Back to the Future
Transport yourself to far-flung galaxies with this French take on futuristic mid-century American architecture.
In the village, everyone talks about The House, yet few have actually seen it. Some say it rotates. Others imagine all sorts of fantastical scenarios. Hidden in the middle of a pine and oak forest in the Perche region, some 90 minutes to the southwest of Paris, an extraordinary reinforced concrete structure looks out over an undulating, 13-hectare park. The space-like vessel was built between 1973 and 1976 – a period when all sorts of crazy architecture were still allowed in...
Take Two
Sensitive planning made this Auckland bungalow renovation into a home that enjoys the best of old and new.
You know you’ve found a good architect when he advises you against buying a particular do-up property, you ignore his advice completely and buy the house anyway, and he still manages to transform it into a beautifully livable space. Architect Tim Dorrington recalls the day when a couple, who he had been working on a renovation scheme for, called him to come and see another property that they were thinking of buying instead. The house in...
Future Perfect
Anchored to the ground by concrete, like spaceships out of a 1960s science fiction film, the Hingarae Resort modules are set to be a new breed of ultra-luxury accommodation. Motivated by the lack of “anything particularly exciting in the global resort space”, Hingarae Developments set out to create a resort with design and architecture as key components. Due for completion mid-next year, the resort’s architecture was inspired by 1960s airports, sci-fi pop culture, and the optimism that existed in the middle of last century before the move to a more imposing austere Cold War-era architecture. According to...
Everything Is Illuminated
If you’re unsure how strongly interior lighting affects us, just conjure up two images: one of the flat, fluorescent glare of a McDonalds at 3am, and the other of a cosy low-lit bistro, with tables centred under gentle pools of light. Good light is vital to good health, says lighting designer Helmut Waldhuber, and his new company, Lightgeist, is all about inproving people’s lives through light. “Light works on a subtle level where it affects the human spirit,” he explains. “Our emotional reaction to buildings is shaped by the control of light and shadow.”
Lightgeist (a name inspired...