Surface is a newly available flat-panel computing platform from Microsoft that allows users to access and manipulate data with their hands.  It’s the next big thing – literally. 

Firstly, apologies for the absence of blog posts this past fortnight. Diseño Earle have been enjoying our summer break and are now refreshed and ready to go. To get things rolling, have a look at this:

Houses are expensive things nowadays. Especially in England, where even a modest starter-home can set you back over 200,000GBP. In 2005 the British government launched a competition to build homes for less than 60,000GBP. No easy task, thats for sure.

Developers George Wimpey joined with the architects at Rogers Stirk Harbour to win the competition from the field of 221 other competitors. Love them or loathe them, I can see why they won.

The main cost saving method was to have the floors, ceilings and walls all pre-fabricated in a factory and delivered ‘flat-pack’ style to the site, ready to be assembled. Due to the simple nature of the houses, they can be put together remarkably quickly, in less than a day. That’s right; a day. The results, as you can see, look great, and in a couple of years when the surrounding gardens have matured a little, I think this estate is going to look fantastic.

From a design point of view, the houses are simple and certainly nothing special, but they do have a nice modern feel and, let’s face it, are far more interesting to look at than most of the twee houses you normally find on British housing estates.

In a country with a big shortage of affordable housing, these are winners in my book. Watch the video below to see these being put together; it shows that whilst the building of Rome in a day was highly unlikely, constructing a modest family home isn’t outside the realms of possibility.

 Article found on The Contemporist

Carparks can be a real nuisiance. And thoroughly uninteresting places to boot. Confusing layouts send people around in circles, guided only by small and vague signs promising that the exit is somewhere in this direction or that. To add to the frustration, car parks are ugly places: dirty and poorly lit concrete does not a pleasurable experience make. The worst part is that generally the car park is the final experience people have upon leaving the building, and this can leave a sour taste in the mouth.

The Eureka Tower in Melbourne, Austraila employed designer Axel Peemoeller to make their parking situation a much more interesting one. Rather than pepper the environment with small directional signs, Peemoeller has used optical illusions to make the correct route present itself only when you’re in the correct place. The directions are so large you couldn’t possibly miss them or get confused and the way they magically leap out when you’re on track has the effect of reinforcing the point that parking wasn’t just an after-thought with this building. 

The signs just look like colourful decoration until you’re in a position where they become relevant to your journey through the carpark and demand a response from you rather than potentially adding to your parking confusion.

This idea not only simplifies the parking experience but makes it colorful and engaging, rather than a dull experience that can ruin the overall impression of a building and it’s design.

This small wooden bridge in England is deceptively primitive. Designed by Valentin Bontjes van Beek and Natalie Rozencwajg, the apparently improvised structure is rather carefully designed, - a dynamic web of rough timber struts, steel cables, and computer-milled wood decking that hangs lightly from the existing trees.

See link below.

http://www.bdonline.co.uk/story.asp?storycode=3107415

The art world is a highly ponderous arena, and subsequently open for analysis. Here at Modern Design we pride ourselves on forming honest opinions, and when it comes to art, we occasionally - in fact invariably - disagree on certain artists, works and collections. Sporadically these opinions become so incredibly opposing; our office can become a hostile environment – so strong are the opinions a small faction of art contra-rebels break off and hang out by the coffee machine until reprimanded and brought back into line. Cy Twombly almost had this effect, so to avoid an in-house revolt, the editor decided to give the art insurgents a chance to flank the general consensus…and here it is.

Cy Scribbly. Why on earth, established octogenarian art deity that he might be, would you waste precious wall space at the Tate Modern (something thousands of unrecognised yet incredibly talented artists would give-up their deft brush hands for) with a bunch of old teenage scribble? Okay, I don’t mean representative art is necessarily always the best, but frankly, my senile great aunty has got more interesting stains on her carpet than some of Cy’s crude canvas ramblings. To flag it up as an abstract form of philosophical graffiti is an insult to aerosol wielding hoodie gangs across the UK and the decorated London Underground carriages that channel poor punters to the Tate Modern. I’m afraid the notable critiques, the ones who decide the great and the talented, have been swindled – so in effect, hats off to you Cy, you pulled it off – conned everyone and made classic fools out of some of the most revered experts on the planet. Cy Doodly, has just thrust his finger up at the British art fraternity and walked away laughing.