Sharp has been one of the biggest names in home appliances for decades now, especially when it comes to microwave ovens, but they’ve never offered a complete matching kitchen suite until now. The New Jersey-based brand has just announced a new range of smart built-in kitchen appliances that look sharper than ever (pun fully intended).

Designed as a seamless solution for consumers, the suite includes SuperSteam ovens, induction cooktops, wall ovens, a slide-in range, microwave drawers and over-the-range microwave ovens, dishwashers, and refrigerators. That means you can basically have an entire kitchen full of matching high-tech appliances at the click of a button.

Like most of Sharp’s contemporary pieces, these ones will have black edge-to-edge glass and the ability to hide their controls behind a panel for a minimalist look. The company’s goal appears to be to appeal directly to interior designers, architects, and discerning homeowners who want both top quality and sleek modern looks for new kitchens and renovations.

Unveiled at this year’s Nationwide Primetime Show in New Orleans, Louisiana, the line appears clean and simple on the surface, but includes new features like connection to the Internet of Things (IoT).

“This line of kitchen appliances is rooted in Sharp’s rich heritage in cooking,” says Jim Sanduski, President of the Sharp Electronics Marketing Company of America. “We’ve taken our experience in the kitchen and created the recipe for a brand-new, end-to-end kitchen solution that is both technologically advanced and beautiful.”

“The entire team at Sharp Home is committed to delivering on our promise to service the dreams and desires of the home cook, and the introduction of our first-ever kitchen suite is another step in our commitment to Simply Better Living,” adds Peter Weedfald, the company’s Senior Vice President of Sales and Marketing.

“Our revolutionary new products, such as the IoT-enabled SuperSteam+ Built-In Oven and IoT Microwave Drawer, are simple to use and help create great-tasting meals for modern, fast-paced families pursuing a healthier lifestyle.”

You’re not alone if you’re wondering why in the world you’d want your microwave to be connected to the internet, and Sharp has yet to release all of the details behind these new appliances. But generally speaking, smart microwaves are supposed to give you a new level of control over the cooking and reheating process, helping you target exact temperatures and control everything from other rooms via your smartphone. Some smart cooking appliances can even identify exactly what you’re cooking and switch to the appropriate settings automatically.

Sharp says its 24-inch IoT SuperSteam+ Built-In Oven and 24” IoT Microwave Drawer Built-In Oven will allow easy integration into new or existing smart home systems, and other features include “easy wave open” for quick, touch-free opening.

Weedfald also notes that the smart appliances will go hand-in-hand with an app powered by SideChef that lets you browse for a recipe and send instructions directly to your oven, which is pretty cool, especially for people who aren’t the most experienced home cooks.

The new Sharp appliance series is set to launch in 2020, so be sure to stay tuned for more information.

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The existing layout of “404 Apartment” stretches from the front to the back of the building, with windows and balconies on the north and south ends. The common spaces like the living room, dining area, and kitchen are arranged along one side, with the private bedrooms and bathrooms on the other side. There was no way to physically enlarge the apartment, so optical illusions had to suffice.

Color plays an important role in this kind of expansion. The architects painted both the floor and ceiling a medium shade of gray and used cherry blossom pink for the walls on either side. “By visually lowering the ceiling, the aspect ratio of the perceived space is crushed horizontally to 16:9, further emphasizing the lateral expansion of the space,” they explain. “The aspect ratio of 16:9 is used for movie screens and television monitors, and is a familiar frame image for most people.”

Since we don’t view the real world through angle-limiting frames, the architects applied the 16:9 ratio view of the space from just one end of the room. The placement of all elements, including furniture, counters, and doors, is optimized so there’s more to look at horizontally than vertically, with the gray ceiling “crushing” the interiors. Nearly every piece of furniture is built in, with just a narrow table and bench along the center.

The pink wall panels are another visual trick. Some of these panels are actual doors to the bedrooms, bathrooms, cabinets, or closets, while others are just in place to make it seem like there’s more to the space than there really is, kind of like a movie set. The pink shimmers and catches the light, further guiding the eye along that horizontal line.

The team adds that “each of the cherry-red walls lies about its own role. They are not only walls, but also fixtures, wall decorations, and furniture. In short, a single component has multiple roles, but since they are all composed of the same details, finishes, and modules, it is sometimes difficult to tell which is a wall and which is a fixture. If we recognize it as a piece of furniture, we feel that even a mere wall is somehow intimate.”

If the space feels a little bit futuristic or reminiscent of a sci-fi movie, that’s also intentional. “This room, with its slight eeriness and discomfort in the midst of everyday life, is perceived as more expansive than reality,” they say.

Sugurufukuda’s 16:9 aspect ratio follows common advice to use eye-catching, reflective materials in the center of the space and darker contrasting colors above and below to change how narrow or wide the space is perceived. If you have plenty of horizontal space but the ceiling is lower than you’d like, just flip those colors, with the lighter, more reflective shade on the ceiling. It’ll catch the light coming in through the windows and make the whole area brighter.

The post Movie Studio Tricks Visually Expand Tokyo’s Tiny 404 Apartment first appeared on Dornob.

This particular apartment, called Gambetta after the street it’s on, features a layout running at an angle to the street-facing facade and rounded walls in the two main rooms, the kitchen/dining area, and the living room. So how exactly does one take an iconic Parisian apartment with this kind of unusual shape and modernize it for the 21st century — without losing its historic charm? Jean Benoît Vétillard Architecture decided to emphasize its curves, creating custom built-in furniture to amplify the preexisting theatrical character.

“The original plan is enlarged, and the lines of force are extended,” explain the architects. “The new composition is made of depths of field. So many backstage and stage spaces, more than serving spaces/served spaces. This new organization of domestic spaces is constructed by the punctual positioning of multifunctional furniture in oiled okoume wood and brushed aluminum.”

“The front of the kitchen table hides the access to the child’s bedroom, the bow window gives its shape to a modular tatami, the living room houses a large library, but also the parental bedroom, round by geometric mirror…the advantage of this design is that it does not alter the original structure, which remains unchanged. In their original material, the light of the Boulevard Gambetta, the white stucco, and the oak parquet floors have reappeared.”

The beauty of this renovation is that the architects have chosen to play up the apartment’s quirks and historic details rather than permanently eliminate or modify them. The brushed aluminum built-in bookcase that curves around the back wall of the living room contrasts with the all-white original trim around it, highlighting the geometries of the space. This material is seen again on the kitchen wall, where it’s joined by warm wooden tones that brighten up the room and complement the flooring.

The child’s bedroom, though small, is made functional thanks to a new built-in lofted bed above a series of built-in cabinets. The primary bedroom faces the back of the living room’s curved wall, now clad in the same wood as the kitchen cabinets. Most fun of all might just be the round modular seating in the living room, upholstered in a rich blue matching the adjacent curtains. It fits perfectly into the rounded nook beside the fireplace, its modern simplicity accented by the rusticity of the old wood floors. Overall, the design feels both mature and playful, contemporary and rooted in old Paris.

The post Curvy Paris Apartment Creatively Reimagined by Jean Benoît Vétillard Architecture first appeared on Dornob.

If you’ve been following our posts about designing small spaces over the years, you probably already know the answer to this problem. A combination of built-in cabinetry and hideaway furniture that’s easy to access and put away can make even the most challenging tiny spaces livable, and that’s exactly what K-Thengono Design Studio did for their “3-in-1 Living” apartment design.

The designers gave the couple the master bedroom of their dreams, clean and simple with plenty of storage, closets, display spaces and room to walk around the queen bed. The bathroom is a standard size, as well, so they didn’t have to sacrifice any functionality there. They also managed to fit a small bedroom for guests or future children. But as you can see in the original floor plan, that didn’t leave much room for anything else.

K-Thengono’s alteration incorporated additional built-in storage into every room and created a streamlined cabinet system that takes up an entire wall of the remaining space. Hidden behind the minimalist white cabinet doors is everything you’d find in a bigger apartment, including a fold-down dining table and two fold-down benches, a couch hidden in its own little nook, and tons of room for all the couple’s stuff. Some of those cabinets even become displays when various components are in use, like the dining set. Others remain closed to hide things the couple doesn’t necessarily want to show off.

“When all the panels are closed, the clutter is hidden inside, the living space allows some extra activities like yoga and home workout to take place,” the designers say. “Both the master bedroom and bathroom are connected with a translucent pivot metal door to maximize the daylight penetration. Sliding panels are used to hide unorganized closet space in the rooms or allow the veneered wooden rack for displays. Functionality is key to the various design strategies, making every piece of furniture as efficient as possible for multiple uses.”

The wall opposite the cabinet is almost entirely mirrored, including the doors to the bedrooms and bathroom, to create the illusion of additional space. With a sliding glass door and balcony on the end and all that white, there’s plenty of daylight to go around, and the view becomes the focal point. It seems like the couple isn’t much into cooking, either, since the kitchen remained the same size before and after, located just inside the front door.

Another thing to note: there’s no loft involved in this small-space renovation. Lofts are often a great way to make use of vertical height, which often just ends up being wasted space. Sometimes, when ceiling height allows, they’re placed on top of new built-in cabinetry units like this one to free up even more floor room. It’s a smart tactic, but not everyone wants or is able to climb up into a loft to go to bed. But this design demonstrates that you really can make a tiny apartment work even if you treasure your bedroom as a spacious, private sanctuary.

The post Hidden Fold-Down Furniture Makes This Ultra-Narrow Jakarta Apartment Livable first appeared on Dornob.

In Barcelona’s Eixample district, architects Anna and Eugeni Bach turned a beautiful but highly challenging apartment into a cozy live/work residence where everything has its place. The corner flat has an unusual floor plan featuring four diagonally angled rooms, including a trapezoidal kitchen. There’s minimal square footage to work with, but the historic building features some absolutely stunning architectural details, like tray ceilings, a marble fireplace, and ornate wooden doors.

The owners want to use the apartment as a study for the next 15 years, at which point they’ll retire and live there. That means it has to be both multifunctional and comfortable to live in, while also offering the possibility of hosting their future grandchildren. The living room, entryway, and bedroom extend from the back wall at a 45-degree angle that’s known as “chamfered,” a layout that’s not uncommon in Barcelona’s older neighborhoods.

The biggest and most successful intervention is the plywood built-in cabinetry extending along the flat’s one straight exterior wall, from the kitchen into the living room. The architects envisioned it as a home for all of the apartment’s “services,” including the kitchen cabinets and appliances, bookcases, closets, bathroom, and even a set of built-in stairs leading up to the uppermost level of storage space. Made of smooth, pale plywood and devoid of most visible hardware, this cabinet brings a contemporary feel to the home and unifies its two main rooms.

At the same time, dynamic new flooring subtly separates each space from the next while maintaining a cohesive look. In the kitchen, marble tiles follow the angle of the built-in cabinet, butting up against the straight line of the patterned hallway flooring. The living room, bedroom, and entryway all have their own unique colors and patterns, too, contrasting the clean feeling of the white walls and wooden accents.

“The rest of the house is left practically intact,” say the architects. “The floors, ceilings, and carpentry that were kept in good condition are recovered to establish a careful contrast with the service furniture. A contrast that brings together both the two directions of the chamfer, and the two times of intervention in the history of the house.”

Even if the stairs of the cabinet don’t exactly lead anywhere, since there’s no loft, they still add an interesting graphic element to the design, as does their minimalist ceiling-mounted railing. The cabinet doesn’t just disguise all the little things that would otherwise create too much visual clutter, it anchors the whole apartment. Little design details like the leather pull on the bathroom door and ornate brackets on the mirror above the fireplace are just icing on the cake.

The post Plywood Built-Ins Transform a Tiny Barcelona Studio Apartment first appeared on Dornob.

The pair had already worked together more than once. Crasset previously produced a set of rings for Le Buisson, and back in 2014, she transformed a stone farmhouse in the heart of the forest near the Chinon region that Monory had inherited. It’s clear from the results of the 2019 project “Le Rainbow et le Bousquet,” which means “the rainbow and the woods,” that they’ve developed enough of a rapport for Crasset to unleash her creativity at full blast.

Monory gave Crasset free reign to do whatever she wanted with the 861-square-foot space, which originally had a conventional layout with an entryway, two bedrooms, a living room, and a kitchenette. Naturally, Crasset wanted to start completely fresh, focusing on a sense of openness, natural light, and a full spectrum of color. The space also had to be multifunctional, serving as both a home for Monory and, occasionally, a showroom for Le Buisson.

“I wanted to create a space suspended somewhere between two of the main places that define the modernity of Paris, the Eiffel Tower and the tour de Montparnasse: you can see both of them from the windows of this apartment,” says the designer. “After having completely cleared out the original plan, I made the radical choice of playing with color and a near-absence of furniture.”

After tearing down the original walls, Crasset established a clean white canvas throughout the house to act as a backdrop for her rainbow-colored installations. Custom built-in furniture like benches and tabletops defines separate areas within the open space, with the kitchen and showroom areas painted green to set them apart. These parts are “the woods,” contrasting to the “rainbow” seen throughout the rest of the apartment.

The apartment’s centerpiece is a four-person floating lounger, with two halves affixed to a central white wall. Even better, a bright circular screen can be drawn around it for privacy or to filter the light.

Crasset explains that the lounger is “an area for comfortable exchanges in levitation, surrounded by color above all, so we are in the heart of an invigorating rainbow that invites us to take advantage of the present moment each day. Color is life. The present configuration allows double exposure and makes the terrace accessible continuously with the living area.”

“The multi-colored vertical rhythm rotates to organize the area in different ways: along the wall, to accompany the moment of personal meetings; half-closed, it becomes an openwork panel to create several zones; completely turned, it closes the area off to create a space where one can sleep surrounded by this benevolent rhythm of color.”

The result is, according to Crasset, an “invigorating framework [that] helps one to remain active with a lively mind.”

Monory seems to be pleased, too, saying that she “moved just by changing interiors.”

The post Matali Crasset Gives Drab Paris Apartment a Rainbow-Bright Makeover first appeared on Dornob.

Sometimes the most impressive designs are almost accidental, evolving as if they’re living organisms.

There are some amazing bookcases out there in the world, but forget all of the ones you’ve seen for just a moment. Instead, consider the beauty of bookshelves populated with your favorite volumes … there is a case to be made, if you will, for simply letting these stand on their own and evolve visually as you fill them up.

(Above, Left to Right & Top to Bottom: John Barman, Eric Staudenmaier, Bill Kingston & Lili Abir Regen).

Design to Inspire recently gathered a series of photographs depicting relatively conventional (mostly built-in) bookcase designs of ordinary houses that, individually, might not look all that impressive … but taken together they are a bit like touring a library built over centuries in different styles. Here are some of the best pictures from the bunch, organized by style, material, tone and color.

(ILs and Jan Baldwin)

Classic Dark: These images could have been shot almost anytime in the past century (save for a few more recent pieces of furniture). Building floor-to-ceiling, wall-to-wall bookcases is not new… arguably, it was even more common before the advent of the internet. Do you find these ones cozy or overwhelming?

(M2 Interior Design and Simon Watson)

Modern Bright: There is nothing quite so successful but simple for adding color to a bland white interior as a well-placed, large-scale bookcase – the books do your work for you (especially if you do not trust your taste in modern wall art). Plus, there’s a never-ending supply of things to look at.

(Coburn Architecture,?Hus & Hem & Landstr?m Arkitekter)

Natural Wood: where white serves as blank and wood grain established mid-tones and visual orientation, books can add another finer-grained dimension to an otherwise cheap and elemental design like the ones shelved on these basic wooden built-ins. (Thomas Mayer and Jordi Canosa)

The post 14 Floor to Ceiling Bookcase Designs first appeared on Dornob.

The post 2 Cheap DIY Corner Desks with Shelves first appeared on Dornob.

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Of course, densely-populated cities — and micro-unit buildings — are nothing new. Ultra-compact urban housing has always been a less expensive option for people who need access to jobs and resources in big cities but can’t afford to live in larger houses or apartments. But as housing gets more expensive overall and larger units are subdivided into studios to help meet demand, more of us will have to learn how to downsize our lives.

Faced with the prospect of living in a micro-apartment, the first question you might ask is “but where would I put my stuff?” Most of us aren’t minimalists, and whittling down our possessions to the bare minimum is pretty much as hard as it sounds. Single-room apartments also present challenges when it comes to working from home, entertaining guests, and having children. The key to making small spaces work for a wider variety of people is to work in more adaptable layouts and multifunctional furniture pieces.

The Richmond Apartment by Melbourne-based Tsai Design is a perfect example of how this can be done. Tasked with creating a spacious home and office in a 376-square-foot (35-square-meter) one-bedroom apartment, the multi-disciplinary firm managed to produce a result that was fresh, modern, airy, and uncompromising on quality. Most importantly, it’s not cluttered — far from it, actually, thanks to a series of clever built-in and sliding elements.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l3yHLikvjPU

“The design is in support of the tiny house movement,” they explain. “The design questions the notion of living in excess; in the number of belongings, as well as the size of living areas. The client bought a tiny 35-square-meter one-bedroom apartment without a working kitchen. The challenge [was] to refurbish the unit with clever interventions to create a generous living condition.”

About two-thirds of the narrow space is painted white, all of it facing the apartment’s only windows. The other third is anchored by new wooden surfaces on the floor, walls, and ceiling, creating the illusion of additional space. Not only does this area house a new galley kitchen and plenty of multipurpose built-in storage, but it also offers a series of shallow closets that divide the kitchen from the bedroom.

The apartment has cabinets, drawers, and work surfaces galore, providing lots of places to hide objects that would otherwise make the space feel busy. Crucially, there’s a “home” for just about everything, from bottles of wine and kitchen implements to shoes and umbrellas. The wood adds warmth to the space and gives it a unified appearance — one offset beautifully by black marble accents. Mirrors on the opposite wall make the space seem a lot larger than it is, while window seats provide the inhabitants with a connection to the outdoors.

Above all else, the most important aspect of Tsai’s design is its ability to transform. The flexible main room can act as a living area, study, office, or dining room. Tabletops fold down, televisions appear from behind hidden panels, and an entire dinette for two pops right out of the kitchen wall, complete with flat-pack stools. Take a really close look, and you’ll find that there’s also plenty of room for books, plants, dishes, clothing, decorative items, and even a bicycle.

The post Small, Smart, and Super Functional: This Micro-Apartment is Packed with Space-Saving Features first appeared on Dornob.

The subdivision of indoor space into impractically tiny rooms, by which some areas of a home are made to feel dark and isolated, is a common problem in the world of interior design. When builders are trying to maximize space on a tight budget, the airiness and daylight transmission of the resulting rooms aren’t typically top priorities. Before Gosplan renovated “Into the Woods,” the house was characterized by a single long hallway that split the interiors into two sections. The designers demolished half of this corridor right off the bat and relocated the staircase leading to the attic in an effort to do away with the home’s “one-directional” feel.

Taking inspiration from the early 20th-century modern artworks in El Lissitzky’s “Proun” collection, which itself is characterized by geometric elements offset from one another on irregular axes, Gosplan designed a cross-shaped cieling-mounted structure that would stretch out across the living room, into the adjacent kitchen, and finally through the hallway leading up to the master bedroom. It’s all one continuous element of pale blonde wood, and it contrasts beautifully with the home’s white walls.

For most of its length, this new wooden element looks a bit like decorative ductwork, clinging tightly to the ceiling. But in the living room, it descends in one corner to create a suspended staircase, which hangs in the air while a second wooden element continues the path down to the ground floor. The result is quirky and playful, with a cutout window that allows the inhabitants to peer into the room while traveling up and down the stairs. The complementary structure on the ground does quadruple duty as shelving, a long bench, a television stand, and a storage space for firewood.

In the kitchen and hallway, the arms of this cross connect to blue volumes that stretch down along vertical planes in the form of cabinets and closets. The doors to the bathrooms and bedrooms are also set within these storage volumes. At the end of the corridor is the entrance to the master bedroom, which itself has been covered in a mirror to visually double the size of the space. Inside, the cabinetry continues in a more muted shade of gray, matching the custom headboard of the bed. A vanity with a fold-down table nestles in between closets.

The overall result is a home that feels polished despite its modest dimensions, its aesthetic sensibilities having been simplified simplified by a controlled color scheme and material palette (which consists largely of medium-density fiberboard and natural European oak).

All photos by Anna Positano

The post Cross-Shaped Wooden Cabinets Define This Bright Italian Home first appeared on Dornob.

Transforming, space-saving furniture is a lifesaver when it comes to living in a constrained home. If you need a single room to perform multiple functions but don’t want to sit on your bed while you cook, it’s pretty much required. We’ve featured dozens of all-in-one solutions here on Dornob, from modular and mobile designs to built-ins that take full advantage of every inch of vertical space. Portability is a plus if you move a lot, but furniture systems that are tailor-made for a particular space are definitely more effective. Too bad they tend to come with a price tag so high, they’re often out of reach for the people who need them the most.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Uu1kLsEeWI

This genius setup by architect Angel Rico is the best of both worlds, using modest, budget-friendly materials to make an “impossibly” tiny apartment in Barcelona comfortable for a couple and their child. While it was designed specifically for this space and includes a bathroom renovation, it also provides some serious small-space inspiration for portable transforming furniture that could work in another rental, too.

Made primarily of wood, this built-in system allows the family to enjoy a full kitchen and enough space to host up to eight dinner guests. It also hides a child’s bed and includes a room divider to separate it from the pull-out couch in the living area. The couple could even accommodate two overnight guests in a small loft above the bathroom. The woman, who works at a hospital, says she uses it regularly for naps and to “chill out” after a long shift, sleeping on the pull-out couch only because her husband doesn’t like climbing stairs.

The wooden cabinet opens to reveal a sink, cooktop, microwave, and all of the family’s cookware and dinnerware, along with some cabinets for additional storage. Slide the dish rack over the sink, and you can pull down a child-sized Murphy bed with shelves and built-in lighting. The cabinet on the right swings out into the space to provide privacy and offer a bedside table. Small components on wheels pull out to become side tables.

If you didn’t know it was there, you might not even realize that the home has its own bathroom, since it’s hidden behind another furniture panel that contains a closet, linen shelves, and even a small washing machine. Have you ever seen an apartment of this size with its own laundry facilities? That in itself is impressive. It’s also pretty cool to watch the client pull extra dining chairs and dining table sections out of a hidden storage compartment above the balcony. All in all, this apartment’s design is a smart, well-organized, and fun way to adapt to the modern urban lifestyle.

The post Transforming Modular Furniture System Makes Micro-Apartment Livable for a Family first appeared on Dornob.

The bureaucratic pain involved in recreating that original wallet led to the extremely versatile Volterman, which, among other things, boasts a built-in alarm system so you can find it when you’ve left it behind in a restaurant. When you move out of range, a helpful warning message will be sent to your phone. If it’s your phone you’ve misplaced, on the other hand, and you can’t find it in its usual hiding place behind the couch cushions, don’t panic. Just push a button on the wallet and listen for the ringing, which it will do even if it’s on silent mode.

The Volterman will also alert you when a sticky-fingered pickpocket has their grubby paws on it. This feature is especially useful to anyone traveling outside the country, where a wallet’s contents can’t just be replaced on the fly. The smart wallet has even been equipped with a clever theft-detection camera. When the Volterman is in “Lost” mode, it’ll take a photo of anyone who opens it and email you a copy of their mug. If a thief tries to electronically steal your data or identity, they’ll be met by the smart wallet’s built-in RFID-blocking system. Ingenious!

Small but mighty, the Volterman has also been fitted with an embedded power bank, which allows you to charge your devices on-the-go either wirelessly or with a hidden cable. That means no more fumbling for chargers and searching hopefully-yet-frantically for a free outlet to use. The wallet also features GPS tracking and Wi-Fi hotspot capabilities, keeping you connected no matter where you are in the world. Say goodbye to exorbitant roaming charges.

There are three siblings in the Volterman family, and we have a feeling you’ll be reluctant to play favorites. They are the “Cardholder,” the “Bifold,” and the “Travel Wallet.” They share virtually all of the same features, though each model’s power bank has a slightly different capacity because of size differences.

The Volterman reached its $45,000 crowdfunding goal on Indiegogo in a couple of hours. Its inventors seemed to anticipate this, though, describing the wallet as “the epitome of market-leading innovation and technological advance.” They’re especially proud of its technological features, which are “all wrapped up in a slim, lightweight, and stylish design.”

“Slim” is no exaggeration. The bifold version of the wallet is only 11 millimeters thick and weighs just 120 grams. It’s also completely waterproof, in case you find yourself in torrential rain. All Volterman wallets are constructed from either genuine Nappa leather or “superior-quality” vegan faux leather, and they are also fully compatible with both iOS and Android devices.

The post Volterman: The World’s Most Powerful Smart Wallet first appeared on Dornob.

Stella Vie’s creators, the solar team over at the University of Technology Eindhoven in the Netherlands, claim that their vehicle is “the most efficient family car that has ever been built.” The “Vie” model is an update on two previous Stella concepts, both of which have been in development for the better part of the past decade. Stella Vie is completely solar-powered, seats five people, and can travel an impressive 1000 kilometers, or about 621 miles, on a single day’s worth of sunlight. From the front, it almost looks like a cartoon character, but that’s part of the fun.

Like its predecessors, the Stella and Stella Lux, the Stella Vie was designed to compete in the annual World Solar Challenge. The car’s curving roof is completely covered in solar panels and was intentionally shaped to be nine percent more aerodynamic than the Lux model. If the Vie generates any surplus energy, it can easily be fed back into a house or local electric grid. A built-in smart charging and discharging system keeps track of energy prices and informs the driver of the best places to recharge along their route.

The Stella Vie’s solar navigator will find the most efficient route for you no matter where you’re going, meaning you’ll always be maximizing your energy savings. Every time you go for a drive, the car will tell you exactly how much energy you’ve saved and how much more you would have used in a gas or diesel-powered vehicle. To make things even more eco-friendly, the car includes a built-in notification system that lights up to give the driver tips on how to improve their driving efficiency. If you love those smart features, you’ll really get a kick out of Stella Vie’s built-in solar parking system, which uses weather data, height maps, and a parking probability map to find the perfect sunny spot for the car to recharge in!

A quick glance at the car’s design and skinny tires makes it clear that it belongs on well-maintained city roads, and that it isn’t likely to tolerate much in the way of bumpiness or ice. Still, it’d be an interesting way to commute around a city or suburb. Consider the number of places on earth with dangerously polluted air, and it becomes easy to see the appeal of an urban center full of zero-emissions solar cars.

“Vie, which is french for ‘life,’ is the car for everyday life,” explain its creators. “Although she is lower than conventional cars, due to her big doors and handles she is easy to enter. Inside she provides a comfortable driving experience due to ergonomically optimized seats, a clean and spacious interior and intuitive controls for both driving and infotainment. A futuristic solar car that is ready for today! But that’s not all. Vie also stands for the Roman numeral ‘V’, or 5, as Stella Vie is the first solar powered family car ever to seat five persons!”

The post Stella Vie: A Funny Little Solar-Powered Car for Families first appeared on Dornob.

Flat 227 by OODA — Porto, Portugal

Portuguese design firm OODA created a spacious atmosphere in this two-story apartment by incorporating floor-to-ceiling windows, using lots of white paint, and installing a newly enlarged full-height stairwell—complete with a net stretched across part of it to form a built-in hammock. The net is located next to a window with incredible views of the sea and proves that comfortable lounging areas can fit into surprisingly small spaces.

Tadeo 4909 by Proyecto Cafeína — Puebla, Mexico

The architects at Proyecto Cafeína created two-story lofts with lots of character for a new 8-unit condominium in Puebla, Mexico. The design features a sharp contrast between exposed materials, like brick and concrete, and a clean glass exterior. One of the building’s most interesting features is its net lounge area, which has been tucked away in a quiet, sunny corner.

Maison NW by Nathalie Wolberg — Saint-Ouen, France

Just outside of Paris in the town of Saint-Ouen, architect Nathalie Wolberg has converted the former headquarters of a printing house into the workshops and living spaces of nine artists, including herself. Maison NW was created as a laboratory for testing out new designs, environments, and furniture arrangements. The experimental structure contains all kinds of cool rooms and features, including a built-in hammock. According to Wolberg, the large net “allows the individual to extract himself from the surrounding environment, and makes the body become gravity-conscious.”

Micro House by Ruetemple — Moscow, Russia

The Russian firm Ruetemple was charged with the difficult task of designing a 300-square-foot apartment that would be comfortable, spacious, fun, and practical for both adults and children. They tackled this challenge by utilizing as much vertical space as possible and integrating several built-in storage elements. The architects removed the floor of the area above the living room and, leaving only the support beams in place, replaced it with a built-in hammock that would allow a family to see and talk to each other from both levels of the home. Before having its floor removed, this upper room felt claustrophobic and was not even tall enough to fit furniture in.

Baan Moom Residence by Integrated Field — Bangkok, Thailand

Integrated Field managed to pack enough space for gardening, dreaming, creating, resting and enjoying nature into just three stacked stories for a Bangkok family of five. The home was designed around a series of openings that promote daylight transmission, ventilation, and visual connections. Naturally, the team chose to install a net lounge over one of them.

The post Hanging Around the House: 5 Fun Built-In Hammocks first appeared on Dornob.

Organizing studio apartments so that there’s ample room for all the different functions you require in your living space can present all sorts of challenges. Whether you’re working with a spacious open-plan loft or a micro apartment the size of a typical master bedroom, you still have to determine how to delineate the space for your sleep, work, leisure, bathing, dining and dressing routines. Bookcases, curtains and room dividers can definitely help, but when square footage is severely limited, creative solutions are required. Spanish interior design studio Zooco presents a novel approach using modular wooden inserts that divide the space into zones for each major need, in the order that you need it.

Against one mirrored wall you’ll find a built-in bed and sofa, tucked away so they don’t take up valuable floor space. On the opposite wall, a shower is hidden in the far corner beside a sink and vanity. Taking up the center of the room are three narrow, low-profile, ribbon-like built-in units with three different functions: a desk, a lounge and a closet. The units seem to cascade down from the ceiling, flowing toward the floor in a wave. This shape disguises clutter beneath the tiled surfaces and keeps the line of sight open from one end of the room to the other, making it feel larger. Those floor-to-ceiling mirrors further multiply the space visually.

Zooco calls the concept ‘Modulor,’ an organization scheme that pushes private functions against the walls for a protected, cove-like feel while the more public functions are exposed to the sunlight coming in from the front windows. One module offers a flat desk surface with storage and space for a chair underneath, while the second is shaped like a reading nook with room to lounge on the top, inside the nook or on the end facing the windows. The third module features a clothes rod and shelving. Half of the floor space is left clear for entertaining, working out and practicing guitar, with two vertical gardens giving the entire apartment a lush, vibrant atmosphere.

The modules appear to have been custom-created for this 366-square-foot space in Madrid, conforming to the curvature of the ceiling, but it’s not hard to imagine the concept adapting to all sorts of other room shapes and sizes. Sequentially spaced according to this particular resident’s routine, they could be rearranged as needed. The pale wood and circular tiles unify them with the rest of the room, and the overall effect is definitely one of harmony and organization. This particular setup is notably lacking a kitchen, but a fourth module could theoretically be inserted to add that function if the concept was carried over to other apartments.

Living in a small space almost always requires careful management of your possessions, since even the most cleverly disguised storage can take up a lot of room. Most concepts for compact urban living focus more on multi-functionality and transforming furniture to make the most of every square inch, but this one manages to maintain dedicated space for all the various residential functions without feeling cramped or cluttered – as long as you’re not a pack rat.

The post Modular Morning to Night: Built-In Units Space Out Your Daily Functions first appeared on Dornob.