Tag Archives: clever design

SPOTTED – the Exbury Egg – a floating, self sustaining piece of micro architecture

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Alternative offices are far more exciting to work in than the standard desk and partition sort of space (and we would agree as we are currently moving into our new office, which used to be a public WC in Brighton and we are nicknaming Studio Loo). Having an interesting space around you really can boost your creativity and productivity. But offices do not usually get as alternative as the Exbury Egg…

This floating, self sustaining office is a combined project between British design firm SPUD, Perring Architecture + Design (PAD), boat builder Paul Baker, naval architect Stephen Payne, and artist Stephen Turner – with Turner being the lucky person who will inhabit the space for the next 12 months. He will use this time to document the tidal creek and humans own interaction with nature.

Two years in the making, the Exbury Egg now sits atop a tidal section of the River Beaulieu, where it will rise with the tides and rest on the estuary bed when the waters recede.

The cold moulded plywood and local timber create a beautifully organic space which although sparse, feels very cocoon like. 

Exbury Egg, PAD Studio, the SPUD Group, Stephen Turner, floating egg

The space is rather minimal, with a hammock taking up most of the internal space, along with a stove and working area. A wet room style bathroom is also included.

After the 12 month residency the Exbury Egg will become a travelling exhibition – hopefully it will travel close to Brighton so we have the opportunity to visit this beautiful piece of micro architecture.

(images via Inhabitat)

SPOTTED – the ‘soilid’ chair

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The use of natural materials to create structures is nothing new – traditional buildings have been constructed from the local materials for centuries, but it is very interesting when designers create new processes from old foundations.

This is exactly what Erez Nevi Pana has created with the very innovative ‘Soilid’ chair. 

Erez Nevi Pana, Soilid furniture, Soilid, Soilid chair, fungi

Looking like an old, and even perhaps burnt piece of timber, this stool is actually constructed from a really interesting mix of a few base materials. Soil, fungi and other natural materials were combined to create a mix which actually feeds itself and rises like a dough, doubling in size.

Left overnight, the risen material can then be moulded in a wood or plaster form, then baked just like a loaf until it becomes rigid and structurally sound, being able to be drilled and cut like wood.

Given the fact that the base ingredients are so natural and readily available, this innovative process could be utilised across the world to create pieces of furniture, or perhaps even pieces of buildings themselves…

(image via Inhabitat)

SPOTTED – the reclaimed Grandpa Desk by Martin Davis

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The repurposing of furniture is a bit of a studio obsession – when we are faced with a project we tend to turn to the client’s existing pieces to amend, or we start to trawl through our trusted list of local charity shops, second hand stores and flea markets to source reclaimed starting points. Using something old and discarded to create something new and reloved has a lovely poetic nature as well as a solid sustainable foundation. We love to see how other designers use these principles too – and we love the reclaimed Grandpa Desk by furniture designer Martin Davis.

Designer Martin Davis, martin davis, reclaimed wood furniture, reclaimed wood, recycled materials,  Grandpa’s Desk, wood desk, reclaimed wood desk

Like lots of our own reclaimed furniture and product design projects, this piece was conceived after a client asked Davis to reuse two old wardrobes originally built by their Grandpa – reimagining them as a new piece.

The resulting desk is constructed entirely from the old wardrobes, even down to the original screws which have been cast into resin to create the drawer handles.

This is a lovely example of how an old piece of reclaimed furniture can be reinvented for a modern home, but still retain the history and memories which make it special.

So when you are looking to obtain a new piece of furniture, ask yourself – can something you already have be redesigned and repurposed? Or can you rescue an otherwise unloved piece and bring it back to life?

(image via Inhabitat)

Wednesday Walls – REBORN paints from Newlife Paints

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Today on Wednesday Walls we are very pleased to be featuring a new product line, REBORN Paints, from one of our favourite paint companies, Newlife Paints, who have won numerous awards over recent years for their innovative processes and very high quality recycled paint. We have used their paint on a variety of projects and have always been incredibly impressed with the product and delighted by their wonderful customer service.

Making an exhibition of ourselves

Their new range, REBORN Paints takes these years of investment in their recycled paint processes and combines it with natural minerals to create very chalky, flat, breathable, low carbon paint. It has high coverage (about 2.5 litres will cover about 30 sqm), low VOCs and dries in two hours. Pretty much perfect – and it is available in a great range of colours.

We literally cannot wait to get our hands on the Intense Slate shade – which we are pretty sure will end up in our new studio very, very soon…

Intense Slate

Plus, at £29 per 2.5 litres, this high quality, responsible paint will not break the bank…

Find out more at the new Reborn Paints website.

(image via Reborn Paints)

SPOTTED – screenprinted vintage mirrors of asintended

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We adore finding beautiful, handcrafted pieces to feature here on The Ecospot, or for the projects we work on with our clients. We are particularly in love with anything letterpress inspired, and this traditional way of printing often crops up in our projects in some way or another.

she stood in the storm

So we were delighted when we spotted these gorgeous letterpress inspired screenprinted vintage mirrors by graphic studio asintended, who we discovered on an Artists Open House trail in Brighton.

Using vintage mirrors  the studio prints inspirational quotes over the top to create a beautiful decorative, reflective piece with stacks of depth.

she stood in the storm

Perhaps not the mirror you would choose for a bathroom  but we are thinking about this for a hallway, or even a kitchen diner space to add a bit of extra character and to bounce the light about.

Stunning – and one we will be specifying without doubt. Contact asintended for further information on the mirrors or the other great letterpress prints in the studios collection.

(image via asintended)

the importance of humour in design – the Peter Bristol Clip Bag

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Design can, and does, create real change in the world. Change for the good. Design has the ability to progress humanity and alter lives for the better. Design is serious and we take our responsibility as designers very seriously indeed. But it is just as important to have a sense of humour and on occasions it is great to see design that makes you smile. We saw this on Pinterest and loved it – the Peter Bristol Clip Bag.

A little black bag is essential for any wardrobe, but (as you might expect) the ordinary bag does just not do it for us. It would have to be unusual in one way or another. And this is why we fell in love with this particular design.

It just looks exactly like the fold back clips that litter the studio and ironically, my own bag. Plus, it looks great as a lovely simple piece of design with that little bit of quirkyness. As Bristol observes,  ’new scale creates new purpose’.

Bristol is currently looking for manufacturers for the Clip Bag, so it could not be too long before you see me turning up to a meeting with a Clip Bag full of stray clips.

(image via Core77)

Monday musings – shipping container homes as transitional housing gets go ahead in Brighton

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A few weeks ago, when we were still deciding what to call this series of Monday blogs, we wrote about a new project in Brighton which planned to use converted shipping containers as transitional housing. This project was still in planning, so despite the masses of value that we could see for such a scheme, there were no guarantees that the shipping container homes would actually be realised in the city.

shipping container homes

However, the end of last week saw some great news. The project by Brighton Housing Trust and developers QED has been given planning approval by Brighton and Hove City Council.

The project was described as an ‘imaginative and appropriate’ way to create temporary  transitional low cost housing in a location that is not suitable for permanent housing in the centre of the city.

Plus, when the land is required for part of the extended redevelopment of the New England Quarter in Brighton, the shipping container homes can be relocated with relative ease.

We are very excited that this scheme has been granted planning permission as it shows a real move forward not only for innovative architecture in Brighton, but also as it will provide real change for those who will call these shipping containers home.

We will be following this story closely, so expect updates as the project develops in Brighton.

Open source design – the Sea Chair

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Great design is not highly polished. It is considered from start to finish. Great design adds to the world – for the better. Great design, to coin a phrase from Cradle to Cradle thinking – is elegant. And this very unassuming stool has to be one of the most elegant we have seen to date.

The Sea Chair has been created by Studio Swine and Kieren Jones and is one of the featured Designs of 2013 currently on show at the Design Museum in London.

The design is extremely simple. It is a stool created out of plastic, in a highly recognised and familiar form. But what is beautiful about this stool is the story of its creation.

Created by hand, each stool uses only pieces of waste plastic fished out of the sea – cleaning up our oceans whilst championing the beauty of the accidental and the hand made. It has a real raw beauty which we find stunning.

But the Sea Chair is not one of those very worthy designs which are made from recycled materials  by hand, but cost a small fortune to purchase.

The Sea Chair is also an open source design.

So, for anyone wanting to create their very own Sea Chair AND clean up a section of beach in the process, the full methodology of how to create the piece can be found on the Studio Swine website. Right down to how to create your own furnace and how to identify different types of plastic.

This type of project really gets us excited – using an otherwise waste material, a low tech process and a hand made finish to produce an item which will be different from the next.

Visit the Studio Swine website for full details on how to create your own Sea Chair.

(image via Studio Swine)

Weekend Colour Inspiration – vintage book graphic colour schemes

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We have lots of sayings that we like to use in the studio. From ’work hard and be nice to people’ to ‘why fit in when you were born to stand out?’, but my personal favourite has to be a quote from the wonderful Paul Smith.

‘You can find inspiration in everything. And if you can’t, look again’

Which is how I explain our obsession with taking photos of everything. Everything. Things, textures, fonts. Natural or man made. Design, fashion, architecture. Because you never know where your next spurt of inspiration will come from.

And whilst on our recent trip to Amsterdam we filled our phones with lots and lots and lots of stuff - many of which have featured here on the Ecospot in various forms.

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So today we are looking at another three images from the Dutch collection – three books which we spotted in an antique book fair in Amsterdam and just loved. We are suckers for nice colour combinations and nice fonts, so these were real winners and out came the phone…

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Despite their age, the colours were remarkably vibrant and were quite beautiful. The pale blue, greys and whites on the Texel book really appealed to me (lovely grey again…), but the rich oranges, reds and greens were stunning. The juxtaposition between the colours was inspiring and illustrations, well, you could have easily framed them.

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So this week we are not really showcasing a particular colour scheme  but a process – look at everything around you – explore, take photos, cut images from magazines  And not just of a finished design – stuff.

It is that ‘stuff’ that you will look back on one day and discover the germ of a new idea. Because you really can find inspiration in everything. And if you can’t, look again.

(images by claire potter design)

new stylish electric cycle to grace Milan Design Week

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We love our electric bikes – it is a bit of an obsession in the studio and I am determined to be whizzing about on a beautiful electric superbike one day. A nice one like this in black or charcoal grey please…

Anyway – because of this, electric bikes and electric cycles tend to pop up readily on our radar. Some are functional. Some are made from sustainable materials. Some are just gorgeous.

And it is the latter band that this wonderful electric cycle fits into, quite stunningly. Plus it will be gracing the streets of Milan for Design Week.

Created by Italian brand Cykno, the electric cycle has an impressive vintage quality styling in carbon fibre, steel and leather (which is a bit steampunk too) combined with a high quality lithium battery which goes to full charge in four hours and can last for 60km.

The electric cycle can also be powered by pedal, with an integrated torque sensor, just in case you are found chargeless whilst swanning about the city.

So if you are heading out to Milan, keep you eyes peeled for these beauties.

(image via Inhabitat)