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Dynamic Architecture: 13 Buildings with Moving Parts

04 May

[ By Steph in Architecture & Houses & Residential. ]

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Entire Italian villas spin in circles on wheels, solar-powered shades follow the sun, rooms zoom up into the air on telescopic stilts and windowless facades lift up on one end like shoebox mousetraps, all at the push of a button. These dynamic houses, apartment buildings, pavilions and offices have all sorts of moving parts, transforming as if of their own accord to change the views or keep the interiors cool.

Phalanstery Module

Envisioned as a house for zero-gravity, where all surfaces are treated equally, the Phalanstery Module rotates a full turn per hour, with one of the surfaces becoming parallel to the ground every fifteen minutes. Say the creators, “In the middle of every 7.5 minute conversation, two people are bound to collide. Architectural program and activities become overpowered by the instinctive interpretations of our bodies against measurable dimensions.”

Sharifi-Ha House

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At the push of a button, three wooden volumes tucked inside a main structure turn their glass-capped ends in various directions. The residents of the Sharifi-Ha House by next office i Tehran can choose whether they want these particular rooms to be shaded or illuminated by the sun, as well as the view they prefer. Rotated fully out of their containing spaces, they telescope out over the driveway.

Villa Girasole

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Set on wheels and rails, northern Italy’s Villa Girasole rotates to follow the sun as it arches across the sky throughout the day, just like its namesake, the sunflower. Built in the 1930sby a wealthy engineer the two-story house rotates from a 42-meter-tall tower at the center, moving about 4 millimeters per second. It takes 9 hours and 20 minutes for it to rotate a full turn.

La Caja Oscura

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From afar, this house looks like a giant shoebox mouse trap, one end tilted up to reveal an elevated concrete slab. The windowless exterior moves up and down to either open the interior to the elements, or seal it off completely when the owners are gone. Designed by architect Javier Corvalan as the vacation home of a filmmaker, the house transforms with a manual winch. When closed, a pinhole allows the entire structure to function as a camera obscura, projecting an upside-down image of the landscape outside onto the interior walls.

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Dynamic Architecture 13 Buildings With Moving Parts

[ By Steph in Architecture & Houses & Residential. ]

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Gritty Cities: Oil Painter Captures Cityscapes at Dusk & Dawn

04 May

[ By WebUrbanist in Art & Drawing & Digital. ]

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Artist Jeremy Mann works in early in the day or evening, and it shows in the dark, smudged and ultimately riveting way in which he captures streetscapes of major cities from New York to San Francisco.

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Wiping, smoothing and layering oil paints with rollers, sponges and brushes, his works, like urban environments, are executions of complex and chaotic addition, evocative yet forever incomplete pictures of a place. He often applies broad marks with an ink brayer and wipes sections away with solvents. Getting increasingly experimental, he has even tried applying and moving paints with doorstops, window wipers and liquor bottles.

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“Even that banana which turned out to actually be a good blending tool, painting with lettuce, though, I can tell you might be useless,” said the artist in an interview. “In this process of experimenting with tools, an artist inevitably discovers new techniques as a result of accidents and learning how to recognize those accidents as worthy or not, and then harness them or bury them.”

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His paintings are as much about capturing the spirit of a place as its details. Rather than appearing as normal paintings, the pieces start to blend and blur, looking more like photographs shot on a rainy day with all the reflections of puddles, drips, and reflections enhanced. If anything, his recent works also seem to be growing more obscured and abstract over time, perhaps in part as his pallete of artistic tools expands.

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As art writer Christopher Jobson explains: “Mann applies and wipes away areas of the canvas to recreate these hazy environments, adding layers of paint back on top of the slightly smeared works with more detailed strokes. This layered effects makes the works appear like double exposed images, two scenes gently blurring into one. The resulting paintings are dark and atmospheric, urban streets seemingly drenched in rain and mystery.”

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Mann’s work goes beyond just urban landscapes, and some of his pieces can be seen come June in the John Pence Gallery (you can also see more of his work on Instagram and Facebook).

[ By WebUrbanist in Art & Drawing & Digital. ]

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Street Origami: Vivid Urban Art Installations in Folded Paper

03 May

[ By Steph in Drawing & Digital. ]

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Busting out beyond small proportions, delicate materials and indoor settings, origami has a chance to bloom, bringing bold colors and unexpected patterns to urban surfaces around the world. Paris-based street artist Mademoiselle Maurice installs large-scale origami artworks on public walls, ceilings, crumbling stone castles and even beach rocks, everywhere from Singapore to San Francisco. While some of her creations are made on canvas or installed in galleries, others are made to be destroyed, as ephemeral as real flowers blossoming and then dying on a branch.

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Maurice says she was first inspired to work with origami while living in Tokyo for a year. She was there when the devastating earthquake, tsunami and nuclear power plant explosion occurred in 2011, and wanted to make art reflecting how she felt about the tragedy. Her first project came from the legend of 1,000 origami cranes, an ancient tale promising that anyone who manages to fold that many tiny paper cranes will be granted a wish by the gods.

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Growing up in the urban confines of Paris, which she found rather grey and monotonous, Maurice wanted to add more color to the world with works that “emanate a carousel of emotion.” In the past five years, the young artist has collaborated with heavyweights like Louis Vuitton, Google, Vice Magazine and Issey Miyaké, and her work has been installed in Italy, the Netherlands, Sweden, China, Vietnam, Australia, Mexico, the U.S. and many more countries.

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“This is my way to stay discrete and not to impose myself too much on the walls,” Maurice said of her choice to use paper outdoors. “But otherwise I love doing something telling me that it will not last, ‘dust thou shalt return to dust.’”

[ By Steph in Drawing & Digital. ]

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A New View: 65+ Illuminating Larger-Than-Life Macro Images

02 May

[ By Steph in Art & Photography & Video. ]

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Few of us would ever get a glimpse of the tiniest rope-like iridescent quills on a peacock’s feather, the scales on a moth’s wing, dew droplets on a spider’s eyes or the planetary patterns on a bubble of soap if not for the macro photographers who carefully document details too small for the naked eye to see. It’s almost as if we’ve shrunk small enough to stare an arachnid in the face, or put ourselves in danger of being trapped by a carnivorous plant.

Spiders by Jimmy Kong

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Six to eight spider eyes stare back at you, reflecting the image of a camera lens, the human holding it, and sometimes a light. Photographer Jimmy Kong captures images of all sorts of creatures, but his spiders seem to have so much personality, watching curiously as he gets close enough to spot the tiny hairs on their legs.

Butterfly and Moth Wings by Linden Gledhill

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Tiny overlapping scales reminiscent of flower petals reveal the smallest details of their shapes and vivid colors in a series of macro butterfly and moth wings by Linden Gledhill, a biochemist by training.

Coral & Other Sea Life by Daniel Stoupin

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150,000 shots went into this video documenting the secret lives of ‘slow’ marine animals like coral and sponges, their movements being too small to be seen without a time lapse. Says Bioquest Studios, “Why so many? Because macro photography involves shallow depth of field. To extend it, we used focus tacking and deconvolution algorithms. Each frame of the video is actually a stack that consists of 3-12 shots. just the intro and last scene are regular real-time footage.”

Peacock Feathers by Waldo Nell

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Go closer and closer and closer to a peacock feather, and the level of detail and color variation only gets more intense, with the smallest parts revealing themselves to be tiny ropes. Photographer Waldo Nell used an Olympus BX 53 microscope to take hundreds of individual shots, combining them to get the images seen here to get the depth of field that is typically lost in this kind of photography.

Carnivorous Plants by Joni Niemelä

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The sticky insect-baiting appendages of carnivorous plants get a good inspection in all their alien beauty in this series by Joni Niemelä. Each photo offers a different view of the Drosera plant, commonly known as the ‘sundew.’

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A New View 65 Illuminating Larger Than Life Macro Images

[ By Steph in Art & Photography & Video. ]

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VR Journalism: Experience a Solitary Cell in Prison with ‘6×9?

02 May

[ By WebUrbanist in Art & Photography & Video. ]

6x9 jail cell

The Guardian has launched a virtual reality app for Android users, compatible with low-tech VR devices like Cardboard (which uses your mobile phone); its first story is about solitary confinement, which you can dive into virtually. The preview makes it sound like a horror film, but for prisoners life in solitary can really be a living nightmare.

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As The Guardian explains, “6×9 takes you to a virtual cell, telling a story of the psychological damage of extreme isolation. Right now, more than 80,000 people are in solitary confinement in the US. They spend 22-24 hours a day in their cells, with little to no human contact for days or even decades. We invite you into this world.”

6x9 simulation virtual reality

Throughout the enhanced story, six prisoners share personal experiences of life in solitary. This is to be the first of many new ‘virtual journalism’ efforts undertaken by the Guardian, and makes for a good prototype: the piece is impactful, relatively easy to simulate in VR (a single room) and highly relevant given growing concerns about prisoner isolation, especially in America.

6x9 how it works

Users without Cardboard or other virtual reality equipment can alternatively experience the story through 360-degree videos on personal computers or mobile devices. Whether this is a one-off experiment or the beginning of a new kind of audience integration remains to be seen, but so far the reviews of the app are overwhelmingly positive.

[ By WebUrbanist in Art & Photography & Video. ]

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Silk & Sadden: 15 Closed & Abandoned Lingerie Shops

01 May

[ By Steve in Abandoned Places & Architecture. ]

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The thrill is gone and so are the thongs! These 15 closed & abandoned lingerie shops have nobody else to blame for their sagging level of support.

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Cue “Thunderstruck”… but whether you’re AC or DC, Thunder Lingerie and More is, er, no more. Located at 100 Greenwich Street in NYC’s Financial District, this boldly named ex-lingerie store was open as late as early April of 2011 as can be seen by the last of three images above. Kudos to Flickr users H Y (Haruko16), Scott Lynch (Scoboco), and Andy (ho_hokus) for capturing the late and lamented lingerie (and more) retailer in all of its Old Glory.

Secret Garden of Delights

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Lingerie AND flowers? Shoot, a fella’ could have a pretty good weekend in Vegas with all that stuff. But enough about strange love, The Secret Garden in Hamilton Square, NJ closed shop some time before Flickr user Brian McGann came across it on January 1st of 2009. “ASK ABOUT R HOT RESS”… nope, in this case ignorance really is bliss.

We Had Everything

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It would seem that even having everything (including “Bras Of All Sizes”) wasn’t enough to stave off retail oblivion for We Have Everything, a quaint and charming now-abandoned lingerie shop on Chicago’s gritty north side. Flickr user John W. Iwanski (Chicago Man) snapped the sad state of the screened & shuttered store on January 25th of 2011.

The Writing’s on the Wall

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Netherlands-based lingerie retailer Lindessa is still going strong but the outlet above, according to Flickr user oerendhard1, is closed tighter than the clasps of an outgrown brassiere. The photographer snapped the shop’s graffiti-encrusted exterior on a gloomy, overcast day in December of 2008.

Lead Us Into Temptation

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Jesus, what lovely knickers! You knew the Germans always make good stuff but were you aware their shop signs often fill viewers with shock and awe? Take CHRIST, for example, a lingerie shop whose mission it was to make perfect angels look their devilish best. One might’ve called it the best lingerie shop in Berlin, bar nun. Flickr user Squiggly Diggums captured the semi-sacrilegious storefront in Berlin’s central Mitte district on December 8th of 2005.

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Silk Sadden 15 Closed Abandoned Lingerie Shops

[ By Steve in Abandoned Places & Architecture. ]

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IKEA VR: Explore Interior Layouts in New Virtual Reality App

30 Apr

[ By WebUrbanist in Design & Fixtures & Interiors. ]

ikea virtual reality

A new virtual reality application from IKEA lets users try out various kitchen configurations in three dimensions. Using an HTC Vive headset, the app lets people see different setups but also change key details in each, such as the colors and materials of drawers and cabinets.

ikea interactive vr

Created in partnership with the French company Allegorithmic and employing the Unreal Engine 4 (from Epic Games), the app lets would-be buyers select from various furnishings and fixtures.

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“Virtual reality is developing quickly and in five to ten years it will be an integrated part of people’s lives,” says optimist and futurist Jesper Brodin, managing director of IKEA of Sweden. “We see that virtual reality will play a major role in the future of our customers. For instance, someday, it could be used to enable customers to try out a variety of home furnishing solutions before buying them.”

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For now, the system is a test case, available to those with access to a virtual reality headset. Users are encouraged to try it out and let the company know what they think about the current setup and how it can be improved. The company hopes to enable participants not only to shop smarter but also to become a part of the creative process in developing new design ideas and interior options.

[ By WebUrbanist in Design & Fixtures & Interiors. ]

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World’s Longest Tunnel Slide Opening at Sculptural London Monument

30 Apr

[ By Steph in Destinations & Sights & Travel. ]

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Experience monumental sculpture like you never have before with a new 15-story tunnel slide that spirals around London’s ArcelorMittal Orbit monument, set to be the world’s longest. The UK is really pushing its public art to the next level by adding a record breaker to a record breaker, as the sculpture already holds the title of tallest in the nation. The slide wraps around the sculpture 12 times, and it takes forty seconds to get from the very top to the bottom in a trip through the tube.

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Opening to the public on June 24th, 2016, the Carsten Höller-designed slide features both opaque and transparent sections so riders get brief glimpses of the London skyline before plunging back into darkness. A tight corkscrew section snakes its way around the red geometric structure, ending in a straight run to the ground. The slide’s total length is 584 feet.

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London erected the strange and rather controversial ArcelorMittal for the 2012 Summer Olympics, offering panoramic views of the city from its location in Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park. Tickets for the attraction are already on sale for £15 ($ 22), with a limited number available each day, and you can book more than one ride at a time.

[ By Steph in Destinations & Sights & Travel. ]

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Germany Puts Stoplights in Sidewalks for Distracted Pedestrians

28 Apr

[ By WebUrbanist in Gadgets & Geekery & Technology. ]

safety signals

Walkers preoccupied with their mobile devices as they traverse Augsburg, Germany, are starting to notice something new in their peripheral vision: sidewalk-embedded traffic lights designed to let them know when to stop and when to go.

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The city, concerned about people looking down and ignoring traffic signals, decided to step in with this new invention. The design addresses both people who are at risk of walking out into active lanes, but also lets those standing and staring into their phones when they can safely walk again.

Currently, the city is testing these out in two prime trial locations where railroad tracks run roughly at the same level as sidewalks, making it easy for people to miss physical cues (like a change in pavement elevation) and where a vehicle is less likely to be able to stop in time (train versus car).

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A survey conducted in Berlin and several other European countries revealed that nearly 20% of pedestrians (mostly younger people) missed the signal change because they were distracted by their phones. Whether the city should accommodate such behavior is, of course, another question entirely.

According to Stadtwerke Augsburg (translated), “The stubborn look at the smartphone can lead on the road to dangerous situations,” hence the decision “to enhance security for smartphone users.”

[ By WebUrbanist in Gadgets & Geekery & Technology. ]

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Paper Westeros: Game of Thrones Intro Recreated in Moleskine Notebooks

28 Apr

[ By Steph in Art & Sculpture & Craft. ]

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A snippet of the imaginative and ever-changing opening sequence of HBO’s Game of Thrones series is recreated in stop-motion using over 7,600 paper cutouts made with Moleskine notebooks in this 40-second video. Made by Milan-based animation studio Dadomani to promote the brand’s new Game of Thrones notebooks, the moving models mimic the computer animation seen on the show, wherein three-dimensional structures emerge from the surface of a map and spring to life.

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Opening with a view of the sigil of House Baratheon, the video sweeps through King’s Landing as paper gears turn and spires begin to retract. The tiny paper houses disappear as the stag-topped sigil spins, and the camera pans out to a classic Tolkien-style map of Westeros before the scene splits into four pieces.

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These four components are revealed to be the individual notebooks in Moleskin’s Game of Thrones series, each covered with the dire wolves of the Starks, the Targaryen dragon and the Lannister lion. A fifth notebook, the collector’s edition only available in Moleskin stores, features an image of the Iron Throne. The silkscreened covers were designed by emerging artist Levente Szabó, and each notebook retails for $ 19.95 – $ 25.95.

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The designers of the original animation took inspiration from Leonardo da Vinci’s machines to achieve an effect appropriate for the fantasy series, which is set in a fictional country in a time period recalling the real-world Middle Ages. The cog-filled engines beneath the surface of the map that power all of the movements above represent the secret machinations of the series’ main families, the Houses of Lannister, Baratheon and Stark, along with all of their allies and enemies. Check out how the paper version was created in the video above.

360Photography

Archive for the ‘Creativity’ Category

Dynamic Architecture: 13 Buildings with Moving Parts

Phalanstery Module

Sharifi-Ha House

Villa Girasole

La Caja Oscura

Next Page – Click Below to Read More:
Dynamic Architecture 13 Buildings With Moving Parts

Gritty Cities: Oil Painter Captures Cityscapes at Dusk & Dawn

Street Origami: Vivid Urban Art Installations in Folded Paper

A New View: 65+ Illuminating Larger-Than-Life Macro Images

Spiders by Jimmy Kong

Butterfly and Moth Wings by Linden Gledhill

Coral & Other Sea Life by Daniel Stoupin

Peacock Feathers by Waldo Nell

Carnivorous Plants by Joni Niemelä

Next Page – Click Below to Read More:
A New View 65 Illuminating Larger Than Life Macro Images

VR Journalism: Experience a Solitary Cell in Prison with ‘6×9?

Silk & Sadden: 15 Closed & Abandoned Lingerie Shops

Secret Garden of Delights

We Had Everything

The Writing’s on the Wall

Lead Us Into Temptation

Next Page – Click Below to Read More:
Silk Sadden 15 Closed Abandoned Lingerie Shops

IKEA VR: Explore Interior Layouts in New Virtual Reality App

World’s Longest Tunnel Slide Opening at Sculptural London Monument

Germany Puts Stoplights in Sidewalks for Distracted Pedestrians

Paper Westeros: Game of Thrones Intro Recreated in Moleskine Notebooks

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Archive for the ‘Creativity’ Category

Phalanstery Module

Sharifi-Ha House

Villa Girasole

La Caja Oscura

Next Page – Click Below to Read More: Dynamic Architecture 13 Buildings With Moving Parts

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Moving Architecture: 12 Unbelievable Buildings in Motion

Adaptive Architecture: 12 Transforming & Convertible Buildings

Dynamic Shape-Shifting D*Haus Rotates to Follow the Sun

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Street Origami: 30,000 Pieces Folded to Create Colorful Art

Math + Paper Craft: Computer Scientist Creates 3D Origami

Origami Shelter: Instant Flat-Pack Architecture on Demand

Spiders by Jimmy Kong

Butterfly and Moth Wings by Linden Gledhill

Coral & Other Sea Life by Daniel Stoupin

Peacock Feathers by Waldo Nell

Carnivorous Plants by Joni Niemelä

Next Page – Click Below to Read More: A New View 65 Illuminating Larger Than Life Macro Images

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A Closer Look: Super-Simple Macro Lens for Smartphones

Larger than Life: 10 Giant Portraits, Murals & Sculptures

Giants in the Streets: Urban Street Images in Macro-Scale

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Insane Prisoner Inventions: 24 DIY Prison Tools & Weapons

IKEA VR: Explore Interior Layouts in New Virtual Reality App

Gravity: Augmented Reality Tablet Lets You Draw Ideas in 3D

Secret Garden of Delights

We Had Everything

The Writing’s on the Wall

Lead Us Into Temptation

Next Page – Click Below to Read More: Silk Sadden 15 Closed Abandoned Lingerie Shops

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Empty Chambers: 10 Closed & Abandoned Gun Stores & Shops

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No Spoking: 11 Closed & Abandoned Bicycle Shops

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Virtual Interior Design: Augmented Reality IKEA 2014 Catalog

VRchitecture: Interactive Virtual Reality House Feels 90% Real

CastAR 3D: See the Future of Work & Play in Augmented Reality

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Chinese Skywalk: World’s Longest Glass Bridge Spans Two Cliffs

8th World Wonder in the Works: Tunnel from Russia to USA

Park & Slide: 100,000 Sign Up to Slip 300 Feet Down a Street

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Run Bell: Warn Slow Pedestrians to Get Out of Your Way

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Hell is Other People: Avoid Your Friends Using Social Media

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Grottos to Game of Thrones: 16 Jaw-Dropping Restaurants

Paper City Animation: “Rise & Fold” of a Fragile Metropolis

Magic Circle: Laser-Cut Paper Sculptures Inspired by Nature

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Dynamic Architecture 13 Buildings With Moving Parts

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A New View 65 Illuminating Larger Than Life Macro Images

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Silk Sadden 15 Closed Abandoned Lingerie Shops