I’m on a roll here with “artist as designer” blog topics. From September 14th until January 27th the Cooper-Hewitt Design Musuem is showing Provoking Magic: Lighting of Ingo Maurer. As a lighting designer, I truly admire Maurer because he really captures the intrigue of lighting design. He has designed more than 150 lighting systems since the mid 1960’s and this exhibit will show 53 of them.
http://www.cooperhewitt.org/EXHIBITIONS/provoking_magic/
This weekend, I visited the MOMA (Museum of Modern Art) in NYC to see the Richard Serra Sculpture: Forty Years exhibit that is on display until September 10th. It was a fantastic showing of large scale steel sculptures in beautiful forms that create exciting new spaces. You cannot help but interact with these pieces.
http://moma.org/exhibitions/2007/serra/
The new concept aircraft from Boeing, a 787 called Dreamliner. It includes bigger, softer seats and more overhead storage, which is great, but where they win real points is in innovation. They have designed the body of the 250 passenger plane out of one piece. It is made of carbon fibers which makes the plane ultra light weight and therefore consumes approximately 20% less fuel and produce fewer carbon emissions than aircrafts of a similar size. By making the body out of 50% composite materials, Boeing eliminates the need for 1,500 aluminum sheets and more than 40,000 fasteners.
Another very smart feature is color changing LED lighting in the cabin that shifts over the course of the flight to adjust the circadian rhythms of the travelers so they feel more refreshed when the reach their destination.
Photo Credit: Boeing Photo
Telling time never SMELLED so good thanks to a new timepiece design called Horizon from British Industrial Designer, Marc Newson. His materials selection is an unusual mix of 18-karat gold and vanilla scented rubber. You can find them at his own company, ikepod or at the Moss Galleries in New York, and Los Angeles.
This fall, fashion designers like Malo, Calvin Klein, DVF, Anne Klein, Bruce are showing oversized chunky knit sweaters on the runway. This season you won’t have to sacrifice your comfort to be a slave to fashion. These designers are showing us how staying warm can be sleek and glamorous. I prefer the Malo (first on left) as a kind of nod to the craft of knitting in space-age style.
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Staffan Strindberg, a Swedish architect, in conjunction with Modern Marine Homes, designed the Näckros Villa, a new concept of marine living. Since 2002, Modern Marine Homes had a vision of waterside living without compromising the demands of modern living. They collaborated with Staffan as well as Tecomatic, relentlesly studing marine grade, environmentally friendly materials and construction methods. The result is a floating home with modern design characteristics and careful craftsmanship.
http://www.mmh.se/060217/index.html
http://www.strindberg.se/060118/default.html
Just as BBQ season is wrapping up, I found this simple barrel grill design by Eva Solo. The charcoal barrel is perfect for a contemporary outdoor setting. The steel drum is for people who love cooking food over glowing coals, without complicating techniques and methods (and possibly adding to the atmosphere by listening to a steel drum band). When the grill is not in use, a flat protective lid covers the heavy-duty cooking grid, converting the grill into an extra patio table.
http://www.comforthouse.com/grilmatgaspr.html
Understatement is key for Australian architect Gary Marinko. When he submitted his design for the Poll house to the local council, he described it as ‘a typical single-storey house with a tin roof.’ Because of it’s modesty of materials (concrete, brick, and corregated metal), it’s site location (set back off a wooded road in a Perth suburb) and scale, he’s not far off in that description. So, it may be modest in that regard, but it is anything but typical. Due to its simplicity, this home is intriguing at first glance, but it combines energy efficiency, handicap acessibility, and a space for art exhibitions.
“The spaces I design are pretty simple,” says Marinko. “The best architecture seems to have a compelling inevitability about it; you are never sure what to expect as you move through but once you arrive in a space everything looks like it’s meant to be there; there’s a subtle ease about it.”
http://www.garymarinko.architecture.net.au/
Famed fashion designer Cynthia Rowley integrated her Fall 2007 collection with paint manufacturer Sherwin-Williams new color palette. Featuring 250 high-demand hues in 10 color families, the Concepts in Color palette is integrated throughout Rowley’s line. Thanks to a unique display tool, each color in the Concepts in Color palette can be viewed, beside similar shades, on a larger swatch with a perforated “window” opening. This method allows for easier coordination with fabrics, wallcoverings, flooring, or other colors.
“I’ve always loved to play with new ways of using color in fashion as well as in the home,” says Rowley. “Color is where it all starts each season and Sherwin-Williams helps me explore new combinations in design.”
“Our partnership with Cynthia Rowley reflects the growing crossover from fashion to the home,” adds Sheri Thompson, Sherwin-Williams director of color marketing and design
images from http://www.style.com/
http://www.sherwin-williams.com/pro/paint_colors/paint_color_samples/pdfs/concepts_in_color.pdf
“There’s a vast network of electronic information surrounding us, and we’re navigating and participating in it all the time.” This was the inspiration for Damon Seeley and Cameron McNall of LA based firm Electroland to design a modern life video game from a building facade. After seeing an installation project designed by Electroland for the reopening of SCI-Arc, Forest City developers invited the firm to compete in the Percent for Art , a project for Met Lofts in the South Park neighborhood of LA.
Electroland designed a system of electronic tiles just outside the entrance to the Met Lofts lobby, and serves as the interface with pedestrians. Then they set a riser system into the surrounding concrete and placed a grid of 176 16-inch-square tiles within it. Each tile is a sandwich of fritted glass and plastic holding 96 red LEDs, four compression sensors, and a microcomputer beneath.
The weight of a person stepping on the sensors sends data to a master computer located in the lobby. That computer in turn signals the tile to illuminate. These tiles are linked with another gird of illuminated squares on the west elevation of the building. The movements of the pedestrians below illuminate on this billboard-like facade. Seeley says that players detect the correlation between themselves and the building face, and understand their influence on the urban landscape.
for a video visit:
With the ever-rising price of real estate, it helps to have a few tricks up your sleeve for expanding your space. The kitHAUS is an affordable and stylish alternative to building an addition to your home for that home office, retreat space, or kid’s playroom. In 6-12 weeks an aluminum frame can be delivered to your site and quickly the modular elements, which are US designed and fabricated, are quickly assembled. There are several combinations of parts to choose from!
I recently saw the exhibit You are the Measure, on the work of Gordon Matta-Clark. He is renowned for his splitting and carving of building structures. His work turned buildings that were slated for demolition, into sculptural works of art. This exhibit is now on display at the Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA), Los Angeles.
http://www.moca.org/museum/imagerotator.php?exid=391&id=2418
A little offbeat, but clever none the less… Slawinkski & Co has designed this circus style knife block in the form of a knife-throwing target! The shapely wood exterior conceals magnets that keep a firm grip of all kitchen carvers. This is a great sculptural piece that gives your kitchen a sense of humor.
http://www.konstantinslawinski.com/
I absolutely love this solution to pool lighting! Sold by Italian lighting purveyors, Slide, the moondrops are a safe, wire-free way to bring lighting to your pool! They are available in seven different sizes, so be playful with the arrangements of these globes around your pool or garden.
RISD (Rhode Island School of Design) grad and furniture designer, Matthias Pliessnig, introduced a sleek and elegantly bowed wood bench inspired by his summer studies of boat making and sailing. He fabricated a softened grid of wood that supports and bends to shape around the sitter.
http://www.matthias-studio.com/