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Adream 2012 Ideas Competition winners

The Ideas competition 'Adream 2012 – Architecture and design using renewable and ecological materials' – is a European project under the joint auspices of the Regional Council of Picardie (France) and the Free State of Thuringia (Germany) aimed at giving impetus to new developments.

The potential of renewable and ecologically sound materials is still substantially under-exploited. Through this competition, the partner regions have therefore invited and promoted innovative proposals for developing a sustainable economy by means of contemporary designs which make well-considered use of such resources.

Entrants from all over Europe submitted a range of creative and innovative projects. Here are some of the winning projects.

Coffee ground pots - Sanam Viseux - France
1st prize Design/Student

Modular thatch panels - Ratia Rabemananoro - France
1st prize Architecture/Professional
Modular thatch panels for insulation and exterior wall

Eco Bell - Camille Courlivant - France
2nd prize Design/Student
Storage bells

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tags: sustainable, outdoor, fabric, awards, project, textile, new technologies, ceramic, competitions, new products, wood
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Stools from Vladislav Zhukovets

Russian designer Vladislav Zhukovets created 'Stool' for the Perm Furniture Competition and became the winner in one of the categories.

 

The stool is made from natural wood with the upper part unpainted. The idea is very simple: to create beautiful, warm and ecological objects which are good-looking, nice to touch and comfortable to sit on.



Jury's comments:

“A very very nice spirit and I really appreciate the honesty and warmth in these simple designs which could have excellent commercial success.” Ross Lovegrove

“I am ready to buy such stool right now. Harmonious, modern, harmless subject with obvious function and the application scenario. Beauty!” Vadim Kibardin



Via designeast.eu

tags: furniture, awards, competitions, wood
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Tower of Nests

'Tower of Nests' was the project presented by Kjellgren Kaminsky Architecture for Evolo Skyscraper Competition. KKA presented a vision of a tower where humans and animals coexist. A building that aims to be a symbol; not of power nor wealth, but of a new era of harmony and interplay between nature and mankind.

Creating habitats for animals that have been driven out of their natural environments as a result of development. Creating vertical density within the city to reduce sprawl and commuting distances.

The development trend of contemporary metropolises is to increase the population density. This leads to developing cities vertically instead of horizontally. Although increasing the population per unit area of the city may reduce the daily commutes, it reduces the daily interaction of people with green spaces, animals and insects. This creates a gray, dull city and may increase stress and depression among the inhabitants. Moreover, the diversity of animals and insects will be reduced significantly. On the other hand, building parks, as a suitable place for animals, may not be economically feasible due to the land price. In the era of Green Architecture, where building sustainable is becoming commonplace, what if the collection of green buildings could go a step further and actually become a functional habitat for birds and wildlife?

To address all of these issues, we developed a new high-rise typology which is essentially integrating human and animal inhabitants in high-rise buildings. The design further elaborates a combination of rational, man-made apartments and natural, organic-formed bird nests on the facade of a skyscraper. Birds and insects are nature's premier architects, using a disarranged form to build functional homes in which to live, reproduce and care for their young ones. Recycling sticks, branches, grass and mud to construct their shelters, they are undoubtedly the first creators of Green Architecture.

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tags: sustainable, outdoor, contemporary architecture, project, competitions
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The Air We Breathe

The Chicago Clean Air Design Challenge is a regional design contest to address issues of air quality in two of Chicago's most affected neighborhoods- Pilsen and Little Village. Residents of Pilsen and Little Village live below two coal powered plants that regularly emit lead and other toxins into the air. High rates of asthma and other air-quality illnesses are pressing concerns for the residents of these neighborhoods and for much of Chicago. This is the critical environmental concern of the moment in your city and you are a designer.

What will you do about it?

They want to find out what designers in industrial design, graphic design, interior architecture, architecture, and public space design will envision to address issues of respiratory health, raising awareness, and improving overall quality of life for the people who live (and breathe) in neighborhoods nestled amongst the coal burning power plants.

They encourage cross-disciplinary collaboration and submissions can come from a class, a group, a partnership, or an individual.

Goals of the contest:
• Use design to empower individuals through information, tools, spaces, etc to help them protect themselves while Fisk and Crawford continue to operate and until they are forced to shut down.
• Use design to raise awareness and mobilize individuals to take action.
• Use design to better educate people in the Pilsen and Little Village communities about the health effects of airborne contaminants caused by the coal plants.
• Use the contest and the exhibition/awards ceremony as a media event to raise awareness throughout Chicago about the negative impacts of the coal plants in Pilsen and Little Village.

The Air We Breathe will culminate in an exhibition of outstanding submissions and awards ceremony at a gallery in Pilsen.

More details at DesignMakesChange.com

Deadline: April 18 2011

tags: outdoor, project, competitions
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Prix Emile Hermès 2011 Call for Entries

Participate to the Prix Emile Hermès 2011, worldwide design competition organised by the Hermès Foundation!



As a designer, an interior designer, an architect, an engineer or a student in design, don't miss the registrations for the Prix Émile Hermès.

This design competition supports actively the young talents in their desire of future and innovation and thanks to the success of the 2008 European edition, the 2011 edition extends henceforth on the international stage.

The 2011 edition will reward projects stemming from a reflection on the sense of the object and answering the current and future needs of the society on the following theme: "Heat, me-heat, re-heat".

Beyond sheer creativity, it is a question of activating a forward-looking thought taking into account the environment (through the promotion of sustainable development) and traditional skills, two of the Hermès Foundation's core spheres of action.

The initial shortlist is drawn up by a distinguished international jury chaired by Toyo Ito. Then each designer is invited to create a prototype financed by the Foundation, from which the same jury will select three winners, each receiving a cash prize designed to launch or further their career (50,000 euros for the winner, 25,000 euros for the runner-up, and 15,000 euros for the third place). The winners' work will also feature in a special exhibition and in its catalogue and it will be promoted by the Foundation around the world.

Subscriptions already started and will be closed on November 30th, 2010. For the submission of projects and designs, it will close only on February 15th, 2011.

For further information, please visit www.prixemilehermes.com. It is also the place to participate!

The Hermès Foundation team for the Prix Émile Hermès

tags: competitions
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Solar Decathlon Houses

The Solar Decathlon is a competition organized by the U.S. Department of Energy in which universities from across the globe meet to design and build an energetically self-sufficient house that runs only on solar energy, is connected to a power grid, and incorporates technologies that maximize its energy efficiency.

FabLabHouse (photo credit Design Training

"The house is lifted up from the ground, creating a shadow space beneath it. Despite the opportunities provided by the earths natural insulation, weve opted in favor of exploring other avenues (ventilation strategies, evaporative cooling, creating a structural core with thermal inertia, exploiting wind dynamics, etc.) A series of reinforced frame bars create a ribcage in this space, and they define a minimal geometric distance, allowing total freedom but without technical overkill, complicated construction or structural excesses. The structure and the skin become one and the same."



Sunshine Inn/ Bamboo House  (photo credit Design Training)

"Bamboo House is a house that combines traditional oriental architecture with new technologies. It includes a curved roof, a bamboo structure, the most advanced solar systems, temperature and humidity control systems and high level thermal insulation systems. It also has a semi-enclosed garden with bamboo walls that will have a view to Manzanares River."


In the final phase of the competition, teams assemble their prototypes in the so-called Villa Solar. The prototypes designed by the participating teams will then compete in a set of ten contests (Decathlon) in order to demonstrate the self-sufficiency and energy efficiency of each house.

All of the competitions that have been held so far have been located in the National Mall in Washington D.C., and have resulted in great media and social impact, with more than 100,000 visitors attending the competition.

tags: sustainable, outdoor, contemporary architecture, exhibitions, competitions, wood
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Luxury insect hotels in London

A unique architectural competition sees the development of five luxury insect hotels across the London's public gardens. The five hotel designs have been shortlisted as part of ‘Beyond the Hive’, a competition launched by British Land and The City of London Corporation to celebrate 2010 as the International Year of Biodiversity.
Members of the public will be able to see the final constructed hotels on this site and vote for their favourite design between the 19th and 28th June.

The hotels have been designed to attract stag beetles, solitary bees, butterflies, spiders, lacewings, and ladybirds, and will be constructed at Bunhill Fields, West Smithfield, Postman’s Park, St Dunstan’s in the East and Cleary Garden.

The shortlisted designs and teams are as follows:

Hotel A: The Bumblebee City Nesters


Designed by Fisher Tomlin (Professional Garden Designers & Landscapers)
Location: West Smithfield
This design is inspired by the City of London’s prestigious tower buildings, and uses a flexible system that allows it to be adapted to create anything from a two-storey wildlife B&B for smaller spaces, to a complete five star hotel for larger gardens.At West Smithfield, the team will create a series of five towers, ranging in height from 90cm to 120cm, made entirely from recycled materials, including recycled timber, recycled broom poles, and garden and building waste. Two local schools in Wimbledon will help the team in creating the towers, which are designed with solitary bees and bumblebees in mind, but will also provide homes for an array of other insects and invertebrates.


Hotel B: Brookfield Bug Buddies


Designed by Brookfield Europe in collaboration with consultants Arup, DP9, Hilson Moran Partnership and Sir John Cass’s Foundation school, Stepney Way, E1
Location: Postman’s Park
Taking its inspiration from the City of London itself and the juxtaposition between the ancient past and the modern age, the hotel uses pipe work of different widths and lengths sourced from the Pinnacle project. These are fixed together in a sweeping line, rising up from a recycled wood planter base. Reinforcement bars used to create the framework will both support the structure, and allow a plant climber, such as native traveller's joy (clematis vitalba), honeysuckle (lonicera periclymenum) or hop (humulus lupulus).
Hilson Moran Partnership was employed to assess the design’s environmental impacts, Arup Structures reviewed the structural design and DP9 advised on possible planning considerations. Brookfield Construction co-ordinated the team effort and will deliver the scheme, whilst children at local secondary school, Sir John Cass, will assist in procuring the materials and furnishings for the project.


Hotel C: Beevarian Antsel and Gretel Chalet

Designed to commemorate the excursion to London of the German Women in Property; entry co-ordinated by Helaba Landesbank Hessen-Thueringen
Location: Cleary Garden
Based on the design of a typical Bavarian mountain chalet, the ‘Beevarian Antsel and Gretel Chalet’ was designed by “German Women in Property” to commemorate their recent excursion to London.
The design features reclaimed bricks to attract solitary bees, rotten logs for invertebrates, louvered boxes filled with bark for hibernating butterflies, a log drilled with holes for ladybirds and eaves filled with bamboo for lacewings. Set over three floors, all materials used to construct the hotel will be collected from within the City.


Hotel D: The Insect Hotel


Designed by Arup Associates
Location: St Dunstan’s in the East
The façade of the hotel consists of a series of compartments based on a Voronoi pattern found in the natural world, which generates a series of voids varying in size at a depth of 500m.
A variety of recycled waste materials and deadfall are loosely inserted into these voids, whilst the sides of the hotel are accessible for butterflies and moths, and the top is suitable for absorbing rain water through planting.


Hotel E: Inn Vertebrate

Designed by Metalanguage Design
Location: Bunhill Fields
Designed to reflect the diverse architecture of London, the ‘Inn’ is a stylish multi-story habitat with different-sized cavities to accommodate a wide variety of invertebrates.
The main structure will be built off-site, where a network of talented crafts people and designers will be involved in the sourcing and storing of materials, and construction, whilst the final phase - the filling-in of the cavities and planting – will be undertaken when in situ.
The inn will be constructed from recycled and reclaimed wood, bricks and off-cuts found in surrounding areas. Cavities will be filled with soil and stones collected from the garden, whilst seeds for planting wildflowers will be donated by the Bumblebee Conservation Trust.

tags: sustainable, outdoor, awards, contemporary architecture, competitions
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'Sukkah City: New York City' Competition

12 radically temporary structures will be built in Union Square Park this September.

Biblical in origin, the sukkah is an ephemeral, elemental shelter, erected for one week each fall, in which it is customary to share meals, entertain, sleep, and rejoice.

The sukkah's religious function is to commemorate the temporary structures that the Israelites dwelled in during their exodus from Egypt, but it is also about universal ideas of transience and permanence as expressed in architecture. The sukkah is a means of ceremonially practicing homelessness, while at the same time remaining deeply rooted. It calls on us to acknowledge the changing of the seasons, to reconnect with an agricultural past, and to take a moment to dwell on--and dwell in--impermanence.

'Sukkah City: New York City' will re-imagine this ancient phenomenon, develop new methods and propose radical possibilities for traditional design constraints in a contemporary urban site. Twelve finalists will be selected by a panel of architects, designers, and critics to be constructed in Union Square Park from September 19-21, 2010.

One structure will be chosen by New Yorkers to stand and delight throughout the week-long festival of Sukkot as the Official Sukkah of New York City. The process and results of the competition, along with construction documentation and critical essays, will be published in the book "Sukkah City: Radically Temporary Architecture for the Next Three Thousand Years."

tags: sustainable, outdoor, contemporary architecture, project, competitions
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Seoul Cycle Design Competition

Once considered a 'hard' city, Seoul is making strides toward becoming a 'soft' city.
Seoul is about to be reborn as a soft city by embracing design concepts that will redefine its urban environment with an emphasis on themes centering on green, blue, history and human.

The Seoul Cycle Design Competition will be held under the theme, 'cycling with design: seoul style', and is part of Seoul's city-wide effort at improving its design brand and image. The primary goal of the competition is to help build a design oriented city that focuses on its people.

The competition is divided into three categories: cycle design, cycle fashion & accessories design, and cycling infrastructure. All three categories emphasize environment-friendly ideas, with the hope that the contest will contribute to establishing a healthier cycling culture.

Cycles have become an icon of 'eco-friendliness' and 'healthiness,' and are part of a major urban lifestyle trend. Nearly everyone can enjoy riding cycles; therefore, just about everyone will be able to enter the competition. Through this competition we hope that all citizens will have the chance to share their own personal visions for a new Seoul, a city that has embraced change through design. We invite everyone who is interested in cycling and design to take part in the Seoul Cycle Design Competition.

Deadline: July 5 2010

tags: sustainable, outdoor, transportation, competitions, sport
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Winners of the Skyscraper Competition

eVolo has announced the winners of the 2010 Skyscraper Competition.

The Jury selected 3 winners and 27 special mentions among 430 entries from 42 countries.
 
Globalization, sustainability, flexibility, adaptability, and the digital revolution, were some of the multi-layered elements taken into consideration. 

Vertical Prison
The first place was awarded to a project for a vertical prison designed by architecture students Chow Khoon Toong, Ong Tien Yee, and Beh Ssi Cze, from Malaysia. Their project examines the possibility of creating a prison-city in the sky, where the inmates would live in a “free” and productive community with agricultural fields and factories that would support the host city below.

Water Purification Skyscraper in Jakarta
The recipients of the second place are Rezza Rahdian, Erwin Setiawan, Ayu Diah Shanti, and Leonardus Chrisnantyo, from Indonesia, whose project ‘Ciliwung Recovery Program’ aims to purify and repair the Ciliwung River habitat. The building is designed as an ingenious habitable machine that would collect garbage, purify water, and provide housing to thousands of people that live in the slums along the river.

Nested Skyscraper in Tokyo
The third place was awarded to Ryohei Koike and Jarod Poenisch, from the United States, for their project ‘Nested Skyscraper’ that explores robotic construction techniques for a novel structure of carbon sleeves and fiber-laced concrete. The building is a system of multiple layers of composite louvers which thicken and rotate according to solar exposure, ventilation, and materials performance.
 
Among the special mentions there are skyscrapers used as bridges that link different territories, cities in the sky powered by renewable energies, instant deployable buildings for disaster zones, skyscrapers that purify and desalinate sea water, or high-rises that commemorate historic dates. Other proposals create new pedestrian layers for existing cities. Some use the latest building technologies and parametric design to configure environmentally conscious self-sufficient buildings, while others create city-like buildings where different programs are mixed in one structure.
 
Established in 2006, the annual Skyscraper Competition recognizes outstanding ideas that redefine skyscraper design through the use of new technologies, materials, programs, aesthetics, and spatial organization. The award seeks to discover young talents whose ideas will change the way we understand architecture and its relationship with the natural and built environments.

tags: sustainable, outdoor, awards, contemporary architecture, project, competitions
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Pediatric Clinic, East Africa

Architecture Studio 4of7 has developed a project for a pediatric clinic in East Africa. The intent was to create spatial solution which would be able to grow and adapt according to the changing need; or according to varied conditions at different locations. Notionally, if more and more modules were to be added, such configuration could grow infinitely but always confined the circular matrix, defined by three differently sized courtyards.



Responsive solutions in building industry are normally associated with high budgets. In contrast, this is a low-cost application of adaptable architecture. Proposed design is not site specific; it is configured to suite different surroundings and varied demands. For practical reasons, it is based on the use of a single component designed for infinite growth within a recursive geometric pattern.



Proposal for the phase one satellite clinic entails ten modules grouped around two circular courtyards, while phase two configuration will need twenty modules grouped around five circular courtyards.

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tags: sustainable, outdoor, contemporary architecture, project, competitions
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Francesca Martire
Interiorally, on May 16:
"Hope this is available on Amazon, if so it's going on my wish list. I'm fascinated by tonal variety ..."

Daphne, on May 2:
"Love it..such a stunning pieces! want to have one"

Andy Grey, on April 26:
"Mainly hardened polyvinyl carbonate type materials are used to make inflatable furniture,so that the..."

David, on April 26:
"What a beautiful creation it is. I really would love to have this master pieces in my home. How can ..."

Joe, on March 20:
"Simple yet elegant. Great design."

Tony, on March 13:
"Amazing post. Every single one of these will apply to my kitchen. The first image is the coolest I t..."

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