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Architecture
When You Put Sexy Green Architecture together with Italian Design, What is the FIRST thing you think of?
Well let me first start off with this. I consider TWITTER my lover. Why? Well, I do not get to visit it as often as I like. However, when I do, it never disappoints. Scanning my TWITTER feed in a frenzy, while thinking that I should be feeding my son, my dog and tending to a long list of other jobs on the to-do list, I come across the word FERRARI and I am stopped in my TWITTER tracks!
As you should know or you can refer to in my most recent Automotive Article, I LOVE CARS. However, not just any CARS. I LOVE SEXY CARS. FERRARI is at the top of list.
As with a STYLISH and SEXY Black Dress or their national Football team, the Italians know SEXY and DO IT RIGHT! So if there was anything that would get me to stand to attention on dreary Wednesaday morning in Malibu, it was the word FERRARI!
Well, let's not forget that this is the Architecture section and not the Automotive section! So let's turn our attention to what I am really going on about. Ok, Ferrari's new museum in Modena, Italy has gone Geothermal. What does that mean? Well, Future Systems and Shiro Studios collaborated to design an Environmentally Sustainable museum for the Italian motor racing legend and business mogul Enzo Ferrari. This is the first geothermal museum in Italy. It incorporates the use of water recycling systems and photovoltaic technology.
This museum is just not Environmentally friendly with geothermal power and partial bermed construction, it is also very SEXY! It's Italian and I would not expect any different! Like FASHION today, amongst the most FASHIONABLE, there is always the incorporation of the old with the new!
In this instance, within the Architectural design of the musem, the architects included a vintage montage with the incorporation of the early 19th century house where Enzo was born. Well Done! I love IT!
To top it all off Ferrari is looking to bring a petrol-electric hybrid to market by 2015. Watch out WORLD!! Until then watch this...
Reference: "Ferrari Goes Green with Geothermal-Powered Museum in Modena, Italy" by Alexandra Brower for StumbleUpon.com
Photos Courtesy of StumbleUpon.com
Article by Birungi Ives
Where Art Meets Architecture
When it comes to your dream house, look no further than the work of Clark Sanders. His innovative work marries art and architecture to create masterpieces of form and function. Each home is custom–designed using a wide array of sustainable, locally–sourced products such as straw, adobe, stone, plaster, and reclaimed or recycled wood. Many of his homes feature posts and beams from fallen barns, fusing old and
new into incredible sculptures that are filled with a one of a kind, environmentally conscientious character.
Sanders is located near the Catskill Mountains in Upstate New York, and has been designing and building with alternative products since the 1970’s. He is well known for having built the first legally permitted straw bale building in the country in 1989.
Straw bale homes are a cost effective alternative to mainstream buildings, saving in construction as well as heating and cooling costs. They have evolved from what were make–shift shelters in the 1800’s into the magnificent pieces of artistic engineering we see in Clark Sanderson’s work today. As he states on his website, "Ultimately if we (the client and I), have done our job well, we will have sculpted a home which embraces, soothes and protects the occupants
while providing refuge from the inherent stresses of life".
To learn more about Clark Sanders work visit his website Here.
You can also read “In the Catskills, Building Stone by Stone, Bale by Bale” in the Home and Garden section of the New York Times featuring Clark Sanders.
Article By Haley Ann O'Neil
Modern Production
Looking out over the cliffs of Point Dume at the glorious wide expanse of the Pacific Ocean, an actor that will remain nameless expressed her awe over the majesty on display from the master bedroom of this GORGEOUS modern home.
Malibu Architect Doug Burdge, has brought many clients and friends to his STUNNING example of Sustainability. Set in one of the most beautiful places on earth, this home is perched on the most coveted location in the Point Dume area of Malibu, California.
Having a façade from the street that blends in effortlessly with the Point Dume Nature Preserve, this home is not a protruding McMansion. Quite the contrary, this home stands true to Passive design. According to Burdge, this home functions on a passive system where the use of excess energy is kept to a minimum.
Being in Malibu, California, there is very little need for heating or air conditioning, so with the precise location of windows and doors, this home benefits from natural air conditioning via cross ventilation.
Upon entering the home, there is a beautiful use of Ipe hardwood flooring that is ethically harvested from Sustainable forests in Brazil. As you move effortlessly from the outside to the inside and back out again, you have the opportunity to take in the luscious landscape designed by renowned landscape designer Jay Griffith. Using plants that are native to the area, this landscape is as environmentally friendly as it is beautiful!
Burdge says, “…We let the site tell us what it wants! Once we start building, we let the house tell us what it wants…” This process is a like a movie production. Builder Michael McDonald, originally a producer/director, works along with Burdge & Associates Architects Inc., building homes and creating sets for a luxurious life! Although there are building plans, as there are scripts for movies, Burdge finds that like an actor needing the spontaneity to ad lib, a house needs the same flexibility for spontaneous changes during the building process. 9 out of 10 times, this process of listening to the needs of the house, works!
Just as the home can dictate what it wants, according to Burdge, so does the location. Starting in Cabo San Lucas in Mexico with building Spanish Colonial homes for Americans in the 80s, Burdge then moved on to Mountain style homes in Sun Valley, Idaho. Currently, Burdge is finding in Malibu that modern is a more prevalent style.
No matter the setting, Doug Burdge has a way with a home that leaves you feeling like the star of your own movie!
Please feel free to view more of Doug Burdge’s work at www. buaia.com
Global Design
Now we all know Brad Pitt! Maybe some of us know of his organization, the Make It Right Foundation, which was founded in response to the devastation left my Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans. But how many of you know about the beautiful and diverse architectural designs, created by top architects from all over the world, for new homes in the Lower 9th Ward? Now here is a chance for you to take a look at my favorite designs. To learn more about the Make It Right Foundation and view more designs visit, www.makeitrightnola.org
My favorites are….
Photo courtesy of www.makeitrightnola.org
Billes Architecture, Gerald W. Billes- architect
Billes Architecture create spaces that fortify a clear reciprocal connection between owner and environment
Photo courtesy of www.makeitrightnola.org
ELEMENTAL, Santiago, Chile
The focus of ELEMENTAL’s projects are for both public interest and social impact
Photo courtesy of www.makeitrightnola.org
Pugh + Scarpa Architecture / Santa Monica, CA
By making the “ordinary extraordinary”, Pugh+Scarpa Architecture is socially and community conscious through environmentally sustainable design that allow us to see our environment in new ways.
Michelle Kaufmann Designs
580 Second Street, Suite 245
Oakland, CA 94607
www.mkd-arc.com
Michelle Kaufmann Designs is a full service architectural design firm that specializes in sustainable, innovative, high quality design.
We believe that sustainable, well-designed buildings should be accessible to more people. To achieve this we have simplified our process and chosen off-site modular technology as our only means to create beautiful, eco-friendly homes. Our hope is that, through our practice, we will make it easy for people to build green and live a more sustainable life. We are making a difference one home at a time one family at a time.