Shelves are incredibly versatile furniture items that are vital in organizing, decorating, and maximizing efficiency in various spaces, including homes, businesses, and industries. Crafted from a wide range of materials and available in numerous designs, shelves enhance compact environments by adding flexibility and easy access. With this in mind, we've compiled suggestions to elevate these ubiquitous solutions — temporary additions or integrated architectural features — into prominent elements within interior design.
Auction houses, secondhand furniture stores, and realtors make small fortunes from a nomenclature that, despite the fuzziness surrounding its indeterminate span and whether everything made during its indefinite duration ought to be stamped with the same label, continues to demand attention. Years from now, serious collectors of architectural magazines may search for that single issue of the 21st century magazine Dwell, absent a major spread of a house designed in the midcentury modern (MCM) manner or a restoration of a building from that era. MCM is the very blood that pulses through the publication’s arteries, promulgating a view of a squeaky-clean and well-lighted lives lived almost invariably by (often childless) ectomorphic couples, blissfully happy under a flat roof with floor-to-ceiling windows affording fine views of distant landscapes best enjoyed behind insulated glass in an ambient temperature of 72 degrees Fahrenheit. But what are we to make of this term, this period—some even call it a “movement”—so well-known globally it goes by initials?
When Kisho Kurokawa designed his now iconic Nakagin Capsule Tower in 1972, the structure was meant to represent the core principles of Metabolism, experimenting with ideas of growth and change borrowed from biological processes. The emerging style in postwar Japan aimed to create buildings and megastructures that emulate living organisms that can evolve, expand, contract, and adapt to their changing conditions. Following this concept, the Nakagin tower was composed of 140 identical cell-like capsule units, each individually bolted to the two central shafts. The capsules were intended to be replaced and upgraded every 25 years, allowing for flexibility and mutation. The innovation proved to be impractical, however. Almost 50 years after its construction, the tower was demolished, but not in its entirety. A total of 23 capsules were saved and removed from the building to be given a new life. Now, the capsules are scattered around the world, continuing to represent Metabolist ideals in unexpected ways.
In Nieuw Delft, a newly developed city area next to the historic city center of Delft and in close proximity to the central train station, Common City is developing the winning LeeuwenPart plan in collaboration with Space&Matter. The project includes a residential building located on the edge of the future Van Leeuwenhoek Park. The project is developed as a co-commissioning, a process where the future residents are included in the design process, resulting in a well-adapted building and a close-knit community.
via Shutterstock | mariakray, Boca Raton Aerial View
The Center for Arts and Innovation has just selected Pritzker Prize-winning architect Renzo Piano to design its new creative campus. The campus is situated in the heart of downtown Boca Raton in Florida and aims to become a global hub for creative excellence. Ultimately, The Center is on a mission to transform Boca Raton into an internationally recognized destination for culture, arts, innovation, and technology.
Color plays a significant role in the world. Partly because of the significance attached to each hue, the use of color in architecture – especially in interiors – changes the ambiance of each project. In commercial establishments, color has a considerable influence on highlighting a given brand, and in homes, it can reflect the resident’s personality and complement the language adopted in the project. This exploration can take place directly in the tectonic object (architecture) through the surfaces that constitute the building, or it can take advantage of mobile elements, easily changeable.
