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Products: The Latest Architecture and News

Meet the 75 Finalists in ArchDaily's 2023 Building of the Year Awards

After two weeks of voting in our 14th edition of the Building of the Year Awards, our readers have narrowed down over 4,500 projects to just 75 finalists across 15 categories, casting over 100,000 votes. This year's awards celebrate the very best in design, innovation, and sustainability from around the globe, with the shortlist featuring an exceptional range of projects, from a house in a favela to cutting-edge cultural centers and innovative public spaces that are sure to impress. As a crowdsourced award, we are proud to say that your selections are a true reflection of the state of architecture, and this year's finalists are no exception.

The ArchDaily Building of the Year Awards is brought to you thanks to Dornbracht, renowned for leading designs for architecture, which can be found internationally in bathrooms and kitchens.



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What we are currently experiencing in the world is a shift in values. A crisis like COVID-19 leads us to question how we want to live, who is important to us, how we should spend our time. As our needs change, we focus on enduring values such as family, community, and an emphasis on our physical and mental well-being. When it comes to the objects that we surround ourselves with, themes such as lasting value, longevity, and quality are coming to the forefront. It is no longer only about what is good for the individual today, but also what will be useful and relevant tomorrow.

What to Expect at the Salone del Mobile 2019

It is officially the time of year when the streets of Milan flood with design enthusiasts, eager to explore cutting-edge innovations and intricate Italian craftsmanship exhibited during Milan Design Week. From the 9th till the 14th of April, ArchDaily, along with 300,000 visitors hailing from countries all across the globe, will exchange ideas and indulge in the most recent furniture, product, and interior design technologies.

As part of Milan Design Week, Salone del Mobile, the most anticipated furniture and interior design event of the year, will be hosting more than 2,000 exhibitors at the Milan Fairgrounds in Rho, ranging from renowned architecture studios and architects to upcoming designers who are debuting their creations for the very first time. The list of acclaimed architecture studios participating in the Salone includes Zaha Hadid Design, Renzo Piano, John Pawson, and UNStudio to name a few.

Laser-Cut Mini Architecture Masterworks As Wall Hooks

Indian design and fabrication studio, MuseLAB creates customized furniture and products. Their 2017 creations include to-scale miniature architectural wall hooks. These functional household items were inspired by the works of Oscar Niemeyer, Le Corbusier, Charles Correa, Michael Graves, and others.

5 Architects Who Turned to Selling Products, Not Architecture

This article was originally published by Archipreneur as "Turning Ideas into Products: 5 Architects who Successfully Sell their Designs."

The emergence of interconnectivity, smart and sensor-driven designs, home automation, clean energy, shared knowledge, and efficient software have created numerous opportunities for those looking to build their businesses around products. This includes architects who, by design, have a large skill set that allows them to engage with a wide variety of business models.

The idea of automating or productizing architectural design services is a contentious one and it trickles down to the very definition of architecture. But when it comes to the business aspect of the profession, it becomes clear that many among today’s most renowned architects owe their success to the idea of productizing their services.

Cut Maps Adds Contemporary Precision to Cartographic Objects

Have you ever wanted to decorate your walls with old-style maps but been discouraged because they don't fit your minimal and contemporary aesthetic? Enter Cut Maps, the Virginia-based company that creates cartographic representations of cities and states using laser technologies to precisely define borders and streets. The resultant maps offer the illusion of their paper precedents, but with an otherworldly precision only possible in the digital age.

Toyo Ito Designs New Mayuhana Lamp for Yamagiwa

Yamagiwa has just released a new version of Toyo Ito's popular Mayuhana lamp - Mayuhana Ma Black. "Ma," meaning "true" or "genuine," represents the new lamps darker color that is, as the company describes, "more deep and profound."

"Mayuhana Ma Black is light in darkness. It is the quintessential quality of light found in Japan that reminds me of ‘In Praise of Shadows’ by Junichiro Tanizaki," says Toyo Ito.

Shigeru Ban Designs Retractable "Scale" Pen Inspired by Architect's Ruler

Shigeru Ban has designed a retractable, refillable "SCALE" pen for ACME Studio that was inspired by the architect's ruler. The aluminum pen, designed to fit comfortably into your hand, serves as a fully functional architect's scale outfitted with a ballpoint pen that retracts with a simple twist of the pen's two halves.

Architect + Entrepreneur (Volume 2): How to Stabilize Your Revenue Streams With "Passive Income"

In “Architect + Entrepreneur Volume Two”, we follow along as architect Eric Reinholdt scales his business, continuing the narrative begun in volume 1 and applying an entrepreneurial mindset to every facet of his work. The book chronicles his experiments failures and successes as he reinvents his architectural practice.

The primary innovation is a focus on passive income producing products and it involves a simple shift supplementing the standard consulting arrangement – hours traded for revenues earned – with an architecture-as-product revenue model. We discover how products, especially digital products, are nearly infinitely scalable. As compared with the limits of time, which govern the standard consulting arrangement, passive-income-generating products reinforce the brand message and create more freedom for the business owner.

Rather than wholly rejecting the individualized, high-touch service side of the business in favor of products, the book demonstrates how a line of products can actually nourish the consulting arm with only those clients best suited for the brand, while producing enough residual income to fully fund the practice.

The following is an excerpt from chapter 2, “A New Hope Model.”

How I Developed Ergo Kiwi, an Ergonomic Craft Knife that Your Fingers Will Thank You For

If you've been through architecture school you're probably wary of craft knives, which can puncture the skin of an non-alert, caffeinated student at a fraction of a second's notice. Even if you manage to avoid the hospital, though, these scourges of the studio still know how to hurt you: their designs are the antithesis of ergonomics, making a marathon modeling session a mighty endurance battle against hand cramps and joint pain. Aiming for a more comfortable solution, architecture graduate Sean Riley developed the Ergo Kiwi, and today is launching a Kickstarter campaign to help bring the product to market.

In addition, Riley has also meticulously cataloged his design and production process. At ArchDaily, we thought it gave a fascinating insight into not only the design of Ergo Kiwi, the but the steps involved in developing and bringing to market a convincing product. As a result, we invited him to share his story.

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Frank Lloyd Wright's Taliesin 4 Lamp Now Available on Yamagiwa

Update: The product is available internationally, but has yet to be released in the US. 

You can now adorn your home with your very own Frank Lloyd Wright Taliesin 4 lamp. Lighting brand Yamagiwa and the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation have reached an agreement to sell reproductions of the wooden lamp.

Available in both cherry and walnut, the towering geometrical lamp was originally designed by Wright for the Hillside Home School theater that had burned and was reconstructed at Taliesin in 1952. It features an array of stacked boxes, embellished with red accents, that indirectly reflect off directional boards placed above and below each cube.

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nendo Designs Leather Bag for Architects

Designed with the architect in mind, nendo has created a morphable Architect Bag for TOD's. "In the extended form," says nendo, "the bag holds a full-size A3 drawing as well as samples with quite a bit of length. Folding it into half creates two spaces where you can store A4 size drawings and documents, and the middle part of the flex section houses rolled-up drawings, heavy catalogues or books and samples of construction materials. With the ability to store away the two handles, you can turn it into a clutch bag when you have fewer things to carry." Take a closer look, after the break.

Renzo Piano Designs New Handbag Inspired by the Whitney Museum

Renzo Piano has designed a limited-edition handbag for the Italian fashion brand Max Mara to match his newly completed Whitney Museum of American Art in New York. The leather, top-handle bag, inspired by the "pure design and sophisticated materials" of the Whitney, features distinct ribbing inspired by the museum's facade.

"Our aim was to apply one of the most characteristic elements of the museum project - the facade - to the bag: hence the idea of the modular strips enveloping the exterior," said Piano in an interview with Max Mara. "We tried to maintain a simple, pure design, working only on the details by applying a creative use of technology and placing the accent on respect for the materials."

The 17 Top Architect-Designed Products at Milan Design Week 2015

The 54th edition of Milan Design Week (also known as Salone del Mobile) recently came to a close. In celebration of its success, we have compiled a list of the most talked about architect-designed products showcased this year. Take a look after the break to see new products from Rem Koolhaas, Zaha Hadid, David Chipperfield, and more.

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Win Your Very Own Arckit, A Freeform Model Making System

Physical model making can be time intensive and expensive. However, thanks to the makers of Arckit, that has changed. Based on a panel by panel modular system and a standard 1.2 meter grid, the newly released Arckit provides an easy-to-use, flexible model building system that allows architects to quickly construct and modify a diverse range of scaled structures. Architect tested and approved, the kit is currently available for purchase in the EU, US, Amazon and now Barnes and Noble.

To celebrate its success, the makers of Arckit have agreed to gift 5 ArchDaily readers their largest, most expensive set: Arckit 240, a 620+ piece kit valued at $399. For a chance to win, check out all four sets available on the Arckit website and enter the sweepstakes after the break.

Finalists Create Next Generation of Sustainable Building Products

In attempts to better define what it really means to be green, the Cradle to Cradle Products Innovation Institute, in partnership with Make it Right, has selected products from ten companies as finalists in the Product Innovation Challenge. 144 applicants were screened by toxicologists and building professionals, proposing new alternatives from insulation grown from fungi and bricks from living organisms, to roofing made from waste limestone and recycled plastic. The ten finalists represent the shared values of practical sustainability and entrepreneurship, creating "a building product that is safe, healthy, affordable, effective and designed to be returned safely to nature or industry after use."

Three winners will ultimately be announced on November 15, 2013 at the Institute's Innovation Celebration in New York City, offering a $250,000 cash prize: $125,000 for first place, $75,000 for second and $50,000 for third. The jury members, who include executives from Google, US Green Building Council and the Schmidt Family Foundation, will judge each product based on five categories: material health, material reutilization, water stewardship, renewable energy and social fairness.

Without further ado, the 10 finalists are…