The Weinerchaise by Andy Martin Associates

At this year’s 100% Design show in London, Andy Martin Associates will be exhibiting the ‘Weinerchaise’ as part of the ‘100% Inspiration’ feature. This is Andy Martin’s response to the brick as an inspirational object, “it is such an iconic British building material and I thought it worth pursuing for inspiration. Individually a brick seems characterless but with others has the possibility to be poetic,” says Martin. It is constructed entirely of extruded and wire cut bricks using the thin set joint method and resin bonding. The bricks are stacked and bonded accurately in a mould, and once set, carved by hand to the designed shape. The piece was produced with the help of Weinerbergerbricks, one of Europe’s largest and most innovative brick manufacturers.

Link: http://www.contemporist.com/2009/09/24/the-weinerchaise-by-andy-martin-associates/

Brick wall

Modern day movie posters

More at http://www.mymodernmet.com/profiles/blogs/25-magnificent-modern-day

Highway

Living bridges

I do hope this is not a hoax or anything, because it is lovely.


North-Eastern India is one of the wettest places on earth. There bridges aren't built - they're grown.


The living bridges of Cherrapunji in India are made from the roots of the Ficus elastica tree. This tree produces a series of secondary roots from higher up its trunk and can comfortably perch atop huge boulders along the riverbanks, or even in the middle of the rivers themselves.

Go to http://rootbridges.blogspot.com/ to see more pics.

Sliding house

Inspirational.


The Sliding House, by dRMM Architecture, may look like a simple timber barn or shed, and you may not be impressed by it — until you discover that it contains a surprise within it. The design of this home is so unique that, well, there is no real actual architectural term to describe it. In fact, the best way to describe it is to say that the house slides!


You see, what appears to be house’s exterior walls and roof are actually a second skin that slides across a longitudinal axis to reveal a second facade. Sliding back and forth, the mobile exterior offers the house’s residents incredible flexibility with the look and behavior of the building. The lighting and mood of the interior spaces can be altered with the simple movement of the exterior. The building’s architectural trick also mean the heating and cooling loads of the house can be manipulated throughout the year.

The house was designed by London-based practice de Rijke Marsh Morgan for a client who desired a retirement home. The house is made up of three buildings arranged along a longitudinal axis, with a garage set perpendicularly, off to the side. A small patio was located in front.

Glass and red rubber work in unison with the timber of the roof/wall enclosure to create a pleasing and unassuming shape that resembles the barns and sheds of the rural countryside. The entire house sits on a concrete bed, which partially hides the surprising mechanism that allows the home to reveal a second facade.

If achieving a flexible outcome within tight planning constraints is truly the hallmark of a great architect, then dRMM architects can clearly take a bow. We absolutely loved this one.

Text from inhabitat: http://www.inhabitat.com/2009/02/20/residence-sliding-house-drmm/

Architect: drmm - http://www.drmm.co.uk/

Heaven of Delight

Royal Palace in Brussels with Jan Fabre's Heaven of Delight - with the ceiling decorated with jeweled scarabs.

A flame in microgravity

In the year 2000 the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) of the United States discovered that gravity plays an indirect role in flame formation and composition. The common distribution of a flame under normal gravity conditions depends on convection, as soot tends to rise to the top of a flame (such as in a candle in normal gravity conditions), making it yellow. In microgravity or zero gravity environment, such as on a circular orbit , convection no longer occurs and the flame becomes spherical, with a tendency to become bluer and more efficient. There are several possible explanations for this difference, of which the most likely is the hypothesis that the temperature is sufficiently evenly distributed that soot is not formed and complete combustion occurs. Experiments by NASA reveal that diffusion flames in microgravity allow more soot to be completely oxidized after they are produced than do diffusion flames on Earth, because of a series of mechanisms that behave differently in microgravity when compared to normal gravity conditions. These discoveries have potential applications in applied science and industry, especially concerning fuel efficiency.

Text from tywkiwdbi, who got it from wiki. Link below.

http://tywkiwdbi.blogspot.com/2009/01/flame-in-microgravity.html

Cat Shower 2 (Woody Style, very funny and cute) 猫ウッディーのシャワー2

Ahh! too cute!