toy box

Green Pocket

This is such a great idea to incorporate natural textures to your home. Also gives a lot of flexibility for the inhabitants to customize how the wall should look and feel like depending on what type of plants you might use. Mine will be filled with all kinds of herbs...continuously cleansing the air and fusing the room with herbal aroma.

Second Nature

We have been looking forward to visiting this exhibit Second Nature while in Tokyo at 21_21 Design Sight.

The main exhibit was chairs and artworks made of synthetic crystals. Some of them are still in making inside of the special aquarium in which plays Beethoven in order to let the crystal form naturally based on the music note.

The crystal chair inside of the aquarium felt like it was an organic creature breathing like a living mermaid. It was like a baby inside of the mother’s womb who are growing slowly listening to the his mom singing Beethoven.

And because of the surreal cloud like installation inside of the exhibit space, it makes visitors feel as if they are inside of this aquarium of nothingness just like how the crystal chair is…being reborn.

I wish I could have taken better pictures. They had pretty strict rule of “no photography”. This was the one I was able to score using my iPhone.

Greening Up Your Downspout

 

Artist Buster Simpson took rainwater downspouts to another level as part of the 'Growing Vine Street' project in Seattle. Click to see some other functional, yet unusual examples:
http://deputy-dog.com/2008/10/pimp-my-drainpipe.html

Best library ever!

During my visit to Seattle, I checked out the famous library designed by Rem Koolhaas. Big library but it kept me intrigued and never bored me to explore the space more. Everything was thought through. Little details mattered. My iPhone pictures don't do the justice...
view from the top. Everything is thought out.
Rethinking the private space.

Coming soon...

 Construction site for hotel in Paris. They are using printable panels turn ugly "in process" construction site into optimistic view to excite the public. I really like the hand drawing style they used to capture the future vision. Can you see the sketch line on the windows and how drawing fades away and construction structures see through as it goes toward the top of the panel?
documented in Paris, August 21st 2008.

Use me as you like... (riverside furniture)

So flexible, inviting and comfortable. The scene from 6pm on Thursday evening... (where is this in Los Angeles?)
documented in Paris, August 21st 2008.

Public space fully utilized

Hello from Hamburg. I was in Paris for a few days and now in Hamburg, Germany. I will be reporting from this side of the world till the end of this month. 

So Paris! My favorite hang out place in the city was this spot. On the river bank, a stretch of one mile or so turned into a casual "beach" like setting both catered toward tourists and locals. I think they execute the idea of "public space" really well. Everywhere I went, there were parks and squares with comfortable chairs to lounge nearby beautiful old gardens. Those settings makes it almost effortless to let the time pass by. (unlike Los Angeles where public space almost feels hostile.) I wonder what are the ingredients in creating a space like this... Beach chair alone can not be the only reason. People are definitely relaxed and always ready to jump into spontaneous activities (let that be singing and dancing along with piano, tasting gelato...) I think it is an atmosphere that is created by a combination of people, environment and pop-up inserts (piano, chairs, umbrella, magic show...) without becoming too cheesy. (I think some summer festivals in America miss the sweet spot by making it too theme oriented)  So where can I find a place with this kind of quality to live? 

   

Chair made out of compressed straw

Designed by Ryan Frank, inspired by traditional African chair, made out of formaldehyde-free material made entirely from compressed straw and wrapped in 100% felted wool. via: sub-studio

Stereoscopic Parking Garage

Stereoscopic Parking Garage inside the Eureka Tower Carpark in Melbourne, Australia designed by Axel Peemoeller. It's taking a conventional idea of stretched road sign (horizontal road signs are usually stretched to help drivers read sign easier from distance) to the next level. The effect is especially interesting because of all the turns drivers have to make inside of the parking lot and seeing these signs from all different angles. (Thanks for sending the link, Corey!)

Unexpected green spaces in the cities

Last night I got a twitter message from my friend pbullock that she "Just initiated some guerilla gardening with my neighbor on Main and 3rd" in Los Angeles downtown (Got to love your trendsetter friend).  While I am waiting to see some of the pictures from her... I started thinking that downtown would be an interesting place to live if there are more "creative" green spaces. Not having enough resources to build conventional green areas (aka: park) is probably one of a reason why the greens space is scarce in downtown. So I dug around online and found a few very creative ways to "up" the unexpected green spaces in a dense city.
Portable garden via Yanko Design designed by Kevin VanBraak.
Green panel via Apartment Therapy designed by YABG. We've seen a lot of vertical green walls but modular approach might work better. Also really like the affect of "pixel" look. Would be a great opportunity for an urban advertisement?

And let's not forget about PARK(ing) Day coming up on September 19th, 2008.