitare will close. They ran the 1st big piece on my work,” said designer Sebastian Bergne.
RCS is also closing its economics journal Il Mundo as part of its new publishing strategy for 2014.
Abitare was launched in 1961 in Milan and is written in both Italian and English. Covering architecture, design, art and graphics, it became one of the world’s best known design magazines.
Previous editors include architect Stefano Boeri and graphic designer Italo Lupi. Architect Mario Piazza is the magazine’s current editor in chief.
The latest issue 537 hit the news stands on 15 January (cover pictured).
“Ford changed the game this week when it unveiled its aluminum-intensive pickup truck, the 2015 F-150, that is as much as 700 pounds lighter than a comparable steel-bodied vehicle. To the casual observer, the anticipated 3 mpg (20%) increase gained by Ford’s high-tech ‘light-weighting’ (a term of art) may seem marginal, but I assure you it is a figure of immediate and national consequence.
[Gives example of fuel economy gain and resulting net efficiency of Toyota Prius, which averages 50 mpg, with that of low-mpg vehicles like pickups, in which the fuel-saving effect is multiplied: to nearly four times that of the Prius, in his example.] Now reckon with the Big Multiplier: 763,000. That is the number of F-series trucks Ford sold last year, a figure that on its own would make the F-series the seventh largest vehicle company in the U.S. market. By virtue of the hundreds of millions of miles rolled up by the F-series annually, you are looking at the single biggest real-world advance in fuel economy in any vehicle since the Arab oil embargo.”
News: architect Julien de Smedt has designed a museum to feature at the centre of a plot line in popular Danish television series The Legacy.
A model of the museum building appears in the third episode of The Legacy – called Arvingerne in Danish – which aired last Sunday.
“The museum covers a big part of the overall plot,” JDS Architects founder Julien de Smedt told Dezeen. “You will see it a lot in the next few episodes.”
Still from The Legacy showing model of the museum designed by JDS Architects
The Legacy is a serial drama produced by Danish broadcaster DR that focuses on the life of a famous artist’s family who come together following her death to divide up their inheritance. One of the artist’s daughters, Gro, is a museum director who plans to build a new museum at the family’s estate on the Danish island of Funen.
The plot line centres on whether Gro’s plans for the museum will go ahead and in the third episode she is seen showing a model of the building based on De Smedt’s design to a representative from Paris cultural institution the Pompidou Centre.
Still from The Legacy showing model of the museum designed by JDS Architects
“To convince the audience that it is possible to build such a grand museum in Funen we thought that it should be modern and visionary, like an art piece,” Mia Stensgaard, the show’s production designer, told Dezeen. “If it was designed by a hotshot international architect then it could become the sort of museum that people would travel to see, so then I thought of Julien de Smedt.”
Still from The Legacy showing model of the museum designed by JDS Architects
Asked whether this was a particularly unusual commission for his studio to receive, De Smedt replied: “Obviously it doesn’t happen every day, but it makes a lot of sense. [The] same goes for set designs: it makes sense for architects to be involved with set design. I remember that the late [American architect and artist] Lebbeus Woods was involved on the set designs of [Terry Gilliam’s 1995 film] Twelve Monkeys, though not sufficiently credited.”
Explaining how the creative process differed from designing a real building, the architect said: “It’s different in the sense that we don’t have the same constraints and obviously the project will only live on the small screen so it needs to stand out even more.”
“You could say that the project would have been probably half the scale if it had been real, but for the sake of being able to present it as it is on the set we needed to give it a certain volume,” he added.
Still from The Legacy showing model of the museum designed by JDS Architects
Julien de Smedt receives a brief namecheck in the dialogue, when Gro mentions who designed the model she is presenting. The architect said that he was initially offered a cameo in the show but that his schedule wouldn’t allow it.
The show has been hugely popular in Denmark, with each of the first two episodes watched by audiences of almost two million. It will be aired in the UK this year and has already been sold to broadcasters in Australia and the Benelux countries.
News: scientists at the Google[x] research facility in California are working on contact lenses containing tiny electronics that could constantly monitor glucose levels in the tears of people with diabetes.
“We’re now testing a smart contact lens that’s built to measure glucose levels in tears using a tiny wireless chip and miniaturised glucose sensor that are embedded between two layers of soft contact lens material,” said Google in a post published on its official blog.
The contact lenses would be able to generate a reading every second, making it possible to instantly identify potentially dangerous changes in the patient’s blood sugar levels.
“We’re also investigating the potential for this to serve as an early warning for the wearer, so we’re exploring integrating tiny LED lights that could light up to indicate that glucose levels have crossed above or below certain thresholds,” the company explained.
As well as minuscule chips and sensors, the lenses could also incorporate an antenna thinner than a human hair that would communicate with apps so patients or doctors could view the measurements on a smartphone, tablet or computer.
Diabetes patients are currently required to test their blood sugar levels at regular intervals throughout the day by pricking their finger to draw a tiny amount of blood that can be analysed. The process is painful and time-consuming and can discourage people with diabetes from checking their blood glucose as frequently as they should.
“The one thing I’m excited about is that this is a device that people wear daily – the contact lens,” project co-founder Brian Otis told the BBC. “For us to be able to take that platform that exists currently, that people wear, and add intelligence and functionality to it, is really exciting.”
Google stressed that the technology is at a fledgling stage in its development but added that it will be seeking out potential partners who could help it refine the hardware and software required to turn the concept into reality.
“It’s still early days for this technology, but we’ve completed multiple clinical research studies which are helping to refine our prototype,” Google claimed. “We hope this could someday lead to a new way for people with diabetes to manage their disease.”
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