The Armada House The Armada House was designed by Canadian studio KB Design and built in 2007 by Abstract Developments. This 5,299 square foot modern post and beam home is located in the Ten Mile Point/Wedgewood Estates neighborhood of Victoria, British Columbia in Canada. View the website Modern Concrete House (15 photos) When you first think about the words concrete house, you might imagine a cold, sterile environment, perhaps something similar to a prison. If that's the case, this one story house designed by architecture studio A-cero will likely change your mind. Located on the outskirts of Madrid, Concrete House II features a façade that boasts a spectacular view of the whole house. The first impression that visitors usually get is that the building seems to be hidden between concrete walls and ramps that extend up to the roof. Upon further inspection, they find a vegetation area that climbs towards the sky! The back of the house opens up towards the garden where the lounge, dining room, library, study, and bedrooms are found. A-cero
Blog Archive & Holman House by Durbach Block Jaggers - StumbleUpon A Picasso painting inspired this cliff-top house near Sydney by architects Durbach Block Jaggers. Above photo is by Brett Boardman The curved forms of the kitchen and living room, which project over the sea supported by four angled stilts, are derived from the torso of Picasso's The Bather. Above photo is by Anthony Browell The two-storey Holman House was completed atop the 70 metre-high cliff at Dover Heights back in 2004. Stone walls surround bedrooms on the ground floor, which nestle against the rock face. Terraces surrounding the house at different levels provide two patios, a top floor garden and a lower level swimming pool. This project is the third Australian house published on Dezeen in the last week, following one residence with an oversailing glass roof and another that incorporates cantilevering concrete slabs - see all our stories about projects in Australia here. Photography is by Peter Bennetts, apart from where otherwise stated. Here's some more information from the architects:
Would You Live in a Shipping Container? Adam Kalkin isn't the only architect to make homes out of shipping containers. A handful of architects, including Jennifer Siegal and Lot-Ek, began using them ten years ago as a gritty reaction against the tidy white surfaces of modernism. But nobody has employed shipping containers more inventively than Kalkin, a New Jersey architect and artist who has used them to design luxurious homes, museum additions, and refugee housing. In architectural circles, Kalkin is regarded as something of an oddball. His talk this week was tied to the publication of Quik Build: Adam Kalkin's ABC of Container Architecture ($49.95), which shows 32 of his projects in all their odd ingenuity, including Bunny Lane, a home he built for himself with a 19th century clapboard cottage inside an industrial hanger, and the Push Button House, a furnished room that unfolds from a container with hydraulic walls. For all his artsy provocations, Kalkin's strategy makes some practical sense.
Alice of Magic World – Tokyo Whimsical places exist all over the world. And We Heart is just the place to discover some of them. Check out this awesome new Tokyo restaurant designed by Fantastic Design Works Co. Alice of Magic World – the fourth in a series of eateries based on Lewis Carroll’s creation – is a decidedly trippy affair, complete with custom made heart shaped chandelier and table, playing card tables and its own forest. There’s even Cheshire Cat tail pizza slices on the menu. via We Heart Share this post
Most Interesting Libraries of the World The Royal library Black Diamond at the waterfront of Copenhagen owes its name to the black granite from Zimbabwe used for the facade of the building. The name was used by the public first and has been adapted officially later. Design by the Danish architects Schmidt, Hammer & Lassen. Energy Seed by Sungwoo Park & Sunhee Kim Trashing Batteries for Brighter Sidewalks We all know alkaline batteries are really bad for the environment if you don’t dispose of them properly. The right thing to do is send them to special recycling centers but hundreds of tons end up in landfills where their toxic innards seep into the earth. Perhaps a good solution is the Energy Seed, an LED lamp post powered by trashed alkaline batteries. The idea is to encourage people to throw their batteries away into the Energy Seed. There’s a slot for nearly every size battery. Of course once the bins are full, we’re left with the same original problem. Designer: Sungwoo Park & Sunhee Kim
Maldives Floating Islands: Star-Shaped Mini-Cities - Decoded Stuff The tiny island nation of the Maldives is under serious threat from rising sea levels caused by climate change. No part of the 1200 islands which make up the Maldives is more than six feet above sea level, so as sea-levels rise, the entire nation will be under water. The government is buying up land in nearby nations as a place to retreat to when the Maldives disappears. Now it appears that the intrepid Maldivians have come up with a new strategy to fight the rising tide: creating mini floating islands! Koen Olthuis Designs Maldives Floating Islands concept. While exact design details of these new floating islands are still unavailable, Dutch Docklands knows a thing or two about creating water developments using methods and procedures that reduce impact on underwater life and minimize changes to coastal morphology. Source: Inhabitat, Waterstudio.NL
Michael and Iris's Laundry Nook Akurum Published on July 6th, 2011 | by Jules IKEAHacker Materials: Ikea Akurum, Rubrik, Lagan, etc. Description: In this hack, we used a variety of Ikea kitchen cabinet parts/pieces to hack a laundry-nook for a Marin Eichler-built home. We’ve found the Ikea Akurum line to be very versatile when it comes to hacking. For a behind the scenes (or under the countertop — which is a basic Lagan) look, I’ve posted a shot of the structure below. In the base cabinet here, the plywood serves as internal braces to accept the weight of the machines and is just a hair taller than the adjacent cabinetry (to keep the weight on the plywood, not on the particleboard cabinets. Most of the details and more pix can be found on our blog post. One thing we’ve found handy in this install (and our kitchen) is the use of drawer faces for “spacers” — for instance, in the hack linked above, a drawer face was turned 90deg, chopped to height, and used as the faceplate-spacer between the two drawers. The Author
The Luxury Casa Kimball Private Retreat in the Caribbean The Luxury Casa Kimball Private Retreat in the Caribbean The Casa Kimball luxury villa has been designed to the highest of standards by Architect firm Rangr Studio. It is a unique luxury rental villa located in Cabrera, Dominican Republic and consists of eight immaculately designed bedroom suites, which all feature breathtaking views over the Atlantic Ocean. About Richard Barker Love Interior Design & Exotic Travel? May 23, 2011 | Caribbean Dominican Republic Travel | View comments The Westin Hotel, Golf & Spa, Abu Dhabi by Gettys International architectural practice, Gettys, have designed the The Westin Hotel, Golf & Spa project. Luxury Paddington Penthouse, London Renowned London architects and designers SHH have completed the Paddington Penthouse project.
Architecture Imagine the renovation dilemmas. A huge penthouse of a converted 1930s office building in TriBeCa, New York, is to be turned into a functioning home for a family with three teenagers. In fact, we can not quite imagine the issues that faced Steven Harris Architects when the family showed up, literally, at the doorstep of the celebrated architect and asked if he’d like to work on their home. Harris said yes and proceeded to make his magic. The scale of the apartment is huge and the freedom from budget constraints allowed for some spectacular solutions. Harris’s work is often distinguished by clarity and light, by the use of glass, by the maximization of views and, above all, bold solutions. What emerged as a result of the TriBeCa Penthouse project, is a multi-level (27th and 28th floors) nearly 8,000 square-foot (743 square meter) family-friendly residence that includes self-contained guest quarters and a new glass-and-teak-beam rooftop pavilion that functions as a recreation room.
Tangga House by Guz Architects By Eric • Mar 23, 2011 • Selected Work The Tangga House is another Singapore’s dream home designed by Guz Architects. Completed in 2009, the 7,663 square foot residence is located in Holland Village, an elite district of Singapore that is famous amongst the expatriate community. The luxury single-family home gives the owners the opportunity to live in harmony and comfort with nature, in Singapore’s hot tropical climate. Tangga House by Guz Architects: “The house is a contemporary interpretation of a traditional courtyard house, laid out around a central green courtyard with a double height stair and entry area forming the focal point of the project. The L-shaped plan creates open spaces which encourage natural ventilation and offer resident’s views over the courtyard to the veranda, roof gardens and beyond. The large roof above the courtyard creates an indoor and outdoor space leading to the gardens and swimming pool which wraps around two sides of the house. Photos by: Patrick Bingham-Hall