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Archive for the ‘Creativity’ Category

Hidden Beauty: Savvy Secret Room & Passageway Engineers

16 Jan

[ By Steph in Design & Fixtures & Interiors. ]

Hidden Rooms 1

Whether they hold a cache of high-tech, Batman-style weaponry or just a quiet retreat from the kids, secret rooms can make anyone feel as if they lead a life of mystery and intrigue. A company called Creative Home Engineering designs incredible secret passage systems that are virtually undetectable, hiding private spaces behind bookcases, wine racks and ordinary-looking walls.

HIdden Rooms 2

Hidden Rooms 5

While many secret rooms involve replacing a regular door with a bookcase on hinges, Creative Home Engineering’s carefully designed systems contain hidden cavities with steel structural support, so they won’t begin to sag or scrape over time due to weight and humidity.

Hidden Rooms 4

They’re also designed to blend flawlessly with the surrounding room. The key to security for any secret room, of course, is proper concealment. You could also get an optional vault door with a super heavy-duty locking system that can be integrated into your home security system. Other options include armored doors and biometric access control devices, like fingerprint scanners.

Hidden Rooms 6

While armor-plated panic rooms with hidden surveillance aren’t exactly accessible to most of us, financially speaking, it’s fun to dream about creating an network of secret passageways in our own homes.

[ By Steph in Design & Fixtures & Interiors. ]

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Retro Redial: 8 Creative Phone Booth Conversion Projects

15 Jan

[ By WebUrbanist in Technology & Vintage & Retro. ]

phone booth banksy art

As you may recall (and please, forgive the pun), pay phones used to be ubiquitous – in many places they remain a physical presence, but without a use. As Banksy‘s work (above) points out, their primary purpose is arguably quite dead – but, on the upside, that leaves room for all kinds of radical rebirths.

phone booth data hub

Around the world, old phone booths are also becoming high-tech data hubs. Consider New York City, which has just unrolled a pilot program to turn 250 old phone booths into information centers, providing basic maps, directions and directories to tourists, but also up-to-the-minute emergency information and safety alerts in case of serious storms or other natural disasters.

phone booth library nyc

Local architect John Locke has come up with another, lower-tech, even-easier reuse project for some of the 10,000+ remaining unused public phones on the streets of Manhattan – easily-fabricated micro-libraries that can be slotted into existing boxes, taking advantage of their robust framework and shelter. No fasteners needed for this efficient and inexepensive flat-pack solution.

phone booth media swap

Across the pond, iconic red-box phone booths of England may be even more well-suited to this particular kind of conversion, being closeable and thus, while not 100% weatherproof, still more completely sealed from the elements. The result is one of “the country’s smallest lending libraries – stocking 100 books. Villagers from Westbury-sub-Mendip in Somerset can use the library around the clock, selecting books, DVDs and CDs. Users simply stock it with a book they have read, swapping it for one they have not.”

phone booth charging station

Turning back toward the high-tech, Telekom Austria is tackling over ten thousand disused phone booths, turning them into recharging stations for the nation’s estimated growth toward over a half-million electric vehicles in the next decade. But enough about functional conversions – what about the artistic side? See below for homeless shelters, aquariums, even outhouses made of old phone booths.

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Retro Redial 8 Creative Phone Booth Conversion Projects

[ By WebUrbanist in Technology & Vintage & Retro. ]

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Utopian ‘Private City’ Envisioned as Crime-Free Oasis

15 Jan

[ By Steph in Global & Travel & Places. ]

Guatemala Private Walled Utopia City 1

Could a utopian dream of a crime-free private city actually bring fears of fictional dystopia to life? Developers are currently building a white-walled 34-acre complex of apartments, shops, nightclubs, boutiques and restaurants that would offer a safe haven from the notoriously high crime rates of Guatemala City. Paseo Cayala will offer luxury living in a nation where most citizens make less than $ 300 per month.

Guatemala Private Walled Utopia City 2

This walled compound will theoretically enable its residents, living in apartments that cost between $ 260,000 to $ 800,000 each, to avoid the realities of life in urban Guatemala altogether. Paseo Cayala will be virtually independent – a livable, walkable dream community that the developers hope will eventually expand into ‘Cayala City’, in a 870-acre area just a bit larger than New York City’s Central Park.

Guatemala Private Walled Utopia City 3

But just past those symbolically charged walls are the huts and shanties of the city’s poorest citizens. About half of Guatemala’s 14 million residents live in poverty. In a nation with one of the world’s highest homicide rates, it’s not hard to understand why some wealthier residents crave a place in which safety is not a concern. Unfortunately, though, arrangements like this can deepen class divides and cause even more strife in the long term.

What isn’t shared in publicly available information about the city is just how they plan to control who is allowed inside and who isn’t; low-wage workers will have to be brought in from outside to keep the private city’s essential functions running. Will there be armed guards? How will crime be defined in a community that prides itself on being crime-free? Do you think such a utopia can ever really be reality for long?

[See photographs of the city by AP photographer Moises Castillo at The Huffington Post.]

[ By Steph in Global & Travel & Places. ]

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7 Abandoned Wonders of Institutional Architecture

14 Jan

[ By Steph in Abandoned Places & Architecture. ]

Abandoned Institutional Buildings Main

Churches, prisons, psychiatric hospitals and courthouses given over to the elements can sometimes taken on a mythic significance, given a haunting, creepy beauty by the passage of time. Removed from their former functions, these institutional buildings become both architectural skeletons and snapshots of human activity, frozen in time. In their emptiness, the echoes of past patients, prisoners and parishioners seem louder than ever.

Carabanchel Prison, Spain

Abandoned Carcel Prison Spain

Abandoned Carcel Prison Spain 2

(images via: alex//berlin_alexander stübner)

One of the biggest prisons in Europe until its closure in 1998, Madrid’s Carabanchel Prison was built by political prisoners after the Spanish Civil War between 1940 and 1944. During the ten years of its abandonment, the prison was inhabited by homeless people and other marginal groups, and covered in elaborate graffiti. Despite its historical significance and the protests of many locals, the prison was demolished in 2008.

It represented one of the most impressive examples of the repressive panopticon design, which allows a watchman to observe all inmates without them knowing when they’re being watched. The panopticon arrangement was initially envisioned not just for prisons, but also for hospitals, sanitariums and daycares.

St. Agnes Church, Detroit

Abandoned St. Agnes Church Detroit 1

Abandoned St. Agnes Church Detroit 2

(images via: memories_by_mike 1 2, erik_mauer)

Abandoned in 2006 due to financial troubles, Detroit’s St. Agnes church remained in fairly good condition for three years, though it had been stripped to its bare bones. Even once all of the organ pipes, chandeliers and stained glass windows were gone, the church displayed much of its old grandeur.

But the structure underwent a striking transformation in 2009, when leaks in the roof led to extensive water damage and mold, causing the masonry to crumble. Textural details are revealed in stark contrast by a black grime of dirt and mold. Today, the church looks like much of the rest of Detroit; it has been looted and vandalized to the point of being unrecognizable.

Gartloch Mental Hospital, Scotland

Abandoned Gartloch Hospital Scotland 2

Abandoned Gartloch Hospital Scotland 1

Abandoned Gartloch Hospital Scotland 3

(images via: strike4th, bigcagwell, justified sinner, skin-ubx 1 + 2)

In service for over a century, Gartloch Hospital is a sprawling Victorian complex located just outside the city of Glasgow, Scotland. From the time of its opening in 1889, it served as an asylum for the poor people of the city. Though its primary purpose was as a psychiatric hospital, it temporarily served as an emergency medical facility during World War II. It was the subject of many a Scottish ghost story long before it closed in 1996, and today its dark, empty hallways feel more haunted than ever.

Hellingly Asylum, Sussex

Abandoned Hellingly Asylum 1

Abandoned Hellingly Asylum 2

Abandoned Hellingly Asylum 3

(images via: howzey)

Has any creepy old mental hospital ever been more fittingly named? Hellingly Asylum in Sussex, England opened in 1903 to relieve overcrowding at other institutions during a time in which people could be thrown into hospitals for the rest of their lives for being gay or having a child out of wedlock. Located on 400 acres, the complex included sex-separated wards, a villa for ‘mentally defective’ children, and a small isolation hospital for infectious diseases, which stood in the woods at some distance from the rest of the buildings. The hospital even had its own electric tramway.

Hellingly closed in 1994 and most of its buildings fell into rapid decline. Fires, vandalism and theft took their toll. Medical equipment and furniture could still be seen among the ruins during the years in which the only people who ever entered were urban explorers, graffiti artists, photographers and people with questionable intentions.

Today, only a few buildings remain. Most have been demolished to make way for new housing.

Next – Pripyat Schools, Bronx Borough Courthouse and Gary, Indiana’s City Methodist Church

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7 Abandoned Wonders Of Institutional Architecture

[ By Steph in Abandoned Places & Architecture. ]

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The ABC of Architects: 26 Famous Buildings in 100 Seconds

14 Jan

[ By WebUrbanist in Architecture & Public & Institutional. ]

abc of architects

An adult-fascinating and kid-friendly overview of 26 works by architectural greats from the last 100 years. Watch as this fantastic collection of animated iconic buildings comes to life in less than two minutes.

G raphic designer Federico Gonzalez worked with architect Andrea Stinga to create this instructive-yet-comical tour de force, animated in the style and set to the same sort of tune you might expect from a vintage cartoon.

abc mid century modernists

Aalto, Barragan and Calatrava lead ultimately to Xenakis, Yamazaki and Zaha – their aim was to cover a worthy structure from each of the 26 architects, and diversify their selections in terms of style and nationality.

abc architect examples

The creators’ only lament: that they could not include more works – but as any architect will tell you: sometimes having limitations and guidelines (like a 26-building limit, in this case) helps you focus on what is most important, and create the best design possible.

[ By WebUrbanist in Architecture & Public & Institutional. ]

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Crossed Up: 9 Twisted Swastika-Shaped Buildings

13 Jan

[ By Steve in Architecture & Public & Institutional. ]

Swastikas are ancient symbols of positivity tarnished by a negative recent past, which explains why modern architects have generally avoided employing the hooked cross design in their blueprints. With that said, a little digging turns up more than a few swastika-shaped buildings – some where one might expect to find them, others most definitely not.

Barracks at Naval Air Station North Island, Coronado CA

swastika-shaped building coronado Nay (images via: Si1very and Google Sightseeing)

The United States Navy’s Naval Air Station North Island in Coronado, California was established in 1917 and during the Second World War it was the main naval base supporting the war effort in the Pacific. Post-war construction at the base salutes the American armed force’s victories with streets named “Tulagi” and “Guadalcanal” to name just a couple. Though nobody’s admitting it, commemorative construction may have moved beyond roadways and into the base’s buildings.

swastika-shaped building Coronado Navy (images via: San Diego City Beat, IsraelMilitary.net and The Power Hour)

The buildings in question are a six-building complex currently occupied (according to a USN Public Affairs Officer) by the U.S. Navy’s Amphibious Construction Battalion 1 (the Seabees). Originally designed by John Mock of Hendrick & Mock Architects in the late 1960′s, the Navy’s original specs called for “a boiler plant and a recreation room; and a single ‘L’-shaped 3-story barracks.” The plan was then amended to have the dormitory building “be repeated three times and placed at 90-degree angles to the central buildings.” It was only after ground was broken on the project that the Navy realized what shape the complex would display when seen by the air but as very few people overflew Naval Air Station North Island in the early 1970s, figured it wasn’t a big deal.

swastika-shaped building coronado (images via: About Facts)

Which it wasn’t, for decades, until the Internet and Google Earth allowed anyone and everyone to enjoy birds-eye views of anywhere and everywhere… and some folks did NOT enjoy what they viewed at the Navy’s Coronado barracks. The cost of adding additional landscaping and associated construction to camouflage the barracks’ shape has been pegged at $ 600,000 though a, er, final solution to the matter has yet to be implemented. Curiously, a pair of buildings just beside the barracks appear to be modeled after World War II-era bombers flying directly at the “swastika” (the other side of which sits an empty baseball field) though neither the Navy nor the architects will confirm this.

Glendale AZ Medical Buildings

swastika buildings Glendale medical (images via: Cloverangel7, Thunderbird Internal Medicine and City-Data)

Located just north of Thunderbird Hospital on W Thunderbird Rd west of 56th Ave. in Glendale, Arizona you’ll find the Thunderbird Internal Medicine building and its doppelganger to the south, the Oakeson Physical Therapy building. Known together as “The Fountains”, the buildings house a number of small to mid-sized doctor’s offices, labs and diagnostic facilities. The low-lying, nested cluster of buildings feature coppery-red terracotta tiled roofs and exhibit a blueprint more like a child’s pinwheel than a classic swastika. The coordinates of the buildings on Google Earth are 33.36.48.96 N by 112.10.43.02 W.

swastika buildings Phoenix (image via: Phora)

Curiously, another group of 4 buildings (probably by the same architect) is situated relatively nearby at 33.28.50.87 N by 111.56.45.60 W. The two buildings at either end of the row display a full swastika/pinwheel plan while the inner pair display 3/4 crosses only. What’s up with metro Phoenix and swastika-shaped buildings? Like many such designs, structuring these buildings in a swirled cross design optimizes the exterior wall area to allow for a maximum number of outward-facing windows. While visually pleasing for those working there, the plan also eases the need for air conditioning, an important factor when planning architecture in the desert southwest.

Kenyatta National Hospital

swastika buildings Nairobi Kenya (images via: TechMtaa and YouTube)

Located on the grounds of Kenyatta National Hospital in Nairobi, Kenya, is an “estate” of four low buildings that from the air display swastika floorplans. Two of the buildings are oriented in the traditional counterclockwise direction as employed for several thousand years by cultures as disparate as India’s ancient Sanskrit-speaking Indus Valley Civilization and the Native American tribes of the American desert southwest.

swastika buildings Nairobi Kenya (image via: Kikulacho)

Another two buildings on the hospital grounds are laid out in the clockwise (right-facing) direction similar to the swastika design adopted by Germany’s Nazi Party in 1920. As far as the Kenya buildings are concerned, it’s estimated they house nurses who work at the Kenyatta National Hospital and/or its associated buildings such as the Kemri University of Oxford Wellcome Trust Collaborative Programme offices just across the street.

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Crossed Up 9 Twisted Swastika Shaped Buildings

[ By Steve in Architecture & Public & Institutional. ]

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Annemarie Busschers: 11 Clearer Than Life Portraits

11 Jan

[ By Marc in Art & Drawing & Digital. ]

Annemarie-Busschers-Montage

Annemarie Busschers is a contemporary artist from the Netherlands who creates portraits that beautifully captures the raw emotion of her subjects, often photorealistically.

Annemarie-Busschers-3

Annemarie Busschers works, most of which can be found on her site here, follow similar themes of “saying goodbye to the self” (in the artist’s own words). Even when she’s setting out to to capture her subject’s emotion, the realism of her depiction gives it a photo realistic aspect. These examples show several self portraits (top right photo, and bottom).

Annemarie-Busschers-2

This painting, via PulpFactor, is one of Annemarie Busscher’s earlier works, and an excellent example of the emotional realism that continues through her most recent portraits. The second image comes via Booooooom and gives a good perspective on the size of her canvases.

Annemarie-Busschers-4

These Annemarie Busschers paintings are excellent examples of the amount of texture she attains with her artistry. The size of the canvas gives her room to create a landscape out of skin and facial features, creating an image that’s an incredibly clear treatment of her subject.

Annemarie-Busschers-5

Found on entremundos and galeriebrandt, these pieces reveal the contrast between Annemarie’s treatments of different subjects. Each subject requires a different approach to capture their personality.

Annemarie-Busschers

Annemarie Busschers has incredible talent that’s constantly evolving, but always sticks to one essence: that the subject will have their essence captured in whatever way serves them best.

[ By Marc in Art & Drawing & Digital. ]

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Surround Screen: ‘Illumiroom’ Immersive Gaming Projection

11 Jan

[ By WebUrbanist in Conceptual & Futuristic & Technology. ]

illumiroom surround system projection

What ever happened to in-home 3D technology and virtual reality? Perhaps futurists got a bit ahead of themselves, and maybe the way our eyes and minds focus means that many entertainment experiences must be focused on a screen … but that does not mean they are limited to it.

illumiroom first person shooter

From Microsoft: “IllumiRoom uses a Kinect for Windows camera and a projector to blur the lines between on-screen content and the environment we live in allowing us to combine our virtual and physical worlds. For example, our system can change the appearance of the room, induce apparent motion, extend the field of view, and enable entirely new game experiences.”

illumiroom immersive 3d gaming

Beyond a cool gimmick or special effect, on the one hand, or a practical extension of screen space on the other, this is about enhancing your experience – tapping into the background, like surround sound does.

illumiroom concept futuristic gaming

In some cases, context can be added – snowflakes sifting downward as you race on a MarioKart winter level. In other cases, useful peripheral elements can show you the broader built environment beyond your main area of focus – skies and streets above, below or off to the site in wireframe format.

[ By WebUrbanist in Conceptual & Futuristic & Technology. ]

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Shophouses: 6 Ultra-Small Urban Live-and-Work Spaces

10 Jan

[ By Steph in Architecture & Offices & Commercial. ]

Shop Houses Tiny Live Work 1

What would you think if you walked into an antique store in your town, and found it overflowing with the owners’ laundry? In much of the Western world, we tend to keep our lives rigidly compartmentalized, but in Southeast Asia, the boundaries are blurred – resulting in seemingly chaotic and visually stimulating live/work spaces. German photographer and artist Peter Nitsch documented these small combined homes and businesses for his series ‘SHOPHOUSES – 4 x 8 m Bangkok’.

Shop Houses Tiny Live Work 2

Shop Hosues Tiny Live Work 4

Mechanic shops are filled to the brim with both the expected stacks of tires, and colorful art. In a hair salon, a woman sits beside a refrigerator, peeling potatoes. A watchmaker’s shop is packed floor-to-ceiling with boxes and trunks. Doors open to private spaces beyond, giving customers a glimpse at the private lives of the owners.

Shop Houses Tiny Live Work 3

Shop Houses Tiny Live Work 5

Bangkok is full of these combination home/businesses, which are usually two stories with the lower level open to the street, but the typical tourist will never notice. These shophouses can be founded on the outer edges of the city, away from the snarled traffic and blinking neon lights.

Shop Houses Tiny Live Work 6

“But if one allows the pictures to make an impression, a fractal pattern with a high degree of similarity is to be gradually recognised in the overfilled rooms, which from the sheer number of objects suddenly makes a structured Mandelbrot set,” says Nitsch. “The chaos becomes a cosmos and thus transforms into its opposite: an orderliness, to which the photographs additionally lend their characteristic power of peace.”

[ By Steph in Architecture & Offices & Commercial. ]

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Power of Books: 6 Graphic Illustrations of Literal Imaginings

10 Jan

[ By WebUrbanist in Art & Photography & Video. ]

book graphic art project

Ever get done reading a chapter and feel like the book is more real than the room around you? Now, what if that were literally true of your favorite volume? What might that look like?

books power of art

Mladen Penev does photography, retouching, but also takes some liberties that go beyond mere editing, like this series entitled the Power of Books, which gives graphic reality to the imaginations of authors and readers.

book powers graphic series

This award-winning Bulgarian artist has graduated from the University of Applied Arts in Vienna, working in various internships, putting up exhibitions and participating in publications ever since – would would have guessed his love of books?

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Archive for the ‘Creativity’ Category

Hidden Beauty: Savvy Secret Room & Passageway Engineers

Retro Redial: 8 Creative Phone Booth Conversion Projects

Next Page:
Retro Redial 8 Creative Phone Booth Conversion Projects

Utopian ‘Private City’ Envisioned as Crime-Free Oasis

7 Abandoned Wonders of Institutional Architecture

Carabanchel Prison, Spain

(images via: alex//berlin_alexander stübner)

St. Agnes Church, Detroit

(images via: memories_by_mike 1 2, erik_mauer)

Gartloch Mental Hospital, Scotland

(images via: strike4th, bigcagwell, justified sinner, skin-ubx 1 + 2)

Hellingly Asylum, Sussex

(images via: howzey)

Next Page:
7 Abandoned Wonders Of Institutional Architecture

The ABC of Architects: 26 Famous Buildings in 100 Seconds

Crossed Up: 9 Twisted Swastika-Shaped Buildings

Barracks at Naval Air Station North Island, Coronado CA

Glendale AZ Medical Buildings

Kenyatta National Hospital

Next Page:
Crossed Up 9 Twisted Swastika Shaped Buildings

Annemarie Busschers: 11 Clearer Than Life Portraits

Surround Screen: ‘Illumiroom’ Immersive Gaming Projection

Shophouses: 6 Ultra-Small Urban Live-and-Work Spaces

Power of Books: 6 Graphic Illustrations of Literal Imaginings

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Archive for the ‘Creativity’ Category

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Carabanchel Prison, Spain

(images via: alex//berlin_alexander stübner)

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(images via: memories_by_mike 1 2, erik_mauer)

Gartloch Mental Hospital, Scotland

(images via: strike4th, bigcagwell, justified sinner, skin-ubx 1 + 2)

Hellingly Asylum, Sussex

(images via: howzey)

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