Villa Kogelhof

Are you opinionated about architecture? For once the world wants to hear about it: vote for your top picks in the Architizer A+ Awards! Public voting is open until March 21, and there are plenty of categories (and even more subcategories) of beautifully built and rendered work. Not opinionated about architecture? Cast votes for your dream home, office, airport, and garden. Here are some of my top picks.

In the Residential Interiors category, I loved RoominaRoom by Atmos Studio. Located in London, the redesign is a room "grown" within another in response to the building's residents' committee blocking a loft project. Sneaky.

In one of the Landscape categories, the Hans-Wilsdorf Bridge, a scribbly tube spanning the 280 feet of Switzerland's Arve river.

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One of the most satisfying things in an NYC motorist's life is coming over the Queensboro Bridge and heading south on 2nd Avenue late on a weekday night. Through proper timing and judicious use of the accelerator, you can catch a wave of green lights for three miles, from 59th Street all the way down to Houston.

Audi's Smart City Traffic Light Assistance System, if realized, could convey this sensation to millions—while cutting a car's emissions by some 15%. While it's not designed to let you beat lights per se, what the system does is receive information beamed from surrounding traffic lights, then crunches that data with your car's location and speed to present the precise timing between lights. Check it out:

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The obvious hurdle is that it requires a grid of "smart" traffic lights that can beam data--but ideally this is the way cities should be going. And the upshot is that the system can be retrofitted.

Via Jalopnik

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Editor: Have you ever been tempted to take someone else's design? What do you think would happen to you if you did? Here we've got Part 3 of "Accidental Designer's" story, as he follows through on a fateful decision.

Missed the last one? Catch up here.

At a craft fair I'd spotted this guy, I'll call him Rusty, selling these chairs he had made. As soon as I saw his design, I realized I could build them myself, even better than he had. And I darn sure had enough wood to make them. Now I have to point out that these chairs were not my design. But before we talk design theft, I have to detour into auto theft. Because in my life there were two cases where people were getting rid of a boatload of wood and it worked out in my favor, and with the first one I ended up getting my car stolen.

Some guy was selling a garageful of teak, which I'd mentioned earlier. These were huge pieces of rough-cut lumber and you couldn't believe how much of it there was. The guy's grandfather had brought it all over from India on a ship in the 1950s. I had this crappy Chevy Astro van, and each trip I loaded it up to the brim with wood, so badly that the van was practically bottoming out. It was a 1.5-hour round trip and it took me six freaking trips to get all of the wood back to the boatyard where I was living.

By the time I made it back with the final load, it was late at night and I was dead tired. I couldn't lift my arms to unload that last batch and figured I'd get to it in the morning, so I left the car in the lot, staggered back into my sailboat and fell asleep with my boots on.

In the morning I got up and went out to finish the job. But my van was gone. I always parked in the same spot so it's not like I misplaced it, and the keys were still in my pocket, so it's not like a buddy of mine had moved it. It had just disappeared, along with its load of valuable teak.

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Tonight at Curiosity Club we'll talk with Keegan Onefoot-Wenkman, the talented printmaker, artist, and prefix half of KeeganMegan & Co. We'll hear about doing things the hard way by hand, printing with steamrollers, and more. The talk starts at 6pm at the Hand-Eye Supply store in Portland, OR. Come early and check out our space or check in with us online for the live broadcast!

Keegan Onefoot-Wenkman: "My Hands Are Going To Fall Off"
Hand-Eye Supply
23 NW 4th Ave
Portland, Oregon 97209
Tuesday, March 11, 6pm PST

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Time is running out! You only have a little more than a week left to submit your designs to the 2014 Core77 Design Awards! Yesterday, we announced the jury members for the Equipment, Packaging, Educational Initiatives, Speculative and Food Design categories. This time around, we're excited to introduce you to five more teams: Interiors & Exhibitions, Visual Communication, Social Impact, Strategy & Research and DIY. Get to know who you're out to impress and submit your work before the March 20th deadline:

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Still from "Uniqlock" by Koichiro Tanaka

Japanese magazine +81 is pleased to present Graphic Passport 2014 in New York City, featuring two exhibitions—one in Manhattan, one in Brooklyn—and a presentation at NYU's Iris & B. Gerald Cantor Film Center this Friday, March 14. Now in its fifth year, the biannual celebration of Japanese creative culture has established itself as a well-curated showcase of emerging designers and has visited global destinations from Paris to Sao Paulo to Mumbai; following the New York show, the 2014 edition will make its way to Bangkok in late April.

The event kicks off tomorrow evening with the opening reception for a group exhibition at the +81 gallery space in the DUMBO neighborhood of Brooklyn. Starting on Wednesday, March 12, the space will feature Tokyo Graphic Posters, a wildly successful exhibition that launched in 2011; Takeo Paper Show 2008, Fine Papers by "School of Design"; and Tohoku Standard.

Yuni Yoshida

On Friday, March 14, the Iris & B. Gerald Cantor Film Center at NYU will host a triple-header of Japanese designers: art director Yuni Yoshida, digital ad wizard Koichiro Tanaka and filmmaker/photographer Seiichi Hishikawa. Given the quality of their work, this promises to be an enlightening evening indeed.

Last but not least, Saturday, March 15, will see the opening of a group exhibition at the +81 Gallery at 167 Elizabeth Street in Manhattan, where work by Shun Kawakami, Gen Miyamura and Syoh Yoshida will be on view. Again, this looks like it will be a very respectable showing from some of Japan's leading young artists and designers.

Seiichi Hishikawa

Both the Brooklyn and Manhattan exhibitions will be open until April 25, from noon until 7pm daily. More details are available on the Graphic Passport New York and +81 websites.

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Following the success of their first New Skins: Computational Design for Fashion workshop, Francis Bitonti Studio recently
partnered with Makerbot and Lagoa for a second session this winter. Hosted at the Metropolitan Exchange in Brooklyn, the New Skins Workshop: Brumal Bodies took place over ten days this January, including an introduction to computational design followed by a hands-on workshop. Using programs such as Maya and Rhino, students worked together designing garments, which were then rendered in Lagoa, a browser-based, hyper-realistic rendering software, as well as experimenting with the Makerbot Replicator 2 3D printer, with their efforts culminating in a collaboratively designed 3D-printed final project: the Bristle Dress.

The 'Bristle Dress' started by exploring different ways and techniques to create volume. The workshop focused on dissolving the silhouette of the body into the atmosphere, with the aim to create a trasitional garment. The upper part of the dress was designed to be printed in the naturally colored (clear) PLA, a material selected for its translucent qualities—specifically, the way it refracted the light greatly helped us achieve our design objectives. The skirt was created using Makerbot's flexible filament material and was lined with synthetic rabbit fur. The result is a flexible yet highly structured garment: 3D printing the skirt allowed us to create an interesting interface, while the texture of the fur lining further aided in the creation of our overall silhouette, combining both artificial and natural textures. This multi-material relationship has been an emerging area of interest for the studio for some time now. The skirt portion of the dress is customizable and is available for download at Thingiverse.com.

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Would you like to work with a great team of people at a rapidly growing company? Join 4moms, a truly innovative consumer products company. They've introduced robotics technology to the juvenile industry with their suite of high-tech baby gear, including the world's first power-folding stroller. How cool is that? Even cooler, they're looking for a passionate and talented Industrial Designer.

The person in this role will primarily be responsible for the development and guidance of innovative consumer goods and will make effective use of research and reference materials to support idea generation. The right person must be able to use sound problem solving skills to creatively execute solutions for form, usability, and ergonomics to lead innovative products to market from beginning to end. Is this you? Apply Right Now.

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While Chuck Close's tool of choice was the pencil, artist Seung Mo Park makes his marks with a very different medium: Stainless steel mesh.

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Billed as being "perfect for boats, parties and restaurants," Edmund Scientifics' The Incredible Spill Not is simply a 13-buck gizmo that combines a flexible strap with a rigid arm and base. While at first it may seem somewhat silly...

...you can't deny that this thing would be useful on a boat:

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