Tactile Living
The nine-unit
multiple dwelling
Reversible Destiny
Lofts are the first
completed example
of procedural
architecture put into
residential use.
Works of procedural
architecture function
as tools that help
the body organize
its thoughts and
actions to a greater
degree than is
usually present. In other words, these works force the individual parts of the body contemplate how and why they perform a specific action a particular way and then forces them to reconsider those actions to perform them in a new way. The procedural architecture of these lofts take into account all those everyday actions and movements that function within a home and through its design recalibrates our actions within them enough for us to doubt ourselves long enough to find a way to reinvent ourselves through new actions. Essentially, the architecture of the lofts make us question why we are the way we are. But no worries, for the equilibrium challanged the lofts come with a set of directions for use.
By virtue of its design, contruction, features and elements and their juxtaposition, the Lofts make vivid to the operant (that would be us) their tendencies and coordination skills that architects Arakawa and Madeline Gins have come to determine through their findings from their decade-long research in The Mechanism of Meaning, as essential and determinative of human thought and behavior.
The living space within these Lofts both prods and coaxes its residents to continue living, the architect’s optimistic hopes that the Loft will thusly have the capacity to help extend the resident’s life span and quality of life.
Link: Reversible Destiny Lofts
Vertical Oklahoma
Hoping to spread his vision for “vertical farms” Dickson Despommier, a professor of public health at Columbia University, created the concept of a 30-story tower that could feed thousands of people back in 1999 with his graduate students. Since then, the “verticle farm” has captured the imaginations of architects and various city-planners.
The concept of using skyscrapers had design significance for Despommier, who explains that the skyscrapers could protect a city’s food supply from floods and droughts, and from pathogens that attack crops. Fellow architect Augustine Rosenstiehl pointed out that a verticle farm has to be adapted for a specific place, much as the design of any skyscraper, which also makes the concept of a “vertical farm” feesible.
But Despommier doesn’t just see plopping one of these skyscraper farms in the middle of whatever crevice the city can squeeze it into. He believes that entire communities can be developed surrounding these “vertical farms”. He notes that critical to this concept’s success is architecture; stirking designs that make people vie for having one as the central view in their backyard.
Many of the design modeled after Despommier’s concept can be seen here.
A Home for My Shelter
Designed as a tool for a particular group of homeless people who collect bottles from the streets so they can maintain a small income from the recycling plants in order to sustain themselves, designers Gregor Timlin and Barry Sheehan saw the Shelter Cart not as a solution to the social problem of the homeless but as a method of raising awareness about the issue.
Link: Shelter Cart
The Slimy Creature Kissing Me
This is so beautifully wrong and comes via a like-minded, self-proclaimed, twisted individual, Shaku The Twisted Jeepster. ‘Course, Gilding is going off this one post, as the blog is written in Spanish, but hey, anybody who has David Bowie featured in their banner is alright in the book of Gilded Lilies.
Anyhoo, this Oh-so wrong-you’d-find-it-hanging-in-Gilding’s-living room painting of goodness is by Japanese artist Yuji Moriguchi. If translation serves correct, Moriguchi is an illustrator of Tokyo’s underground scene and is inspired by such classic lithographies as Katsushika Hokusai’s The Dream of the Fisherman’s Wife
Fisherman’s wife is perhaps the first instance of tentacle eroticism and depicts a woman entwined sexually with a pair of octupuses, the smaller of which wraps one of its tentacles around the woman’s nipple and kisses her, while the larger one performs cunnilingus. Often interpreted by Western audiences as as rape, Hokusai created the woodcut during the Edo period in which Shinto was making a resurgence in Japan; this influenced the piece’s animism and playful atitude towards sexuality.
Link: Shaku The Twisted Jeepster | Yuji Moriguchi | Wikipedia– The Dream of the Fisherman’s Wife
The Pope Under the Staircase
Designer John Teall, of Flux Interiors, had originally planned to put a life-size waxwork statue of director Roland Emmerich under the stairs of Emmerich’s London home. After discussing news coverage of Pope John Paul II’s death with Emmerich, though, he decided it would be much funnier to depict the pope reading his own obituaries.
Link: NYTimes– “Far From Conservative”
What Becomes of the American Way of Belittling and Token Cooperation
“Russia did not want this crisis. The Russian leadership is in a strong enough position domestically; it did not need a little victorious war. Russia was dragged into the fray by the recklessness of the Georgian president, Mikheil Saakashvili…[who] clearly wanted to make sure that, whatever the outcome, Russia would be blamed for worsening the situation. The West then mounted a propaganda attack against Russia, with the American news media leading the way…What is clear is that Western assistance in training Georgian troops and shipping large supplies of arms had been pushing the region toward war rather than peace,” writes Mikhail Gorbachev.
It is this same Western involvement
that the Jihad regime in Afghanistan was created and funded during the Cold War. What is wrong with the American government that it keeps making the same mistakes?
Gorbachev continues, “Indeed, Russia has long been told to simply accept the facts. Here’s the independence of Kosovo for you. Here’s the abrogation of the Antiballistic Missile Treaty, and the American decision to place missile defenses in neighboring countries. Here’s the unending expansion of NATO. All of these moves have been set against the backdrop of sweet talk about partnership. Why would anyone put up with such a charade?
There is much talk now in the United States about rethinking relations with Russia. One thing that should definitely be rethought: the habit of talking to Russia in a condescending way, without regard for its positions and interests.
Our two countries could develop a serious agenda for genuine, rather than token, cooperation. Many Americans, as well as Russians, understand the need for this. But is the same true of the political leaders?”
Link: NYTimes — “Russian Never Wanted a War” by Mikhail Gorbachev
Walk the Walk
Oh, goody goody gumdrops! Based on the BBC Television Series and brought to life by none other than those fabuous master of The Creature Production Company, comes fifteen roaring, snarling, “live” dinosaurs in their very own stage performance, Walking with Dinosaurs The Live Experience.
The stars of the show include Tyrannosaurus Rex, Utahraptor, Stegosaurus, and the largest of them all, the Brachiosaurus, which is 36 feet tall and 56 feet long from nose to tail.
The show depicts the dinosaur’s evolution spanning their entire 200 million year reign. The history of the world is played out within scenes of the daily interactions between dinosaurs. You will see how carnivours evolved into bipeds to walk on two feet, and how their four-legged herbivore prey fended off these more agile predators.
And with a $20 million budget, the show is guaranteeing a “dazzling arena specatcle of unprecedented size and quality.”
Rape Me, Murder Me, But Damn My Jeans Look Good!
“You know that period at the end of the night, when that girl you’ve been eyeing at the end of the bar, gets up and stumbles to the door to leave, without saying goodbye to you, even though you made eye contact with her like twice, and she just heads out, and you have no choice but to follow her, and rape her and then leave her on the side of the road, bloodied, or in a river, if you accidentally killed her, while you were forcing your 300 pounds of man on top of her.
Wrangler knows that period. And they’ve made the perfect jeans for it.
Good job Wrangler for attempting to make dead women seem fashionable.” ~Daniel Saynt
..::Sigh::..Yet another case for Jean Kilbourne.
Link: fashion indie
Complex Shit
“An inflatable dog turd the size of a house has blown away from a modern art exhibition in a Swiss museum before bringing down an electricity line and smashing a greenhouse window.
“Complex Shit”, a sculpture by the American artist Paul McCarthy, cast loose its moorings and was lifted by a sudden gust of wind from the Paul Klee centre in Berne and carried 200 yards to eventually make landfall in the grounds of a children’s home.”
Via: Nothing To Do With Arbroath
Is It Sunny Outside?
Gilding is tucked away in her hovel planning her next big scheme. So miss her dearly and come back often and she’ll have some off the wall tidbit for you to peruse and question WTF? soon enough.
Tickle Cock
“Architects designed the new underpass at Tickle Cock Bridge…” ~ Dezeen
Teenyweenykins for Your Munny
Good grief. If you love Munny then these will be simply inescapable. Say goodbye to your pocket book for yet one more sickeningly cute bauble.
Teenyweenykins, by Kaley Woods, is a prototype range of toy animals with interchangable heads. The prototype was presented in London’s New Designers exhibition back in June so its only a matter of time before someone somewhere picks them up for market.
Though they aren’t a DIY toy like the Munnys, they are a dismemerable toy that won’t put your kid on the radar as a future psychopath when they start dismembering them.
The concept behind the toy is that each of the six animal heads fit on each of the three bodies, and when pressed they react in different ways. This gives the child an incentive to match the heads and bodies together. Or, for the overgrown child, see how many incorrect responses it takes before their drunken asses gets it right. The toy will also reward the player with a sensory reaction…and pee on them when they get it wrong. Nope, just kidding. Bit of wishful thinking on Gilding’s part.
The reaction would include illuminating, vibrating, and sounding the corresponding animal’s name.
Ok, so all the learning shit aside, and before they go and ruin the damn things with Matel paint jobs, Woods should take a page out of Munny’s book and put all that fun sensory overload shit in these little creations and leave them blank like they are here and let us big kids fuck em’ up with our own paint jobs.
Link: Dezeen
Haute Couture of Momento Mori
Nothing like showing up to a funeral in fantastic mourning jewelry. Designer Gisele Ganne has created a range of jewellery that explores the social symbolisms of death, mourning, and divorce.
Having shown her pieces in the Royal College of Art Show (One) in June, the collection exhibited the jewellery of widows to wear in remembrance of their partner as well as a range of Divorce Rings, symbolising the end of marriage.
Ganne describes: “My mourning jewellery illustrates different forms of death…Each piece tells a story about the deceased and their widow. The widow of the deceased can wear the jewellery in his memory, or in memory of the manner in which he died.”
The divorce rings are a macabre take on the French tradition of the bride’s globe, an object usually given to a bride on her wedding day to hold her crown and bouquet.
In truth, immortalizing and remembering the dead were synonymous with the burial of a loved one and mourning or memorial jewellery has been worn for these events for centuries. This was especially so for the Victorian era, where common symbols used in mourning jewellery included forget-me-nots and other some such sentimental flowers, hair of a loved one, hearts, crosses, ivy leaves, and even more macabre symbols such as skulls, coffins, and gravestones. Oh, common’, you didn’t think your emo self came up with that did you.
Ganne not only refers to these but expounds upon them, glamourizing death to the level of Haute Couture. Wait…that’s not such a bizarre notion. Most haute couture models look dead anyhow.
Anyhoo, Gannes not only refers to the well known customs of mourning jewellery, but that of exotic and other old world or ethnic customs such as the Andaman — a little community in Bengal where the widow takes the skull of their husband after burial to wear it as a necklace). And urban legends were not free from her exploitation. Such legends as the Black Widow, who kills her husbands for their money, and historical events, such as crimes, serial killers, and suicides served as her inspiration.
But mourning isn’t
just about dead people. Its also about mourning the dead relationships, the decaying marriages. Gannes divorce jewellery refers to old and contemporary wedding customs to illustrate this sort of mourning. Being French, most of the customs come from French tradition, such as the Bride Globe. But nothing about Gannes pieces are idle flaunter as each decoration inside the original inpsiration that symbolizes the union and give luck to the marriage, are therefore subverted in Gannes pieces to show the inevitability of the breakup. But Gannes isn’t all doom-n-gloom. Her pieces also show that from these ashes may raise a new life.
Even the materials used in creating this collection serve a symbolic purpose. Interested in the symbolic and mythical function associated with leather, sequins, foam, human hair, and silver (all materials used in Gannes pieces), and combined with mixture that forms with the celebrities or models that will wear them, Gannes seeks to create a “sort of pop voodoo, or decadent curse.” And as if our world isn’t obsessed enough with celebrity icons, Gannes now offers us the ability that when wearing this jewelry we can mourn the death of celebrity icons we love as they pass on.
Too Despereaux
Despereaux Tilling is a mouse…er, rather, he is the mousy embodiement of love, hope, empathy, forgiveness, adventure, and…depair. He has big dreams, and is author Kate DiCamillo’s tidy packaged tale of mice and men, where she explores the “powerful, wonderful, and ridiculous” nature of love, hope, and forgiveness. DiCamillo’s old-fashioned, somewhat dark story, narrated “Dear Reader”-style begins “within the walls of a castle, with the birth of a mouse.” But from birth, Despereaux Tilling is different from all other mice. Sadly, the romantic, unmouselike spirit that leads the unusually tiny, large-eared mouse to the foot of the human king and the beautiful Princess Pea ultimately causes him to be banished by his own father to the foul, rat-filled dungeon.
This first of four books tells Despereaux’s sad story, where he falls deeply in love with Princess Pea and meets his cruel fate. The second book introduces another creature who differs from his peers — Chisroscuro, a rat who instead of loving the darkness of his home in the dungeon, loves the light so much he ends up in the castle — and in the queen’s soup. The third book introduces yet another unlikely hero — young Miggery Sow, a girl who has been “clouted” so many times that she has cauliflower ears. Still, all the slow-witted, hard-of-hearing Mig dreams of is wearing the crown of Princess Pea. And finally, the fourth book returns to the dungeon-bound Despereaux, and brings full circle the connected lives of mouse, rat, girl, and princess in a dramatic denouement.
“Children whose hopes and dreams burn secretly within their hearts will relate to this cast of outsiders who desire what is said to be out of their reach and don’t dare to break ‘never-to-be-broken rules of conduct’.”–Karen Snelson
This tale of three unlikely heroes — a misfit mouse who prefers reading books to eating them, an unhappy rat who schemes to leave the darkness of the dungeon, and a bumbling servant girl with cauliflower ears — whose fates are intertwined with that of the castle’s princess, has been turned into and Eeeek-ingly cute motion picture. Film’s release date set for December 19, 2008.
sillycaffe — and, no, that’s not a typo
So, Gilding & Mr. Gilding have been doing some strategic life planning after our experiences with FSU and UF. Frankly, our faith in Florida’s education system has been damaged beyond repair, and you can only base so much of life on Faith alone. Mr. Gilding in particular has had his fill of spending time in taking on education — between elitist attitudes that question, scoff, or belittle his life as an artist in a wheelchair, bureaucratic bullshit between universities and campuses across the board that has whittled his Associates degree in the Arts to something worth little more than nothing and accepted nowhere (and that’s above the already there stigma of Arts as a degree). And frankly, Gilding herself has run out of things to say to him to make it all better. Florida’s current education crisis affects not only grade school but has created all sorts of trickle effects in higher education that was unforeseeable.
Everyone in the nation should (by now at least) see that the “No Child Left Behind” shit is just that — shit!. And that standardized testing, let alone basing a school’s funding on test scores, especially when those reward funds go to schools that already have funding and money and the grades rather than going to the inner city and poor schools that need it, is a backwards, fucked up system that only promotes the continued establishment as well as exponentially exacerbates the current status of poverty to new and greater levels. More over, standardized testing has created stupid college students that can’t study, can’t learn, and are little more than programmable robots. And the few that can think are little assholes because they know that they are ahead of the game — which is stupid because thinking should be a fucking given, not a quality rewarded by tolerating that shit-head attitude.
And universities don’t want to deal with their asses either. Which has only helped promote attitudes of elitism and reward for those with enough money to buy their way in to the right school and fuck all the rest that worked their way through hard work and determination. Correction, those hard workers can eventually make their way in to the Florida University of their choice — but more than likely they are going to have to bounce from one University to the next in the hopes of finally achieving all the core requisite classes that that ONE particular university requires — or make the decision to settle for receiving a degree from a school of third, fourth or even fifth choice. And that’s just shitty. Gilding holds out the hope that this is only a Florida education crisis reality and not nationwide, but if trends hold steady, this reality will be spreading to a hometown near you like the virus that it is.
So — obviously not in love with the education system as it is currently, and not yet ready to locate to some far away state where no family lives, the Gilded Duo have been in search of a life decision that makes them happy and financially secure — well, as secure as you can be in the times of recession and stupid bureaucratic sell-outs. The idea of a cafe has been a recurring one that the Gilded Duo can’t seem to escape. What kind remains to be a surprise…to you, not the Gilded Duo, of course. But how friekin’ cool would it be to make this your favorite local cafe to hang out at.
Just in case you’re thoroughly mystified, that is a shipping container that slash-cafe is made out of.
A few years back, several architects, Adam Kalkin being at the forefront, began a movement to solve the problem of creating low income houseing that both the day laborer and the government could afford. On the heels of that problem was the rising shipping containers that were piling ever higher in shipping yards, blocking the views and in some cases the sun, of the neighborhoods behind them, as America was importing more than it was exporting. This issue hasn’t changed, but Kalkin saw an opportunity to resolve both problems. And thus he began making homes out of shipping containers.
This illycaffe is a spin-off from his Push Button House design. And yep, that means that this cafe opens with the push of a button.
Wonder if its a trademark infringement to name ours sillycaffe? It does have a nive ring to it.
Link: NOTCOT | Adam Kalkin
