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There are small homes, then there are smaller homes … then there are super-skinny, ultra-mini houses inside of homes. The strange starts on the outside but quickly works its way to the interior. For starters, the whole (larger) home is sandwiched between thick and solid concrete slabs that rise straight up on either side of an extremely narrow building site. But step inside, please, and see an even smaller surprise.

Within the thick exterior walls, a wood cabin-shaped box serves as a suspended loft bedroom space. The wooden siding and conventional cabin (or mini-house) shape make it seem almost like a forest retreat … except that it sits within a living room area in an already-small house. This curious little home-in-a-home part even has windows and a skylight of sorts.

Kitsch or not, this room-within-a-room concept turns a somewhat cramped-feeling master bedroom interior into a cozy sleeping quarters – the wood serving to warm the space and set it apart from the colder concrete and bare white surfaces around it.

A multi-story vertical space serves to create some breathing room in the middle of the house while also acting as a light well. This openness is mirrored in the open-tread stairs that cling to the concrete sides and drop down from the lofted bedroom. These slim metal staircases also serve as bridges to connect spaces across voids, allowing movement but maintaining a sense of separation and spaciousness as well.

Even at three stories tall, this slim Ryoichi Kodi Kojima boasts less than a thousand square feet of space – and that is if you include the small front porch below and tiny deck area on the third floor above. All things considered, it is hard to tell that this complex Japanese home is so small (at least by American standards) from the dynamic floor plans and three-dimensionality of the interior.

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Seb Przd is a skilled photographer known for his fantastic “little planet” photography. He has also created this highly compelling set of seemingly impossible bookcases to showcase his skills as a photographer but even more so as a highly creative photo editor – someone who can manipulate reality in novel but highly mathematical ways.

Seb can be seen here creating infinite loops, regressions and spirals and even arguing with himself in one instance. He works, in general, with photographs that are impossible with a conventional camera – and specifically with spherical panaromas and creative ways to map these onto flat surfaces including stereographic projections and conformal mappings.

So what does this have to do with actual bookcase design? Very little, directly speaking, but it speaks indirectly to new ways we can look at old conventions. These photographs take a very simple 3-by-3 design grid – one of the most conventional design layouts in the world – and reinterprets it in radical new ways. Also, take a second look: while these may look impossible at first they are, in reality, only highly improbable. All could be built in one form or another, though the level of detail might be highly difficult to achieve.

“About my work…”

“The first step is spherical panoramas, or as they are commonly known, Virtual Reality. Visit my equirectangular set, or view my last ten pictures in an interactive and immersive viewer (courtesy of fieldofview; needs Shockwave). I also have a limited number of interactive panoramas in ViewAt.org (in Flash).”

“As the visual sphere cannot be projected onto a flat surface without being distorted or torn, I have devised several ways of showing these spherical panoramas on a flat screen. One of the most appealing ways is the stereographic projection, the most common presentation of which looks like a little planet. The stereographic projection is just one example of conformal mappings, an infinite family of mathematically defined projections of the sphere to the plane that look good.”

The post Seemingly Impossible Spiral Bookcase Designs first appeared on Dornob.

During a recession we want everything we do to be cheaper and easier – projects cannot take the place of work (or of finding a job) but no one wants to sacrifice style for convenience either. This clever do-it-yourself concrete clothing hanger is a great blend of easy-to-make, cheap materials and innovative look.

While frustrated by constantly-breaking coat hooks and simultaneously working on an unrelated project to fill light bulbs with concrete for artistic purposes, well, it is clear what happened next: the idea to fuse these two make-it-yourself projects into one cleverly functional idea.

The process and plans are pretty simple – undo the bottom of the bulb, fill it with concrete, add a lag bolt and seal it back up. After it dries, crack the glass and screw it into the wall. The result is durable and visually engaging though somewhat eccentric and industrial as well.

If you like the design but don’t want to go to the trouble of making one yourself, the project’s designer also has them available for sale online.

“Last winter after breaking out the serious cold weather gear, I found myself fighting the coat rack next to the front door. It was, to put it bluntly, failing miserably. Tipping over, breaking off, it was a mess. I swore before the next winter I would drive some serious hooks into the wall that would handle all my heavy overcoat needs. I just haven’t seen any kickass hooks yet that I liked enough to justify making serious holes in my walls.”

“I’ve been playing around, trying to make a concrete lightbulb. Why? Because I find the contrast of blending a new material like concrete in an everyday shape like a lightbulb to be a great design element. So while messing around with these guys, I realized this would be a great excuse to drive lag bolts into my wall for hooks. By embedding a lag bolt into the concrete lightbulb, I could make a wall hook that was useful enough to handle anything I wanted to hang off it. Thus this project was born.”

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This convertible dress design by Sebastian Errazuriz is nothing short of stunning in any of its possible stylistic configurations. The wearer can simply zip and unzip along any of the horizontal zipper lines to convert their clothing in a matter of seconds.

What might be most remarkable about this design is how quickly it can shift from elegant to sexy, a full-length, single-piece dress one could potentially wear to work into a skimpy, short-cut, two-piece number that could put some bikinis to shame. In between there are any number of other options for shortening the top or bottom or even leaving some zippers partly on and partly off.

Despite the obvious benefits in terms of variable style, temperature and so on there are some clear drawbacks to this design as well. How much cold metal can you, after all, take on your skin? And do you really want to give any passerby 120 ways to undress you in the blink of an eye? These exceptions aside the idea is incredibly innovative and has all kind of potential – if the kinks can be worked out.

“The dress was influenced by the constant changes and demands that fashion establishes every season. The idea was to create a single dress that could easily be reconstructed over and over again to comply with hundreds of variations. The zipper dress can be adapted from a full-length night dress, to a T-shirt, a miniskirt or even a belt.”

“The dress was made with 120 custom made zippers. Each one of them can be either separated from the rest of the dress or open to play and reveal layers or skin beneath. Its author the artist and designer Sebastian ErraZuriz believes the concept is particularly poignant in the current economic crisis; buy one dress, get a hundred different fashion possibilities. The dress is a one of a kind piece, yet could be produced industrially for a relatively accessible price.”

“On one hand the Zipper dress offers its owner the independence to adapt it to their every need, on the other hand, it invites people to re-think fashion and everyday objects.”

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Designing for a hot climate, small site and hillside lot are difficult enough individual constraints for architects to overcome alone – let alone all at the same time. This marvelous little home by P + T architects manages to make the most of a seemingly difficult situation through a few critical design moves that turn problems into opportunities.

The result is a two-volume solution in which the top level overlaps the lower story to create a shield from the bright sun while also providing views out over the valley below. The odd triangular lot shape led to a complex angular form that conforms to the site without violating the legal boundaries of the buildable lot area.

Variegated stone fences create a conceptual barrier that blends in with the desert-like natural surroundings while the rectilinear wood and dark gray stone of the house proper set it apart from the landscape. In the end, this house manages to be both contextual and contemporary, using local materials but clearly differentiated as a modern home on the hill.

“The terrain presented three conditions that determined the actions taken that would finally define the project. Because of the lot being of triangular shape located in a corner, the legal edification lines left the constructible area in the center, a steep incline of 40%, and finally, sun exposure and views towards the valley.”

“The operation consists in separating the architecture program into two overlapping volumes parallel to the terrain lines, so when seen in section both volumes relate to the landscape.”

“The lower volume is buried in the terrain and adopts a materiality that allows you to understand it as a socle that blends with the landscape as well as the stone walls that enclose the site. In this volume the bedrooms connect with the garden that exists over the street level below.”

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While made of wood rather than stone, and not quite pyramids per say (more like three-dimensional triangles), these designs are still inspired by the megalithic architecture of ancient Egypt in more than one dimension. Scalable sides are the innovative key here: hatches that allow access to each level directly from the climbable exterior shell.

Like its ancient architectural forerunners, these small-scale versions have scalable sides – in this case more manageable in size. Rather than a a stepped side/roof system, a series of intentional spaces in the exterior wood slats double as handhold and foothold slots.

Double-duty combination door-and-window elements (disguised as part of the roof surface) flip up to let in light, air and even people on all levels while leaving some areas more secluded than others. There is also potential for expanding these lengthwise to accommodate multi-family housing and/or larger-community functions.

Three floors accommodate a central guest/child sleeping level sandwiched in between the private top story (for master bedroom and bathroom) and public first story (containing kitchen and living room). The triangular taper works well with this concept, leaving less (and more-enclosed) space on each level progressing upwards to the top.

VisionDivision envisions each unit in its Peak Series catering to the climate of a particular country or region, with prefabricated variants suited from cold springs and hot summers, dry desert plots, wet water-side sites and snow-topped mountain-peak properties – the ultimate vacation home for any season or location you can imagine.

“Part house-part playground, the Peak series is a series of pre-fabricated summer homes by Swedish firm Visiondivision that can be placed in many environments. The Peak series homes are designed to promote close community and leisure.”

The interior of the Peak series cabins is divided into three levels. At the base is the main entrance and open social space with a kitchen and living room, above the ground floor is a loft space Visiondivision calls a mezzanine-like space that holds guest bedrooms. The top floor houses the master bedroom and a bathroom.”

“The Peak series different from other pre-fab homes is its unique wood plank façade design. The planks are left with spaces in between so the entire structure can be climbed and essentially becomes a giant jungle gym. Hatches open up from each floor so people inside can climb out and around on the exterior structure, as well as have convenient fire escapes and views of the surrounding environment.”

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Like watching television but sick of staring at the dish-shaped eyesore in your yard, on your roof or sticking out from the side of your house? Architects enjoy shaping the big picture (so to speak) when it comes to design, but few will remember to factor in those details that most homes have but most homeowners wish to hide. Fortunately, from camouflage dish covers to huge fake rocks, there are a few clever solutions to this standard problem.

On such stealth dish from Sqish comes with various patterns pasted onto its from, from faux-brick finishes to fake wood-slat patterns, imitation concrete to artificial grass, all so it can fit into any site or setting as subtly as possible.

“You can make your Sqish even more discreet by adding a sqishoflage sticker. Take a picture of the location where the Sqish will be sited and we will supply a UV-stable matt finish sticker for you to attach. We now print 3 stickers to allow a better match, one light tone one medium and one dark…”

“The Sqish currently comes in white. It can be made more discreet by adding a skin. We can produce a skin in any colour or from an image taken of the installation site as follows:

Take an photo of the installation site ideally with our colour match chart to one side. The colour match chart helps us to match the tone. The image needs to be around 60cm wide for us to crop the correct size skin.”

Sure, the texture will never quite match the background, but it may be an aesthetic step up from those standard black, white and gray varieties that most satellite dishes tend to come in – and few residential building materials do.

There are also companies that sell stickers made to smoothly slot into the circular form of round, standard-sized satellite dishes – some (such as cats, sunflowers and flags) may be a bit too tacky for your taste but again may also be better than no dish decor at all.

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