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No Exit: Dementia Village Dwellers Live in Alternate Reality

19 Feb

[ By WebUrbanist in Architecture & Public & Institutional. ]

dimentia second story view

It sounds like the dystopian plot of Dark City or The Truman Show, with free-seeming residents unaware they are actually inhabitants of a closed community they cannot leave and in which they are under constant surveillance … but that is only one side of the story.

dimensia overall site planning

dimentia public outdoor space

A total of 150 Alzheimer’s sufferers live in Hogewey, this gated community unlike any other. Located in the Netherlands, it boasts open copious walking paths and green spaces, a grocery shop, hair salon and dozens of stores and clubs.

dimentia village resident grocery

The friendly grocers and stylists are, however, all employees of the facility (caregivers, doctors and nurses). If someone approaches the single exit to the outside world they are politely, gently but firmly told to perhaps try another door as this one is closed.

dimentia interior focused plan

dimentiaville ramps parks paths

If this sounds like a terrible situation, consider this: patients can roam much more freely than in many elder car facilities. Patients here require fewer medications, eat better and live longer. Still, it raises philosophical questions that are difficult to answer about the relative value of knowledge and happiness, for instance.

village exterior facade view

themed patient room interiors

Dormitory-style rooms are situated around the exterior of the campus, allowing views out, but building exits all face inward. Each residence structure has a “lifestyle theme” associated with it, designed to make people feel it home, surrounded by appropriate religious symbols for some, music and art for others.

dimentia city architecture model

CNN’s Dr. Gupta traveled to Weesp, the village in which the facility is set, and interviewed caregivers in this extensive twenty-three-minute segment on its purpose and workings. Some people question the ethics of the inherent deception, but if the residents feel at home, it is hard to say what a better alternative might be than this seemingly-ordinary everyday reality.

[ By WebUrbanist in Architecture & Public & Institutional. ]

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Abandoned Nazi Bunker Converted to Power Plant & Cafe

18 Feb

[ By Steph in Architecture & Public & Institutional. ]

Converted Nazi Bunker 2

The words ‘Nazi power’ have taken on a new meaning in Hamburg, Germany as an abandoned bunker formerly equipped with anti-aircraft turrets has been transformed for a surprising new use. The Hamburg-Wilhelmsburg flak bunker helped shield city residents from aerial attacks for four years during World War II and was abandoned for decades until its conversion by IBA-Hamburg into a renewable energy power plant and memorial in one.

Converted Nazi Bunker 1

Converted Nazi Bunker 3

Converted Nazi Bunker 4

The fortress now meets the heating demands of 3,000 local households using 85% renewable energy including a biomethane-fired heat and power plant and a solar array on the roof that heats a 2-million-liter water tank for dwellings in the Weltquartier district. 30 meters above the ground, a cafe has opened for business inside one of the aircraft turrets.

Converted Nazi Bunker 5

Converted Nazi Bunker 6

The conversion project stands as both a symbol for the ‘Renewable Wilhelmsburg’ Climate Protection Concept, which aims to incorporate sustainability into urban planning, and a historic attraction. Before it was restored, the bunker was stained and shrouded in ivy.

[ By Steph in Architecture & Public & Institutional. ]

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Modern Tree Houses: 14 Awesome Arboreal Dwelling Designs

18 Feb

[ By Steph in Architecture & Houses & Residential. ]

Modern Tree Houses Main

Some tree houses are crafted in organic shapes and materials to blend into their environments or designed as veritable castles in the sky, but these 14 are as modern as arboreal dwellings get. Ranging from a tree hotel in Sweden with a variety of eye-popping options to a simple freestanding backyard structure you can build yourself, these contemporary tree houses might get you daydreaming about your own private tree retreat.

Treehouse Conference Center

Modern Treehouses Conference Center

Your brainpower might just be multiplied if you attended a work conference in a treehouse like this one. The stimulating environment of a Belgian forest provides the setting for an elevated structure consisting of two large wooden cabins connected by a walkway, with a ramp leading to the grass below. Built by German architectural studio Baumraum, which is responsible for many other gorgeous modern tree houses, this complex is set on 19 stilts.

Beach Rock Treehouse in Japan

Modern Treehouses Beach Rock

Japanese builder Kobayashi Takashi created this domed ‘Beach Rock Treehouse‘ for the sole purpose of communicating with outer space. Seriously. It’s featured in the book ‘New Treehouses of the World,’ in which the author writes “A sparkling beacon among treetops, it is easy to imagine the dome succeeding at its mission to make contact with alien life.”

Tree Snake Houses

Modern Treehouses Snake

Inspired by serpents, these twin treehouses in Pedras Salgadas Park, Portugal take advantage of a sloping hillside. The structures extend out from ground level to hover within the woods, requiring no stairs or ladders to feel as if you’ve ascended into the treetops. Each unit is equipped with a mater bedroom studio space with a small kitchen and wash area.

Prefab Eco Perch

Modern Treehouses Eco Perch

Set it on the ground or put it in the trees – ‘Eco Perch’ by Blue Forest is adaptable to virtually any environment you’d like to place it in. The prefab luxury tree house unit is made of natural materials and can be installed within 5 days, taking up just 6 by 8 meters. The living area, kitchen and bedroom inside can accommodate up to four people.

Modern Treehouse for Kids

Modern Treehouses Kids Nashville

Those of us who were lucky enough to have a treehouse as kids often happily made do with little more than a rickety plywood platform and ladder treads nailed into the bark. How fun would it have been to call a two-story treehouse like this one your very own? This freestanding treehouse was built around a pine in the owner’s Nashville backyard.

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Modern Tree Houses 14 Awesome Arboreal Dwellings

[ By Steph in Architecture & Houses & Residential. ]

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Figure & Ground: Surreal Animated Walking City Shifts Shape

17 Feb

[ By WebUrbanist in Art & Photography & Video. ]

transforming-city-design-an

Mesmerizing as it morphs forms like some kind of architectural mutant, this latest take on the Walking City is a freshly-animated and anthropomorphic twist on a fifty-year-old concept.

walking city animation forms

The transforming shape at the center of this eight-minute short flexes between organic and artificial shapes and structures, shifting between forms that take the viewer through glimpses of Buckminster Fuller and Zaha Hadid, from Constructivism through Moderisnm and Postmodernism to Deconstructivism.

surreal walking city video

shape-shifting-walking-city

From its creators at Universal Everything: “Referencing the utopian visions of 1960’s architecture practice Archigram, Walking City is a slowly evolving video sculpture. The language of materials and patterns seen in radical architecture transform as the nomadic city walks endlessly, adapting to the environments she encounters.”

walking converting figure ground

The result is neither precisely a historical tour nor an entirely artistic abstraction, but something in between that hints at bits, pieces, strategies and forms found in built environments and design approaches past, present and possibly future.

[ By WebUrbanist in Art & Photography & Video. ]

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No Child Left: 10 Eerie Abandoned Daycare Centers

16 Feb

[ By Steve in Abandoned Places & Architecture. ]

Won’t somebody please care for the children? Sorry, Helen Lovejoys of the world, these 10 eerie abandoned daycare centers just don’t care any more.

Fissioning School

abandoned daycare center Pripyat Chernobyl (images via: Boston.com, WXXI and Boing Boing, Miles O’Brien)

Let’s get this one out of the way post-haste: an abandoned daycare center in the nuclear ghost town of Pripyat, Ukraine. Like every other public and private facility in the former Soviet atomic boomtown (no pun intended), Pripyat’s daycare center was abandoned suddenly in 1986 when the nearby Chernobyl reactor exploded and governmental authorities couldn’t hide, er, became aware of the scope of the subsequent disaster.

abandoned daycare Pripyat Chernobyl (image via: Inmobiliaria Lares)

Before the catastrophe, Pripyat’s schools and childcare centers – this one appears to be a combination of both – must have been pleasant places suffused with bright primary colors, echoing to the joyful voices of cheerful children and dedicated caregivers. That’s hard to imagine now. Kudos to Flickr user Inmobiliaria Lares for the still life (heavy on the still; light on life) photograph above.

Deserted In The Desert

abandoned daycare Niland CA (images via: Toadhaven Homeschool)

Niland, located in California’s far southeastern Imperial County just south of the Salton Sea, is home to about a thousand hardy souls and, presumably, their equally hardy children. With the population shrinking by about 20 percent in the past decade and the region’s relentless drought showing few signs of abating, borderline communities like Niland are having an especially tough time surviving. One of the town’s daycare centers, investigated by visitors from the Toad Haven Homeschool, has already bitten the dust.

What Does It Mean??

abandoned daycare center Waco Texas (image via: Trashsociety)

How does one make Double Rainbow Guy doubly tearful? Show him this intense late-2010 scene from an abandoned daycare center in Waco, Texas! Full credit to Trashsociety for the cropped image above, which succinctly captures the former facility in all its dayglo post-apocalyptic glory.

Smell Ya Later!

abandoned Seattle Avalon daycare center hazmat (images via: West Seattle Herald)

HazMat and daycare: two words that never should appear in the same sentence but did, in the June 24th, 2013 online issue of the West Seattle Herald. Reporter Patrick Robinson recounts that after receiving a 9-1-1 call, a HazMat team from the Seattle Fire Department raced to the five-years-abandoned Avalon Daycare Center and began prying boards off the former church’s windows. “It was the smell of chemicals or gas but we put up air monitoring and nothing’s coming out,” according to SFD Spokesperson Kyle Moore. We’re not sure if Moore’s referring to fumes or occupants but either way that’s a good thing.

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No Child Left 10 Eerie Abandoned Daycare Centers

[ By Steve in Abandoned Places & Architecture. ]

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Deserted Parisian Metro Stops as Underground Pools & More

16 Feb

[ By WebUrbanist in Architecture & Cities & Urbanism. ]

paris converted subway pool

The myriad abandoned subway stations of Paris are full of hidden potential – and one current candidate for mayor is working with architects to show the city just how much these semi-secret and long-neglected subterranean spaces can hold.

arc park

paris abandoned dance club

Nathalie Kosciusko-Morizet, together with designers Manal Rachdi and Nicolas Laisné, pictures fresh uses ranging from restaurants, theaters and night clubs to green parks and swimming pools.

paris converted metro restaurant

Given their positions around the city, it only makes sense to reactivate these ready-made voids: after all, metro stops are planned around hubs of activity and along lines of transportation.

paris underground performance space

Imagine for a moment the acoustics of a auditorium in such a setting, or the echoes of splashing water, all aside from the immersion in historical structures below the city.

paris vintage underground station

Many of these stations have been deserted and boarded up for decades – some for nearly a century, and others (attached to since-abandoned lines) were never opened to the public in the first place. Over time, some have been used to shoot commercials or scenes from films, and others have had wartime uses as shelters or for stockpiles.

paris historical metro photo

There are eight stops in total that have been deemed suitable for revival, including Champ de Mars, Arsenal, Porte Molitor, Haxo, Croix Rouge, Porte des Lilas, Saint Martin et Martin Nadaudso. More on the mayoral candidate’s proposal can be found here, via Messy Nessy.

[ By WebUrbanist in Architecture & Cities & Urbanism. ]

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Can’t Stop the Music: Submerged Turntable Plays Perfectly

15 Feb

[ By Steph in Art & Installation & Sound. ]

Submerged Records 1

What will become of all that humans have created when we’re no longer on the planet to preserve it? This project by artist Evan Holm is both a nod to the grief that the mere thought of losing so much art, architecture, music and other culturally significant creations can incite, and hope for a new beginning. ‘Submerged Turntables’ play music perfectly even when placed underwater, spinning in a black pool.

Submerged Records 2

Watching the record swirl in the water is an eerie sight, powerfully evoking visuals of the monster floods we’ve watched wipe out human settlements in epic disaster movies as well as in real life. The knob to control the record player is built into a branch that hangs over the pool. The video below shows the process of setting up the installation.

Submerged Records 3

“There will be a time when all tracings of human culture will dissolve back into the soil under the slow crush of the unfolding universe,” says Holm. “The pool, black and depthless, represents loss, represents mystery and represents the collective subconscious of the human race. By placing these records underneath the dark and obscure surface of the pool, I am enacting a small moment of remorse towards this loss.”

Submerged Records 4

“In the end however this is an optimistic sculpture, for just after that moment of submergence; tone, melody and ultimately song is pulled back out of the pool, past the veil of the subconscious, out from under the crush of time, and back into a living and breathing realm. When I pe

[ By Steph in Art & Installation & Sound. ]

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Civic Secrets: Urban Patterns Revealed in Street-Side Snow

14 Feb

[ By WebUrbanist in Architecture & Cities & Urbanism. ]

urban sneckdown intersection image

Ingenious and contagious, the idea is spreading: after it snows, document where cars do not go, then use that to understand where sidewalks and other public areas can be expanded without any spatial cost to vehicular commuters.

urban public space activism

Jon Geeting of This Old City shows how these so-called ‘sneckdowns’ can work after a snowstorm in Philadelphia. Starting with simple phone-camera photographs, he added colored-line highlights that illustrate actual traffic patterns. These captures implicitly suggest ways to eliminate car parking, introduce pedestrian plazas and potentially much more.

urban snow implied space

As for the strange name, he explains: a sneckdown “is a clever combination of “snow” and “neckdown” – another name for a curb expansion – that uses snow formations on the street to reveal the space cars don’t use. Advocates can then use these sneckdown photos to make the case to local transportation officials that traffic calming interventions like curb bumpouts and traffic islands can be installed without any loss to car drivers. “

urban post snow photos

Bypassing cumbersome urban planning studies, this approach is a free, easy and highly visual way for people to first understand and then communicate possibilities for future usage to local politicians and business owners. Simple cell phone photos provide the backdrop, allowing activist citizens to argue for everything from sidewalk and green space extensions to the creation of entire urban islands, outdoor seating for restaurants or other civic functions … all in places where, as the snow shows, no one generally drives anyway.

While the phrase and phenomena are gaining all kinds of fresh traction, the idea is not new to those in the know – Street Lessons from a Blizzard (above) by Streetfilms talked about the same process a few years back, and others have discussed it before as well. With the rise of Instagram and Twitter, however, more and more ordinary citizens are snapping shots locally, tagging them and spreading the word.

[ By WebUrbanist in Architecture & Cities & Urbanism. ]

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Subtractive Street Art: Sculptural Murals Cut into City Walls

14 Feb

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

cut face wall mural

Vhils is adept at carving, cutting and peeling to reveal art inside solid surfaces, but his artistic experiments also include carefully-calculated explosions to create pictures and phrases when the dust settles and debris clears.

mural multi level city

mural subtracted painted art

mural alley family portrait

While this Portuguese artist (real name: Alexandre Farto) has exhibited in galleries, his 3D building-side murals are somehow especially sublime, tied as they are to gritty urban contexts and turning crumbling paint, plaster and brick into physically and emotionally layered portraits.

mural experimental stencil explosion

mural explosive wall art

His work with explosives is also powerful, playing with both relentless reality of controlled demolition and the festivity of fireworks, with elements of unpredictable chaos thrown into the mix.

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Subtractive Street Art Sculptural Murals Cut Into City Walls

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

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Stacked on Silos: Shipping Containers Reclaimed as Dorms

13 Feb

[ By Steph in Architecture & Houses & Residential. ]

Shipping Container Silo Student Housing 1

Disused grain silos long considered an eyesore in Johannesburg, South Africa are now topped with four layers of reclaimed shipping containers and almost ready to house hundreds of eager students. Mill Junction is an innovative housing project by Citiq Property Developers offering secure, comfortable, reasonably priced housing that could help raise the number of students who actually earn a degree.

Shipping Container Silo Student Housing 2

The 11-story grain silos make up the bulk of the complex, with many apartments contained within. Windows have been cut into the silos and a paint job will help unify them with the colorful containers stacked on top. Mill Junction will contain 375 individual apartments as well as libraries, lounges, computer rooms and study facilities.

Shipping Container Silo Student Housing 3

The height of the complex will give students some of the best views in the city, especially those lucky enough to get the shipping container units with balcony space. About half of South African undergraduate students drop out of school, partially due to the high cost of living. This project offers energy-efficient, low-cost accommodation with details like motion-sensor lighting and common green space on the roof.

Shipping Container Silo Student Housing 4

Construction was completed in January 2014 and students are expected to start moving in within weeks.

360Photography

Archive for the ‘Creativity’ Category

No Exit: Dementia Village Dwellers Live in Alternate Reality

Abandoned Nazi Bunker Converted to Power Plant & Cafe

Modern Tree Houses: 14 Awesome Arboreal Dwelling Designs

Treehouse Conference Center

Beach Rock Treehouse in Japan

Tree Snake Houses

Prefab Eco Perch

Modern Treehouse for Kids

Next Page – Click Below to Read More:
Modern Tree Houses 14 Awesome Arboreal Dwellings

Figure & Ground: Surreal Animated Walking City Shifts Shape

No Child Left: 10 Eerie Abandoned Daycare Centers

Fissioning School

Deserted In The Desert

What Does It Mean??

Smell Ya Later!

Next Page – Click Below to Read More:
No Child Left 10 Eerie Abandoned Daycare Centers

Deserted Parisian Metro Stops as Underground Pools & More

Can’t Stop the Music: Submerged Turntable Plays Perfectly

Civic Secrets: Urban Patterns Revealed in Street-Side Snow

Subtractive Street Art: Sculptural Murals Cut into City Walls

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Subtractive Street Art Sculptural Murals Cut Into City Walls

Stacked on Silos: Shipping Containers Reclaimed as Dorms

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Archive for the ‘Creativity’ Category

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Fissioning School

Deserted In The Desert

What Does It Mean??

Smell Ya Later!

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