Because it's Cool

Patkau Architects won a competition for on-site cottages, supporting residential educational programming at the Frank Lloyd Wright masterwork in Fayette County. They will be sustainable buildings that look to be built in the ground. The interesting thing that the judges commented on is that they were impressed with what the architects left out, not only with what they included. It reminds you that editing yourself is important and that white space or emptiness is sometimes as (if not more) important as the bells and whistles. More info at Dezeen design magazine.

VitraHaus outshines the collection it houses. Don’t get me wrong, Vitra furniture is modern, streamlined and fresh - my current office has Vitra chairs and not only are they aesthetically pleasing but they are functional and oddly comfortable. But the architectural masterpiece, VitraHaus, imagined and built by Herzog & de Meuron tingles my senses.

When I first saw it, I had one of those moments where I said to myself, “why didn’t I think of that.”  The building connects two themes that often appear in their work: the archetypal house and stacked volumes. The photo by the way was taken by Iwan Baan, http://www.iwan.com/iwan_index.php - a photographer definitely worth taking a look at.