Concrete aggregate

I have just written an essay on the mass demolition of concrete prefab council estates country wide regarding the discarding of invested energy and material that goes into constructing such estates. For example 3 football pitches full of waste would have accrued if the Park Hill estate (1000 flats) in Sheffield had not been decidedly redeveloped of recent, wasting 3 weeks continuous output from a power station. So with 1.0 to 1.2 million tonnes of demolition waste amassing annually, this project was a rather welcome find. Singaporean designers have developed a process to recycle aggregate concrete into various applications, further contributing to a more sustainable built environment.  

I am very keen to start experimenting with concrete as a material and have seemingly be saying so for too long, I must act. Concrete, though controversial, its possibly my most favorite, quite a statement but due to its emotionally received complexity: volatile, looming, intimidating, masculine, dominating, beautiful, cool, calm, straight talking, purposeful, austere, ugly, harsh and foreboding.

http://www.designboom.com/weblog/cat/8/view/5839/recycled-aggregate-concrete-street-furniture-by-cilicon-faytory.html

The Age of Stupid. Stupid!

For the release of Franny Armstrong's The Age of Stupid (out in cinema's on March 30th), a documentary featuring Pete Postlethwaite as a man living alone in the devastated future world of 2055 looking back at old footage from 2008 asking why didn't we stop climate change when we had the chance, I aided the construction of a series of chairs for VIP's at the the premiere in Leicester Sq from recycled newspapers. Rolled up, taped, bundled into rigid blocks and then assembled, the chairs were a simple and effective solution to the brief. 

Anti-social project

Live project: Nokia Friend View

Nokia: Friend View

For this live brief myself, Lizzy and Vilma had to design a stand at a mobile exhibition for Nokia's latest software release: 'Friend-View', a status-update focused piece available on its new handsets that allows registered friends/associates to identify the locations of other members.

Intensive research into the brand and the users shaped the final design outcome which revolved around the concept of the spectacle. We designed a stand based around the notions of a cuckoo clock, hundreds of individual boxes form the fabric of the stand, each connected to an arduino which is activated through the Nokia website enabling users to enter their status both online and at the exhibition where details are displayed following the cuckoo's ejection from its box simultaneously alongside hundreds of others.

The concept arose from the seeming 'human' connotations the Nokia brand conveys, we decided to draw out human parallels thus creating a stark contrast to the technology heavy based competitors at the exhibition arousing a natural curiosity.

http://vilmajar.com/Nokia/

Alas the CV is good to go!

Here it is, after much tweaking the curriculum vitae is finally ready for the road. After all that trouble and toil it is quite frustrating that the preferred format is pdf! It consists of a laser cut net of thin corrugated card which houses 3 laser cut initials alongside the A3 poster. 

I'd rather not talk about it.

The letters were shipped and finally reached Mr Sykes at Teacake just in time for his spring exhibition on Sunday.  

Teacake continued:

The exhibition letters continued: The absolutely impossible concretesque coating nearly destroyed all spirits so I proceeded forth on the laser cutter, an excruciating 5 hours were endured with its deafening high pitched screeching, almost there though, almost there! Oh and I must not forget that there exists such a think called 'spray foam-coat', if I'd of know this my sanity may have been spared, sorry Gra!

Heatherwick vents

Fresh out of Fabric one saturday morning me and Chris stumbled on this beautiful structure by  St. Paul's cathedral (Paternoster Square). It's simply an air vent by Heatherwick studio that was ingeniously derived from an A4 sheet of paper scaled up to this magnificent size. Each tower is constructed from 63 8mm steel identical isosceles triangles which due to their folded nature wholly support the structure itself. For me the beauty of this construction is the thought of the original A4 paper model being sat in Heatherwick studio, on a shelf. That I find fascinating, something of this scale being conceived in the way it has been, the beauty of folder paper.

Paice award

£1500 for a design project of our choice, yes please sir! The Paice award, offered up for us Goldsmiths 2nd year design students as a way of realising a potential project of our choice, me and Livia had a few things on the cards but decided to propose to use the funds to initiate a project with children in disadvantaged circumstances being a subject close to our hearts. Through the KidsCompany charity who deal with such children we were channeled down to the underfunded St. Marys primary school in Stoke Newington to investigate the type of project the children would like to engage with. 

Our initial thoughts were to engage them throughout the creative process, from ideation, development, and execution positioning them essentially in the driving seat to foster an air of ownership which we felt would be beneficial all round to them and the project.

We arrived at the school with open minds, cameras and an array of materials for the kids to express themselves with. The school itself had preconceived ideas about the type of project them deemed would be beneficial to the children, a garden, playground improvements etc... but we the source of material had to flourish from the children themselves so we took them on a tour of the grounds, and encouraged them to document the factors they preferred and those they did not to eventually form the premise of the proposal.

It transpired that the playground was chronically devoid of visual and physical stimulus which was collectively confirmed, inciting a modeling session in the playground to conjure up scenarios of what the children would like having the power to do so. Some fantastic models and concepts were devised.

The workshop as a whole was successful, I was amazed by the unbridled enthusiasm of the children and fantastic ideas they struck up so we shall have to see what happens. What a fantastic bunch of kids, a little provocation goes a long way in formulated unprecedented responses.

Salt-Beef rant 2

The salt beef beigel store at the end of Brick land (Brick Lane Beigel Bakery) as we all know is revered, sworn by and ardently frequented by all that know of its admired and appreciated 24 hour existence and rightly so, their salt beef, gherkin and mustard doused beigels fail not to hit the spot anytime of the day or unearthly hour of the night, it is truly a gem. But, I must confess that whilst cycling through Hoxton last Wednesday, eyes prying for a morsel or two, I may have found its contender.

Halting in my tracks as a swarm of people crammed into a tiny cafes gangway, instantly compelled I breathed in and entered Franca's I believe it was called. Tiny, and with a menu so crammed I could make out one laminated sign 'New York Special', I saw 'salt beef £3.50' under the description and thought god yes. I stood for five minutes in the midst of 6 seemingly volatile yet confusingly coordinated Italian staff whilst golden omelets oozed on the back griddle, spaghetti flung into fresh, creamy sauces then promptly slapped into polystyrene containers. Coffee flying, steam rising whilst I stood, mouth watering profusely, observing my magnificent sandwich undergo construction. A large brown roll sliced, a fat wedge of firm, juicy pink salt beef undergo the knife, piled unashamedly thickly, gherkins, tomatoes and emmental cheese immediately followed by a brief grilling rendering distractingly golden. Now when I say this sandwich permeated my days remaining thoughts, I mean I thought of nothing else. It kept appearing before my eyes like little sun spots, little salt beef sandwiches flashing before my eyes. It was particularly good, different to Brick Lane, but worth the detour.

Teacakes all round sir!

A little signage for MR G.A Sykes's Teacake exhibtion at the end of the month. I will not be using foam coat ever again: 3 layers on 7 letters, sanding inbetween, its a bloody joke I tell you, if the letters can't be rendered beautifully blemish free then I shall be starting again on Monday, with the lasar cutter.

Salt-beef rekindling x

Omnipresent, pervading, pointless, revealing, baffling, overrated, insightful, tiring, provoking, mind numbing and faddish. Welcome to the blog. There's no doubt I could summon  at least ten thousand further adjectives to describe that which I am begrudgingly surrendering to. But truth be known, it is more simply a matter of me not being the least bit faffed in setting up my own website, just the prospect fills me with an array of undesirable emotions. So I declare that I shall update, as frequently as humanly possible events relating to that which I have been seemingly devoting my life, design and food. Impossible to exclude food. Therefore I feel the perfect rekindling topic is to be... Beef. Salt-beef as it so happens, and so it begins.

100% Design

www.100percentdesign.co.uk, must attend event for all design savvy. Three day interior design focused event with lectures on sustainability, materials, futures topics etc... an interesting melange of events alongside up and coming designers and their creations, £10 if students register online before the 12th of September.

Processed. These re-appropriated pallets would have been a stroke of ingenuity at the Goldsmiths BA Design 3rd years 'Processed' exhibition on Brick lane given that the space was filled with a truck load of the splinter inflicting things supporting their works. This re-appropriation has been coined as 'product hacking', customising the existing and transforming into products suited to users individual needs, there's a plethora of great examples  at www.designboom.com/contemporary/product_hacking.html, also www.studiomama.com, this is the Nina Tolstrup, the London based designers website behind the line of processed pallets.