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Excavated Sanctuaries: Building Beneath a Protected Valley in Jordan

10 Nov

[ By WebUrbanist in Architecture & Houses & Residential. ]

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Preserving the natural beauty of a UNESCO-protected valley in the Jordanian desert, this underground architectural complex is designed burrow and branch out beneath the surface.

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This conceptual proposal by Rasem Kamal of Oppenheim Architecture features nearly 2,000,000-square-foot network of spaces containing a train station, museum and hotel. The idea aims to bring services to the area with minimal disruption to the natural beauty of the sand and sandstone of the Wadi Rum. In turn, these additions would set the stage for a residential development.

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The so-called Excavated Sanctuaries bring in natural light from above via limited openings while using the thermal mass of the desert to regulate interior temperatures below ground. Inspired by the nests and warrens of ants and other subsurface creatures, the layouts are at once complex but organized, buildings semi-autonomous but interconnected. The renderings have a Dali-esque quality, highlighting the surreal as well as the serene beauty of simple architecture in a desert setting.

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Aside from its contextual response, there is a deeper thesis here as well: good architecture does not have to stand out – at times, it is called upon to blend in or be invisible.

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“Lately, a great many prominent architectural practices have been focusing on developing dynamic forms, new building materials, sophisticated details and tectonics as well, while only the minority of these contribute to their internal spaces,” explains Kamal.

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“Consequently, this thesis aimed to flip the relationship between the explicit and implicit, by diminishing the power of external form along with exploiting all the previous efforts that were used for it to subtract spaces where we will live, experience and enjoy.”

[ By WebUrbanist in Architecture & Houses & Residential. ]

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Art of Camouflage: Flying Bird Silhouettes Blend into Broken Window Voids

09 Nov

[ By WebUrbanist in Art & Installation & Sound. ]

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A boy aiming his slingshot into the sky seems to aim both at the broken windows of an abandoned building but also a series of birds that seem to appear in the gaps of cracked glass, transfixed in various stages of flight.

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Artist Pejac is well known for his negative-space interventions, from pealing back paint chips to carefully reveal brick beneath to other contextual installations. Much of the art is in the craft: a meticulous removal (or breaking) of materials to slowly reveal some new whole, much like a sculptor chips away at a marble edifice.

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This latest piece was produced during his residency with the Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art in Rijeka, Croatia, where he spent multiple weeks crafting site-specific works.

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Camouflage (Tribute to René Magritte) is set in the huge windows of an old paper factory power plant, depicting a flock of birds that might be hard to spot were it not for the outline of a boy taking aim below them. His figure calls attention to the larger work, signalling a passer by the existence of something both large and subtle going on in the frame.

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The implied story is one about hunting and survival, the birds disguising themselves against a backdrop of broken window panes, making them harder for the child to spot. The boy, too complex a figure to render through even the most craftily broken glass, is painted over a series of panes (images by Sasha Bogojev).

[ By WebUrbanist in Art & Installation & Sound. ]

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Rugged Luxury: Take Your Queen Bed On the Road In This Modern Camper

08 Nov

[ By SA Rogers in Technology & Vehicles & Mods. ]

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If your camping style is somewhere in between sleeping under the stars and ‘glamping’ with all the comforts of home, Track Trailer’s MK4 ‘Tvan’ camper has your number. Designed to be towed behind standard trucks and SUVs, it’s basically a hotel room on wheels, packing a queen-sized bed, two kitchen configurations, air conditioning and a quick-erect tent to multiply the available space.

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The latest in a series of Tvan designs, this camper trailer enables the most rugged of adventurers to go deep into the wilderness, and it’s gotten a thumbs-up from explorers of Australia’s most punishing desert landscapes. The Tvan is manufactured in Melbourne and has been around since the early ’80s, and features MC2 suspension, a riveted steel and aluminum cabin body, hot-dipped galvanized chassis, and a rear folding platform for the tent, which stows away in its own compartment.

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The slide-out kitchen offers a surprising number of features, including four burners, a sink, counter space and three storage drawers, and it all packs up tight for travel, remaining secure even when you’re driving over rocky terrain. There’s an integrated windshield that deploys simply by raising it into position so windy conditions don’t blow out the flames on the range.

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The cabin itself is substantial enough to block out noise, sun, heat, cold and wind, and when the tent is in use, it secures to the hard fold-out floor, keeping it up off the ground. The rear hatch is assisted by gas struts to make it easy to open and close, and the whole thing is aerodynamic, making it easy to tow.

[ By SA Rogers in Technology & Vehicles & Mods. ]

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Modern Home Makeovers: 15 Dramatic Before & After Transformations

08 Nov

[ By SA Rogers in Architecture & Houses & Residential. ]

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Not every radical home makeover turns an ugly duckling into a beautiful swan, but they sure can render the original structures completely unrecognizable, for better or worse. Sometimes no more than the bones of the home stay in place as an entirely new sort of residence rises in its place, while other renovations maintain a starkly visible division between the old and the new. These transformations certainly prove the value of looking past a building’s flaws to its potential, as no matter what a house may look like when it’s purchased, it can ultimately be anything the homeowners want it to be.

Kensington Residence, Sydney, Australia

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There was nothing particularly special about this two-story 1920s bungalow residence in Sydney, Australia, before CplusC Architects got ahold of it and transformed it into a sustainable home. An existing extension to the first floor is vastly improved by a timber screen that improves natural ventilation and gives it loads more curb appeal.

Brooklyn Row House by Office of Architecture

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A 110-year-old Brooklyn row house looked very 1980s with its vinyl siding, boring sash windows and afterthought of an awning, not to mention missed opportunities for vertical expansion and a visual connection to the private outdoor space. Office of Architecture renovated the space inside and out, integrating a second-floor extension, lots of glass and a wooden facade.

Commercial Building to Modern Residence in Thailand

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A gutted five-story commercial building becomes a spacious, luxurious home for an extended family of siblings, their spouses and children in this stunning Bangkok renovation project by IDIN Architects. The first level accommodates the family’s jewelry store, while the rest serves as their private home, full of atriums planted with live trees.

Texas Ranch House Transformation by MF Architecture

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Who would ever think that a ranch house had so much potential? This residence east of Austin, Texas had already been expanded several times and was full of dark, disconnected interior spaces. MF Architecture conserved most of the exterior envelope while knocking out lots of the interior walls, but gave the facade a fresh look with white brick, timber cladding and a high row of narrow windows that bring light inside.

Modest Home in Salmon Arm, Canada

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The couple who bought this property in Canada called it a “run-down, boring sausage-box cookie-cutter house built in ’73 on a large lot with ramshackle garbage-filled sheds.” But they knew it could be more, and took on the project of renovating it themselves, adding a third-floor volume that extends to the ground in the front and back, transforming the facades and tacking on two carports.

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Modern Home Makeovers 15 Dramatic Before After Transformations

[ By SA Rogers in Architecture & Houses & Residential. ]

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Retail Micro-Farming: MIT & Target to Launch In-Store Vertical Farms

07 Nov

[ By WebUrbanist in Architecture & Offices & Commercial. ]

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At the convergence of the localvore and vertical farming movements, Target’s new in-store micro-farms are positioned to offer the freshest possible produce to consumers. On offer: leafy greens and herbs initially but eventually also potatoes, beets, zucchini, tomatoes peppers and more.

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In collaboration with the MIT Media Lab and IDEO, the company’s Food + Future CoLab will be testing their indoor production technology in stores around the country starting next spring. Target aims to leverage its scale to optimize their approach over time while also using their strategy to attract conscientious consumers.

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Among other advantages, local and in-store aquaponic setups require less water and no pesticides as compared to outdoor alternatives. Also, since stores are already temperature-controlled for food storage and customer consideration, heating and cooling are effectively taken care of without additional energy expenditures.

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Neither vertical farming nor close-to-source produce are new. Huge vertical farms have enjoyed success from Japan to New Jersey and rooftop farms often provide food for local communities or restaurants and hotels below. Still, like a similar project in Germany, this takes the idea to the next level, offering fresh organic crops alongside conventional ones right in a retail grocery shopping outlet. As populations continue to urbanize, demand for city-grown food (without the transportation costs and with appeal to local-oriented eaters) will only continue to grow.

[ By WebUrbanist in Architecture & Offices & Commercial. ]

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Spilt Milk: 12 Udderly Abandoned Dairies & Dairy Farms

07 Nov

[ By Steve in Abandoned Places & Architecture. ]

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Now you calcium, now you don’t… OK, that was awful but so’s the sight of these abandoned dairy farms moldering away ’til the cows come home.

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The so-called “Scary Dairy” in Camarillo, California was a dairy farm operated under the auspices of the former Camarillo State Mental Hospital. The dairy opened in 1932 and was part of an enlightened (for the time) program that explored alternative treatments for the mentally ill. We’ll refrain from making any “mad cow disease” references.

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The dairy was closed in the mid-1960s and the hospital itself shut down in 1997. Five years later, the hospital was renovated and occupied by the new California State University, Channel Islands and in 2009 the university bought the 367-acre parcel of land that included the abandoned dairy farm.

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Now known as the CSU Channel Islands University Park, the land is open for public use though the Scary Dairy is fenced off – not that this has stopped graffiti artists from making their marks. Flickr user Thomas Hawk visited the Scary Dairy in June of 2011, taking these and many more spectacular and spooky photos.

Boom To Bust

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Here’s the Sinton Office of the Red Canon Dairy in Cañon City, Colorado. Flickr user jimsawthat‘s photo captures the well-worn aura of a business with deep roots going back many decades. The photographer captured the above image on December 26th of 2014.

No Milk Today

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Flickr user David Benjamin visited an abandoned dairy farm in early May of 2013, and although he doesn’t give any hints as to where this gently decaying farm is located, that’s just as well: not everything needs embellishment with graffiti.

Southburied

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The Southbury Training School in Southbury, Connecticut opened in 1940 and stopped accepting new mentally-challenged “students” in 1986. The facility has operated in a sort of weird limbo since then: in 2001 there were 639 residents (down from 1,111 in 1986). At that time the average age was 55 and the average resident had been at STS for 43 years.

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The school’s on-site dairy farm was closed in the late 1990s with the last 101 cows sold off to a local farmer in 2003. Urbex explorer infraredrobert visited STS in March of 2015, where he snapped the photos above and more.

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Spilt Milk 12 Udderly Abandoned Dairies Dairy Farms

[ By Steve in Abandoned Places & Architecture. ]

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Datascrapers: Infographic Skylines Overlay Income Inequality on City Grids

06 Nov

[ By WebUrbanist in Art & Drawing & Digital. ]

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Somewhere between data visualization and civic artwork, these info-driven diagrams reveal wealth disparities in the centers of America’s second and third largest cities. Herwig Scherabon‘s project, titled simply Income Inequality, uses a matrix of blocks (minimicking magnetized iron) to highlight rich and poor neighborhoods.

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The city grids form a recognizable backdrop for these axonometric representations, allowing viewers to read the baseline built enviroment against the overlaid information. In turn, the millions of stacked pixel blocks end up forming an alternative landscape of skyscraper-like structures in the urban environment.

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The net result is a map of the city’s invisible patterns and correlations shaped by power, money and time, revealing inequalities and mechanisms of segregation. Above: Chicago’s infamous low-income South Side (with Lake Michigan for reference). Below: poor areas of Los Angeles located directly next to the downtown core.

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The final presentation was mounted on a pair of wooden boards with the city names shown on the cites, exhibited at the Glasgow School of Art graduate show. Captions on the side give more details on the diagrams.

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From the artist/designer: “The two large prints (150x75cm) are visualizations of income inequality in Los Angeles and Chicago and are currently shortlisted for the Information is Beautiful Awards. They are printed on matte Somerset Velvet paper and mounted on thick wooden boards. The images are abstract diagrams of these cities that show a high resolution matrix of blocks. The height of these blocks corresponds to the income in the respective output area.”

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“It is part of the design idea to inspire the viewer to look for their own neighborhood or other areas that interest them. I want to trigger a train of thought for what the reasons behind inequality might be. I am always fascinated by the patterns and correlations in the urban fabric. The politics behind urban planning tell us a lot about the people who live in these places and the powers who shape them. I think that it is utterly important to try to unveil the inequalities and the segregating mechanism that we got used to live with.”

[ By WebUrbanist in Art & Drawing & Digital. ]

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Virtual Reality Nature: Helmet Lets Humans See the Forest Like Animals Do

05 Nov

[ By SA Rogers in Conceptual & Futuristic & Technology. ]

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Dragonflies experience their brief lives on this planet 10 times faster than humans, and in 12 color wavelengths as compared to our three, a viewpoint that’s been impossible to comprehend prior to the arrival of virtual reality tech. Thanks to a project called ‘In the Eyes of the Animal’ by the creative studio Marshmallow Laser Feast, we can see the world the way super-sighted creatures do in a feat that’s being called ‘sense hacking.’

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Aerial drone footage, CT scans and LiDAR remote sensing technology taken from the Grizedale forest in the UK gives the team 800 million data points upon which to render a hyper-rich environment in tandem with a real-time visual and audio engine. Visitors to the real, actual forest put on virtual reality headsets obscured with moss to take it all in.

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“Visual engine generates and renders whole environment in realtime with certain generative elements which makes each experience unique,” explains Creative Applications Network, . “Visual engine communicates with 3D Audio Engine via OSC [OpenSound Control] to provide positional data as well as head tracking data from the Inertial sensors of the VR headset. The sound uses Binaural audio, a technique mimicking the natural functioning of the ear by creating an illusion of 3D space and movement around the head of a listener as immersive as reality can be.”

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The result is an immersive experience at the intersection of science and digital art, and the images of the helmets in use in Grizedale Forest are pretty incredible, like something from a film. If you didn’t get a chance to see it yourself during the installation’s tour of festivals, you can watch the video to see an approximation of what it looks like.

[ By SA Rogers in Conceptual & Futuristic & Technology. ]

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Monsters of New York: Creepy Critters Cuddle Strangers on City Subways

04 Nov

[ By WebUrbanist in Art & Drawing & Digital. ]

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NYC subways are strange, dark and oft-overcrowded places where many people retreat into themselves and avoiding engagement, at least until these unusual (and invisible) creatures come along.

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Artist Ben Rubin uses candid everyday photos of passengers as a canvass for an exotic cast of fictional characters that seem right at home in the public transit system of America’s largest city. His work is complex and detailed, but all rendered on a portable iPad device using the Procreate app.

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One could easily imagine that the off-putting noises and smells found on subway trains would be tied to such a strange set of monsters and aliens.

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In some cases, they seem to intrude on those seated next to them. In others, they unobtrusively wait in stations for a ride or look at maps, apparently puzzled about getting from Manhattan to Brooklyn.

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For the artist, these works started as a way to pass the time on the commute but have become a method of engaging and layering ideas onto photographs outside of the subway as well.

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Passengers engrossed in a book, listening to a podcast or zoned into a mobile phone game may not notice them, but these Subway Doodle creatures are there, at least in one man’s imagination. One has to wonder: if any of these really appeared, would the zombie humans around them even notice?

[ By WebUrbanist in Art & Drawing & Digital. ]

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Now Complete, the Chicago Riverwalk Reclaims Disused Industrial Shore

03 Nov

[ By SA Rogers in Architecture & Cities & Urbanism. ]

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The final phase of the Chicago Riverwalk opened to the public this weekend, completing a project that connects the city’s downtown area to a previously neglected industrial waterfront. For decades or perhaps even centuries, this sort of prime real estate has been similarly misused and disused in cities all around the world, given over to factories, shipyards, power plants and other facilities that don’t exactly encourage public interaction with the shore, but the Riverwalk is part of a movement that’s taking them back.

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The Chicago Riverwalk development is a 1.5-mile promenade for pedestrians and bicycles that runs alongside the Chicago River, helmed by Sasaki and Ross Barney Architects. The first and second phases have been open since last year, attracting thousands of visitors to the south bank to patronize restaurants, bars and shops, and take water taxis to other spots along the river.

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The clean modern design, which sets off the city’s historic Beaux Arts architecture to its greatest advantage, won an annual design excellence award from the American Institute of Architects, which noted that the Riverwalk “has become the city’s backyard patio.” The promenade features an expansive stepped section planted with trees, effectively creating stadium seating from which to enjoy the water.

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It also crosses both over and under several of the city’s bridges, so you can take a continuous riverside walk without ever encountering motor vehicle traffic. Recreation areas, gardens ,lawns and sculptural accents give it the feel of one big park, and some of the gardens float upon the surface of the water.

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Many Chicago residents may be less than enthralled with their mayor, Rahm Emanuel, but his signature public works project seems to be going over pretty well, and it’s a valuable contribution to the urban landscape. The city has already ensured that its lakefront is open to the public rather than being claimed by big businesses and wealthy landowners, and it’s refreshing to see the river get the same treatment.

360Photography

Archive for the ‘Creativity’ Category

Excavated Sanctuaries: Building Beneath a Protected Valley in Jordan

Art of Camouflage: Flying Bird Silhouettes Blend into Broken Window Voids

Rugged Luxury: Take Your Queen Bed On the Road In This Modern Camper

Modern Home Makeovers: 15 Dramatic Before & After Transformations

Kensington Residence, Sydney, Australia

Brooklyn Row House by Office of Architecture

Commercial Building to Modern Residence in Thailand

Texas Ranch House Transformation by MF Architecture

Modest Home in Salmon Arm, Canada

Next Page – Click Below to Read More:
Modern Home Makeovers 15 Dramatic Before After Transformations

Retail Micro-Farming: MIT & Target to Launch In-Store Vertical Farms

Spilt Milk: 12 Udderly Abandoned Dairies & Dairy Farms

Boom To Bust

No Milk Today

Next Page – Click Below to Read More:
Spilt Milk 12 Udderly Abandoned Dairies Dairy Farms

Datascrapers: Infographic Skylines Overlay Income Inequality on City Grids

Virtual Reality Nature: Helmet Lets Humans See the Forest Like Animals Do

Monsters of New York: Creepy Critters Cuddle Strangers on City Subways

Now Complete, the Chicago Riverwalk Reclaims Disused Industrial Shore

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Archive for the ‘Creativity’ Category

Kensington Residence, Sydney, Australia

Brooklyn Row House by Office of Architecture

Commercial Building to Modern Residence in Thailand

Texas Ranch House Transformation by MF Architecture

Modest Home in Salmon Arm, Canada

Next Page – Click Below to Read More: Modern Home Makeovers 15 Dramatic Before After Transformations

Boom To Bust

No Milk Today

Next Page – Click Below to Read More: Spilt Milk 12 Udderly Abandoned Dairies Dairy Farms

Next Page – Click Below to Read More:
Modern Home Makeovers 15 Dramatic Before After Transformations

Next Page – Click Below to Read More:
Spilt Milk 12 Udderly Abandoned Dairies Dairy Farms