Green Growing Concrete

Grass can be grown directly in green-growing concrete.  It can be planted into different structures on roofs and also on the side of river banks.

"Green-growing concrete has the strength and durability of concrete, as well as the ability to grow plants like soil.

Not only can lawn or grass be grown on the concrete, but it can also take medium-sized trees."

Castleford Regeneration

Castleford in Yorkshire was in the spotlight earlier in the year as Kevin McCloud's Big Town Plan televised the regeneration of this former mining town.

Today I went to Castleford and saw the famous bridge and the Tickle Cock Underpass.  The bridge works really well and has some cleverly designed seating right the way across the bridge.  It curves across the bridge and there are four lots of seating.  

I was intrigued to see Tickle Cock Underpass because of the flocked wall and seating.  The Underpass itself is very well designed but the immediate problem as you can see from the photos above is that the flocked seating has been vandalised.   It was only opened on 27 June 2008 so what will it look like in another six months?

 Martin Richman selected this material so it will be interesting to see what materials he uses for the London Olympic bridges commissions.

 

Cold War Modern - Design 1945-1970

Cold War Modern - Design 1945-1970 at the Victoria and Albert Museum is on until 11 Jan 2009.  This is a long and very detailed exhibition which takes you through both US and USSR design developments during a time of extreme fear and anxiety after WWII.  "Modern Life seemed to offer both utopia and catastrophe" as both countries tried to out do each other with design complexities and innovations to build a better world.

Interesting though the exhibition is I didn't like any of the designs.  All this creative output was created by anxiety and fear which is the antithesis of anything I am interested in designing.  The paranoia and potential terror all filter into the work.

Smell: Fashion V Sport at the V and A

I really didn't like Fashion V Sport at the V and A.  I didn't like the way it was exhibited, nor the patterns, shapes, fabrics, colours, lighting or display of the exhibition.  

Two of the exhibits weren't working when I went, which I suppose as the exhibition finishes on 4 Jan is fair enough. 

The first one not working was "Please touch the wall to activate the smell" - I think you were meant to be able to smell BO.  The second one not to work said "Please walk over the floor to activate the smell" and I think you were meant to smell something musty but it had obviously worn off.

It was meant to be clever and witty...

Geffrye Museum

Two exhibitions about the home at the Geffrye museum:

Christmas Past: 400 years of seasonal traditions in English homes - finishes 4 Jan

This exhibition shows you a typical room with a typical Christmas table laden with the kinds of foods and drinks eaten.  Apparently the concept of politeness in the eighteenth century was more complex than today's present meaning and it included not showing extremes of temper or opinions.

Choosing the Chintz: Men, Women and furnishing the home from 1850 to the present - finishes 22 Feb.  What captured my imagination in this exhibition is the fact that men were the main selectors of soft furnishings and decoration in the home in the nineteenth century.  Women's influence in the home only developed after 1879 and the Married Women's Property Act when their legal position changed and they were allowed to retain ownership of belongings after they were married.  Until this time men chose their furnishings as it reflected their position and status in society.

Urine Odours on concrete

There is a forum for "Removing dog urine smell in concrete floors" which is quite comprehensive and makes lots of useful suggestions and white vinegar seems to be an effective solution.

Demos looks at happiness

Demos is an independent research and think tank.

A recently published book A Material World: Caring for the Public Realm stating "How things are kept and cared for demonstrated their significance...in terms of how much value we place on them".

Happiness is also something that Demos has noted that we are all taking much more interest in 

Guerilla Gardening

Guerilla Gardening has been described as political gardening.  Active guerilla gardeners enables derelict urban areas to be rejuvenated.  It's a global enterprise with examples from Australia, to US to Denmark to South Africa and to the UK.

There is a blog about Guerilla Gardening by Richard Reynolds who has also written a book "On Guerilla Gardening" and with instructions on how to get started.  The Community section on the blog shows how widespread it is with an international sunflower spreading festival. 

Amazon Court Office Complex, Prague, Czech Republic

Schmidt Hammer Lassen are the architects who designed Amazon Court Office Complex in Prague.  What is particularly interesting is that they worked with a textile designer to produce the printed screens for the windows over looking the atrium.  This work really demonstrates exciting creative solutions for buildings and also interesting opportunities for textile designers.

The textile designer in question is Ann Marie Ploug.

Too Many Possessions...

"If we do not see that we get used to our material possessions, we shall over invest in acquiring them, at the expense of our leisure.  As a result, our life can get distorted towards working and making money and away from other pursuits."

from Happiness Lessons from a New Science by Richard Layard

Is it fun being so rich?

Jack Ma, entrepreneur extraordinaire commented on wealth during The Interview was asked "Is it fun being so rich?"

During this interview he said he was happiest earning $10 a month and that being a rich man is a big burden.

Happiness is having a hinterland...

The concept of a hinterland is doing the rounds after David Milliband's comments.  What is a hinterland?  Hinterland is basically about having old fashioned hobbies or interests that have nothing to do with career, cash nor family...

Creating Flow

"Cultivating Flow in Everyday Life

• wake up in the morning with a specific goal to look forward to
• if you do anything well it becomes enjoyable
• to keep enjoying something you need to increase its complexity
• practise making everyday tasks enjoyable - eventually you will learn the meta skill and be able to turn any activity into an occasion of flow
• take charge of your schedule
• make time for reflection and relaxation
• try to be surprised by something everyday
• find out what you like and what you hate about life
• start doing more of what you love and less of what you hate."

From Mihalyi Csikszentmihalyi

Regeneration of Castleford

Tickle Cock Bridge in Castleford, West Yorkshire has been regenerated by architectural practice DSDHA with artist Martin Richman who works with light.  The bridge is actually an underpass and has been regenerated using lighting and a flock lining to the concrete structure.

The regeneration of Castleford was televised during four programmes on Channel 4 in August this year in "Kevin McCloud and the Big Town Plan".

Will Happiness Find Me?

Artists Peter Fischli and David Weiss questioned

IS HAPPINESS LOOKING FOR ME IN THE WRONG PLACE?

Screen made of Transparent Concrete

Someone told me about this screen on the site for We Make Money and Not Art.  Another innovation in concrete using optical fibres.  This screen from 2006 is a collaborative development between an engineering student, an architecture student and industry.

Muf Architecture

Muf Architecture are an award winning "collaborative practice of art and architecture".  Their award was for their regeneration for Barking Town Centre and they won the  2008 European Prize for Urban Public Space.

Their portfolio covers a wide range of projects from urban design and landscapes, building for arts and art projects. 

Muf has a blog which was started to cover a project to regenerate a nineteenth century spoil heap in Beckton known as Beckton Alp.

Concrete Innovations and Form Square

There seems to be no end of concrete innovations, so far I've written about Jethro Macey, Transparent House, Litracon, Concrete Canvas, Memux and Girli Concrete.  All are exciting innovations in concrete, but there are more innovations than I have mentioned.  Concrete is not so dull afterall.  I've still to mention Concrete Blond now called Form Square who specialise in customised insulation panels designed to have a wallpaper print on...

Concrete Radiators

The Droog radiator above was designed by Jaris Laarman in 2003 and the one below is in Ljubljana Museum, Slovenia.  Although it's not as attractive as the Droog radiator shown below, it has a certain minimalist charm.

Girli Concrete

Girli concrete is a research duo from Ulster University.  They are looking into printing on to concrete in interesting ways.  

Concrete Canvas

Concrete Canvas is an innovative material which allows you to do something unexpected to concrete, you can drape it.  It's been used for emergency shelters for the army and for refugees. The material is ground breaking, you can drape it and then once it is wet the concrete sets and it then behaves as you would expect concrete to behave.

Transparent House

Transparent House are a 3D design and visualisation studio.  Above is one of their engraved patterns in concrete, but it's only one of their specialisms.

Litracon - Fibre Optic Concrete

Litracon is an innovative light transmitting concrete building material.  Designed by a Hungarian architect, Litracon is an award winning material.  It contains thousands of fibre optic materials (about 4%) of the material and can be used for building, lamps and logos...infact the applications are developing and on going.

Make:Good

Make:Good "make public buildings and spaces friendlier, more colourful, and much more enjoyable".

Set up in 2005 with a group of 6 people or so, from architects to civil engineers to artists and social workers they work together to "make:good dreams".

Site Specific: Ptolemy Mann & Jason Bruges

Two site specific artists/designers spoke at 100% Design.

Ptolemy Mann is a trained woven textile designer who has developed an architectural colour consultancy and now also works with architects on multi million NHS hospital projects looking at wayfinding solutions. 

Jason Bruges studio also produces site specific solutions but his are architectural lighting based concepts and they all have a certain clever magic and humour about them.  Trained as an architect he and his studio look like they have fun...

Authentic Happiness by Martin Seligman

Authentic Happiness, the book by Martin Seligman also has a website with 700,000 users with resources and tests for users.  It is a self improvement concept with instructions how to change things if you so desire.

The tests range from optimism, gratitude, grit, life satisfaction, signature strengths questionnaire...

Papercrete

Papercrete is a combination of re-pulped paper fibre mixed in with Portland cement.  There is a workshop in the US soon where you can make your own brick.  Papercrete is an environmentally friendly building material that is also cheap.  

"It's a new way to think"

Jethro Macey

Jethro Macey works with floor coverings and won the Elle Decoration award in 2007 for best floor covering.  He now has his own site and the textile side unit is particularly interesting.  He has been named by the Telegraph as a name to watch in 2008.

Concrete Curtain - Memux

Concrete curtain from Memux in Vienna 

Another concrete pot

Michael Lin

Michael Lin describes his work as "something pleasant, warm, welcoming...something specific..."

On this You Tube film he describes his work and inspiration.

Lin is an artist that plays around with architectural spaces and bases his designs on Taiwanese fabrics that he finds around his home coming up with fabulous site specific solutions.

Concrete furniture

Grafitti

Elderly playground in North Manchester

This is a fabulous idea, but when I went to visit there was no one using it.   The playground cost £15,000 and consists of 6 pieces of equipment to help mobility and fitness.  A great concept, but not sure how well it is sited with number of pedestrians going by.  

Tutti Frutti by Urban Splash

Urban Splash has an interesting urban regeneration project in New Islington, Manchester called Tutti Frutti.  It's a regeneration project that will revitalise NE Manchester near to the Manchester City football ground.  Urban Splash admit that it's not an entirely original concept as they were inspired by the work of West 8 in Borneo Sporenberg, Amsterdam.

Gretchen Rubin - Happiness Project

Gretchen Rubin is researching a book on happiness and has her own blog called the happiness-project.  She is researching anything and everything that makes us happy.

10k steps walk

This walk was done to see approximately how far the 10,000 steps takes that the government suggests to maintain a reasonable level of fitness.  It was about 7 kilometres and it took about 1 1/2 hours to walk around a housing estate and park in North London.

Wibble Wobble wibble wobble - Jelly Building on a plate

Jelly architecture is not just a wibble wobble about nothing...this competition organised by the Bartlett at UCL, London earlier this summer brought out a whole range of flavoured architecture...

Slovenian architecture

Goldfrapp's Happiness

Goldrapp's video for Happiness is a good starting point for this project about both happiness and regeneration.