the wee house

The Wee House Co. produce one or two bedroom houses, built in under 5 weeks.

The cost for the one bedroom house is £59,000, either built on or off site.

All you need is a plot of land, planning permission and the money and you are good to go!







The house boasts an efficient use of space throughout. Thorough planning and design through testing has led to a refined and effective interior.


I can see the wee house being perfect for a couple buying their first home or a comforting place to retire in.


The quick build time and ease of construction is a major drawing point compared to traditionally built housing.







My only slight concern is whether the wee house could be sold on to someone else and at what cost. A house appreciates in value, but will the wee house do the same? Only time will tell.





I for one love the idea.





check them out at:

theweehousecompany.co.uk

Eileen Gray

Eileen Gray (1878-1976)
Architect and Furniture Designer



Eileen Gray is now considered as one of the most important architects and furniture designers of the 20th century. Her work inspired modernism and Art Deco movements. She remained independent throughout her career in a time when leading designers were predominantly male.

Her work is very distinctive with a luxuriant take on geometric forms and industrially produced materials.

She studied painting at the Slade School of Art in London before moving to Paris. Her passions quickly moved onto lacquering which can be painstaking and dangerous: she developed "lacquer disease" on her hands. She was taught for 4 years by Sugawara, a young Japanese lacquer craftsman. After opening a shop and having a successful period selling her work she moved into architecture.

In 1924 they began work on E-1027, situated on a steep cliff near Monaco. It was designed to be L-shaped, flat-rooved and have floor to ceiling windows facing the sea. Gray also designed the furniture for the interior of the building. 

After completion she built herself a small house "Tempe a Pailla" in the 1930s at Castellar. Living in such a compact home caused her to design many space saving devices such as the fold-able S-Chair.

Her work was largely unappreciated and she lived a quiet, reclusive life in her later years. Her work was brought back into the public eye with a review of her career in Domus magazine. Gray was quick to criticise when she thought her work was poorly displayed or restored, but later said: 

"One must be grateful to all those people who bother to unearth us and at least to preserve some of our work. Otherwise it might have been destroyed like the rest."

Gray's reputation was sufficient to warrant an announcement of her work on French national radio, albeit the first time she had ever been mentioned in a radio broadcast. 

I always find it interesting that so many 'famous' artists, designers and architects only became famous after or close to their deaths... 

3D printed houses

Like me, you may have wondered where 3D printing was going to go next.

I myself have had experience with 3D printing for various work and projects and have found it to be a far from perfect process. This being said, the latest movement of producing 3D printed housing is exciting... and not necessarily for you and I.

If you are reading this blog post you have access to a computer: my guess is that you're sitting in a nice cafe or in the comfort of your own home. 3D printed housing is probably not going to change your life.

As Professor Behrokh Khoshnevis explains in his TEDx Talk, 3D printed housing could change the lives of those living in extreme poverty. His talk is 11 minuted long, but well worth a listen.

Here are some facts for you:
- 1 in 3 children do not have adequate shelter
- 50% of the world population live on under $2.50 per day

It is these people that this advancement in technology may benefit with suitable backing and development.

The BBC reported (25th April 2014) that a Chinese company had built 10 full sized eco-houses in 1 day. They use recycled construction and industrial waste to build these houses at a cost of just £2830 each. As technology advances and this becomes more commonplace, this cost will only come down.

This is still a lot of money, but in comparison to alternatives it is very reasonable indeed.

A company in Amsterdam have been slowly creating the first 3D printed Canal House. It is constructed using a Lego type system of blocks that are printed in the "KamerMaker" - a 6m high custom made 3D printer.
It was recently visited by Barack Obama and has been attracting a lot of media attention.



As for the future of 3D printed housing, I for one am excited. I certainly hope that this technology will be developed and used to benefit those who need it the most.

Colour

Design and technology

Ben craven 

27/02/14


We are all colourblind.

There are 5 million light sensitive cells on the retina. An image is formed on the retina. This goes down optic nerve to what we actually see with - the brain. Each cell responds to one colour - the cell is most sensitive to a particular wavelength of light...yellow say. The signal the cell produces becomes weaker if the wavelength is less/more or if it's brighter/darker. Red, green and blue cones (what your cells have) - major overlap between them. 3 is a majorly important number in colour vision.

 When you mix coloured lights the effects are: green + blue = greeny blue, red + blue = reddish blue, green + red = yellow (the only one that is not a mixture of the two... When you mix red and green paint you get brown) - not physics but biology. When you mix all three you get white. Yellow light, and a mix of red and green (yellow) look the same, but show a red pepper in very different ways. We can't see the difference though. Everyone sees slightly differently. Each person's pigment is denser than others. Different parts of your eye see different colours as well.







Pigeons have 4 types of light cells in our eyes, dogs have 2, we have three. When the lighting is bizarre we can see colours to be different (shades) - the moon is really dark, dark slade, but in fact it looks white because it is in a very light place. The colours surrounding a colour can really affect what it looks like (light or dark)

Why do we see colour? We can forget easily that we're watching a black and white film. Well, it can be a matter of life and death. We can see fruit (food) a long way off with colour: fruits change to an easy colour when they are ripe. The plants are attractive colours so that they get eaten and then their seeds are dispersed through poo.






Psychological effect of red:

• Olympics - given red or blue randomly. More likely to win if in red than in blue. 

• Teams that wear red are more likely to win. 

• The colour red slows down people's answers to questions. 

• Red provokes feelings of avoidance.

Colour is of major importance in the natural world and therefore in design as well. The colour a product/logo/graphic is may determine how successful it is. Therefore colour has to be a major consideration in all aspects of design and cannot be overlooked. 

Professor Tom Inns

Design and Technology
13/03/14


Professor Tom Inns has a very varied background:

• Studied mechanical engineering at Bristol
• Studied industrial design engineering masters at Royal College of Art
• Worked with James Dyson when he had 8 workers 
• Sponsored by Rolls Royce
• Brunel design researcher and academic 
• Did a lot of research and design projects in animal welfare with the RSPCA
• Professor of design at Dundee for 12 years
• Now director of GSA. 

What struck me is that even though you may get a job after graduation, there is no reason to say that is what you'll do all your life until you retire at 65 (or if the government keeps increasing it maybe: 99!)

We then went on to think about successful products. We think of Apple as one of the most successful companies in the world right now. However, this has not always been the case. The apple newton for example was a terrible failure.
It also depends what we consider to be a "success". PDMA.org say 56% of new products are successful in the market place. Business wise no-one can argue that Apple are a successful company, but at what cost. Apple products are made in an 'apple town' which had the highest suicide rate in china.

We may be moving forward with technology, with many people having numerous hi-tech gadgets. The problem is that we have to think about what the cost of this is; whether now or in the future.

The Floyd Leg

The Floyd Leg was an interesting project I came across recently:

The main idea is captioned in the phrase "Create a table from any flat surface."

Basically the idea is that you buy a set of four of these steel legs which can be clamped onto any flat material to create a table. It started out as a kickstarter project where it raised over $250,000 when it's goal was only $18,000.

They are now on sale on the website for $189 for a set of four (to make one table).

The idea of using these legs to make a table with a piece of old wood that you have in the house is one that I like. It gives the freedom to have a table in your house which is chosen and made by you. I believe this adds value to the table, compared to one just bought from a shop. It's personal.

I for one would like a set. The whole idea is great and could be an insight into a future life where everything is reused and recycled. Not only that, but a furtwhere your furniture is designed and made you.




















For more information have a browse here: http://www.thefloydleg.com/

Open Design

Design and Technology
Roy Shearer and Paul Smith
28/02/14


Defining open design is not an easy task, with many differing opinions on what the term means. To me, open design is allowing others to freely see, use and adapt a design you have produced.

Enzo Mari is considered to be one of the first designers who wanted to distribute his plans freely. He wanted everyone to be able to make their own furniture by starting with the design he came up with. 

Ronen Kadushin produces furniture that's laser cut. Although it is still open design, it is not as widely available due to the process required to make it. 

Arduino is a great example of successful open design - even though the plans are released people really value the Arduino brand.

Local motors - open on input and output is tied to a garage. Solid works files available for all the parts of their automotive design. 

Roy mentioned that the instructions provided with the design are the most important part; as poor instructions do not allow the person to understand and use the design. This restricts the user and is detrimental to their design development.

Roy talked about an Instructable he made with shelves made of wood and old bottles. It is an interesting concept and I like the idea of using items, that would normally just be thrown out, to make useful furniture. It is similar to my next blog post which is going to be about the Floyd Leg.

Open Design is certainly and interesting concept. Releasing designs for anyone to use is certainly something I will consider in the future, depending on what the project I am working on is. Sites like Instructables are really useful platforms for sharing ideas and designs, creating a real community of creativity.