Campsite is a New York based design blog and studio run by visual designer Max Ritt.
This year a modern classic has it’s half century birthday. The 606 system was originally released and is still on offer from Vitsoe. Designed by one of my all time favorite designers Dieter Rams, the 606 modular shelving and storage system lives at that rare intersection of form and function. Few pieces of furniture and especially modular shelving do their job with such style and grace. No wonder then that the 606 system has remained a staple offering for Vitsoe for fifty years now.
Over the past year I have had the honor to collaborate with my close friend on the branding and design for his new bar The Narrows. Off the Morgan stop on the L train, it is one of evermore amazing little spots in the otherwise desolate neighborhood.
Inspired by the art-deco era and craft drink making, we had a lot of great visual influence. During the discovery and research period I looked at tons of deco and deco informed typefaces, because I knew we would invariably land on a type based logo.
My friends and frequent collaborators Jackie Balzer and Brian McAllister worked with me on this project to provide flawless development work including WordPress integration with some custom plugins for fast and simple menu changes and event scheduling.
Feel free to visit the Narrows site or if you are in New York City head out to Bushwick grab a pie at Roberta’s and stop off at the Narrows for a seasonal cocktail or craft beer.
Called the Wall-Less House this house designed by Tezuka Architects relies on it’s core to support the minimal exterior. On the ground floor the space opens completely out onto the garden. Often times using industrial grade materials can give a sterile or even rough feeling, but here they have achieved a wonderful elegance by playing concrete and metal surfaces off of warm woods and large expanses of white.
(via HomeDSGN »)
Guest House designed by Paratelier architects in Carvalhal, Portugal is a nice take on a beach or vacation house. The construction is a modular of three sections divided into, one for living, storage and parking.
(via ArchDaily »)
Finding the intersection of art and sustainability can be tough, unless you are The National Gallery in London, and you are working with Van Gogh’s A Wheatfield, with Cypresses as inspiration. Taking this famous painting and the technique of creating a green wall, designers used around 26 varieties and over 8,000 total plants to bring Van Gogh’s masterpiece to life literally.
(via Inhabitat »)
Building blocks seem to be a nice medium to translate interesting design ideas into. This set displays portraits of 44 US presidents along with details about them and one side is a piece of the American flag. The picture above shows them all organized to create the full flag. The product description makes me really happy as well. “Handcrafted in Michigan of Basswood grown in the Great Lakes area and printed with non-toxic inks.” You can pick them up over at UncommonGoods.
(via swissmiss »)
I posted about Josh Owens aka Mind Relic once before, also for his amazing time-lapse shots of New York City. You can view my previous post here. I think the same stuff I said last time is still entirely applicable, but now he has achieved an even higher level of awe. Using a Stage Zero Dolly Josh was able to smoothly and seamlessly shift the angle of the shot giving each one of clips an even greater amount of depth.
(via Cameron Moll »)
The Swedish design firm Lundgren+Lindqvist worked on this comprehensive rebranding for Loft Investments. The bold logo type and colors of the brand are nice and pair well with minimal grid design of the the accompanying digital designs. When viewed on the iPad, as pictured here the site is extra sleek.
(via Design Work Life »)
The approach of designing homes with larger developed outdoor space has been widespread for sometime. Most commonly seen in beach or vacation houses. Here with the Seya House in Japan by Suppose Design Office has changed the relationship between indoor and outdoor spaces. By containing both within the main exterior structure they have broken down both the physical and figurative walls between the indoor and outdoor areas. The contrast of the plywood, and the river stones and planting in the entryway is particularly nice.
(via Spoon & Tomago »)
The idea of having a highly functional, easy to clean minimalist kitchen like this has been a dream of mine for a long time. It seems to be poised somewhere between the stainless steal line kitchen tables of my formative years and the Bulthaup workstation I hope to have one day. Here we are looking at a concept kitchen designed for Naber by industrial designer Kilian Schindler. This system is modular and adaptable so you can customize it to fit your space or needs, which is just an added bonus on top of it’s aesthetic.
What a unique idea for a hotel. The concept and interiors for Hütten Palast in Berlin were created by Silke Lorenzen and Sarah Vollmer. The hotel itself occupies an old vacuum cleaner factory and has been restored and filled with spruced up old campers and newly constructed cabins. The comfort and kitsch of this is not lost on me. Most people shy away from hotels where the rooms are too small, but in this case it creates a much greater shared communal space around each of the trailers.
Designing a stand alone kitchen is not easy task, but Johanne Procee has done exactly that. His Keuken Kabinet concept is a rolling kitchen and storage system confined with in one minimalist box, which opens to reveal your own little chef’s station. A idea like this is so applicable to many of the issues encountered in New York City apartments. Whether you live in a small cramped apartment or a raw open space.
(via NOTCOT »)
It seems pretty common for a bag or luggage manufacture to make a set or system that has the same look and feel, but in this case Unitportables has taken it to a different and better place. Their ultra minimalist bag system all works together to create a multi function bag with tons of little pockets and compartments specifically designed for things like power adapters and iPads. Available in series of monochrome options including my favorite, all black. Their website says there are more products soon, and I excited to see what those end up being.
(via The Fox Is Black »)
Designed by Marte.Marte Architekten this holiday house on a canal in Fussach Austria is an industrialists dream. Along the canal, just a few feet shy of the length of the house is massive garage door, which opens to reveal three sizable water craft. One other detail that jumped out at me is the large skylight panel on the roof, which opens up to the sky and provides increased air flow. When all the doors and skylights are closed the house looks very castle like, but once you start to open those sections up it blurs the line between the inside and outside of the house and makes it much more inviting.
(via SUBTILITAS »)
Studio Joon Jung have attacked the problem of creating a speaker system from a far different angle and with far different goals from your typical speaker designer or engineer. The Natural Speaker creates a softer more natural sound using a wood, ceramic and porcelain construction for the casing and transmission components. This gives a certain resonance or echo that makes the sound quality softer and more natural feeling. I also really love the more organic qualities of the design, most speakers stick out in a home, and rarely do they match the lived in aesthetic of our other things.
(via The Fox Is Black »)
Many of the great architectural wonders I come across these days are duty to the size restrictions of the building lot. On top of that many are from in and around Tokyo where open space is scarce. The Skuhujii Y House has taken it’s design upward, by maximizing the vertical space Ikeda Yukie architects were able to create a very open and airy interior with some great nooks. There is also a little loft nested up at the very top of the house.
(via ArchDaily »)
I have always admired Andy Cruz and House Industries. Their work incorporates great elements of historical and classic design, often beautifully hand painted lettering, but despite those elements and inspiration it manages to feel contemporary. These images of Cruz’s home and the House Industries studio, from an article on The Scout Magazine really give a good picture of what these guys surround and inspire themselves with.
(via The Scout »)
The Momentus Project is a list of some of the more defining moments in the short US history, which will be visualized by a group of designers. The list of designers working collaborating was put together by Evan Stremke.
Momentus immediately reminded me of Dan Cassaro’s project 50 and 50, which is a group of 50 designers and illustrators illustrating their state motto.
(via Quipsologies »)
Anna Craemer has created a wonderful collection of video interviews on design for her personal project entitled Critical Graphic Design.
This particular one is an interview with Karel Martens who is the head of the famed Werkplaats Typografie program. He riffs on curiosity and compares the beauty of imperfect type and design to the great imperfections that make jazz music so great.
(via Frank Chimero »)
Alessi held a competition earlier this year for the students of the industrial design school at the University of Art and Design Laussane in Switzerland. The competition was to design a line of desktop goods. My favorite submission is this tape dispenser. The ultra minimalist aesthetic paired with the obvious functionality of it is inspiring. We have all grown used to the two common types of tape dispenser available to us. The clunky sand filled ones and the feather light plastic ones. Despite all my ill will towards it’s predecessors the elegance of this little guy cuts right through those feelings and reminds me of how good design can improve everyday things.
(via NOTCOT »)
