How It’s Made

Didier Toubia, the co-founder and chief executive of Aleph Farms, explains that his team developed a new growth medium using a combination of fetal bovine serum (obtained from the blood of cow fetuses) and a few cells extracted from a living cow, creating a specimen grown outside an animal with a muscular texture close to that of typical meat. While this method still requires cows in some capacity, the requirement seems miniscule compared to the number that are currently being slaughtered for consumption.

Toubia believes successful lab-grown steaks are a minimum of three to four years away from being commercially viable. The challenges along the road to perfecting the process range from aesthetics to taste and cost. “It’s close and it tastes good, but we have a bit more work to make sure the taste is 100-percent similar to conventional meat. But when you cook it, you really can smell the same smell of meat cooking,” he adds. Thickness is also a hurdle, with the current prototype only being about one-fifth of an inch thick.

The Price Of Pretending

Anti-meat zealots claim that shunning animal products is the “single biggest way” consumers can shrink their carbon footprint. Based on some scientific studies, greenhouse gas emissions from meat-producing animals promote climate change, endanger wildlife, and contribute to oceanic dead zones. Marco Springmann at the University of Oxford notes that “although the technologies are evolving, there is no indication that lab-grown meat is significantly better for the environment and health than existing alternatives to beef. The latest reviews have put the emissions of lab-grown meat at several times that of chicken and far above any plant-based alternative, in particular due to the large energy inputs needed during production.”

As far as pricing go, the Aleph Farms prototype would run you around $50 for a very small strip. By contrast, the premier lab-produced beef burger that Mark Post created in 2013 cost around $322,000. Toubia notes that those numbers would drop even more the minute synthetic meat went into production at a commercial plant.

Even though very few synthetic meat products are currently on sale to the public, the efforts have never been so aggressive as they are now. American company JUST also recently announced that its slaughter-free chicken nuggets would soon be on a few restaurant menus.

Toubia concludes: “If you want to have a real impact on the environment, we have to make sure we solve the issue of production, and we grow meat in a more efficient, sustainable way, with no animal welfare issues and no antibiotics.”

The post Raising The Steaks: Synthetic Meat Created in Israeli Lab first appeared on Dornob.

Pawson, best known for his minimal approach to architectural design, took on the challenge of making the hotel out of a former hospital and convent on Tel Aviv’s pristine seafront. Working with local conservation architect Ramy Gill, Pawson took the historic 19th-century complex, whose existing architectural styles ranged from Arabic to neoclassical, and transformed it into a tasteful and stylish high-end hotel that retained all of the period elements while still feeling fresh and contemporary. This mix of old and new is exquisitely executed in every area, from the central U-shaped courtyard filled with trees to the vaulted chapel-turned-bar and lobby, both of which take full advantage of the convent’s former prayer space. Elsewhere, 120 guest rooms and 32 exclusive residences have been situated in a new addition.

The meeting of historic and modern can also be seen in the hotel’s materials and finishings, which, in classic Pawson style, have been treated delicately to reveal the true character of the building. The owners of the hotel explain: “the plastered walls were scraped down to reveal the generations of patina that touch the building’s signage and paint patterned walls, paying homage to the building’s historic beauty.” The result is calming, with brushed plaster arches complementing exposed masonry for a uniform look that makes everything in the hotel read as part of the same story. Some of the bedrooms even have impressive vaulted ceilings that crest above the beds and display mottled paintwork, allowing the light from the windows to dance across the roof.

The Jaffa’s furniture and artwork are also used as feature elements. In the lobby and bar, accent colors like powder blue and burnt orange contrast with the neutral stone palette of the floor and walls. The bedrooms used muted creams and grays with the occasional splash of color to create a relaxing environment, with white bed linens and ethereal curtains completing the ambiance. Artworks by famous artists like Damien Hirst cement the hotel’s luxury status, though it’s already palpable in its restaurants, dining areas, and spa.

All in all, The Jaffa is an incredibly unique hotel that offers its guests the very best in state-of-the-art luxury, with modern conveniences seamlessly blending with traditional charm and old world elegance throughout.

The post John Pawson Transforms Historic Tel Aviv Hospital into Luxury Hotel first appeared on Dornob.

Two courtyards, reflecting pools and lots of glass ensure that the interior of this stunning modern home in Israel is always filled with plenty of natural light. The cubic home finished in matte white features an elongated bridge crossing a sunken front courtyard, which leads to a double-height, minimally furnished monochromatic living area.

‘Ramat Hasharon House 13’ by Pitsou Kedem Architects is a private residence that emphasizes connection to outdoor spaces from each and every corner of the home.

The glazed facade of the home leads directly out onto the rear courtyard and 65-foot-long swimming pool, the walls receding at both sides to completely open to the outdoors. This entire facade can be closed and covered for security and privacy.

Inside, the home is bright and open, with only a few spaces closed off to the rest of the interior. Various glazed doors and balconies overlook the grassy front courtyard, maintaining visual contact with greenery and the sky.

More from Arch20:

“A private resident built between two, central courtyards. A frontal courtyard excavated to a depth of three meters and the second courtyard at the level of the building’s ground floor. This topographical interface creates a unique cross section to the building’s mass with each part of the building, even the section constructed as a basement, being open to its own courtyard.”

“The central space of the kitchen, the dining room, and the living room is open in two directions – to the west and to the east. This provides a feeling that space is constantly enveloped by natural light and the greenery of the trees in the courtyard. The structure’s central space, set in the center of the plot, is accessed via a long bridge that crosses the sunken courtyard and leads to the front door. From the bridge, we can see the children’s living rooms which open into the basement.”

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Accommodating more than one nuclear family in a single residence while preserving both privacy and a sense of connection can be a challenge. Some approaches link individual houses with vastly different designs, while others seek something more cohesive. Argentinean architect Nestor Sandbank chose the latter for ‘Cubes,’ a villa in Israel offering separate spaces for different members of the family.

This contemporary white residence is designed like a luxury resort, with individual cubes standing side-by-side adjacent to a wing of common areas, to form an overall L-shape. Each person in the family gets their own private living room, bedroom and bathroom, with views of the swimming pool.

The main wing contains a private cinema, game room, study, main living area, designer kitchen and other public spaces for the family members to enjoy together. A glassed-in corridor links the cube villas together and to the shared space.

The residence is unified by a simplicity of design, with lots of white space, warm wood floors, glossy white built-in features like a spiral staircase and a striking textured concrete stairwell. All of the glazed walls can be closed off with the press of a button.

“The family living in ‘The Cubes House’ had a fantasy: to build a house that wasn’t a normal house, in which all functions and rooms are part of a mega volume contained in a rectangular box. Nestor Sandbank offered a very special design in which each child’s bedroom is a two story unit occupying an independent quasi-autonomous structure.”

“Joined by a single corridor, surrounded by water features, the rooms of the three older children: 17, 15, and 11 years old, are built in a row perpendicular to the main house, with space for individual life in the first floors and the bedrooms upstairs. Each room has its own terrace overlooking the garden, as well as a large balcony off the master bedroom on the main wing. The courtyard is carefully designed with contemporary design furniture that is integrated with the design of the residence, keeping it an essential part of living and comfortable space.”

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In the midst of insanely high housing prices in Tel Aviv, Israel, clients who want to upgrade their living spaces are left with few choices. One client, the owner of a tiny 40 square meter studio, decided to keep her current abode and transform it entirely.

The client wanted to trade in her studio apartment for a one bedroom. Rather than adding walls to divide the space, SFARO Architects added a central command center contained in a cube in the center of the apartment.

The central cube contains storage, a kitchen, a bathroom and the resident’s entertainment gadgets. Sliding doors disappear into the body of the cube when closed and hide its contents when open, letting the resident create different looks for different situations whenever desired.

On either side of the cube are narrow corridors that create a sort of never-ending flow to the living areas. The only walls in the apartment, aside from the central cube, surround the bedroom – but even these can fold or slide out of the way to keep up the effortless flow of the space.

By placing all of the apartment’s functions into one central locations, the architects were able to create a dramatic space that feels much larger than its diminutive 40 square meters.

The renovation turned the small apartment from a studio into a one-bedroom with all of the style and personality of a much larger living space.

“By adding sliding doors that disappear into the cube, the space can be altered according to the time of day and the various needs of the owner, contributing further more to the sense of a multi-functional and multi-layered space,” say the architects.

“SFARO Architects (2009) was founded by architects Nir Rothem and Bosmat Sfadia-Wolf. Our design approach puts architectural planning and real-life problem-solving ahead of aesthetic pleasures and paradigms. We believe in the power of architecture and its ability to aid find better spatial relations between users and programs, whether it be a small apartment or a new neighborhood.”

The post Tiny 40-Sq-M Tel Aviv Apartment first appeared on Dornob.

Think back to your first apartment or house. If you’re like most of us, it was a bit underwhelming in style, probably thrown together from hand-me-downs and thrift store finds. Not so for Ron Benshsoshan and his girlfriend who live in Israel. They recently purchased their first Tel Aviv apartment and performed one incredible renovation.

When the couple moved in, the apartment was a dismal, dull space left over from the 70s. With not much time and a very limited budget, they tackled the monumental task of turning the space into a stunning modern home. These before and after pictures illustrate what a dramatic change their efforts made.

The renovations included knocking out a kitchen wall to open the kitchen up and connect it to the living room. Other projects included turning a small, segmented bathroom into one large bathroom and enclosing a balcony off of the bedroom to make a larger bedroom space.

Ron, an industrial design student, decided to design and build most of the elements on his own to save money. The results, however, are so sophisticated and stylish that it would be easy to believe the apartment was entirely remade by a high-priced designer.

The two-bedroom dwelling is a true reflection of the couples’ unique personalities and tastes – and it shows off their talents in spectacular style.

The apartment is almost entirely unrecognizable, going from a neglected and dated space to one where the couple and their cat can happily live, work and play in style.

Some of the most striking objects created by the couple in their incredible renovation are the bar that pulls out of the wall between the kitchen and dining area, the clustered light fixture in the living area, and the wall-mounted cat lounge area.

But the true crowning glories of the apartment are the living room wall clock made of clocks, the recessed bookshelf in the dining area, and the gorgeously creative towel rack/faucet combination in the bathroom. We would be speechless over this monumental renovation…except that we just can’t stop talking about how much we love everything about it!

The post Tel Aviv Apartment Transformed in a DIY Makeover first appeared on Dornob.