Playhouse by Aboday A spiralling concrete slide connects the kitchen and child's bedroom of this family house near Jakarta designed by Indonesian architects Aboday and photographed by Happy Lim. Update: this project is included in Dezeen Book of Ideas, which is on sale now for £12. Play House is part of a gated cluster of 120 residences in Bumi Serpong Damai, Tangerang. Apart from three enclosed bedrooms the interior is an open-plan space with whitewashed walls and exposed ten-metre concrete ceilings. An open staircase sits between the library and living area on the ground floor and leads up to a gallery on the first. The two-storey house has an exposed concrete exterior covered in part by climbing plants, and punctuated by slit windows and ceiling-height glazing. The house has a large thermal mass due to its concrete construction, relying on natural ventilation and shading, heat-resistant finishes, and a forty-millimeter wall cavity to prevent overheating during the summer. Click above for larger image
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
10 Amazing Underground Homes - Oddee.com (underground, homes...) With the population growing more and more each year, it was only a matter of time before people started building their homes underground like Hobbits from the Tolkien tale. Mankind started off living in caves, and now we realize that "earth homes" are actually a very eco-friendly way to live. These ten underground homes are so amazing they might make you want to set up camp underground too! Cave House in Festus, Missouri This modern and energy-efficient 15,000-square-foot home is built within a sandstone cave in Festus, Missouri. This space was previously used as a concert venue and a roller skating rink! Malator in Druidstone, Wales This contemporary home is touted as one of Wales' architectural masterpieces. "The turf roof, steel chimney and peephole doorway inevitably gave way to its local nickname as ‘the Teletubby house'. Hidden House in Lower Silesia, Poland The Underground House, Great Ormside, Cumbria, England Sedum House, North Norfolk Coast, U.K. Flower Petals in Bolton, U.K.
Apple to build largest end user-owned, onsite solar array in the U.S. Apple's Maiden data center already boasts a white cool-roof and is set to add the largest end user-owned, onsite solar array in the U.S. Following widespread criticism of its environmental record from groups including Greenpeace, Apple has made efforts to reduce the environmental impact of its products and facilities in recent years. As part of these ongoing efforts, the company has revealed plans to build the United States' largest end user-owned, onsite solar array at its Maiden, North Carolina iDataCenter. The news comes from a newly released report outlining the environmental impact of Apple's worldwide facilities, including its retail stores, R&D facilities, and operations and data centers. Further enhancing the facility's environmental credentials, Apple will build a 100-acre, 20-megawatt facility on land surrounding the data center to supply 42 million kWh of renewable energy to the facility annually. Source: Apple Facilities Report (PDF) via 9to5Mac About the Author
Small House has the footprint of an average sized bedroom - Images 'Small House' is Unemeri Architects' solution to living functionally on a block of land that is smaller than the average sized bedroom Image Gallery (13 images) This incredible 4 x 4 meter (13 x 13 foot) family home pushes architectural boundaries outside of the box. Situated in the highly dense and populated city of Tokyo, "Small House" is Unemeri Architects' solution to living functionally on a block of land that is smaller than the average-sized bedroom. Spread over four levels, this residential building features two bedrooms, open living and dining room, bathroom and rooftop terrace. View all With a height of 9 meters (29.5 feet), the building is a modern day tower, with each floor being joined by a continuous spiral staircase. Space around the building's perimeter allows natural light to stream through the rooms on each level, and also creates the illusion of open space. Overall, Unemeri's Small House is a clever use of space and design that provides small living to the max.
Modular home comes delivered in a 10 foot box and is assembled “like an IKEA house” House Arc is a prefabricated off-the-grid housing solution that facilitates compact living Image Gallery (20 images) House Arc, by Bellomo Architects, is a prefabricated off-the-grid housing solution that facilitates compact living. The project was originally designed as an environmentally sensitive and affordable method of housing that is not only functional but also attractive to the eye. Furthermore, it is designed to be easily packed and shipped to any location, where it can then be erected by the user or community. View all The House Arc is designed to be flat-packed and shipped in a remarkably small box that measures 4 x 10 x 3 feet (1.2 x 3 x .95 meters). Optional additions to further enhance the sustainability of House Arc include the installation of solar photovoltaic panels and insulation that can be added between panels. Whilst the House Arc would make an attractive backyard retreat, the lightweight and easy-to-construct house could also function as an emergency shelter.
Britain to get first floating amphibious home February 13, 2012 at 5:46 PM Lawrence Hall This is a legacy post from the findaproperty.com blog which is now maintained as an archive within the Zoopla blog. Links have been preserved. It sounds more science fiction than bricks and mortar, but Britain is to get its first ever floating home after planning permission was granted to a house that rises with flood waters. The amphibious home – to be set just 10m from the water’s edge – is to be built on an island on the banks of the Thames close to Marlow in Buckinghamshire. It’s considered a major breakthrough for architects and designers who have been trying to find ways to mitigate the risk and damage of water in flood-prone areas. Diagram showing the amphibious house when the Thames is at a regular height … The modern 225 sq ft home, designed by London-based Baca Architects, will rest on fixed foundations but whenever a flood occurs the entire building will rise up in its dock and float, buoyed by the floodwater. Like this: Like Loading...
Unbelievable and Incredible Staircase…!! - StumbleUpon Sometimes architects can get a bit carried away. These staircase designs are truly incredible and truly fabulous….!! Some of these have been taken from designer / architecture websites and most of them are unimaginable in the normal thinking. let us know which one is the most incredible in terms of design and aesthetics or if you have any picture which can be a part of this post we will be glad to share it with readers. Post your images in comments and we will display them here with your name. [ad1] [ad2] Ads by Google
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
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.
D-Shape 3D printer can print full-sized houses The growing popularity of 3D printers, such as the Printbot or MakerBot's Thing-o-Matic, testify to the fact that additive manufacturing is slowly entering the mainstream. The devices are now small enough to fit on a desk and they can make all sorts of stuff, such as toys, chess figures, or spare door knobs. But what if you want to make something slightly bigger - say, a house? Then you need to turn to Enrico Dini, the founder of Monolite UK and the inventor of the D-Shape "robotic building system." View all The D-Shape is potentially capable of printing a two story building - complete with stairs, partition walls, columns, domes, and piping cavities - using only ordinary sand and an inorganic binder. The building process is very close to what we'd expect of a huge 3D printer. The desired structure is erected in a single work session, starting from the bottom up. The time gap widens in the case of structures with custom shapes. This all sounds very promising.
Lofted Space-Saving Furniture for Bedroom Interiors Tumidei is more than just a furniture company – they construct modern and relatively inexpensive (no, not cheap) pieces of furniture that they also create compositions from – interior design photos that you can use to shape your own space. These lofted bedroom interiors are brilliantly varied and are great space-saving solutions for cramped bedrooms. A lot of these lofted interiors are clearly designed for children and teens in terms of sizes, colors and material quality. There is nothing to say that adults could not use this furniture as well and there are certainly more ways to put these sets together than are suggested by these photographs, but they do provide some ways in which you could coordinate colors, materials and forms to create a composite design that looks planned and organized ahead of time.
Dream Home : Syncline House by Arch 11 This exceptionally designed modern architectural residence sits alongside a mountainous Midwestern terrain. The designing firm, Arch11 was founded in 1993 by James Trewitt and E.J. Meade, and is based in Boulder and Denver Colorado. Arch11 goes beyond seemingly restrictive site parameters to produce the above home on a syncline landscape. The geological definition of a syncline is a fold or crease in landscape caused by the rise of an ancient sea bed over time. The architects strategized to have the home reflect its site, which is a threshold between the city and nearby mountain park area. The home’s design embraces its position between nature and man through its sustainable green design qualities. Exterior facades show geometry and earth-toned materials that blend into the landscape.