Inhabitat

THE STARS OF SUSTAINABILITY AT Symposium C6 in Chicago

The last day of Chicago’s Symposium C6 conference (”The Art World is Flat: Globalism- Crisis and Opportunity”) went out with a bang- the morning’s star-studded panel focused on the theme of “Creating A Sustainable Future.” Panel members and speakers included Natalie Jeremijenko (artist and engineer), Bruce Mau (the man behind the Massive Change exhibition), Jennifer Siegal (one of our favorite prefab pioneers), and Lucy Orta (socially-conscious artist and designer). The caliber of the line-up alone was mind-boggling, and the discussion was even better…

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BOOK REVIEW: ECOLOGICAL DESIGN – 10th Anniversary

Every design-minded citizen loves a coffee table book with glossy photography and eye-catching projects. But every now and then, it’s nice to see a book about green design that takes a more in-depth, perhaps even academic approach to the rich, always evolving and ever-exciting field of ecological design. Few people know their stuff like Sim Van Der Ryn, whose initially published Ecological Design in 1996, and has arguably been one of the grandfathers of green design, designing sustainably for the past 35 years. The book argues that in order to create a more sustainable world, our products, buildings, landscapes, and cities, need to be designed with a greater understanding of ecology.

The 10th anniversary of this groundbreaking text is still relevant, celebrating a decade of progress, while delivering new information to the current generation of designers, architects, and environmentalists. With chapter headings such as Nature’s Geometry, Solutions Grow From Place, and Make Nature Visible, along with a thorough Resource Guide for Ecological Design, Van Der Ryn and Cowan provide a both an overview and strategies for more ecologically-informed, environmentally-sensitive designs.

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PREFAB FRIDAY: David Adjaye’s East London House

Here’s a recipe for good design: take London-based architect David Adjaye, mix with a prefab timber construction system, drop on a site in the middle of Hackney, a London suburb, shake and mix – and you get a stunning solid timber residence for our Prefab Friday series. Adjaye recently designed this 150 sq. meter abode using Eurban’s solid spruce timber building structures as its main structural component (Eurban claims that each cubic meter of timber saves almost a ton of carbon dioxide emissions compared with a brick or block structure). The actual build time for the structure of the house totaled a mere five days.

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INTERVIEW: Designer Fumi Masuda

Japanese designer Fumi Masuda, whose Pile Chair was featured this morning, was recently in São Paulo, Brazil to give a lecture about sustainable design. He also conducted workshops involving Brazilian and Japanese design students and some members of Coopamare, a group of people that earn their bread collecting used papers from the street to sell for the recycling industry. I had the chance to talk to Fumi before the lecture. He told me a little bit about his history and offered some interesting perspectives on the sustainable design market…

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PILE CHAIR By Fumi Masuda

For many people, there’s nothing worse than the thought of moving. But now at least you can find some solace in the moving process knowing that any discarded furniture may have a second life as Fumi Masuda’s stunning Pile Chair, which is built out of old and discarded furniture collected by movers. The idea came from a Japanese moving company, Mover, that provides a service to collect discarded furniture (think of all the sofas and chairs you see strewn on the sidewalk). As an alternative to disposal, the company figured that the furniture could be used as raw material for new designs, instead of the end product. Fumi Masuda’s Pile Chair emerged from a collaborative project with students and teachers from the Design Department at Tokyo Zokei University and Mover.

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SIGG ECO BOTTLE DESIGN COMPETITION

One of the easiest things you can do to lead a greener life is to say no to disposable plastic water bottles. And one of our favorite companies, SIGG, makes this easy and stylish with their Swiss-designed aluminum, taste-inert, eco-friendly water bottles. And now they’ve announced their ‘What’s Your Eco-Style?’ bottle design competition in celebration of the recently passed Earth Day. The company is looking for YOU to design their next bottle to join their already fabulous and graphically-stunning collection of drinking vessels. Visit their website for more information on the competition, the company, and the unique manufacturing processes in which the bottles are made from a single hockey-puck sized piece of aluminum!

+ SIGG ‘What’s Your Eco-Style’ Competition

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WORLD’S SMALLEST WIND TURBINE

This little wind-powered toy brings clean, green energy to the palm of your hand, and is a great little gadget for getting youngsters interested in the beauty of renewable energy. No batteries or charging or nothing – instead just blow on the toy and watch it light up! The wind-powered toy has one green and two blue LED lights which are powered by blowing on the tiny 2.4-inch rotor blade. So you can forget using a lighter or cell phone during that ballad at your next rock concert— illuminate the night with the eco-friendly Blow Light!

£9.99 at Nigel’s Eco Store

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BLOCH BUILDING by Steven Holl

Architect Steven Holl is no stranger to remarkably lit gallery spaces, and his latest addition to the Nelson Atkins Museum in Kansas City, Missouri is a notable display of his talents in using architectural daylighting to create stunning interior spaces. Free to the public, the Bloch Building uses every facet of natural light to a variety of gallery spaces bringing perfectly balanced illumination to both a Noguchi Sculpture exhibit and another gallery with historic pictures that requires a low-light atmosphere. The light in the Bloch building, whose walls consist of large amounts of translucent glass, have been perfectly calibrated along with the use of fluorescents to account for the varying luminosity from season to season, and even from day to night. We were lucky enough to get a private viewing of the museum prior to its June opening to the public.

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KANSAS STATE U TOP PICKS FROM MILAN

During the week of Milan’s Salone Internazionale del Mobile, we put a call out for eco-loving, freelance correspondents to help us out with our coverage. Our plea was met with much enthusiasm from, among others, a design class from Kansas State University, who braved the ruckus of the event to bring us some exciting reports and tips from Salone. Read on for a run-down of some of their favorite and ‘greenest’ finds…

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FLAKE BLIND by WOODNOTES

Biomimicry proved to be all the rage at the Salone Internazional del Mobile this year, with designers drawing big-time inspiration from the wonders of the natural world. Though Finnish textile design studio Woodnotes falls in the same category, their apparent love of ecological structures doesn’t render their work any less unique than that of other eco-emulators. An eye-catching aspect of their booth at the Salone was the Flake Blind which hung delicately amidst their designs. As implied by its given moniker, the Flake Blind was inspired by memories of wintertime bliss and the geometric qualities of a snowflake.

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STUDIO LIBERTINY’S VASE MADE BY BEES

I’m a self-proclaimed Droog addict, and have touted the “je ne sais quoi” of the always-engaging and wryly humorous Dutch design ad nauseam. And this bee-made vessel by Tomas Gabzdil Libertiny of Studio Libertiny is no exception. Making its debut at Droog’s booth in Milan, the vase was made by 40,000 bees over the course of one week. Studio Libertiny constructed a vase-shaped hive that the bees then colonized, building a hexagonal comb to encompass the existing form. And in the usual dry yet oh-so-clever Dutch manner, Studio Libertiny calls this process “slow prototyping,” a more time-consuming, yet much more poetic alternative to CNC rapid prototyping.

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‘THIS TABLE WILL SELF-DESTRUCT’ by STUDIO 1a.m.

An often-overlooked tenet of the green design process is the creation of objects that tell a story, that have a history, and that engage with the user to extend their life span beyond the disposable and ephemeral. Donna Piacenza of Studio 1a.m. (the creative genius behind eco-friendly jewelry like the Cork Cuff and Industrial Bloom) has just produced a new table concept that does just this, flirting with the boundaries of mass production and customization. The table concept, titled ‘This Table Will Self Destruct,’ is a simple, clean-lined design constructed of sorghum and concrete. With each order, a “pixel” is removed from the design, so that each owner receives a different, progressively deconstructed iteration of the original table. After x number of productions, the table will cease to exist. The table raises some interesting questions of sustainability, durability, disposability, and the mass production design market.

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SAN FRANCISCO’S CIVIC TOWER: Greenest Of Them All

Recently, we’ve been seeing scads of new projects that make big claims about their sustainable features. Some projects feature elaborate photovoltaic systems, a few wind turbines, or recycled material, while others promise to save water as much as possible. All in all, the competition to become THE sustainable building project is heating up, and now, the City of San Francisco is putting its foot down and letting everyone know that their new Civic Administration Tower, designed by KMD Architects in collaboration with Timmons Design Engineers, will be the greenest of them all.

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PROJECT EARTH DAY: Student Eco Fashion Competition

This past Thursday, Inhabitat attended “Project Earth Day”, an eco-friendly fashion show at the Teknion showroom. The event was organized by Emerging Green Builders of New York (EGBNY), the local chapter of USGBC and co-sponsored by o2-NYC, and Green Drinks.

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PROJECT EARTH DAY: EGB Eco Fashion Show

Anyone who has been reading Inhabitat for awhile knows that we love our eco-fashion here – almost as much as we love green building. Fashion and architecture don’t often get mentioned in the same breathe, but happily, this past week we were able to see the green architecture and the green fashion worlds come together to celebrate Earth Day in an eco-fashion show put on by the Emerging Green Builders (EGB) Chapter of NYC. “Project Earth Day”, as it was called, was put together to showcase the latest in sustainable apparel and textile designs by up and coming designers.

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IT’S EARTH DAY: Do Something

Five years ago, if you’d asked a stranger to tell you the significance of April 22, you’d almost certainly have been met with a blank stare. The same would likely have been true four, three, even two years ago. But last year, Earth Day finally had its moment on the main stage. Nearly forty years after its founding, it broke out of do-good environmentalist circles and debuted across the glossy covers of Vanity Fair and Vogue. By the end of 2006, it was agreed that this was the year green went mainstream.

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MILAN FURNITURE FAIR: DAY 2

After being alerted to all the Inhabitat-worthy designs that had yet to be uncovered in the Tortona district of Milan during the week of the Salone Internazionale del Mobile, we made our way towards the site of the Zona Tortona Design Event. An initiative of Recapito Milanese, the event was inspired by a smaller affair organized by Giulio Cappellini from Superstudio in April 2001. Last year, Zona Tortona generated 60,000 visitors with over 194 companies from all over the world displaying their wares. For the design community, the event has become synonymous with ‘alternative’ or ‘independent’ design garnering a reputation for more experimental work than the mainstream-oriented Salone Internazionale del Mobile. Read on for more details of all the great stuff we found!

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MILAN 2007: BREEZE SIDE TABLE by SWEDESE

The veteran furniture manufacturer Swedese is notoriously associated with classic Swedish style in their Scandinavian homeland. Since its founding in 1945, Swedese has run in the same circles as fellow Scandinavian design pioneers such as Arne Jacobson and Alvar Aalto in its quest to create sensible and ecologically-evocative design. At the Salone Internazionale del Mobile this year, their simple yet stunning work proved that the initial appeal of ‘Scandanavian Modern’ had yet to fade into the sidelines. A particularly notable piece in the exhibit this year was their Breeze side table designed by Monica Forster.

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INHABITAT T-Shirt Contest ENDS TODAY!

If you’ve been following our Green T-Shirt Competition, then hopefully you realize that today is your LAST CHANCE to get your designs in to us. The competition ends tonight at MIDNIGHT, and its really easy to submit designs to us – and the prizes are great – so for all you green and graphically-inclined readers out there, SUBMIT TODAY!

THIS IS YOUR LAST CHANCE to become the next Inhabitat graphic design star.

DEADLINE IS TONIGHT AT MIDNIGHT, APRIL 20th!

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PREFAB FRIDAY: Resolution 4 Mountain Retreat

The only thing better than a quaint mountain retreat is a quaint PREFAB mountain retreat. And here it is, a 2 bedroom, 2 bath, 1800 square foot stunner designed by architects Joseph Tanney and Robert Luntz of Resolution: 4 Architecture. Set on the loveliest of lovely sites in Kerhonkson, New York, the prefab structure integrates what the architects describe as “lifted bar and 2-story bar” components to create a 2-story indoor/outdoor lofty, loungy space perfectly enhanced by modern furniture and summer dinner party. The owner, who “wanted something modern that had warmth and was organic in its environment,” seems to have met these goals, integrating a modern aesthetic and a long list of green components.

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MILAN 2007: Ingo Maurer Toothpaste TU-BES Lighting

At Salone Internazional del Mobile’s Euroluce in Milan, designers fearsomely competed for attention by decking out their booths with high-tech light displays. But the one that caught our eye and held our attention was a series of innovative light structures from the always creative Ingo Maurer. And this year, Mr. Maurer’s fixtures were particularly green, integrating an array of everyday and reused objects including toothpaste tubes. Leave it to him to make Colgate beautiful.

+ INGO MAURER

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MILAN FURNITURE FAIR 2007 – Day 1

From April 18 to 23, Milan IS the Salone Internazionale del Mobile as designers, tourists, and journalists flock to the trade fair for the most anticipated design event of the year. On Day One, Inhabitat made its way to the Rho-Fiera fairgrounds on the outskirts of the bustling Italian city where the latest international designs were being unveiled before a crazed, but decidedly stylish, public. We’ve seen some great stuff and have tons to report- read on for some highlights!

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WHAT ARE YOU DOING FOR EARTH DAY?!

This year more than ever, Earth Day (this Sunday, April 22) is an important day for us to all stop, think, and make a difference. With the growing interest and attention that green design and sustainability have been gathering, 2007 is really a year that the masses are motivated to gather, celebrate, and make a commitment to protecting our planet. Even though we are of the firm belief that “Earth Day” should be EVERY day – it is still nice to have an opportunity to come together and focus on our planet for a week. Read on for a list of some key events worth attending… everything from fashion shows to concerts, and even Governor Arnold pimping his ride. And stay tuned for a special Earth Day post this Sunday.

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RECYCLED BILLBOARD BIRDHOUSE by Atelier Bomdesign

We love stumbling across ways to incorporate nature into our urban lifestyle, and birdhouses always seem to do this effectively. We’ve featured birdhouses many times before, ranging from clean and modern to the purely practical. These simply constructed boxes caught our eye when we spotted them at Notcot, though truth be told, we took them for mailboxes at first glance.

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INHABITABLE CARDBOARD ROOMS

Cardboard, you abundantly mundane material, what would we do without you? Or rather, what else can we do with you? We’ve already featured some interesting uses of cardboard including furniture, as a structural component, and even a coffin. So we’d like to add one more to the “things to do with cardboard” file, that of a… room?

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VEHICLE GRID TECHNOLOGY: Car power for your home

Here at Inhabitat, we feature numerous ways in which you can power your house. Whether by using solar panels, wind turbines, hydrogen, gas, and even geothermal energy, we can say that alternative sources of energy are slowly creeping into our daily usage. Well, now you can add cars to that list, with PG&E’s new vehicle-to-grid technology which allows you to power your house with your hybrid car!

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The 人 REN Building

Architecture in China never ceases to amaze us—case in point—the REN Building. Copenhagen’s Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG) proposed this eye-catching design over a year ago to coincide with Shanghai’s “Better City, Better Life” 2010 World Expo . The building takes its form from the Chinese character for person 人 (”ren”) and combines two buildings (one symbolic of mind and the other symbolic of body). We love the poetic inspiration that reflects both site and cultural sensitivity.

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BOOKLAMPS by Atelier Bomdesign

The Dutch design shop Atelier Bomdesign features several products fabricated from recycled materials. By far, our favorite is the Booklamp (or Boeklampen, in the native tongue), a clever take on reading light- proving that books are for both learning AND lighting. Used books are beautifully re-crafted and shaped into shades that emit a soft glow. As they are handcrafted, the Booklamps are perhaps more art than everyday fixture, and are priced accordingly (200-400 euros).

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FLOATING ELECTRO-MAGNETIC SKYSCRAPERS by Geotectura

Ever imagined that a building could hover about the ground – floating in mid air? Architect Joseph Cory thinks the above scenario might be possible in the future, using electro-magnetism. In his Electro-Magnetic Skyscrapers project, the structures support each others through their electromagnetic fields.

“By using magnetic fields as a construction material there can be infinite vertical and horizontal expansions due to the final liberation from gravity.”

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WATAIR: Turning Air Into Water

With an estimated 5,000 children dying daily due to dirty drinking water, Joseph Cory and Eyal Malka’s award-winning WatAir design for Arup and WaterAid’s drawn water challenge might be the response barren landscapes are looking for. Simply described, WatAir produces water from the air through its inverted pyramid array of panels. Inspired by spiderwebs and the dew-catching properties of leaves, WatAir is easy to incorporate into both rural and urban landscapes due to its relatively small footprint.

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EGBNY PRESENTS PROJECT EARTH DAY

“Project Earth Day” is an eco-friendly fashion event that will celebrate Earth Day. The runway show will be held at the Teknion showroom on April 19th and will feature a stunning display of the latest eco-friendly designs by up and coming designers. The night will feature a student competition, judged by a panel of industry leaders, with the winner awarded a cash prize of $1500 and a mentorship opportunity. In addition, several emerging fashion designers will put together small collections made from donated textiles.

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