Modern Mobile Log Cabin … or Portable Prefab Pile of Logs? « Dornob Anything but your conventional log cabin home, one might see this structure atop a mountain or on a lake and and think it a pile of rough-cut wood logs rather than a cleverly camouflaged modular living and work space. Designed by Hans Linberg, the ‘logs’ are merely a wood building facade covering a prefabricated plastic and steel frame. The ‘cabin’ is actually a recording studio for now, but would work just well as a mobile forest home or disguised hunting blind. Rectangular in overall shape with likewise angular window openings, this seems to have little in common with traditional cabins but then again: many modern cabins are likewise built with fake facades – this one simply shows off its artificial nature more overtly.
Solutions must be accepted by the people Unser Name BASEhabitat verdeutlicht den sehr selbstbestimmten Anspruch an Lehre und Forschung unserer Institution. Entsprechend eigenständig und grundsätzlich versuchen wir den Gegenstand dieses Lernens und Forschens, den Raum, zu begreifen. Dabei wollen wir den Menschen in den Mittelpunkt rücken als das Wesen, das sich mit dem Raum umhüllt, um sich ein Zuhause zu geben, um geschützt zu sein vor widrigen Umwelteinflüssen, um sich einen Ort zu schaffen, der sein Dasein fördert und bereichert, an dem sich Zukunft denken lässt. Wir suchen die Herausforderung an unsere Baukunst auch dort, wo selbst jene grundlegendsten Anforderungen an den gebauten Lebensraum nicht erfüllt sind. Deshalb haben wir mit BASEhabitat ein Projektstudio eingerichtet, das Theorie und Praxis zu Projekten bündelt, die mit den Mitteln von Bautechnik und Raumkunst einen Beitrag zur nachhaltigen Verbesserung und Erhaltung der Lebensqualität in Entwicklungsländern leisten. Über Schönheit spricht man nicht.
Super-Tiny Homes Trend: Semi-Mobile Small-Space Living « Dornob Mobility may have been the most massive driving force behind the interstate highway system and suburbia as we know it – but the focus is slowly shifting. There is a growing movement toward (and market for) new types of small-space dwellings and miniature homes built on wheels. While similar, these are not the same as the traditional prefabricated-and-portable housing typologies that celebrate always-on-the-road living and go-anywhere, move-anytime lifestyles. The result is a more economical, simple approach to house design without associated costs (personal and environmental) of full-time mobile living. Blending the best of prefabrication and optional do-it-yourself construction, these low-cost dwelling spaces are green in more than the obvious material ways – they simply use fewer resources and require less complex construction.
The Fab Lab House wins Solar Decathlon Europe people’s choice award « FabLab House The Fab Lab House wins Solar Decathlon Europe people’s choice award More than 20,000 people have visited the most popular solar house in Madrid, produced by the Institute for Advanced Architecture of Catalonia (IAAC). IAAC announced that will apply in the next edition of Solar Decathlon Europe in 2012. Prince Felipe said it looked like a boat but the spectacular house produced by Institute for Advanced Architecture of Catalonia was also called “peanut house” “cinnamon submarine,” “forest zeppelin” or “whale belly” . The queues to visit the house have greatly surprised the team of the Fab Lab House during the ten days of competition: more than 20,000 people have visited the solar house. “The competition has been a great way to push the spirit of innovation in the field of architecture and construction in these times of crisis. Guallart also announces that the IAAC, along with its technology partners, will apply again at the next European contest edition. Fotos Adrià Goula
Post-Fad Prefab: Retro-Modern Cabins for Neo-Rustic Living « Dornob If you could not tell from the title: these designs are a bit tough to categorize. There is a certain nostalgia for the classic cabin look: rough-hewn logs stacked up on their sides, a simple pitched roof, small door and window openings and perhaps a little chimney poking out the top and puffing out swirls of smoke. Somewhere between extreme traditionalism and ultra-modernism sits this series of green cabin plans – modest retro-modernist living spaces that use local materials, falling neither into the ‘extreme green’ category of contemporary (st)architecture nor the faux-vintage trap of newly-built but old-style log cabins. This prefab cabin system from Add a Room starts with a small ? In classic Scandinavian style, they are modest in appearance and use the bare minimum material palette to accomplish their purpose – standard-sized windows and doors, locally-farmed wooden slats, flat horizontal and vertical planes of solid and glass to make up the floors, decks, walls and ceilings.
BaseHabitat Rustic Modern + Rural Retro = 6 Forest & Mountain Homes « Dornob From small and cozy cabins of times past to luxurious modern vacation homes, the best rural houses seem to be built and designed with nature strongly in mind. These six eco-centric structures from BCJ Architects embrace their forest and mountain environments and fully engage in the ecology of their rural settings and rugged surroundings. Most of all, they manage to reflect historic and regional styles but also combine them with contemporary materials and building strategies. Set on the gentle slopes of rural Utah, this forested home by Bohlin Cywinski Jackson Architecture starts with a grand gesture: an infinity pools that thrusts out into the trees like a stage in a theater-in-the-round. From the approach and entrance to the views back outside, this edge-of-the-forest and top-of-the-hill home in Pennsylvania is all about phsyical movement and crossing boundaries. Aged, weathered and worn materials were used to construct the storied layers of this Montana forest home.
Help in a Hurry: Disaster-Relief Container Homes for Japan Abstract designs and architectural theory are well and good, but when the stuff hits the fan (or tsunami hits the land, as it were) these notions are put to the test in a very rapid and real way. The result shows who is ready to roll out workable housing solutions to address catastrophes as they unfold. The Ex-Container project is a joint effort to address the displaced populations following widespread earthquake and tsunami devastation still unfolding in Japan. Cheap, easy and fast, container homes provided an obvious answer. Containers are of a size that offer a flexible framework in terms of location, transportation and domestic application – they are versatile-but-stable enough to make for makeshift residences, semi-temporary homes or long-term dwellings (or hotel complexes) depending on demand. Interestingly, in this case it was determined that using manufactured, container-framed units would be quicker, simpler and more cost-effective than reusing existing containers.
Post-Travel RVs: Used Airstream Trailers as Art Campers « Dornob Mobility may be the defining buzzword of the past century, but what will become of all of those gas-guzzling, suburb-fueling portable homes of the future past? These two converted Airstream trailers (now art and writing studios respectively) are at the heart of that question in many ways – iconic symbols of a mobile society, RVs now recycled from aerodynamic campers into niche spaces. The first is still semi-mobile, but definitely local: the so-called “Tin Can Studio is a mobile project space housed in a converted 18ft Streamline trailer. The second is entirely static: a backyard art studio that shows the reuse potential of something designed as a vehicle but re-purposed as a stationary space. The before-and-after photos show just how this vintage classic became more than a icon of retro-futurism – a gutted, modified and ultimately transformed space that is neither entirely old or new. Continue reading below Our Featured Videos
Project Thing In A Jar Just what did I do now? Every mad scientist seems to have a whole rack of "things in jars". Weird shapeless organic-looking objects suspended in cloudy fluid and cryptically labeled. Ingredients: 1 Large Jar - Previously contained pickles. Labeling the label After printing, and cutting out a specimen label I then use a regular ball point pen to fill it out (I would have used a fancier pen but it's all I had on hand). The label by design will mostly be illegible. Aging the label For some reason these jars are almost always really old. I've soaked the label in a cup of tea and coffee grinds for about 20 minutes. To deter late night snacking replace your cookie jar with one of these. But we're not done yet. Ask your doctor if "thing in a jar" is right for you. Now all we need is a "thing" Here I've taken scraps of clay, wire, foil, wood bits, hot glue, and a cork to shape out the "thing". Weird but not very menacing. I've named this color "Krang from the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle's Pink". Notes:
Chic Shacks: 6 Stylish Sheds, Barn Homes & Hermit Cabins « Dornob There was a time when ‘rustic cabin’ meant ‘cheap vacation’ – but a true retreat in this day and age is, for many of us, finding elegance in natural simplicity and luxury in rural solitude. One company has made a mission of catering to precisely those people who want to escape stressful city living and be alone somewhere in the woods of a modern-day Walden at the drop of a hat (or at least the lowering of a crane). However, there is more than the Swedish firm Arvesund than simply escapism: they have developed a line of prefabricated barns and sheds that work for anything from the most traditional purposes (backyard storage spaces, hunting cabins or workshops) to creative contemporary uses (small garden studios, guest quarters or even second homes). The current crown jewel of Arvesund design is the Hermit’s Cabin (shown at the top), a prefabricated cabin structure “for all times of the year” and “that can be placed … anywhere.
Prefab Camo Cabin: Modern Mobile Metal-Clad Trailer Home « Dornob If you saw it sitting in the landscape, you would be hard-pressed to guess that this metal, wood and glass house designed by the Hangar Group has hidden mobility – let alone that it was secretly prefabricated in a factory and shipped to its site. Contemporary hybrid (zinc, steel and titanium) cladding is designed both to camouflage the home in a rocky-mountain environment but also serves to make the structure look more solid, robust and modern than you might expect from a trailer home. Vertical wood strips of siding at either end provide creative contrast – almost like the exposed rings of some giant metal log – and punctuate the entry points. The story is much the same on the inside: synthetic stone-toned tiles and natural wooden flooring, walls and ceiling slats make it feel like a clean, compact and modern cabin.
Find your natural space Garden Studios | Sustainable Buildings | Garden Rooms/Offices/Housing - Ecospace Studios