“These illustrations by New York based illustrator Dadu Shin are beautiful. A quick skim through his portfolio and you’ll find that much of what Dadu draws stems from nature. He creates richly textured worlds which are painted with a palette of simple muted colors and he occasionally populates these places with weird and wonderful creatures.”
Blast is a laboratory of ideas, where every topic is bound to develop new languages, different shapes and innovative solutions.
Founded by Luca Bombassei and Simona Traversa in Milan in 2001, Blast Architects i san architectural design firm which covers various typologies and scales. Within a methodology observing the criteria of sustainable architecture, it designs projects in the fields of urban planning, production, service industries, hospitality, residence, exhibition mounting, design and coordinated image. The aim is to integrate architectural quality, environmental and energy sustainability and a positive social impact, with an accurate evaluation and control of the economic factors of each project.
From 2001 it has been coordinating the design of the Technology and Science Park “Kilometro Rosso” in Bergamo, where it has completed the interiors of the R&D Centre of Brembo and has designed the buildings in “A” class for the Centro delle Professioni and for the University of Bergamo. The most recent projects include: E-motion Park, an innovative commercial format dedicated to the world of the automotive, the flagship stores in Europe and Brazil for Skitsch, a new brand of sustainable design, and Baby Caring, entertainment and play centres for parents and children. H3 hotel is a new kind of hotel designed by Blast Architects that proposes a new model of hospitality capable of combining comfort, economy and energy savings, based on the use of an industrialised construction process.
Blast Architects believes in an integrated approach to the project and builds its team in order to meet the requirements of the client in an efficient and accurate way. From the designing of the concept, to the development of the various project phases, to the realization of the architectural work, the firm can count on talented professionals with suitable attitudes and specializations. Organised on an entrepreneurial logic, it is based on the cooperation of architects, landscape designers, interior decorators, product and graphic designers, who, well-coordinated, come up with innovative and original solutions able to respond to the demands of every theme and planning scale.
Blast Architects also gives great importance to communication and each work phase is supported by the elaboration of visual instruments such as rendering, 3D animation and video capable of describing the specifications of the project to everyone.
The fifteen meters of annual rainfall of the Cherrapunji region–a figure aggrandized by frequent flash floods–accelerate the flow of its rivers and streams, the fierceness and destructive power of which few wooden or steel bridges could withstand. Transport across the region’s numerous water channels is necessary, whether to return to one’s dwelling after fishing or clothes washing or to escape the dangers of one place to move to another. But how?
The locals’ answer lie in the sloping hills hugging the contour of the water channels, where a species of rubber tree flourishes. From the upper trunk of the ficus elastica, secondary roots grow outwards with great profuseness. The tribes people realized half a millenia ago that they could use these roots to forge a pass across the water below, using hollowed out betel nut trunks to guide the direction of the roots’ growth.
Yesterday we took a look at Michael Hansmeyer’s 16-million-faceted plastic columns, the material products of an inconceivably complex algorithm. Meanwhile, artist Yaron Steinburg has dared to construct something that is perhaps even more multifaceted: his own brain. In a quirky “Being John Malkovich”-esque installation, Steinburg invites viewers to and grasp the immensely complex organ that is the source of his thoughts, fears and dreams.
Steinburg’s installation portrays the brain as if it were a city. The artist presents us with a hovering elliptical form, crammed with tiny cardboard houses in a seemingly random arrangement, tightly packed with almost no room to breathe. Meanwhile, a rickety toy train on an elevated track encircles the cavernous space while lights glow on and off, assuring us that this miniature metropolis is very much alive.
Clear like Scotch but thick like packing and durable ala duct tape, this clever prototype puts traditional door hardware along nonstandard edges and folds to create a cute optical illusion.
As a functional indicator of use, though, there is still a missing roll or two in this series – something like a sequence of illusory punched-hole or pre-drilled rivets or a set of steel plates would look more appropriate across seams meant to be cut and opened.
As a functional indicator of use, though, there is still a missing roll or two in this series – something like a sequence of illusory punched-hole or pre-drilled rivets or a set of steel plates would look more appropriate across seams meant to be cut and opened.