Turkish design firm Autoban, have completed the design of another location for The House Café, located in the Kanyon Shopping Mall in Istanbul, Turkey.

From Autoban:

The latest branch of The House Café chain at the shopping mall Kanyon, is an integration of the mall’s original architecture, The House Café brand identity and the Atutoban design approach. A site-built structure made of steel and glass, which functions as a transparent box to house the café, is carefully planned and designed to fit the valley-like architecture of the mall and sat on a walnut platform to add warmth to the café’s interior. Although an extension, the structure bears its own strong design identity while blending in with its surroundings.

Visit Autoban’s website – here.

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Antonio Di Oronzo, principal of bluarch architecture, has designed the Greenhouse Nightclub in
New York City, which is the first L.E.E.D. registered, eco-friendly nightclub in the United States.

A bi-level 6,000 square foot club, lounge and event space built from recycled or recyclable materials, GREENHOUSE is the first nightclub in the nation to receive certification by the United States Green Buildings Council for its environmentally conscious construction and design.

Visit the website of bluarch Architecture – here.

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Yesterday, we posted the winner of the 2009 Cicely & Colin Rigg Contemporary Design Awards, and now today we’ve received some of the other entries.

The Cicely & Colin Rigg Contemporary Design Award is a generous legacy of the late Colin Rigg (1895–1982), a former Secretary of the National Gallery of Victoria Felton Bequests’ Committee. This ‘Award of Excellence’ focuses on contemporary design practice in the state of Victoria. This award is arguably the most prestigious offered to a contemporary designer in Australia, with a prize of $30,000. In 2009 the exhibition is dedicated to contemporary furniture design.

Visit the website of the National Gallery of Victoria – here.

Adam Cornish
born Australia 1981
Box and Dice, Sydney
est. 1988
Flex hammock 2008
plywood, stainless steel cable, rubber
20.0 x 216.0 x 100.0 cm
Collection of the artist, Melbourne
© Adam Cornish

Lambie Chan
born Hong Kong 1982, arrived Australia 2001
Ribbon, bench 2007
Mountain Ash (Eucalyptus regnans)
(1-2) 55.0 x 199.0 x 97.5 cm (overall)
Collection of the artist, Melbourne
© Lambie Chan

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Bercy Chen Studio contributed their design skills for the remodel of a 1980′s waterfront house that looks over Lake Austin in Austin, Texas.

From the architects:

Through the use of glass, steel, detailing and lighting, the project saught to update the home’s interior while redefining it’s relationship with the lake beyond.

The exisiting house was a typical American wood stud framing building and it was not unusual for such a structure to be demolished to make way for a brand new structure. However after some consideration, the owner decided to keep the existing ‘bones’ of the house and completely re-organize the house. A glass solarium with the same roof angle is created, rotated 20 degrees in plan to follow the side property line, creating a new triangular pool and lap pool extending to the boathouse.

Visit the Bercy Chen Studio website – here.

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Australian designer Simone LeAmon has won the 2009 Cicely & Colin Rigg Contemporary Design Award for the Lepidoptera Chair. The award focuses on contemporary design in the Australian state of Victoria, and is organized by the National Gallery of Victoria. This year, the award was dedicated to contemporary seat furniture design.

Visit Simone LeAmon’s website – here.

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Brazilian artist Henrique Oliveira’s “tridimensionals” installations will be exhibited at the Rice Gallery in Houston, Texas between March 26th and May 9th, 2009.

From the Rice Gallery:

Oliveira uses tapumes, which in Portuguese can mean “fencing,” “boarding,” or “enclosure,” as a title for many of his large-scale installations. The term makes reference to the temporary wooden construction fences seen throughout the city of São Paulo where Oliveira lives. It also refers to the weathered wood Oliveira uses as the primary material in his installations.

Visit Henrique Oliveira’s website – here.  Visit the Rice Gallery’s website – here.

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French architectural firm aum designed the Biscuit House. Located in a small village near the city of Lyon, the house is built on a steep slope facing an open landscape on the fringe of a natural reservation where no house can be built.

Visit the aum website – here.

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Spanish lighting design/manufacturers Luz Difusion have created the Suomi suspension lamp.

From Luz Difusion:

The Suomi lamp is made of 4 blocks of oak sheets, 2 cm thick, that are given a concave shape through the use of a mold. Each block is then laser cut to narrow it gradually from top to bottom. Finally the four blocks are glued together using a super resistant adhesive paste. A fire retardant varnish is then applied to the entire piece. Four steel cables pass through the interior to avoid leaving visible screws on the exterior. In this way we achieve a compact, seamless model, without joints or any other type of assembly.

Visit Luz Difusion’s website – here.

Although a house that was designed in the 1950′s might be pushing the limits on what is generally considered to be contemporary, we’re making an exception in this case because it was designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, who was well ahead of his time.

The Fawcett Ranch House, which was designed by Wright in 1954, has been put up for sale. Located on 80 acres of farmland in California’s San Joaguin Valley, the 3,800 square foot residence has had only one owner.

The home has been listed at $2.7 million, visit the website for more photos and info – here.

A collaboration between architects Delphine Ding and José Ulloa Davet produced this remodeled house in Tunquén, Chile. The original house was designed by local architect Pedro Salas in 1990, and this recent remodel was completed in September, 2008.

Visit Delphine Ding’s website – here. Visit José Ulloa Davet’s website – here.

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Ryan Horsman and Jason Dembski, both students at the Taubman College of Architecture at the University of Michigan, have designed the Chopstick/Steamer Stool.

From Jason Dembski:

Ryan Horsman and I developed the Chopstick/Steamer Stool as part of a summer abroad program at B.A.S.E. Beijing with support from founders Robert Mangurian and Mary-Ann Ray. The goal of this particular project—taking cues from Chinese culture and its ability to make excess/waste useful—was to (re)use everyday Chinese items in new ways. The Chopstick/Steamer Stool takes traditional bamboo steamers, thousands of disposable chopsticks and simple cushioning material, and combines them into a piece furniture.

The stool uses six bamboo steamers stacked vertically and bound. Peaking out of the top steamer is thousands of disposable chopstick—accumulated in less than a year by a ‘one child policy’ family—packed together and standing on end. Serving as a middleman between the steamers and the chopsticks is a basic cushion. Although foam is ideal, the cushion could be made of anything from an old rickshaw seat to a pile of rags. The cushion allows the chopsticks to move independently under pressure and prevents them from falling through the steamer racks. When combined in this way, these fundamental Chinese items form a deceptively comfortable stool which can reasonably be made without spending a single yuan.

Visit Jason Dembski’s website – here.

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Architects and designers SHH have completed a new London office interiors scheme for a private company in London’s west end, working closely with client-side design director Zeljko Popovic. The Manchester Square offices are the result of a brief to create a ‘high impact, 21st century office interior with a strong personality’ with more in common with a gentlemen’s club than a traditional office space.

Visit the SHH website – here.

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Located in the rural desert town of Cave Creek, Arizona, is the Ellsworth residence, designed by the Michael P. Johnson Design Studio.

Visit the Michael P. Johnson Design Studio’s website – here.

Read a detailed description after the photos….

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German kitchen manufacturer ALNO has produced some inspirational photos for their 2009 catalog of kitchens.

From ALNO:

The history of ALNO is as unique as our kitchens. The company was founded in 1927 in the workshop of carpenter Albert Nothdurft. Over the next 30 years, the company grew consistently and eventually moved to Pfullendorf, where it is still based today. Over 750 employees based in Pfullendorf craft exquisitely designed ALNO kitchens of the highest quality. Across Europe and the world, these kitchens are central to family living.

Visit ALNO’s website – here.

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Faber, a Netherland’s based manufacturer of fireplaces, have released some inspirational photos of their 2009 collection of fireplaces.

Faber’s roots are in the Dutch province of Friesland where in 1844, Jan Gerrits Faber established a blacksmith’s shop. In addition to fireplaces, the business also made bicycles, skates, hay and straw balers, beet cutting machines and safes. When natural gas was discovered at nearby Slochteren in the sixties, fireplaces became all the rage. For Faber, this provided sufficient reason to concentrate its efforts on the design and production of quality gas fires. The business gradually developed into market leader in the field of chimney-based fires. In 1996, Faber launched its very first fires with closed combustion technology, a safe technique which has since been adopted by many other manufacturers. In 2001, Faber moved from Leeuwarden to its current location in Heerenveen. The site includes a stylishly equipped showroom open to the public. Behind the showroom is a lab, where fires are designed and international homologation tests are carried out. There is also a factory for final assembly and quality control of all products.

Visit Faber’s website – here.

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