SteamSHIFT

For those few of you who have been with me for any length of time, you will know that I have been intrigued by the possibilities of concrete for some time now. I have blogged about staining concrete, heating concrete and see through concrete and bendable concrete.

You will probably also know that concrete is really bad environmentally and I have blogged about alternatives like papercrete (concrete made using paper) and Earthskin, a mix of 80% earth and concrete.

So in the vein of the former, if not currently the latter of these possibly incompatible interests, I present: Color Changing Concrete. This is a new innovation that uses heat conduction to enable the display of patterns in the concrete.

SteamSHIFT out.

(Via Gizmodo.)

Another prefab / container structure thing.

Prefabulous in London: A Review: “

Guest Treehugger Bonnie Alter reports from London

Prefabulous is a new exhibition by the NLA ( New London Architecture) which attempts to explain how prefab housing can ‘answer the need for new homes in the capital’ (London England). The exhibition consists of a series of white boards, each with an alphabetical theme—from A is for affordable, all the way to Z is for zero defects.

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SHIGERU BAN ARCHITECTS (previously blogged - renowned for his use of paper as a building material) is designing the new Pompidou Centre in Metz.

Just beautiful.

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Bubble House for sale: “Inspired by Finnish architect Antti Lovag (see his own Palais Bulles) in the mid 70’s, the Bubble House with its an indoor river, bubble kernel and cactus garden is for sale.

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Engineered Cement Composites : Bendable concrete: “

Victor Li, at the University of Michigan has developed a new fiber-reinforced bendable concrete. Li claims his Engineered Cement Composites (pdf) are superior to other fiber-reinforced concretes because his composite not only uses microscale fiber reinforcements, but they have also designed the ingredients to the concrete itself to provide more flexibility. The 40% lighter ECC is also 500 times more resistant to cracking, 37% less expensive, consumes 40% less energy, and produces 39% less carbon dioxide than regular concrete.

via wmmna | Physorg

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(Via Future Feeder.)

papercrete, fibercrete, fibrous concrete - Living in Paper: “In the United States, we discard enough paper each year to build a wall 48 feet high around the entire perimeter of the country. Even though about 45 percent of discarded paper is recycled annually, 55 percent or 48 million tons of paper is thrown away or goes into the landfills. Figuring conservatively, it takes about fifteen trees to make a ton of paper. That means that 720 million trees are used once and then buried in a landfill each year. We are experimenting with ways to turn this prodigious amount of waste into low-cost, high-value sustainable housing. “

More container related architecture!

architecture and hygiene - addiction: “what is the quik house?

The QUIK HOUSE is a prefabricated kit house designed by Adam Kalkin from recycled shipping containers. It has three bedrooms and two and one-half baths in its 2,000 square foot plan. The shell assembles by the end of the week, you will have a fully enclosed building. From start to finish, it should take no longer than three months to complete your house.”

You can probably blame Neil Stephenson’s Snow Crash, but I think containers are fast becoming a new obsession for me! Sites like this don’t help, especially when they become linked in my mind to artist’s communities and workspaces.

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Manhattan’s lost treasures

We have some buildings that are over 50 years old! (but we thought we’d knock them down)

(Via we make money not art<Archinect<The New York Times)

shigeru ban: paper loghouse:

“in june 1995, a great number of people were still

forced to live in shabby tents in parks nearby their

destroyed houses even six month after the earthquake

in kobe. ban’s solution was a cheap and simple structure

that could be build by anyone.

the foundation was made of sand-filled beer cases,

the walls of paper tubes and the ceiling and roof of tent

material. the roof and the ceiling were kept separate in

summer to allow air to circulate and closed in winter to

retain warm air. they were easy to recycle after use,

easy to transport, easy to store and the paper tubes

could be made on site. (more…)