Forget Tents: It’s Pop-Up Lodging!
Camping is fun, but setting up and moving everything can overcome the peacefulness of sleeping in a natural environment away from the city. Shelter Co. is a pop-up lodging service for groups for an overnight outdoor experience. Based in California, Shelter Co. travels and sets up a camp wherever you want it, and if you don’t […]
Plant Tags For Urban Objects
This is for all the urban gardeners out there. No, I don’t mean actual gardening in the city: Carmichael Collective (yes, the insect memorial folks) have been placing their Urban Plant Tags around Minneapolis lately. As tipped off by the fine folks at DesignBoom, the Urban Plant Tags are just like those tiny tags you […]
Burn Calories While Working With This Pedal-Powered Workplace
Leuven-based WeWatt created a multifunctional three-seat circular table that’s a workplace and a fitness device at the same time. Stimulating physical activity while working, the company’s WeBike generates electricity to charge your every-day electronic components such as your energy craving smartphone or end-of-battery-life laptop. LEDs in front of every seat indicate the amount of energy generated with cycling. […]
#WDCD: Playing In The City
On the second day of the What Design Can Do in Amsterdam last week, I was expecting restlessness from the speakers and the audience. Nevertheless, hosts and speakers at WDCD managed to keep the audience entertained and focused until the end. The last speaker, Andrew Shoben, presented the work of Greyworld, a collective of artists that creates […]
Tio Tikka, Food (Truck) Pioneer
Helsinkian Tio Tikka is only 21 years old. Yet, he has already been the brains behind some great food concepts in the Finnish capital. At the age of 19 he popped up in downtown Helsinki's public space with a Citroën Camionette truck that he had turned into a 24/7 crêperie/coffee bar on wheels. His struggle with the local authorities over street-selling permits paved the way for a (very) humble street food culture in Helsinki. We had a chat with Tio during our Helsinki visit, in his new restaurant/club Suola that he opened three weeks ago.
Socialmatic: 21st Century Polaroid
ADR Studio created the Socialmatic camera project, a modern-times Polaroid. The design of the camera is directly inspired by the Instagram icon found on mobile devices. The Socialmatic camera takes pictures, applies Instagram effects and prints the typical square photographs directly from the camera onto custom made paper sheets. The integrated software can connect to the Internet and enables users to share their shots directly on Facebook. Nevertheless, the creators are more interested in real life sharing — they have anticipated a glue strip on the backside of the sheet that facilitates public display of the image. A dedicated space for comments could also be left empty if the user wishes to do so.
From Trash To Treasure: Raumlabor’s Recycled Home
My mother always told me that recycling was a good thing to do for the environment (thanks, Mom!). Plenty of architects are catching onto the trend: we’ve written previously about a façade made from a thousand doors, recycled bus shelters in Uganda’s bustling capital city, and, of course, shipping container urbanism. There certainly isn’t a shortage of useable material on this planet that begs to be re-made into something new.
Trade Your Dog’s Poo For Free Wi-Fi
Internet provider Terra collaborated with DDB Mexico to launch a campaign that rewards you for disposing your dog’s droppings with free Wi-Fi. Talk about a treat, and encouragement of good behaviour for the tethered ‘always connected to our mobile devices’ individual. Instead of special signs or the threat of a fine, this pilot tries to make to those poo-littered parks in Mexico (a little) cleaner with positive reinforcement...
This Flower Shop Is A Coffee Bar At The Same Time
Last year we pinpointed the Everything Is A Coffee Bar trend, which involves increasing numbers of urban services and shops that merge with coffee bars. Fleuriste is yet another example that goes with this idea.
Magnetic Bike Lights From Copenhagen
Designers at Copenhagen Parts are specialized in producing original and innovative lifestyle bicycle gear focused on urban mobility, functionality and style. After creating their pretty brilliant Bike Porter, a handlebar with an integrated basket to help you carry your heavy groceries, Copenhagen Parts introduced their latest genius creation: the Magnetic Bike Light. Bike lights are necessary at night, […]
#WDCD: ‘Architecture Is Where Life Happens’
It’s a lovely line, isn’t it? It was uttered towards the end of the first day of What Design Can Do at Amsterdam’s Stadsschouwburg by Cameron Sinclair, a co-founder of Architecture for Humanity, a charitable organisation that provides on-the-ground architectural solutions for communities in the wake of crisis situations. As we recently wrote in reaction […]
Cleaning Day Turns The City Into One Big Flea Market
On Cleaning Day every urbanite can sell or donate his/her furniture, clothes, gadgets and more, right on the street.
We’re So Electric: Humanistic High-Voltage Pylons
High-voltage electrical pylons. While electrifying, they are not exactly the most exciting and inspiring pieces of architectural design on the urban or rural landscapes. That is, until Landsnet, one of Iceland’s energy suppliers, commissioned an international design competition to yield some new designs. The most striking submission came from the folks at Choi + Shine. […]
Kanto: A Pop-Up Sauna In Public Space
During our trip to World Design Capital Helsinki 2012 last weekend, we stumbled upon a wooden sauna right in the middle of Munkkisaari, a raw urban harbor area in the South-Western part of the city.
High-Speed Architecture: 72-Hour Architectural Design
What are you up to this July? Want to design and create a piece of architecture over the course of 72 hours? The 72 Hour Urban Action allows you to do just that. Self-dubbed as the “world’s first real-time architecture competition,” teams have a mere 72 hours to design and construct interventions into a hotly […]
