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Archive for the ‘Creativity’ Category

Crowdsourced Data Reveals Most Beautiful Urban Walking Routes

14 Jul

[ By WebUrbanist in Destinations & Sights & Travel. ]

best walking routes study

Using a mapping algorithm coupled with citizen reviews of sights and scenery, a team of researchers has developed a way to choose paths through cities based on beauty, quiet and happiness rather than simply the shortest distance between two points.

shortest or beautiful route

The project employed Google Street View and Geograph as well as Flickr images and their metadata to build out an initial estimation of probable best paths, then solicited human feedback (to check and enhance the results) from a group of participants on the website UrbanGems (shown above).

london main sites map

The study, published by Cornell University’s arXiv, came up with a number of route suggestions in Boston and London and contains a number of interesting findings. For starters, the ‘beautiful’ routes were only slightly longer than the shortest routes, and significantly shorter than typical tourist-oriented directions and guided-tour paths. As the algorithm improves, it is increasingly able to generate paths through new cities via metadata alone, reducing reliance on input from people.

beauty and shortest boston

boston main sights map

The project’s creators included Daniele Quercia and Luca Maria Aiello of Yahoo Labs in Barcelona and Rossano Schifanella of the University of Torino, Italy. From their abstract: “When providing directions to a place, web and mobile mapping services are all able to suggest the shortest route. The goal of this work is to automatically suggest routes that are not only short but also emotionally pleasant.

beauty walking route london

shortest walking route london

The assessments are not simply qualitative value judgments, but a hybrid of human and machine input: “Based on a quantitative validation, we find that, compared to the shortest routes, the recommended ones add just a few extra walking minutes and are indeed perceived to be more beautiful, quiet, and happy.”

happy walking path london

quiet walking route london

From UrbanGems: “Buildings and neighbourhoods speak. They speak of egalitarianism or elitism, beauty or ugliness, acceptance or arrogance. The aim of UrbanGems is to identify the visual cues that are generally associated with concepts difficult to define such beauty, happiness, quietness, or even deprivation. The difficult task of deciding what makes a building beautiful, or what is sought after in a quiet location is outsourced to the users of this site using comparisons of pictures. With a comprehensive list of aesthetic virtues at hand, we would be more likely to systematically understand and re-create the environments we intuitively love.”

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[ By WebUrbanist in Destinations & Sights & Travel. ]

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Abandoned Alien Homestead: Forsaken UFO House in Florida

14 Jul

[ By Steve in Abandoned Places & Architecture. ]

UFOhouse_mainx

Painted pink and encrusted with graffiti, the abandoned UFO house in Homestead, Florida, has a backstory as mysterious as its otherworldly architecture.

Lions & Tigers & Bears, Oh My!

abandoned Florida UFO house

abandoned Florida UFO house

Located in Homestead, Florida, the so-called “UFO House” (or “Alien House”) was built around 1974 when the town’s population was roughly 15,000. Forty years later, Homestead is home to just over 60,000 yet the UFO House, situated at 37350 Southwest 214th Avenue, is still remarkably isolated… as if the original owner wasn’t interested in having neighbors, EVAR. Credit Abandoned Florida for many of these crisp, clear & creepy images.

abandoned Florida UFO house

abandoned Homestead Florida UFO house

abandoned Homestead Florida UFO house

abandoned Homestead Florida UFO house

Lessee now, why would someone of obvious financial means in ’70s south Florida take steps to ensure exclusivity above and beyond the call? One doesn’t have to consult Sonny Crockett and Rico Tubbs to arrive at a plausible explanation and a decades-long rumor mill has helped fill in the gaps. The prevailing theory goes something like this: the original builder-owner was allegedly involved in drug trafficking using the front of being an exotic animal importer. The contraband was supposedly hidden in compartments built into the floors of the animal cages. Say hello to my leetle friend, Tony Montana the Tiger!

abandoned Homestead Florida UFO house

abandoned Homestead Florida UFO house

“My friend lived down a dirt road from this place,” relates someone who visited the UFO House around 1979. “It was out in the middle of agriculture fields off of Palm Drive as I remember. We used to ride her dirt bike down there to look at these exotic animals that were caged in back of the house, mostly big cats like tigers and jaguars. We had heard the rumors about it being a drug smuggler using the animals as a cover and one day when we went around the outside of the property a man came out of the house, jumped into a car (old Monte Carlo?) and chased us through the fields. We were terrified and he wouldn’t let up until he caught up with us (we were just 2 twelve year old girls tearing along these dirt roads on a tiny dirt bike). He finally caught us and told us not to ever go back there.” Thanks to Flickr user KACP (Kris Alan Carter Photography) for the above images.

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Abandoned Alien Homestead Forsaken Ufo House In Florida

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Dubai to Build New 50 Million Sq Ft Climate-Controlled City

13 Jul

[ By WebUrbanist in Architecture & Cities & Urbanism. ]

indoor mall of the world

Always pushing the limits of posh possibility, this latest endeavor aims to put an entire urban center in a temperature-controlled bubble of indoor spaces, centered around a vast Mall of the World.

indoor city street view

Everything one can imagine will be found inside the complex, including 100 apartment and hotel buildings, various medical services, a huge shopping mall and the world’s largest indoor amusement park.

indoor city giant billboards

Its designers have unabashedly drawn from sources of inspiration around the world, including culturally central parts of New York, London and other historic metropolises.

indoor city faux exteriors

Like some surreal voluntary version of Stephen King’s Under the Dome, the whole thing can be experienced without stepping outside, particularly in hot summer months.

indoor city terraces rivers

In cooler winter months, some pedestrian street roofs and park domes will be retracted to allow for natural air circulation.

indoor city domed spaces

indoor city dubai design

The goal, as expressed by Sheik Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum (and envisioned by Dubai Holding), is to create a beacon for year-round tourism both from local visitors and those coming from abroad, transforming the UAE from a seasonal vacation spot to a place people can come at any time.

indoor city exterior view

indoor city cultural hub

Its architects also claim the system will be eco-friendly, in part because the active and passive systems integrated throughout will work in concert with one another. Whether such a vast system in the desert can be green in the end (or willed be added to the growing list of failed abandonments in Dubai) remains to be seen .

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The City’s a Playground for Cartoon Characters by OakOak

12 Jul

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

oakoak urban interventions 1

Anything from a crooked cinder block to an ephemeral beam of light falling across the street can inspire a playful interactive scene by French street artist OakOak, making passersby stop and smile. Whether by temporary paper cut-outs or more permanent graffiti, the artist transforms ordinary urban settings in fun and unexpected ways.

oakoak urban interventions 2

oakoak urban interventions 3

OakOak wanders the streets seeing creative possibilities in virtually every quirk and imperfection, turning what could be seen by others as urban blight into playful works of art that might only stick around for a day or so, but still manage to brighten people’s day.

oakoak urban interventions 4

oakoak urban interventions 5

oakoak urban interventions 9

Little Bruce Lee figures bend metal poles or break through concrete and trapeze artists prepare to tightrope across chains. A stain on a wall might become a stream of genie-producing smoke emitted from a magic lamp, or a sewer grate could become a snail shell.

oakoak urban interventions 6

oakoak urban interventions 8

Says OakOak of his hometown of St. Etienne, “I like this city, her atmosphere, and I wanted it to look nicer. It was an industrial city with many coal mines; now it’s in regeneration and still quite poor. But it’s easily travelled by foot with awkward aspects ideal for art. I saw shapes everywhere, and wanted to realize them.”

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The Ferrari of Rail: Ultra-Luxurious Train Design for Japan

11 Jul

[ By Steph in Conceptual & Futuristic & Technology. ]

Luxury Ferrari Train 1

Japan is set to get a new luxury sleeper train with spacious modern cabins designed by Ken Okuyama, who’s best known for his work with Ferrari. The $ 50 million Cruise Train will run on both electric and non-electric rails and feature large glass-paneled windows, high ceilings and leather seating. Envisioned as the future of train travel in Japan, this designer creation won’t be for everyone: it’s got a max capacity of just 34 passengers.

Luxury Ferrari Train 2

Luxury Ferrari Train 3

Expected to lance in the spring of 2017, Cruise Train is essentially an upgrade of the ‘Seven Stars in Kyushu,’ a deluxe sleeping car excursion train that’s been in operation since late 2013. The new design appears to be far more open, stylized and modern than that of the Kyushu train, with Okuyama clearly taking a lot of inspiration from luxury personal vehicles.

Luxury Ferrari Train 4 Luxury Ferrari Train 5

The ten carriages of the Cruise Train will include two observation areas with glass walls so passengers can take in the views as the train passes through the countryside. A two-story deluxe suite car with two beds on the lower floor, a private bathroom and a lounge room upstairs will be available as well. There’s no word yet on just how much it’ll cost to experience the Ferrari of trains, but it’s safe to say that it won’t be a bargain.

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Surreal World: 14 Reality-Bending Mirror Art Installations

10 Jul

[ By Steph in Art & Installation & Sound. ]

Mirror Art Hurwitz 1

Cabins vanish into the landscape like a mirage, tiny rooms filled with stars somehow go on forever and treetops float in mid-air in these reality-distorting illusions made using mirrors. With these art installations and sculptures, nothing is quite what it seems, requiring the viewer to closely examine where the real world begins and ends.

Infinity Mirrored Rooms by Yayoi Kusama

Mirror Art Infinity Rooms 1

Mirrored Art Infinity Rooms 2

Visitors waited up to three hours for their turn inside Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama‘s exhibit ‘Infinity Mirrored Room – The Souls of Millions of Light Years Away.’ One hundred multicolored LED lights pulsate at various speeds and patterns inside an entirely reflective room to give it the feel of outer space.

Reflective Illusions by Jonty Hurwitz

Mirror Art Hurwitz 1

Mirror Art Hurwitz 2

Mirror Art Hurwitz 3

Strange, abstracted objects appear to have no particular form when you gaze upon them directly, but place them in front of a mirror at just the right angle, and you’ll see what they really are. Artist Jonty Hurwitz scans animals and human body parts, distorts them digitally and fabricates them so that the original object is revealed when they’re placed in front of a cylindrical mirror.

Ghost Figures in the Woods by Rob Mulholland

MIrror Art Rob Mulholland 1

Mirror Art Rob Mulholland 2

Translucent ghostly figures seem to lurk in the Scottish woods in this reflective illusion by artist Rob Mulholland. The fitters are actually silhouettes made of plexiglas, reflecting and distorting their surroundings so that they appear almost extra-dimensional.

Half-Invisible Desert Cabin by Phillip K Smith III

Mirror Art Desert Cabin 1

Mirror Art Desert Cabin 2

A wooden cabin in the desert seems to half-disappear into the sky and sand in this project by Phillip K Smith III. The abandoned structure was modified with mirrored panels that reflect the surroundings for a partial vanishing effect. The framed faux windows slowly light up at night, so the cabin alternately appears to be “like a mirage or a hallucination” depending on the time of day.

Shattered Sunsets: Broken Mirror Photos of Evening Skies

Mirror Art Shattered Sunsets 1

Mirror Art Shattered Sunsets 2

Look at the sunset in an entirely new way, through the shards of a broken mirror. The ‘Broken Mirror/Evening Sky‘ photo series by Bing Wright breaks the sky into fragments, making each image like a puzzle.

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Surreal World 14 Reality Bending Mirror Art Installations

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Smart Bricks: Life-Size LEGO-Style Blocks for Human Habitats

09 Jul

[ By WebUrbanist in Conceptual & Futuristic & Technology. ]

kite bricks building blocks

Aiming to revolutionize the most basic material units of construction, these building blocks snap together like LEGO bricks while leaving space for insulation and infrastructure inside and between them.

kite building block prototype

kite wall construction detail

Designed by Kite Bricks, a startup company with lofty aspirations, these Smart Bricks offer “high thermal control, full passage of pipes, wires, cables and the like, finishes for both indoors and outdoors, extraordinary tensile strength, ease of construction, safety of materials, and total application throughout a structure—floors, ceilings, and walls.”

Among other ecological and cost advantages, a core idea is to reduce the difficulty of construction and the equipment and debris associated with the building process. The bricks can be stacked by hand and are self-supporting from the start – no scaffolding needed.

kite brick window wall

kite lego like building block

As for applications: “The brick is amenable for building houses, buildings, bridges and more.. The block is constructed of high-strength concrete with unique properties that allow for … large savings in electricity expenses associated with seasonal heating and cooling. The block allows for faster, cheaper, more precise, and stronger building than is available through traditional building methods.”

kite life size lego

robotic construction blocks

Whether this approach will replace bricks as we know them remains to be seen, but the next step will certainly involve full-scale prototypes, albeit hopefully ones more creative and attractive than the rough-and-ready examples shown in the video above.

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Flip for Fun: 4 Clever Pool Tables that Convert & Transform

08 Jul

[ By Delana in Design & Furniture & Decor. ]

rollover pool dining table

Pool is one of those great American hobbies that never seems to get old. As much as we might want to play every day, not everyone has the space to fit an entire pool table into their home. These three brilliant solutions (plus a bonus pool table that wouldn’t save any space, but would definitely be a conversation piece) might finally be enough to convince you to save your quarters and play at home instead.

Disappearing Pool Table

There’s honestly no better solution for hiding something than having it pop out of the floor only when you need it. The Disappearing Pool Table from Stage Engineering does just that: when it’s hidden away, the only clue that it’s there is a huge rectangular cutout in the floor. When you activate some sort of mechanism, the cutout floor drops down and slides away, exposing a full-size pool table that then rises up on a platform to floor level. There isn’t much information available other than this video, but the video is enough to convince us: we want one.

Dining Table Conversion Kit

fusion pool dining table

elegant fusion pool table converts to dining table

Pool table covers are nothing new – you unfold a foam mat or plop a piece of wood down onto the pool table and it becomes a place for dining or playing ping-pong. But the Fusion collection of tables offers a slightly more high-class approach to the idea. The high-quality pool tables come with wooden leaves that slide on securely to stay put for the purposes of eating at the table. The resulting dining table is quite elegant and not at all what you might expect of covered-over pool table.

Rotating Table

dolphin flip over pool dining table

rotating dining pool table

The Bentley Dolphin Rollover Pool Dining Table might be a mouthful, but it’s a fun piece of furniture that leads a double life. On one side it’s a standard-size pool, snooker, or billiards table. Undo the security latches and spin the tabletop upside-down in the frame and it becomes a dining table with a solid wood top or a beautiful inlaid pattern top. The makers suggest that the flat top can also be used as a conference table, but we suspect there wouldn’t be much business going on when there are clearly games of pool to be played.

Converted VW Bus

volkswagen pool table

vw bus pool table conversion

The VW Bus pool table is different from the others here because its transformation was one-way and permanent, but it did once serve a very different purpose so deserves a mention. It is made from the real chassis of an old Volkswagen that was then fitted with a wood and felt top. It’s probably not regulation size and it definitely won’t be level, but those are small details. What really matters is that someone took the time and care to craft this seriously awesome one-of-a-kind Volkswagen/pool table mashup, which is an undeniably beautiful thing.

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[ By Delana in Design & Furniture & Decor. ]

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Living in a Bubble: 15 Privacy-Free Transparent Houses

08 Jul

[ By Steph in Architecture & Houses & Residential. ]

Glass Houses Main

Sometimes, beautiful views of your surroundings simply trump the need for privacy. Living in a bubble isn’t so bad when you’re in a remote location gazing at the sea or the forest, but some people take it one step further, living in almost entirely transparent spaces even in busy urban locations.

Cylindrical Glass House Containing a Tree

Glass Houses Cylindrical 2 Glass Houses Cylindrical 1

If you’re living in a secluded forest, does it matter whether the walls of your home are entirely transparent? Perhaps you wouldn’t mind if you lived inside ‘Tree in the House,’ a four-story modern treehouse encapsulating a beautiful tree. A white spiral staircase winds around the tree, taking you from one room to the next.

Transparent Floating Vacation Home

Glass Houses Floating 2 Glass Houses Floating 1

The term ‘floating house’ would typically indicate a house boat or other structure on the water, but in this case, it’s all about the visuals. Designed by Jarmund/Vigsnaes Arkitekter, this home features a gabled black upper floor on top of an entirely transparent lower floor so that from a distance, the home appears to be levitating.

Farnsworth House by Mies van der Rohe

Glass Houses Farnsworth 1 Glass Houses Farnsworth 2

The classic Farnsworth House is one of the most well-known works by architect Mies van der Rohe. Built for Dr. Edith Farnsworth between 1945 and 1951 in Plano, Illinois, the glass home is located on a secluded 10-acre site. The design seeks to unite the occupants with the natural world just outside, using the adjacent trees for shading and privacy.

Glass Cube House by Carlo Santambrogio

Glass House Santambrogio 1 Glass House Santambrogio 2

Glass House Santambrogio 3

These two entirely see-through houses redefine what it means to put your life on display. Italian architecture firm Santambrogio sought the clearest glass to maintain transparency even through a series of walls, built-in shelves and staircases. ‘Snow House,’ the three-story structure pictured, is one of a series of glass houses created by the firm, and this one has glass thick enough to withstand heavy loads of snow. Special glass panels instantly turn matte for privacy at the touch of a button. The single-story version, ‘Cliff House,’ uses thinner, lighter glass elements.

House NA by Sou Fujimoto Architects

Clear Houses Fujimoto 1 Clear Houses Fujimoto 2

Rather than trying to cut individual inhabitants off from their neighbors, as is typical in densely populated settings, Japanese architect Sou Fujimoto decided to create a home that would unite them. House NA has an almost entirely transparent street-front facade, and instead of enclosed rooms, the interior is filled with small platforms at various heights for free movement and clear lines of sight.

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Living In A Bubble 15 Privacy Free Transparent Houses

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Stairs to Nowhere: Half-Finished Fire Escape Inside a Church

08 Jul

[ By Steph in Art & Installation & Sound. ]

Fire Escape Church Sambre 1

A mass of reclaimed, weathered wood of all shapes and sizes rises up to the cathedral ceiling of the Church of St. Peter the Puellier in Mairie d’Orleans – but don’t expect these stairs to go anywhere. Built by French artist Sambre, ‘Escalier de Secours’ (Fire Escape) brings a sense of chaos and disproportion into a space typically considered sacred.

Fire Escape Church Sambre 2

Fire Escape Church Sambre 3

Installed in the heart of the church, the staircase consists of a framework covered in randomly applied wooden slats, nailed on with no apparent rhyme or reason. Intentionally oversized, the stairs are much to large for any human to walk up, requiring a hands-and-knees climb to ascend.

Fire Escape Church Sambre 6

Fire Escape Church Sambre 9

The work invites visitors to discover the twelfth-century church, which is the oldest remaining intact in Orleans, in an entirely new and self-guided way. Looking up through the nest-like wooden mass from the ground floor, you catch only glimpses of the church’s vaults. Visitors can choose from a variety of paths to make their way through the space, metaphorically exploring the many options available in life.

Fire Escape Church Sambre 8

Fire Escape Church Sambre 7

Sambre is known for large-scale, seemingly haphazard sculptures and architectural installations made of reclaimed wood, including spheres and labyrinths built inside gallery spaces and warehouses.

 

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