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| Thu 04 Dec 2008 |
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Tag: Amsterdam
These items have all been tagged with the tag "Amsterdam", You can see other tags in the Tag Cloud| Vila Sofa - Amsterdam |
| 2008-12-03 04:16:54 |
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VilaSofa, a furniture store that opened in Amsterdam in October is a clever design feat by Tjep. Judging by the VilaSofa website, it is a brand that can use some visual updating. VilaSofa is positioned somewhere between an IKEA store and a conventional furniture store and its claim to fame is reasonable prices and a guaranteed 48-hour delivery of all displayed models. The Amsterdam-based Tjep faced the challenge of making all this look cool. It zeroed in on the warehouse concept but with a homey twist. It focused on the aspects of speed and the transitional nature of the place where factory-born furniture lives while waiting to be taken to your home. Combining warehouse and home isn’t easy, but Tjep accomplished it by only suggesting both. They used warehousing and transportation symbols as the basis for gigantic cutouts and wall graphics, and created a white wall with cutouts of chandeliers, windows and ornate balconies that imply a villa and refer to your home as your castle. Staff rides around in cute cash-register trolleys so that customers don’t need to go to them. The Tjep design team included company founders Frank Tjepkema and Janneke Hooymans, plus Leonie Janssen, Tina Stieger, Bertrand Gravier and Camille Cortet. Tjep is a multiple-award winning firm that works in an astonishingly wide variety of three-dimensional design — Product and furniture design, interior design and interior architecture, identity design and events. Tjep clients include Droog, British Airways, ING, Restaurant Praq, Camper, Heineken and Ikea. Hooymans left Tjep in May 2008, and now works independently thisisjane.com. - Tuija Seipell. |
| Schools in Colour - Amsterdam |
| 2008-11-27 03:36:02 |
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One of the easiest ways to make a boring space more vibrant is to use colour. However, as so many of us can remember, obvious opportunities to do this have been missed for decades in schools, universities and hundreds of other places where young people are more or less stuck for long periods. Luckily, today’s kids have better luck — at least in the schools where Amsterdam’s i29 has had its say. i29 Interior Architects consists of two interior designers — Jaspar Jansen and Jeroen Dellensen — and is known for clear, bold solutions. A good example of this is their custom furniture project for a Het Veer. It is a public school in Almere, a city located 25 kilometers east of Amsterdam and often referred to as the most modern city in Europe. Het Veer is a school for children with learning and concentration difficulties and the objective of i29’s work was to express and entice concentration, playfulness and movement. Their eight different white and red tube furniture pieces can be mixed and matched creating various formations. They play off the Buzz Wire science game that teaches about electric circuits and is based on concentration and hand coordination. At the Caland Lyseum in Amsterdam, 1,500 students work in a sport-centric environment where they receive coaching for their specific sport and in academic topics. i29 was asked to envision the public spaces — including the main hall, staff room, library and computer/media room — for the new Bos & Partners architects-designed building with its gray brick, glass walls and unusual floor plans. They used large images of the school’s famous sports hero alumni and then custom-created multi-functional tables, benches and signage, plus a color scheme for the common areas. The award-winning solution matches the dynamic and multicultural life of the school yet lets the buildings features dominate. - Tuija Seipell |
| Spotlight On Power And Money (Amsterdam) |
| 2008-11-21 05:00:21 |
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When the investment group All Capital wanted a power space for their high-powered meetings in Amsterdam, they engaged two local creative firms that had the right vision. Interior design firm i29 and architectural office Eckhardt en Leeuwenstein created meeting and lounge areas that are prestigious and opulent without being pretentious or stuffy. Themed around the playful concept of being under a spotlight, the spaces feature gigantic, round, black lamp shades spray-painted gold inside. These power lights appear to cast spot lights and create shadows everywhere in the space. The fake ovals of light and shadow on the floor, walls and furnishings are created by altering the colors and textures of the finish. The golden ovals also define specific areas and soften the angles of the black-stained ash wood desks and cabinets. In addition, the gold and silver ovals scattered about can be interpreted as coins — highlighting the business of the client. All existing ornamentation and detail of the building was painted white. The All Capital boardrooms and lounge opened last month in the historic, 17th-century building, De Gouden Bocht located by one of the most famous canals of Amsterdam, the Herengracht (=Gentlemen`s Canal). i29 was established in 2001 by Jaspar Jensen and Jeroen Dellensen. Their style is characterized by a dramatic absence of extras or gimmicks, and by frequent use of clear blocks of color and lots of white. Their projects, mainly in Amsterdam, include schools, retail shops, restaurants, hotels and private residences. Architect duo Rob Eckhardt and Goos Leeuwenstein has a long history of distinctive projects from public spaces to restaurants, entertainment venues and residences. They’ve created offices for Publicis, DDB and Eigen Fabrikaat, film studios for Jurriaan Eindhoven, and interiors for Restaurant Bordewijk. Eckhardt became known early in his career as a furniture designer with the disco stool Dolores as his first success in the early 1980s. He even operated a retail store that sold his furniture, including the 1983 Groeten uit Holland chair and the 1982 Karel Doorman chaise lounge. - Tuija Seipell |
| Global Warming - What's All The Fuss About |
| 2008-11-05 21:33:02 |
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When in Amsterdam, do as the Amsterdammers do. This seems to have been the thought behind Ogilvy Action’s clever public awareness campaign for MTV Switch. In the city named after a river (Amstel) and a dam, what better way to create viral attention inexpensively about the rising sea levels, but to use the canals? Eerily realistic-looking inflatable hands stick out of the water, holding up a sign with a simple question and the website address. The idea evokes thoughts of not only rising water but also of us all sinking, pleading for, and desperately needing, help. - Tuija Seipell |
| UXUS Design Offices |
| 2008-02-18 07:31:28 |
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We always thought that fables anthropomorphized animals, plants and inanimate objects, giving them human-like character. For us, the word fable evokes thoughts of rich, organic colour - a sort of Cirque du Soleil Varekai world. So when we heard that the new office of the Amsterdam-based UXUS Design was inspired by the fables, we expected a riot of colour. Instead, we saw a predominantly white interior with transparent walls, white, gauzy drapery and residential-style floor lamps. A few wall graphics and some organic furnishings do give a nod to nature and, without doubt, the office is a cool background for colourful ideas. It is a stylish base for UXUS, founded in 2003 by USA-born co-creative director Georg Anthony Gottl, Costa Rica native Erica Gottl, and French-born co-creative director Oliver J.P. Michell. Their collective experience spans the globe and their work includes interiors, architecture, retail, hospitality, identity, graphics and packaging projects for clients such as Levi's, Nokia and Adidas. By Tuija Seipell. |
| Open For Royalty - Schiphol's Airport New VIP Lounge, Amsterdam |
| 2008-01-18 08:46:05 |
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Opened just a few days ago by Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands, the new VIP centre at Schiphol Amsterdam Airport could potentially resurrect your impressions of airline travel as something to look forward to. However, the centre - also called the Royal Centre - is only open to Royalty, Ministers and state secretaries, diplomats, trade delegations and top directors in international business. So, unless you qualify, you'll need to just suffer the regular airport torture. The new space has already become the pride and joy of Dutch design. Overall design of the space is by Amsterdam-based concrete architectural associates bv, known for a huge number cool retail, hospitality, entertainment and exhibition environments around the world. Schiphol's new VIP-centre replaces an old, much smaller VIP area. The new centre contains a separate Royal Lounge for members of the Royal Family, a press centre, a Company Lounge, plus various reception and meeting rooms. The Royal Lounge is an enormous living room with lounge sofas, and Royal Family pictures on the bookshelves. The wall paper in the room is created from 5,500 mini reproductions of the national coat of arms. By Tuija Seipell |
| Bike Dispensing Machines |
| 2007-08-22 07:27:56 |
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Here at TCH, we love riding bikes through the city. There's something immensely pleasing about sailing past scores of traffic with little more than a push of a pedal. And at the same time, you're burning the calories, and doing your bit to stay green. But there's one thing we hate about this simple mode of transport. People like nothing more than stealing them, damaging them, or driving buses into them. While your safe at work crunching the numbers, who's looking after your ride home? Cue the bike dispensing machine. Brought to you courtesy of bikedispenser.com, a small firm from Amsterdam, the idea is to help facilitate bike rentals in urban areas. Cyclists pay a small fee to hire a bike, and then they can take it where they please. Once they’ve finished, they can return it either to that machine, or another one across town. And because they’ve been fitted with RFID tags, they won’t all have been nicked before you can get one. Now, if only they can do something about those van drivers… By Matt Hussey |
| LUTE SUITES - NETHERLANDS |
| 2006-02-24 15:46:18 |
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Many countries in the world would have strict heritage listing restrictions on any 18th century architecture used to preserve the authenticity of the structure. In the Netherlands, these restrictions have been overlooked on a row of vintage homes overlooking the Amstel River. Cutting edge designers Boffi, Moooi and Bisazza have joined creative forces and produced these stunning refurbished suites. Lute Suites are the brainchild of hospitality and design gurus, Peter Lute and Marcel Wanders. Each suite is an aesthetic wonder, individually styled and draped in every imaginable luxury. Providing travelers with more than a comfortable home base, the Lute Suites have a signature all of their own. by Billy T |
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