Communal Erotic Spaces
The issue, really, is the absence of the erotic city. It forces us to ask: what do our spaces reflect about our treatment of sexuality? Where are the public city brothels? Why aren’t we holding drunken orgy celebrations open to all? Post-‘Sins of the flesh’ West creates a public suppression of sexuality and eroticism. There […]
A Gas Station In The Dutch Waddenzee
Back in 2007, landscape artist Melle Smets built this amazing Tentstation in de Dutch Waddenzee close to the island of Terschelling. The installation was inspired by the fuel stations as you see them everywhere in the world. As Melle says, “they are among the most fabulous logistic inventions of mankind, as they combine a supermarket, […]
Light Is The New Graffiti
As you may have noticed, we like to explore the boundaries of contemporary street art. In the past we wrote about topics such as confetti graffiti, fluorescent tape art and projections that address the issue of street safety at night. This one is another example illustrating the expanding scope of the street art scene. All […]
Neukölln, Part 1: Gentrification As Supposed To Be?
The often celebrated process of gentrification has lost importance in the debate about the city over last years. Why? Because gentrification is no longer an exciting process with an uncertain product at the end. Nowadays we know the result, as we did not twenty years ago. Gentrification means overaged yuppies drinking cocktails, speaking loudly and […]
August 15: Open Air Lecture on ARCAM Island
On Saturday August 15 we are giving a lecture at DUS Architects’ Gecekondu summerhotel at the mini island of the Amsterdam Architecture Institute (ARCAM) in the city centre. We will be there talking about Pop-Up City and where the city is going. Come along and celebrate summer. Our lecture will be in Dutch. Check out […]
The Walking Grill
In the Berlin district of Friedrichshain I came across this ‘Bratwurst’ selling girl close to train/subway station Frankfurter Allee. Observing her for a couple of minutes, her business seemed to run quite well. Which surprised me, as it was incredibly hot that day, and every single fibre in my body shouted for lemonade instead of […]
On Kiosks, Part 4: Moscow
The two tiny little kiosks on the picture are made within and with the fences of a construction site. Behind these rather familiar looking construction fences, renovation of a Russian orthodox church has already started. The two temporary kiosks are obviously made with permission of the building guys, using the available materials. One sells all sorts of relics — a good choice concerning the nearby church. The other embedded kiosk is one of the numerous food selling spots on Moscow's lively streets.
Tape Is The New Graffiti
Today I stumbled upon the work of New York-based artist Aakash Nihalani, who invented a no-nonsense, effective and creative form of sticker art by taping up the walls and streets of his city. Nihalani’s creations add an extra layer to public space, forcing the passengers-by to stop for a moment and view walls or stoop from a different perspective. […]
Free Classic: Domebook 2 By Lloyd Kahn
Some time ago I wrote about a free PDF version of the rarely available book How to Build Your Own Living Structures by Ken Isaacs. I have another great classic for you to download: the inspiring Domebook 2, written by Lloyd Kahn and published in 1971. The book deals with "how to construct cardboard geodesic play-domes". Just like 'bubbletecture', domes are great architectural phenomenons you can find everywhere in the world in all kinds of forms, from Rome's St. Peter's Basilica to La Geode in Paris.
Sewer Pipe Hotel
Celebrate holiday in a sewer pipe! Why not? From September, campsite Buitengewoon Groenhoff in the Dutch town of Vriescheloo will be offering extraordinary hotel rooms of 2,5 by 1,8 meters, clogged in 15 sewer pipes. The pipes are dug into a typical Dutch dyke. Camping owner Bé Dijkoff was inspired by a sewer pipe hotel in […]
On Kiosks, Part 3: Strategy
In this last article in a series about the importance of the kiosk, I’ll cover an initiative that took of this summer in London, called KiosKiosk. KiosKiosk is a project which offers small kiosk space to creative start-ups, like artists and fashion designers for free. Supported by the London Sustainable Development Commission, its founders want […]
Open Source Urbanism With LimeWire Creator
LimeWire founder Mark Gorton has recently announced to launch an application for open source urbanism, inspired by the peer-to-peer principle. Gorton’s goal is to stimulate “crowdsourced development, freely-accessible data libraries, and web forums, as well as actual open source software with which city planners can map transportation designs to people’s needs”, aiming to open up […]
On Kiosks, Part 2: The Shoebox Shop
Two days ago I wrote about the importance of the kiosk to the urban realm, especially the quality of public space. It seems that the world of urban designers and other creatives have discovered its potential. Today I’ll show you a nice example of a contemporary kiosk. During my holiday in Finland, the people of […]
Acoustic Ecology: Endangered Soundscapes
Under the name ‘Save Our Sounds’, the BBC is currently building a huge digital user generated collection of sounds and soundscapes of the world. All gathered media is linked to geographical locations on an interactive map, which you can explore by clicking here. But… why? Well, just like endangered species of animals, there are sounds that are […]
On Kiosks, Part 1: Urbanism
We all know the kiosks on the busy streets of our world cities — those small, neat pop-up booths that sell about everything, from newspapers and magazines to cigarettes and cold drinks. Kiosks mean a lot to me, and to the city itself. At these colourful places, where tourists buy their public transport tickets and commuters […]
