Tuesday, June 9, 2009

PANAMA HOUSE,SAU PAULO { BRAZIL }

Marcio Kogan’s Panama House is a residence designed for art. Located in Sao Paulo, Brazil, the house makes a powerful but subdued statement in its low, open, elongated elegance a hallmark of Kogan’s architecture.In the past few years, the award-winning, Brazilian-born architect’s Studio MK27 has produced a steady stream of low-rise, boxy work all with an uncanny intimacy, yet without any of the usual stuffy treatments that supposedly create intimacy.


At the Panama House, there are no cozy nooks, no soft furnishings, no homey touches. And yet, there is a feeling of comfort and livability in this art-gallery-of-a-house that makes you want to move in tomorrow.


All levels of the three-storey house including the bedrooms, office, gardens and patio are used to display the owner’s substantial collection of predominantly modern Brazilian art and sculpture








An uninterrupted connection between inside and out makes the entire space seem unlimited, translucent, as if without walls, although the structure is essentially a wooden box inside a C-shaped concrete cask made of cement slabs and a wall.





The sliding vertical wood lathes that form the brise soleils for each room’s facade, are also an important part of establishing the prevailing openness. The brise soleils also provide comfort and privacy, and enable the control of the artworks exposure to direct sun.






Most beautifully, they also create the soft play of light that matches the overall linear shapes - created by creases in window treatments, the floor boards, the rows of pillows on long sofas, the stone work outside - continuing the elongated language of the entire building.








The Sao Paulo-born architect Marcio Kogan graduated from Mackenzie University in 1976 and created films until the age of 30. His considerable talents of creating drama, understanding a setting and leading the eye are certainly evident in the award-winning Panama House.

















MINERAL HOUSE { TOKYO }

Reflection of Mineral is a 480-square-foot (about 45 square meters) residence located in downtown Tokyo's Nakano ward. Designed by architect Yasuhiro Yamashita Reflection of Mineral has received wide architecture and design media attention and numerous international awards.
Depending on viewpoint, the house looks like a bulky camper van about to take off. Or it seems to be the result of a giant`s frustrated attempt to fashion a house from a square box. Realizing that the site is too small and the wrong shape for his house, the giant just stuffed the house into the site by force. The whimsy of this beautiful residence is a big part of its charm. At the same time, the house is also an elegant expression of modern Japanese minimalism, and an example of brilliant use of a sparse site, a requirement in the tight space of downtown Tokyo

Also beautiful is the way in which the interior appointments the lines of the bathtub, the curves of the waste bins, the wavy length of the utilitarian shelves respond to the lines of the building. This makes the interior seem larger and much less boxy than one would assume from the outside.






Yasuhiro Ymashita who was born in Kagoshima in 1960. He established Atelier Tekuto in Tokyo in 1991




SUMMER CABIN



Sommarnöjen provides the houses ready-built on site. Some are suitable for year-round use as well. The mini-houses are also great as additions to a larger dwelling — as guest houses, studios, workshops, separate bedrooms and of course, saunas. For those of us with Scandinavian backgrounds, these cottages look like home. They look perfectly suited to join the thousands of tiny cottages that dot the small islands, rocky seashores and lakesides of Scandinavia where people take July off and also spend every weekend from April till September (or more) at the cottage, rain or shine.






BARROW HOUSE { MODERN TIMBER HOUSE }

The house that made of arrangement of timber boxes with the barrow extension, each part independently rotated and subjected to varying amount of extruding and manipulating forces. The result is a stunning house with a variety of shapes, different volumes of interior and an interesting double story addition to this weatherboard house. See the structure animation to have more detail about this house.


BARBIE FLAGSHIP STORE


The world largest Barbie Flagship store and cafĂ© built on the 35,000 square foot areas and most comprehensive collection of Barbie dolls and licensed Barbie products. The design concept of this store is how to make a figure where “Barbie is hero”; expression Barbie as a global lifestyle brand by building on the brand historical link to fashion.
All the exterior, interior, fixtures and furnishings are designed by Slade Architecture. It’s designed to create a sleek, fun, unapologetically feminine interpretation of Barbie: past, present, and future. The main color of this store interior and exterior is pink expressing Barbie’s cutting-edge fashion sense and history.

For the new facade, Slade Architecture combined references to product packaging, decorative arts, fashion and architectural iconography to create a modern identity for the store.
The facade is made of two layers: molded, translucent polycarbonate interior panels and flat exterior glass panels printed with a whimsical lattice frit pattern. Slade collaborated with designers at BIG, who created the final exterior frit graphics. The two layers reinforce each other visually and interact dynamically through reflection, shadow and distortion




































































































































































































































The Barbie Cafe, a beautiful restaurant and gelato bar on the top floor, offers guests the opportunity to take a break and enjoy both local comfort food and Barbie-inspired refreshments. Mattel and David Laris Concept planned both the Fashion Cafe and the Barbie Cafe. Both spaces were designed by Slade Architecture.