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Art of Interaction: 300 Reasons to Attend INSTINT 2015 in MN

21 Jul

[ By WebUrbanist in Art & Installation & Sound. ]

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Featuring a combination of workshops, lectures, mixers and parties, INSTINT (from the makers of eyeo) brings together some of the most influential and exciting creatives dealing with interactive architecture, art, design and technology from around the world. With less than 60 tickets left, you would be wise to register as soon as possible and if you will be coming to Minneapolis from out of state (or country), be sure to start making travel plans today.

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Attending the event last year, WebUrbanist’s founder and lead technologist were stunned by the high caliber not only of the presenters but the 300 attendees as well, all of whom had stories to share about their work in and beyond the realm of interaction design.

This year, WU is once again a proud official media partner of this amazing gathering. In addition to selected talks from last year (embedded above), more videos from INSTINT 2014 can be found on Vimeo – but keep in mind: at least half of the experience is simply interacting with others in attendance during and beyond the event, so the talks themselves tell only part of the story.

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Frequently found at the bleeding edge of their intersecting fields, INSTINT’s various compelling presenters manage to show off a combination of stunning completed works while also sharing behind-the-scenes lessons for others looking to create responsive environments, interactive art or smart objects. Attendees will be inspired by the finished projects but also learn a great deal from the trials, errors and iterations described in honest detail as well.

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Over three days and in addition to multiple workshops, lunches and mixers, this year’s 14 outstanding speakers include Rachel Wingfield from London, whose experiments with future scenarios combine biology with technology to create living architecture, as well as Nataly Gattengo of San Francisco’s Future Cities Lab who has won awards for robotics, responsive building systems and other developments around the Internet of Things.

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More from the organizers: “Great ideas and technology create ever-new opportunities to bring projects to life everywhere and anywhere imaginable. Along with this opportunity comes the inevitable trials and challenges of physical and site specific work. One-off projects made for one-off locations can make you pull your hair out, and/or go broke in the process. The volume of variables, old and new, can be overwhelming: unpredictable environments, bleeding edge technology, custom fabrication, code, bugs, insects, greasy fingers, hackers, crashers, crashes, caches, spoilers, laws, landlords, curators, committees, workers, shippers, solder, electricity, sunlight, moonlight, fluorescent light, reflections, bad ideas, egos, feasibility, durability, production planning, scope, scale, budgets, and on, and on. What knowledge can be applied from previous experiences and what has to be learned on-the-fly, on a per project basis? INSTINT aims to arm you with insights and inspiration, and expand your ability to execute projects in this exciting, but complex, sometimes harrowing, and ever-shifting field.” Register today!

[ By WebUrbanist in Art & Installation & Sound. ]

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Road Blocks: LEGO-Like Modular Roads & Paths Snap Into Place

21 Jul

[ By Steph in Conceptual & Futuristic & Technology. ]

road blocks lego 1

New roads could be quickly and easily slotted into place, piece by piece, with a new Lego-like modular plastic system that makes the building process feel more like playtime. Prototypes of the PlasticRoad concept will soon be tested in a collaboration with the city of Rotterdam in the Netherlands, potentially replacing asphalt and tar with a strong, corrosion-resistant recycled aggregate made of plastic waste removed from the oceans.

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According to manufacturer VolkerWessels, these modular components can withstand temperatures between -40 and 176 degrees Fahrenheit and other harsh weather conditions, and are ideal for roads built upon structurally unsound ground like sand. It’s unclear whether they would shift around on surfaces like that over time, however, or how cars would handle on their surfaces when it’s rainy, snowy or icy.

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They’re hollow, so cables and utility pipelines can be installed under the surface, protected from the elements and easy to maintain. Quick installation means far briefer periods of disrupted traffic during construction, and the prefabricated panels can simply be transported to the sight and lowered into place. If they pass the tests, the PlasticRoad project could see its first real-life installation in Rotterdam within three years.

smart highways

The concept is reminiscent of other asphalt alternatives that have been proposed over the years, like ‘smart highways’ covered with dynamic paint providing useful information to drivers (pictured above) and heated, LED-light-embedded solar roadways. The latter concept has been dismissed by many critics as unrealistic, considering the vast expense involved in manufacturing and maintaining them and the likelihood that they would draw power from the grid anytime it’s not sunny.

[ By Steph in Conceptual & Futuristic & Technology. ]

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Arboreal Architecture: 14 Houses Built Around & Within Trees

21 Jul

[ By Steph in Architecture & Houses & Residential. ]

corallo house 6

Tree houses aren’t just rustic wooden huts slapped together around a living trunk – they also come in the form of elegant modern residences incorporating the forest into their design, whether by building around existing trees or integrating them right into the floor plan. These 14 modern tree house designs blend into their forest environments and make vegetal views top priority.

Casa Vogue by Alessandro Sartore

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A tree called ‘Bethany’ is the centerpiece of this home in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, passing through a three-meter hole in the floor slab and up through the ceiling of the living room. Casa Vogue by architect Alessandro Sartore also accommodates a second tree in the garage, keeping as much of the original landscape intact as possible and bringing the natural landscape indoors.

The Urban Treehouse by Baumraum

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German architecture firm Baumraum is responsible for many of the world’s coolest modern treehouses, including a pair in Berlin that function as a mini-hotel. The Urban Treehouse preserves the trees on a 650-square-meter privately owned wooded property within the city limits, integrating nature and architecture.

Between the Trees by Sebo-Lichy

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The design of ‘Between the Trees’ by Sebo-Lichy mimics the look of natural tree trunk supports, elevating a portion of the home to work with the steep terrain. It’s built around three chestnut trees and overlooks a forest, with floor-to-ceiling windows and a rooftop terrace blurring the lines between outdoors and in. The house was inspired by Mies van der Rohe’s famous Tugendhat Villa in Czech Republic.

Modern Austin Treehouse by MF Architecture

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This entire Austin home was essentially designed around views of trees in the front yard and on the back terrace. Each of the rooms of the house by MF Architecture look out onto the oak in the backyard, which shelters the entire outdoor area.

Urban Treehouse Apartment Complex by Luciano Pia

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The last place you’d expect to find a treehouse is in the middle of an urban Italian city – let alone an entire apartment building planted with dozens of trees on every level. 25 Verde by Luciano Pia has a load-bearing steel structure shaped like tree trunks as its base, with 63 wooden-shingled dwellings staggered around 50 trees. In addition to looking really cool, the trees help reduce air and noise pollution for the residents.

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Arboreal Architecture 14 Houses Built Around Within Trees

[ By Steph in Architecture & Houses & Residential. ]

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Floatel: Modular Floating Hotel Rooms Provide Portable Privacy

20 Jul

[ By WebUrbanist in Boutique & Art Hotels & Travel. ]

floating hotel main structure

Combining centralized shared spaces like a conventional hotel and the mobility of a catamaran, this award-winning hybrid combines elements of community and seclusion on the water.

floating hotel design

Each individual unit comes with a standard living room, kitchen, bathroom and sleeping loft as well as deck space and a driving area for taking your space around a lake or sea. Meanwhile, the lobby structure bridges the gap between land and water and provides reception, restaurant, event and cafe spaces. Design themes also create a connection between the modules and the whole, including wood slats and white surfaces.

floating hotel room interior

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The rear-facing deck provides space for sunbathing and fishing, while also framing uninterrupted views of nature. Side and front windows can be closed off for privacy, or opened when venturing out on the open water with no nosy neighbors around to sneak peaks inside.

floating hotel open water

Designed by Salt & Water, the approach won a 2015 Millennium Yacht Design Awards for innovatively integrating architectural and nautical systems to create a unique experience for guests. Like the Botel, this remains a conceptual design for now, but clearly something is in the water since firms keep coming back to this novel combination of ideas.

[ By WebUrbanist in Boutique & Art Hotels & Travel. ]

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Traffic Chop: 8 Dedicated Stenciled Traffic Lanes

20 Jul

[ By Steve in Architecture & Cities & Urbanism. ]

dedicated car lane
Seems everyone wants their own dedicated traffic lane these days… and it seems they’re getting them! Is white line fever taking over your neighborhood?

Scissors-Lane

White Stripes would make a great band name… oh, wait. Anyway, there’s no point demanding urban authorities cut it out. Car and truck drivers had better get used to sharing the road all official-like, no matter that traffic is certain to suffer in the short term at least. Can’t we all get along, seeing as we’re all getting along in the same direction albeit in varied types of conveyances and at different speeds?

High Textnology

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If jay-walking is a crime, shouldn’t text-walking be too? The question is being dealt with, and not always in a tongue-in-cheek manner – let’s call it “raising awareness” since that imparts a resistance to mockery in a “won’t someone think of the children?” kind of way. Only the top boffins at Utah Valley University in Orem, Utah know whether their segregated Walk/Run/Text lanes are serious or not… and what if someone’s walking or running WHILE texting? DOH!

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Then there’s the above “Text Walking Lane” somewhere in Belgium that looks official on first glance but last we heard, English isn’t one of Belgium’s official languages.

‘Boarders Security

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OK, so skateboarders are the red-haired children of non-vehicular traffic but don’t they deserve a little lane lovin’ too? No? Maybe you’d prefer they see you hatin’ as they rollin’ on the sidewalk, hmm? At least one ‘boarder has taken measures into his or her own hands, as seen above on a bike trail in Ottawa, Canada’s Centretown.

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Traffic Chop 8 Dedicated Stenciled Traffic Lanes

[ By Steve in Architecture & Cities & Urbanism. ]

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Tree Church: Organic Arbortecture Grown from Living Branches

19 Jul

[ By WebUrbanist in Architecture & Public & Institutional. ]

tree church and grounds

‘Built’ may not be the right word for this compelling hybrid of architectural and arborsculptural design (or: arbortecture), featuring a complete chapel with landscaped fences and carefully cultivated gardens on all sides, the primary structure at its heart made from five species of tree.

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Begun by Barry Cox on his New Zealand property just four years ago, the project originated as a private retreat but as word spread he decided to open it up to guest events as well starting this fall – the structure seats 100 people.

tree church interior view

Leptospernum (Copper Sheen) grows up to create the walls while Alnus Imperialis (Cut Leaf Alder) completes the roof, forming a complete canopy above. amelia Black Tie, Acer Globosum, and Thuja Pyramidalis were also employed in the construction process.

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Within the main building, a slim steel frame underlies the living components, serving as latticework around which the supporting trunks and branches were able to grow.

tree church gardens

On the grounds around the central structure are a number of other intriguing and interactive elements, including a labyrinth and extensive additional gardens for walking and exploring. The entire site is carefully sculpted and maintained, featuring traditional as well as more novel landscapes.

[ By WebUrbanist in Architecture & Public & Institutional. ]

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Painted Praise: Street Art Honors Asia with Iconic Imagery

18 Jul

[ By Steph in Art & Street Art & Graffiti. ]

pejac street art 2

Spanish street artist Pejac both praises and criticizes elements of various Asian cultures in a new series of outdoor paintings making use of iconic traditional imagery and symbols. Human figures are represented as mere silhouettes, allowing reproductions of The Great Wave off Kanagawa or three-dimensional elements like bonsai trees to take center stage in each work.

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The works may say just as much about how a foreign artist perceives the culture of cities like Tokyo, Seoul and Hong Kong as they do about the places themselves. Pejac makes use of some of the most common symbols that outsiders associate with Asian cultures and traditions, like a Chinese dragon beside a heart-shaped scorch mark.

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A piece entitled ‘Seppuki’ in Tokyo depicts what looks like the silhouette of a samurai doubled over as if mortally wounded, impaled by a cherry tree branch instead of a sword. “I couldn’t help but make this sort of tribute as a manner of thank you to the Japanese culture for the inspiration that drove me to create in the first place.”

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A three-dimensional installation of shark fins sticking out of the pavement in Tokyo is a tad harsher in its appraisal, with human bite marks taken from each one. Pejac makes use of “classic anime aesthetics” to calla attention to the environmental impact of shark fin soup, which is popular in Japan.

[ By Steph in Art & Street Art & Graffiti. ]

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Hydro Hammock: Traveling Hot Tub Can Be Hung Up or Buried Below

17 Jul

[ By WebUrbanist in Design & Products & Packaging. ]

hydro hammock outdoors

Flexible and portable, this hanging hot tub hammock can be suspended from trees or other supports or tucked into scooped-out depressions along sandy beaches or on snowy mountainsides, compact enough to be checked on a plane with its associated portable heating unit.

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The highly-mobile Hydro Hammock requires only 20 gallons (less than half of a typical bathtub and supports use by two adults to be used as a hot tub and can be used to line existing voids or suspended in midair. An accompanying device pumps water from wherever it is available and heats it electrically along the way – an eventual goal for future models is to use solar heat so no batteries or other external power source will be required. The extra-durable, high-tensile-strength material supports up to 700 pounds and its canvass-like surfaces give it traction for users.

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hydro hammock design

Aside from its core function as a hot tub, the heavy-duty fabric and associated pump can be reconfigured to turn the system into an outdoor shower or left empty and simply used as a traditional hammock. Its primary target audience, however, is people who wish to have a retreat from extreme environments, taking a hot (and optionally: bubble-filled) vessel with them for breaks from cold ocean waters in the summer or freezing outdoor temperatures in the winter.

More from its makers: “Durable and portable hammocks ready for soothing hot or cool refreshing water. Relax, rejuvenate and fully stretch out in comfort beyond the constraints of an iron or fiberglass bathtub. Equipped with a portable water heater system, LPG or electric. Hydro Hammocks require less water than bathtubs and have a slip resistant texture. The shapes are adjustable and are easy to set up either fully or partially suspended.”

[ By WebUrbanist in Design & Products & Packaging. ]

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Raised Runways: Airplane Paths Lifted Above Downtown Streets

16 Jul

[ By WebUrbanist in Architecture & Cities & Urbanism. ]

urban raised airplane take off

Airports take up vast amounts of valuable real estate in and around urban areas, but what if we could get to and from planes faster, make takeoffs and landings easier, and save city space in the process?

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The Airport City project proposes a radical reinvention of the airport, elevating tracks above roadways and waterways in the heart of Stockholm, Sweden.

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With ground-powered plane taxi systems tied to this track setup, noise and air pollution could be reduced as well, but the critical concept is the degree of urban integration and reduction of single-use architecture and infrastructure associated with a conventional airport.

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Designed by Alex Sutton, graduate of the Bartlett School of Architecture, the idea may not be ready for lift-off anytime soon, but it nonetheless invites designers and travelers alike to rethink the current typology of contemporary airports and how we will accommodate increased air travel in future urban designs.

raised urban airport design

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As automation increasingly transforms airplane travel processes and planes get quieter, there is something magical about imagining we could watch flights take off right within our cities, and step right off of planes into downtowns.

raised urban taxiing system

From the designer: “Travel demand in the aviation industry is set to double by 2030 and continue increasing exponentially into the future. In order to satisfy demand and the increasing importance of the airport on local economies, capacity in the industry needs to increase. This project uses Stockholm, one of the fastest growing cities in Europe, as a testing ground to establish a fully integrated urban airport as part of a new city district, in a time when aviation technology is such that aircraft and airports could operate from within our cities.”

[ By WebUrbanist in Architecture & Cities & Urbanism. ]

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Tiny in Tokyo: Ultra-Narrow House Slotted into an Alley

16 Jul

[ By Steph in Architecture & Cities & Urbanism. ]

tokyo narrow house main

At just six feet wide, this incredibly narrow residence inserted into an alley in dense urban Tokyo is the latest example of Japanese architects thinking way outside the box when it comes to building new housing. The city is so developed, there’s almost no land left to build anything new, so they tend to get incredibly creative with even the oddest-shaped plots.

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The four-story house by YUUA Architects and Associates extends about 36 feet into a former alley between two older buildings, and while the street-facing facade features floor-to-ceiling windows to maximize daylight and views, intimate spaces like bedrooms, bathrooms and main living areas are tucked into the back for privacy.

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The minimalist interior design scheme includes floating platforms at various levels for a sense of openness, some of them made of metal mesh to let as much light pass through the house as possible. While such tiny residences are often kept bright white to create an illusion of extra space, YUUA makes an unusual choice with dark-painted walls.

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There’s a semi-sunken basement for storage, and the first floor features a study area facing the street and a bedroom in the back. The third floor is comprised of an open-plan kitchen, living room and dining area, while the uppermost floor contains a bathroom, bedroom and terrace. Considering it’s only about as wide as an average adult male is tall, the house looks surprisingly livable.

360Photography

Archive for the ‘Creativity’ Category

Art of Interaction: 300 Reasons to Attend INSTINT 2015 in MN

Road Blocks: LEGO-Like Modular Roads & Paths Snap Into Place

Arboreal Architecture: 14 Houses Built Around & Within Trees

Casa Vogue by Alessandro Sartore

The Urban Treehouse by Baumraum

Between the Trees by Sebo-Lichy

Modern Austin Treehouse by MF Architecture

Urban Treehouse Apartment Complex by Luciano Pia

Next Page – Click Below to Read More:
Arboreal Architecture 14 Houses Built Around Within Trees

Floatel: Modular Floating Hotel Rooms Provide Portable Privacy

Traffic Chop: 8 Dedicated Stenciled Traffic Lanes

High Textnology

‘Boarders Security

Next Page – Click Below to Read More:
Traffic Chop 8 Dedicated Stenciled Traffic Lanes

Tree Church: Organic Arbortecture Grown from Living Branches

Painted Praise: Street Art Honors Asia with Iconic Imagery

Hydro Hammock: Traveling Hot Tub Can Be Hung Up or Buried Below

Raised Runways: Airplane Paths Lifted Above Downtown Streets

Tiny in Tokyo: Ultra-Narrow House Slotted into an Alley

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Archive for the ‘Creativity’ Category

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