Good old London architecture and decor. Timeless design. Check out this apartment in the heart of United Kingdom.
Numen/For Use Creates Inhabitable "corporeal" Installation With Sticky Tape
Lengths of transparent film and sticky tape wrap around the concrete columns of a Parisian gallery to form a network of hollows and tunnels in an installation by Numen/For Use .
Numen/For Use created the Tape Paris installation for a group exhibition at the Palais de Tokyo in Paris. Titled Inside, the show explores both physical and psychological connotations of interior space.
Related story: N-Light Membrane by Numen/For Use contains an infinite grid of light
The Vienna-based design collective transformed the entrance hall of the gallery into an inhabitable organism-like structure using layers of sticky tape and plastic similar to cling-film. Visitors can navigate their way through the piece, which is suspended between the ceiling and floor and has a translucent “stretched biomorphic skin”.
“The installation was envisaged as a site specific, parasitical structure invading an arbitrary location,” said Numen/For Use co-founder Christoph Katzler.
Visitors to the exhibition can climb into the series of translucent hollows and channels strung six metres above the gallery foyer for a bodily experience.
“In the moment when the audience enters the installation, what started off as a sculpture seamlessly morphs into architecture,” said Katzler, whose previous projects have included a cavernous net staircase in an Austrian gallery.
The thin layers of film that make up the network flex under the weight of passing visitors, and the translucent surfaces give views from within the structure to the floor below.
“The interior of the structure is supple, elastic and pliable while the form itself is statically perfect,” he said.
A team used layers of conventional Scotch Tape to create the sinuous form between the concrete columns of the gallery.
The tape lines were then covered inside and outside by layers of an elastic plastic sheeting to bind the structure together, forming a 50-metre-long network of cocooning passageways.
“With the further layering of the tape, the figure becomes more and more corporeal as it picks up on the slow increase of the curvature,” said the designer.
Tape Paris is supported by fashion brand COS and is on show at the Palais de Tokyo until January 2015.
New Barcelona Design Museum Merges Decorative Art And Design Collections
News: the Barcelona Design Museum will open in December with newly curated collections that represent Catalonian design history from the third century to present day .
Photograph by Lourdes Jansana
The collections will be housed in the new 8,000-square-metre building called the Disseny Hub Barcelona. Local studio BM Arquitectes designed the metal-clad structure for the Barcelona Design Museum on a site just off the Placa de les Glòries Catalanes, a large sunken garden in the centre of an elevated roundabout.
Related story: Vaulted brick pavilion in Barcelona by Map13
The Disseny Hub draws together over 70,000 items from four previously independent museums – the Decorative Arts Museum, Ceramics Museum, the Textile and Clothing Museum and the Graphic Arts Cabinet – and a research centre.
Photograph by Lourdes Jansana
“The new museum is characterised by a flexible, inclusive discourse, which highlights the transversal aspects of these four large collections whilst also focusing on more specific facets in each,” said a statement from the museum.
Photograph by Xavier Padrós
The newly combined collections, which includes pieces of furniture, clothing, poster design and ceramics aim to encourage visitors to delve into the “historic role of the arts.”
Photograph by Xavier Padrós
“Design is, to a certain extent, a consequence of the earlier decorative arts, whether as a reaction to their ornamental value or as exponents of the new industrial, post-industrial or digital world.”
Photograph by Lourdes Jansana
Four exhibitions of the permanent collections that “reflect the dynamic nature of design, designers and society itself” will coincide with the opening of the museum, encompassing product, graphic and fashion design, as well as artworks.
Chair Garriri, 1987 by Javier Mariscal, on show as part of From the World to the Museum: Product Design, Cultural Heritage exhibition. Photograph by Estudio Rafael Vargas
“The new centre traces the evolution from decorative arts to design, an area in which Barcelona has always stood out, and particularly, explores the future perspectives for this discipline,” they said.
Chair BKF, 1938 by Grupo Austral, on show as part of From the World to the Museum: Product Design, Cultural Heritage exhibition. Photograph by Estudio Rafael Vargas
The collections will be presented within MBM Arquitectes’s Hub building, which is clad in zinc plates with large sections of glazing that give the museum “an industrial feel.”
Motorbike Impala, 1962 by Leopoldo Milá, on show as part of From the World to the Museum: Product Design, Cultural Heritage exhibition. Photograph by Estudio Rafael Vargas
A large angular volume containing an auditorium cantilevers from the top of the building over the tramlines of the Glòries station at one side of the site, while on the other side a further overhanging box has large sections of glazing that look over an artificial lake.
Panel La Xocolatada, 1710, on show as part of the Extraordinary! Decorative Arts and Author Art Collections (3rd – 20th Centuries) exhibition. Photograph by Guillem Fernández
The two projections, coupled with the metal cladding, give the building an anvil-shaped appearance.
Dresser drawer, 1902 by Joan Busquets i Jané, on show as part of the Extraordinary! Decorative Arts and Author Art Collections (3rd – 20th Centuries) exhibition. Photograph by Xavier Padrós
Stairwells and escalator wells that serve the upper and basement floors of the building are attached to the side of the building.
Dress, Barcelona, 1850–1855, on show as part of the Dressing the body. Silhouettes and fashion (1550-2014) exhibition. Photograph by La Photographgràfica
On the interior, the building is divided into two parts – a 7, 00-square-metre exhibition centre spread over four upper floors and a 900-square-metre Documentation Centre across the building’s basement.
Dress, 1950 by Manuel Pertegaz, on show as part of the Dressing the body. Silhouettes and fashion (1550-2014) exhibition. Photograph by La Photographgràfica
The Documentation Centre houses an archive and public library of over 22, 000 documents alongside a space for educational workshops.
Poster for Industria y Arquitectura 2ª Exposición g.R, 1954 by Ricard Giralt Miracle, on show as part of the Graphic Design: From Trade to Profession (1940-1980) exhibition. Photograph by Xavier Padrós
“The goal is for visitors to understand and take part in the process that lies behind the creation of an object, concerning its concept, functions and forms, production, use and social representation,” said a statement from the museum.
Poster for Expoquimia 68, 1968 by Ernest Moradell, on show as part of the Graphic Design: From Trade to Profession (1940-1980) exhibition. Photograph by Xavier Padrós
The Disseny Hub Barcelona will open on 14 December 2014.
A Bubblegum Pink Filing Cabinet
First (pressing) things, first—that photo looks a little pixelated doesn’t it? I’m grappling with a bit of buyer’s remorse because I just splurged on a new Canon EOS 7D and clearly have no idea what I’m doing. I’ve been avoiding it for the past couple of weeks because of the intimidation factor, but finally broke it out yesterday for today’s post. Now I feel like throwing my hands up in the air because only a few shots seemed worth sharing. Any Canon aficionados care to offer some tips? I’m thinking it has something to do with the auto focus, but that’s as far as my imagination has gotten me.
Shoty shots aside, I’m personally of the mind that a few less pixels can’t detract from how precious my most recent Thrift Store Score is. This retro bubblegum pink filing cabinet came from a local used furniture shop downtown and cost me less than \$50. Considering the fact that I had, up until this point, been planning to spend over three times that amount on this beauty from CB2 (of course, now it’s on sale…), I’d call it one of my more responsible purchases! Plus, I’ll take vintage over mass-produced any day.
It was one of those serendipitous moments where I went to the furniture store in search of new dining room chairs, but left with nothing—that is, aside from visions of a pretty pink filing cabinet that I had seen tucked in the corner. Not two days went by before I made up my mind to go back for it. Happily, there she was in all her pristine glory.
It has been so wonderful having a real filing cabinet (with a working key, too!) in my office/studio. Although my filing system is anything but pretty or perfectly uniform on the inside, it is perfectly functional, which is more than I could say of my previous system (aka. piles of paper scattered on every surface). I’m in love.
And with that, I leave you for the weekend. I hope you all enjoy safe late-night traipsing and sweet Halloween treats tonight—I, for one, can hardly wait to get my hands on some candy. I’m obviously going to blame that instinct on my cotton candy-colored filing cabinet though…
Black Glass Facade Mirrors Scenery At South London Home By Ian McChesney
Opaque glass cladding on this south London house by Ian McChesney reflects the brick and stucco facades of neighbouring Victorian properties and foliage from a park next door .
Ian McChesney designed the five-bedroom home, named Tree House, for a plot of land in a conservation area in Sydenham, south-east London.
Related story: Architecture for London creates light-filled London extension using polished materials
The London-based architect came up against a number of planning restrictions imposed for the site, which is surrounded by a number of late Victorian properties, including a requirement to adhere to sustainable building standards. Over 68 objections were lodged against the development by local residents.
“It was made clear to us by the planners at Lewisham that a ‘striking’ and high-quality design was sought for this site,” McChesney told Dezeen.
In response, McChesney designed “a simplistic and crisp form” made of two conjoined volumes topped by a butterfly roof that pitches up at the edges and dips in the centre.
“Given the variety of forms we decided not to mimic the existing massing but to create something obviously new,” he said.
The two timber-framed volumes are clad in sections of black polished glass, favoured by the planning committee for its perceived ability to blend into the surroundings. A layer of insulation between the prefabricated wooden frame and glass facing gives the house warmth.
The glossy surface reflects the facades of neighbouring houses and planting, “helping it to sit harmoniously in it’s leafy setting.”
The larger of the two volumes houses the main open-plan living space of the property and a bedroom on the ground floor, while four further bedrooms are located across the upper floor.
Windows with wooden frames, set neatly into the glass panelling of the lower floor, face onto the gardens.
Attached to the side of living space, the second volume forms a slim windowless stairwell that creates a buffer between an adjacent property.
A doorway at either end of the stairwell provides two entrance points to the building, which is positioned between two small tracks.
Off the hallway there is open-plan living room and kitchen with light wooden floorboards. The kitchen is centred around an island finished in a contrasting dark-stained wood, while in the living room a wood-burning stove with a flue that rises through the ceiling.
Sections of wood-framed glazing overlook the garden and a set of timber steps lead from glazed doors onto an area of raised decking.
Above the living space there are four further bedrooms, and two bathrooms situated at either end of the stairwell. Panels of high-level glazing in the bedrooms sit flush with the polished glass facade and give views to the park.
Site plan 
Ground floor plan 
First floor plan –
Dezeen
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