Tabla de contenidos para January - February 2018 en AZURE

Primo Terrazzo Tavolini Some 500 years ago, Venetian labourers began mixing leftover marble chips with clay to create cheap, durable flooring, using goat’s milk to seal it and to bring out its shine. Today, everything from marble, granite and quartz to recycled glass, porcelain and metal goes into making terrazzo, currently undergoing a creative rebirth – and in service of much more than floors. London’s Theo Williams Studio, for one, looked to the mottled material when developing its Primo Terrazzo Tavolini for British manufacturer Another Brand. Embedded in cement, the irregular, multi-hued fragments add depth and sparkle to the line’s geometric shapes, appearing timeless and timely at once. _KENDRA JACKSON anotherbrand.com Brodie Neill If there’s one designer pushing terrazzo’s boundaries, it’s Australian-born Brodie Neill. Only his terrazzo isn’t made with…

Off the Wall The experimental ceramics of legendary modernist Nino Caruso inspired these concave and convex ceramic tiles (24 x 34 x 6 cm) designed and produced by Enrica Cavarzan and Marco Zavagno, who head up their own multidisciplinary studio in Venice. zaven.net Roxanne Gufram is beloved for its polyurethane foam creations, so it’s surprising to find the Italian firm launching Roxanne, a tub chair sporting cloth upholstery. Designed by Michael Young, the chair has an excavated hollow around the seat called the Tube, intended for storing gadgets. gufram.it Soft Metal Sculptural and artisanal yet entirely functional, this titanium-coated stainless-steel chair by Toni Grilo for Portuguese manufacturer Riluc sat front and centre at the Old Truman Brewery, one of the main offsite locations during the London Design Festival. _EH riluc.com…

Project Ruins Studio Typology Two-bedroom getaway Location Dumfriesshire, Scotland Firms Lily Jencks Studio (London), Nathanael Dorent Architects (Paris) Floor Area 180 sq. m Site Area 10,000 sq. m Floors 1 Furnishings Lily Jencks Studio, Carl Hansen & Søn, Neo 3p stove by ACR The first picture that springs to mind when imagining a remote retreat in the wilds of rural Scotland, might be along the lines of a bare and barren bothy hunkered down against the prevailing winds. Nothing could be further from that idea than Ruins Studio, the result of an architectural odyssey undertaken by Lily Jencks Studio and the London designer’s regular collaborator Nathanael Dorent of Paris. This private house, set on a high ridge in Dumfriesshire’s Southern Uplands, and with views stretching more than 80 kilometres down…

ProjectThe Connected House TypologySingle Family LocationBoulogne-Billancourt, France FirmJakob + Macfarlane, Paris Floor Area800 sq. m Site Area977 sq. m Floors5 CladdingAlucobond, glass, poured-in place concrete Interior Finishes Concrete and French oak flooring, Stuv fireplace For the first ground-up house by Paris firm Jakob + Macfarlane, the mandate was both clear and wildly open: create something “avant-garde, surprising and poetic, which will stand out from its conservative neighbours.” It is the ultimate client brief, and the owners of the Connected House got exactly what they asked for. Situated in the leafy municipality of Boulogne-Billancourt, just beyond the western boundary of Paris, the sharply angled home of white enamelled metal and glass evokes a machine but takes its cues from the trees that surround it. The service core acts as the trunk;…

Mega by Italgraniti Redefining what constitutes oversized has become somewhat of a Cersaie tradition. This year, Italgraniti earned top marks in the large-format category with the latest contribution to its Mega series, which measures 320 x 160 cm. The massive porcelain stoneware practically dwarfs its 2016 predecessor (itself an impressive 240 x 120 cm). The appeal of gigantic yet slim slabs (Italgraniti’s can be as lean as 6 mm) hasn’t waned. The format remains the most efficient and cost-effective way to cover large, high-traffic areas. The extra-extralarge scale means fewer grout seams and joints, and faster installation. And, with bookmatch finishes, big slabs give the impression of continuous panelling. It’s also almost impossible to tell Mega is porcelain; its realistic renderings look just like metal, stone or marble – take…

From pools and platforms to decks and diving towers, harbourside swimming facilities are common in Danish coastal towns. A few years ago, however, the city of Aalborg, Denmark’s fourth largest, decided on a more ambitious program when it came to one such amenity. Aiming to draw more visitors to the fjord on which the city sits, the local government chose Copenhagen architecture firm Adept to convert a typical municipal pool into a 24-hour park that affords direct contact with nature. The recently opened result, executed with GHB Landscape Architects, is 15-hectare Vestre Fjord Park, an imaginative “learning and experience zone” that consists of five low-slung buildings on an isthmus dividing a basin and open-air pools on one side from open water on the other. The buildings, which house clubhouses, a…

When Thomas Heatherwick was contracted to transform a derelict complex of Cape Town grain silos into a new museum devoted to contemporary art from Africa, he and his client, V&A Waterfront, envisioned a cathedrallike space that would draw cultural pilgrims from across the continent and its diaspora. The defining feature of the Zeitz Museum of Contemporary Art Africa – named after philanthropist and ex–Puma CEO Jochen Zeitz, whose extensive art collection is on loan to the institution for 20 years – is certainly worthy of reverence. A vast, 10-storey atrium that was hewn, honeycomb-style, from the 42 soaring tubes that made up the original apartheidera structure, it has been likened to Gaudí’s Sagrada Família. Whether the museum will, in practice, attract all manner of Africans – rich and poor, white…

ProjectG’Day House TypologySingle family LocationWest Vancouver, Canada FirmMcLeod Bovell Modern Houses, Vancouver Floor Area409 sq. m Site Area731 sq. m Floors3 FinishesAccoya wood and Atlas Meridian Glassworks FurnishingsFireorb, Flos, Knoll, Kristalia, Living Divani, Paola Lenti “The sky here can be very big,” says Lisa Bovell, standing on a deck made of Accoya planks that are stained a shade of grey so subtle the wood appears almost white. And the view, without a doubt, is stunning. On this cloudless October day, the scenery is glorious, with coniferous treetops giving way to Stanley Park and the Pacific Ocean’s Strait of Georgia. That view is what defines G’Day House (so named because its owners are Australian), but it was Bovell and partner Matt McLeod of McLeod Bovell Modern Houses who crafted a house…

ProjectCirqua Apartments TypologyMulti-unit low-rise apartments LocationIvanhoe East, Melbourne, Australia FirmBKK Architects, Melbourne Floor Area1,361 sq. m Site Area2,200 sq. m Floors4 Cladding Daniel Robertson brick Interior Finishes Timber, stone and tile Long known as a country of oversized suburban houses, Australia has recently witnessed an unprecedented rise in development consortiums churning out uninspiring apartment blocks. In particular, downtown Melbourne has seen an overabundance of generic glass towers filled with micro-units designed more for investment than for setting down roots. By contrast, the Cirqua Apartments in Ivanhoe East, an established neighbourhood in the northeastern part of the city, is a mid-density residence that accommodates a multitude of lifestyles and family sizes. It’s the work of BKK Architects, a local firm that has, over nearly two decades, experimented with all types of…

Sound-Absorbing Walls _1 Spray On British firm Carmody Groarke used Soundcel – a highly adhesive, recycled-pulp-paper-based spray insulation – on the temporary walls that shape the London Design Museum’s 2017 Beazley Designs of the Year exhibition. Traditionally used on ceilings, the material reduces echo and reverberations. warmcel.co.uk _2 Finish and Function Ideal for absorbing high tones, BuzziSkin Printed is sold as adhesive-backed felt rolls. Made from 100 per cent recycled PET bottles, it’s easy to install and remove, and comes in prints that evoke marble, concrete and foliage. buzzi.space _3 Sound Screen Ecoustic Timber Blade panels from Unika Vaev are ready-made panels of wooden slats mounted on black acoustic scrim backing. Available in four bladespacing options and in four species of wood, the panels measure one by nine feet and…

Shown during Dutch Design Week this fall, Maarten Kolk and Guus Kusters’ Bound Bench could only have been conceived in the Netherlands, land of resourcefulness and red light districts. Consisting of scrap Forbo linoleum strapped to OSB panels with polyester rope, the trussedup seating, the duo says, was inspired by bondage. What’s truly deviant, though, isn’t the kinky allusion, but how simultaneously elegant and durable the finished product is. “We like how linoleum resembles marble in an artificial way,” Kolk and Kusters, who are based in Eindhoven, explain. “It’s a man-made material, but created through a natural oxidation process. This process doesn’t stop once the material leaves the factory.” Over time, in other words, the linoleum will develop a patina, just like natural stone. Bound comes in a variety of…

After years of working to hip hop music as an architecture student at the University of Detroit Mercy, Michael Ford had an epiphany. “Architecture,” he says, “has always been influenced by cultural movements. Religion, for example, gave us cathedrals. And hip hop is a cultural movement, too.” At UDM, Ford dedicated himself to exploring the connections between music and design, christening himself the Hip Hop Architect. Now based in Madison, Wisconsin, where his practice, BrandNu Design, specializes in pre-development strategies, he oversees travelling youth camps that introduce a new audience to Autodesk Tinkercad and sits on the advisory board for the Universal Hip Hop Museum, part of a massive affordable-housing complex slated to open in the Bronx in 2022. In advance of his talk at January’s Interior Design Show in…

With Florim, Refin, Lea Ceramiche and their ilk dominating the Italian ceramics industry for over half a century, it seems risky for a start-up to try to compete. Yet in 2013, Martino Manni, 33, and Antonello Di Leonardo, 36, decided the time was right to launch 41zero42, a ceramic and porcelain manufacturer focused on a fresh aesthetic. “We have a younger perspective,” says Di Leonardo, “so we can offer alternative versions to what’s on the market now.” The two friends, who first met 10 years ago during a dinner party in Bologna, rolled out their inaugural collection – Burlington, a quarry-stone-inspired porcelain – at Coverings in Atlanta in 2013. The positive feedback they received led to 15 more projects, each a contemporary take on industry norms. For their first European…

For Public Spaces _1 Wave Bench So named for its undulating shape, this urban bench brings sculptural form to utilitarian function. It can be affixed to an existing wall or to a custom-built base. Materials Sustainable Accoya wood Dimensions 220 x 100 x 90 cm Designer moveART, Switzerland Manufacturer Burri Public Elements, Switzerland, burri.world _2 Cuddly Seats + Family Table Part of the Organic series, which includes amorphous benches and bullet-shaped litter bins, these chairs and tables achieve their graceful forms via 3-D modelling. Materials Granite or concrete Dimensions Cuddly, 84.5 x 83 x 82 cm, 660 kg; Family, 96 x 52 cm, 695 kg Finishes Anti-UV acrylic-polyurethane varnish in black, white or red Designer Matouš Holý, Czech Republic Manufacturer Bellitalia, Italy, bellitalia.net Distributor Malik Gallery Collection, malikgallery.com _3 Construqta…