The Incredible ‘Unbalanced Hotel’ to be Built into the Side of a Cliff in Peru
A hotel set to be built in Peru has been designed to look like a giant, off-center picture frame.
The cliff-hugging structure, designed for a private client by Madrid-based architecture firm OOIIO, will serve as the perfect frame for the Pacific Ocean on one side, and the Andes on the other. Provisionally named the Unbalanced Hotel, the building is intended to become a landmark for Lima, where it will be built into cliffs outside the city center. The Unbalanced Hotel will have 125 rooms, restaurants, conference rooms and exhibition spaces.
A hotel ‘constructed in a traditional way would be a visual barrier… that could block the ocean view,’ according to the OOIIO website. ‘Thanks to [the hotel’s] peculiar shape, the landscape is now even more relevant – we have framed it!’ The design was commissioned by a private South American client but the plans have yet to be approved by city planners. Continue reading »
Walkie Talkie Building in London Creates ‘Death Ray’ with Reflected Sunlight
A new London skyscraper dubbed the “Walkie-Talkie” due to its distinctive shape, has been blamed for reflecting light and heat from the sun onto buildings in the next street, scorching sidewalk, dazzling passersby and melting cars parked on the street. Business owners and motorists hit out at developers of a new skyscraper for starting fires and causing damage to paintwork, cracking tiles, and smoking a carpet. One journalist even managed to fry an egg on the hotspot. The half-finished 37-storey tower in central London has been thus dubbed the ‘Walkie Scorchie’.
The beam from the concave south side of the building, officially known as 20 Fenchurch Street, was only noticed last week when the sun reached a certain position in the sky. The “Walkie Scorchie” phenomenon apparently lasts for around two hours a day and will come to a natural end in about three weeks’ time as the autumnal sun stays closer to the horizon. Continue reading »
The Festina Lente Bridge
Festina lente (Latin for “make haste slowly”) is a pedestrian bridge over the Miljacka River in Sarajevo. The bridge is 38 meters long and features an unusual looping in the middle, suggesting slowing down and enjoying the view. Conceptual design for the bridge was created by three students of the Academy of Fine Arts in Sarajevo: Adnan Alagic, Amila Hrustić and Bojana Kanlic. The bridge connects the Mak Dizdar embankment (close to the Academy) with Radic street. It was officially opened on 22 August 2012. Continue reading »
Watertower By Tom Fruin
Brooklyn-based artist Tom Fruin installed a beautiful steel and plexiglas water tower in Brooklyn’s DUMBO neighborhood. As sunlight streamed through the colorful structure, photographer Robert Banat snapped the incredible photo below. Continue reading »
Bryan Cranston’s Green Beach House
The star of Breaking Bad opens the doors to his family’s recently completed beach house located just outside of Los Angeles. Photos by Art Streiber. Continue reading »
Chinese Home Builders Find Great Location: On Top of a Shopping Mall
In a densely populated city, land can be an elusive commodity. But that was no such hurdle for the residents of these extraordinary villas. While there may not have been any suitable square footage at ground level, they have instead built their homes on the roof of a shopping centre. Located in the city of Zhuzhou in central China’s Hunan Province, the Jiutian International Plaza is home to one of most famous wholesale markets for shoes in the region.
The four homes are so well hidden on the eight-storey complex that many of the locals have failed to notice them, it was reported on www.hugchina.com. Continue reading »
2013 World Architecture Festival
The Halley VI centre designed by British architects Hugh Broughton in Antarctica which is a dismantlable research station created in the icy wastes for the British Antarctic Survey and has been shortlisted for a global architecture award. (World Architecture Festival 2013/PA Wire) Continue reading »
Horeca Strategies Agency for Desperados Brand
Horeca Strategies Agency has created for Desperados pop-up bars and DJ Stands, which will be used during festivals, concerts ad in promotional areas. To build them, freight containers were used and adapted as to resemble industrial storage space. They can be arranged in multiple combinations, also one over the other. Bar container, of which side wall opens completely is also equipped to serve beer. Using rough, made of metal decorations points out urban, industrial style of Desperados brand. Continue reading »
LEGO Architecture Studio
Explore, experiment and create with LEGO® Architecture Studio with 1210 bricks and a 272-page guidebook endorsed by leading architects.
The Cube Project
The Cube restaurant interior design by Igor Sirotov, Ukrainian designer. Continue reading »
The Iglu Hotel
Welcome to nature amidst a carefully designed environment made of glistening snow crystals – rebuilt every season from 3000 tons of snow at six locations in the Alps and the Pyrenees. A vivid product for exciting events and one of the most innovative hotel concepts of our times – CO2-neutral and sustainable. Continue reading »
Grand Canyon Skywalk
The Grand Canyon Skywalk is a transparent horseshoe-shaped cantilever bridge and tourist attraction in Arizona near the Colorado River on the edge of a side canyon in the Grand Canyon West area of the main canyon. USGS topographic maps show the elevation at the Skywalk’s location as 4,770 ft (1,450 m) and the elevation of the Colorado River in the base of the canyon as 1,160 ft (350 m), and they show that the height of the precisely vertical drop directly under the skywalk is between 500 ft (150 m) and 800 ft (240 m). Continue reading »
Head in the Clouds by Studio Klimonski Chang Architects
Head in the Clouds structure’s armature is made from 1.5″ aluminum tubes that use less material and are easier to transport than more traditional materials such as wood. All the materials are recyclable. Klimoski and Chang worked with schools and local organizations, including New York Road Runners and NYCRUNS, to collect the 53,780 milk jugs and water bottles needed to create Head in the Clouds. The jugs were used to create 120 “pillows” that give the cloud its bumpy, organic shape. The bottles, accentuated with organic food coloring and water, create the interior’s blue hue. Continue reading »
Toledo Metro Station by Oscar Tusquets Blanca
Opened in September 2012, the Toledo Metro Station was the 16th station built on Naples Metro Line 1. Set along one of Naples main shopping streets, Via Toledo, a second entrance to the station is expected to open into Naples Spanish Quarter, Quartieri Spagnoli, in February 2013.
Designed by the Spanish Firm Oscar Tusquets Blanca, at 50 meters deep, the station extends below the ground water and is the deepest metro station built on Line 1 to date. One of Metro Napoli’s Metro Art Stations, it was designed around the themes of water and light. Continue reading »
San-Zhi – The Abandoned Pod Village in Taiwan
San Zhi, Taiwan is an abandoned vacation resort on the northern coast of Taiwan. It was built in the early 1980s, but construction of the futuristic resort ceased after a series of fatal accidents.
Even though it never opened as a vacation resort, San Zhi can still be toured. The strange pod-like buildings act as a tourist attraction. The colors of the pod-like buildings depend on their location. The buildings in the west are green, in the east pink, in the south blue, and in the north white. Continue reading »
Wood Bridge In Netherlands
Commissioned by the Province of Friesland, Oak (Onix and Achterbosch Architecture) has developed a road bridge that connects 2 districts of Sneek on either side of the A7 motorway. The bridge was designed for a municipality that wished to establish a new city marker along the motorway. Framework The Department of Public Works, the user of the bridge, stated that it wished to use more wood in its constructions.
Maijishan Grottoes
The Maijishan Grottoes are a series of 194 caves cut in the side of the hill of Majishan in Tianshui, Gansu Province, northwest China. This example of rock cut architecture contains over 7,200 Buddhist sculptures and over 1,000 square meters of murals. Construction began in the Later Qin era (384-417 CE). Continue reading »
Vocklabruck Platform in the Middle of a Lake
There’s a wonderfully picturesque spot in Vöcklabruck, Austria where visitors are able to sit in the middle of a pond without getting wet. The scenic landscape includes a path leading down to a hollowed out circular area where people can take a seat and relax amongst nature. It’s a surreal journey along the gradual ramp to the observational platform as the water level gains height either side. Once in the resting area, depending on perspective, visitors seem like they’re wading in the lake without a drop of water on them. Continue reading »
Emergency Slide May Save Your Life
An emergency slide is tried out in a building in Shanghai, China. The stainless steel chute has been attached to the banister of the stairs. The idea is that in an emergency the slide would be deployed and people would use it to exit the building quickly rather than using the stairs. According to inventor Zhou Miaorong people using the slide could escape from a five-storey building in 14 seconds. (Imaginechina / Rex Feature)
Shanghai Building Ridiculed for Resembling a Boot
The LAVENU Center in Shanghai has become the latest of a series of buildings in China to be ridiculed by internet users. The structure has been nicknamed Boot Tower because its L shape appears reminiscent of a boot. The tower was designed by Japanese architect Jun Aoki. (Imaginechina / Rex Features)
The Interior of the Fourviere Basilica in Lyon
The interior of the Fourviere Basilica in Lyon is seen after seven years of restoration. (PHILIPPE DESMAZES/AFP/Getty Images)
Roll It: Experimental House
Students from University of Karlsruhe, Germany, Christian Zwick and Konstantin Jerabek have designed this unique experimental revolving house called Roll It, based on the concept of “mobile and space-efficient construction”. The design offers flexible housing in a minimum space.
The cylindrical house features a very unique interior setting which changes its functions depending on the orientation. The workspace in one position becomes bedroom when rolled 180 degrees and the kitchen becomes bathroom. The center of the structure can be used both for sports activities as well as for lighting control. Continue reading »
Boat Roofed Shed in Wales
Boat Roofed shed is Owned by sheddie: Alex Holland. The roof is an upturned boat! It is located at an altitude of 750ft above sea level in the Cambrian Mountain range near Machynlleth in mid Wales. It is full of nautical nonsense befitting a boat turned upside down up a mountain! It has a 20w solar panel trickle feeding a leisure battery which powers 3 pairs of ultra-brite L.E.D. lights and a 12v sound system. There is a 12v/gas refrigerator and a bottled gas cooker with 2 burners, a grill, and an oven.
Also has a small ‘Belfast sink’ plumbed in. It is heated by a 19th century French enamel wood burning stove. The chimney is an old king pole from a circus big top that used to house elephants know as ‘The elephant shed’! The shed is made completely from recycled materials except for the 12v system. 3 sets of chimes from inside mantelpiece clocks have been screwed into the centre board of the boat and you can play them with a big nail. Continue reading »
The Safe House
The Safe House by KWK PROMES is located in a small village on the outskirts of Warsaw, Poland. Surrounding the area, many of the buildings are “Polish cubes” from the 60s and old wooden barns. The house was designed so that the homeowners never feel unsafe or exposed. The result is something of a modern fortress with lots of movable parts and secret openings, complete with a working drawbridge. Continue reading »
Chinese Farmer Builds Apocalypse-Proof ‘Noah’s Ark’ Pods
Liu Qiyuan, a Chinese farmer from the village of Qiantun in northern Hebei Province, located just south of Beijing, has built what he describes as “Noah’s Ark” survival pods in case of a cataclysmic event. Photos by Ed Jones/AFP/Getty Images. Continue reading »
