Guest Post on Design Thoughts

DRAPING IN DESIGN

Today, I am guest posting about Draping in Design on Design Thoughts, great blog on designer's thoughts on balancing Mama, money and her love for all things design! Thanks, Kim, I hope you are enjoying your vacation!!

Mod Design Guro Debut

LOVE love love the  Tiffany & Co.’s Era LOVE Bangles !

Happy Valentine's day!

Today, I am bursting with enthusiasm as I unveil Mod Design Guro.com, previously known as Heymdesign innovations blog. I hope y'all love the new look and let me be your Design Guro to find design inspiration in the most unusual and innovative ways. Let's explore the unexpected, the re-invention and be inspired!

Show some lovin' by clicking 'LIKE' on the new Mod Design Guro Facebook Fanpage.

Wed MUSE Essential: Outdoor living room + garden

Last summer, my husband and I completed construction on our downstair ZenModern space. Now we dream about connecting it to an outdoor living room with garden/deck design and fire feature. Outdoor living can add as much value as an interior space! I have been collecting some  images of planters, pavers, materials(concrete,wood,pebbles) that inspire me:

Informing Experience Design

What is the true power of architecture and interior design? To surround? To engage? To guide users thru space?  Yes, but it should be a lot more. It should be an experience, an architecture that interacts, and connects its user to space thru movement and all of one’s senses. As an architect and designer myself, I want to design experiences: moments where emotion, contemplation, learning and memory is addressed.  This narrative created between the occupant and the building allows its user to transform into a participant, where he/she is open to receive architectural cues and be inspired in some way. The participant’s needs are visualized through one’s senses. This kind of design is influential and needs further exploration because it has the capacity to teach, to dream and promote a positive difference in someone’s life.

If you connect with what I am saying, please share your ideas/ projects you know of on my FB page. I may highlight your project or idea on my 'Sunday Spotlight'.

Labels

Furthermore, I would like to share a great example of Experiential design. The video below shows how Philips design has been studying the idea of transformative spaces with the change of form, light and wind. A conceptual architectural product called Metamorphosis Shimmer shows a kinetic architecture that grows, expands and contracts.  Philips group says,” Shimmer is an architectural product concept designed to facilitate well-being through surprise, movement, natural noise management, air movement and natural light dispersion. The stripes are based on flexible elements that emit natural light and channel air. They can transform to change the interior characteristics of a space in response to people and the atmospheric/lighting conditions outside.”

Philips Design SHIMMER VIDEO

(The attached VIDEO starts off with the Shimmer product I am discussing and follows with other conceptual projects)

Amazing, right?
'LIKE'  FB page

Free Tip Friday: Re-claimed Barnyard door

Hey MDG,
Where can I find a re-claimed barnyard door? I would like to separate my office with a beautiful, rich colored wood door.
Heidi


Hi Heidi,
I love Cliff Spencer's barnyard doors that he makes out of "Wine Oak," a name he coined.  Cliff Spencer is a furniture maker who likes to use re-claimed wood and reclaims oak staves from California wineries and transforms them into barnyard doors and other one-of-a-kind pieces. Yes, I did say wine. How cool would it be to have a door stained from wine- Pinot Grigio for a light stain or Pinot Noir for a darker stain? Check out the beautiful colors and great joinery and craftsmanship! They are uh-mazing! He uses hardware from Crown Industrial.

Cliff Spencer primarily works in Los Angeles but he does ship furniture across California and the Unted States.

CLIFF SPENCER-WINE OAK DARK STAIN

CLIFF SPENCER - WINE OAK LIGHT STAIN

CROWN INDUSTRIAL HARDWARE

Designer Spotlight Sunday: Kinetic Artist Theo Jansen

THEO JANSEN

I am still gasping for air! The collision of physics and art has emerged from an imaginative, kinetic artist named Theo Jansen. Jansen who lives in Deft, near the North Sea has to be some kind of genius!! For the past 21 years, he has devoted himself to constructing wind powered animals called ‘Strandbeests,’ creatures composed of mundane materials such as stiff plastic yellow tubes and batwing-like sails set on a central crankshaft. The plastic tubes are the key element and Jansen says,” the number of tubes and the length of each tube determines the genetic code of each Strandbeest dictating how it will move and interact with the environment.” By capturing and storing wind, these creatures are set into motion down the beach in a herd-like manner. They have an uncanny ability to self-preserve: they can avoid getting stuck in the ocean and can anchor themselves in the sand when they are threatened to be blown away. Impressive! How will these critters evolve and what can they be used for? The future architectural potential is very intriguing! See this video and you will be amazed! Click: THEO JANSEN VIDEO

YELLOW PLASTIC TUBES

STUDY OF MECHANICS

STRANDBEEST

STRANDBEEST

Inspiring!!!!

Free Advice Friday: Back-painted glass

Hey M,
I hate my mosaic kitchen backsplash! Any ideas for a crisp and clean backsplash?
Ann from Boston

Hi Ann,

I love Back-painted glass! It's a contemporary hot trend today where low lead or plate glass is painted on the back and then sealed or baked to give a luminous glow that is stunning! It is custom-templated to fit your backsplash, has no grout lines, easy to clean and is offered in limitless spectrums of color. The one drawback.. its not cheapo! Besides backsplashes, it is ideal for architectural elements such as walls and countertops. See some beautiful installations:

Weekly Muse Essential: Designing with Stripes

to Muse : to brood,to chew over to ponder,to percolate,to mull over,to reflect,to speculate....

I love stripes! Stripes are right in front of us in nature and can be translated into furniture, interiors and architectural deisgn. There are so many combinations and possibilities that it is endless!!

BIRCH LINES,RACHELL TAYLOR

RACHEAL WARD INSTALLATION

TRISTAN TITEUX TABLE

TRISTAN TITEUX TABLE

STRIPED WALLCOVERING

PAUL SMITH FLAGSHIP

ALESSI FLAGSHIP SOHO NY

ALESSI FLAGSHIP SOHO NY

ZE BAR

NEBUTA MUSUEM, JAPAN

NEW FLOWER MARKET,BARCELONA

HIGASHIAOMI JAPAN

What is your MUSE? What inspires you?
To share, click Muse Memoboard: where art,design,architect and technology communities can come together to discuss and share and interface ideas.

Designer Spotlight Sunday: Photographer Charles Cohen

CHARLES COHEN

I really get inspired by a photographer whose work pushes the boundaries to create images that are emotional, edgy, cognizant and original. My good friend from high school, Charles Cohen is one of these photographers who has stamped his own innovative imprint on the landscape of photography. His work applies abstraction to ordinary subjects and provokes the viewer to complete the meaning of his work. My FAVE is his 'Analog Time' series where a ghostly silhouette contrasts with its background. When looking at it, I realized that the silhouette is not literal. It forced me to want to know who the 'cut-out' is and why it is desired? So cool when Art can create intangible pockets or spaces where you, the viewer becomes the participant to the work.  Read on, and learn more about Charles Cohen's unique and mesmeric work.

How long have you been taking photos and how old were you when you first realized you loved photography?

It feels like I’ve been using a camera since the beginning of time, but I do distinctly remember getting a kodak instamatic as a gift when I was much shorter than my subjects.

How would you describe your photographic style?

I use the words abstract and conceptual, probably more liberally than is correct, to describe my work. To be more precise, I say that I look at subjects that you would not normally consider abstract or profound in an abstract and thought provoking way—a point of view that is accessible and often overlooked.

His 'About Face' series depict abstraction and abstract thought as a point of view. Charles says, "these images of bottles in profile' void familiar context, the product's identity and it's original purpose (usually to clean or lubricate in some fashion) inorder to promote the overlooked form and color all by means of a point of view."

ABOUT F

ABOUT Y

ABOUT X

Can you describe your creative process which involves video, digital imaging and sculpture?

Generally, the message dictates the form and therefore process, but pieces tend to evolve quickly. The inspiration comes from a fleeting experience followed by a descriptive note-to-self. It’s easy to get satisfied with just the words on a scrap of paper (I have a massive backlog), but an idea only comes to life by means of an audience. The medium generally doesn’t change from an original vision. I choose photography, digital imaging, video and mechanically produced sculpture because of the democratic nature of the products—each copy is just as much an original as the next. It feels very honest to communicate to an audience in this way, even though, not so strangely, these media, because of their ‘transparency’, are at the forefront of deceptive practices.

 'Standard Double' is a complelling series where stills are extracted from a five minute video. The piece shows moments from television shows where he frames the unexpected appearance of a character's twin. Charles wanted to reveal, " what it would be like to meet yourself?"

STANDARD DOUBLE: PETER

STANDARD DOUBLE: GILLIGAN

STANDARD DOUBLE:URKEL

In his Analog Time images 'Why I Prefer Digital Clocks and Can No Longer Pretend to Like Analog Time,'  Charles says, " Despite the indication of any weakness on my part, I love Digital, I love her."



ANALOGTIME01



ANALOGTIME02



ANALOGTIME03

How did the signature silhouette come about and how does this idea provoke the viewer?

The use of the silhouette, in my Buff series, came about from looking at a porn image attached to an email. I was more disturbed by the random things going on “off set” that were left there without regard to the product or me, the audience. I was clearly supposed to look only at the naughty bits and not the picture as a whole. I simply inverted the subject to subvert the image. Suddenly, in this experiment, I realized other levels of meaning were exposed—ultimately how the viewer completes the circuit by co-authoring the meaning. Below are pictures from his provocative 'Buff Series'.

BUFF PIC071

BUFF PIC16b

Where do you typically draw inspiration from?

Typically, inspiration comes from participating in the banal: watching television, going to the grocery store, taking out the trash, walking down the street, and most certainly, doing these things while traveling. It’s about finding that tiny wedge in the facade of normalcy and suddenly seeing that which we project as empty and full of potential.

What photograph are you most proud of and why?

THAT: PROFILE MC1 

THAT: PROFILE BB

THAT: PROFILE YELLOW

That’s a great question for me. Great because it’s hard to say and I tend to avoid favorites in general, but I think that a break through image of mine was one of a McDonalds sign taken from the side or as I have called it, the Profile. Merely by changing a point of view, literally, all that was intended for and expected of this sign was rendered nil to make way for interpretation. I am more after the feeling of potential than I am of dictating a narrative about something. The moment of inspiration is feeling nothingness and “everythingness” (oneness, perhaps) at the same time. I always wanted to take a picture of nothing and for me, in this image, there it was.

I love the ' THAT' ! These pictures make you wonder and force a dialogue with oneself. Thank you so much Charles for the interview, your art is extremely provoking!