photo by bildwerk89.de

The Ratiopharm Arena was designed and planned by Max Bögl Group together with the ARCHITEKTURCONCEPT Pfaffhausen and Staudte GbR architectural firm.

photo by bildwerk89.de

The multi-purpose hall was opened up via a foyer on the ground floor with access to the surrounding area on the first floor. On the second floor, in addition to 270 business seats, there are also eleven boxes and two VIP lounges which can be booked for various events and for company or private occasions. Through the glass facade of the modern business club, guests and visitors can see the Ulm Minster.

photo by bildwerk89.de

photo by bildwerk89.de

The multi-purpose room concept quickly transforms the approx. 1,950 m² floor area from a sports’arena into an event venue. The spectator capacity caters for 6,000 visitors at sporting events and a capacity of up to 9,100 people for concerts with a centre stage. The individual activation of the LED floodlights, a high level of energy efficiency and optimum ease of maintenance speak for the technology developed. The outer skin of green metallic ALUCOBOND® and orange stripes is extraordinary and gives a unique and characteristic look to the arena.

photo by bildwerk89.de

+ Project facts

Project: Ratiopharm Arena, Ulm / Neu-Ulm, Germany
General Contractor: Max Bögl Group
Architects: Architektur Concept Pfaffhausen & Staudte GbR
Fabricator: Dodel, Ulm
Year of Construction: 2011
Product: ALUCOBOND® seafoam green metallic
Construction: Riveted / Screwed
Photos: bildwerk89.de

Todays Fridges…What's in?

In any catering business, it is, ultimately, the product, the staff and the equipment who remain crucial. Whilst you (unfortunately) can't always control the productivity of employees, you can shop for the best in kitchen features. In today's market there is an impressive range of specialist product to suit any independent, café, bar or restaurant.

Of course, one of the most relied upon devices in hospitality is the humble fridge- which works as a backbone somewhat to the standard of food service. Fridges are essential to maintaining optimum food safety, appearance and taste. In the current revival of the glorious British summer (long may it last!) a visit to Fridgeland might be just what a small business needs when selling all their Summertime treats…

So what should be in any self- respecting shop fridge this summer?

Foodie trends reign supreme and the latest is the 'mocktail' inspired ice- cream- ice creams with an alcoholic lending. Traditional run' n' raisin has been updated to a plethora of exciting flavours including a combination of lemon sorbet, Pimm's and ginger beer dubbed the 'Pimm's Float.' Pimm's is a long standing British favourite brought up to date in this fresh take on the drink.

Locally brewed beer is also enjoying a revival. In 2012 there were more than 1 million American homebrewers. Sometimes referred to as 'mad brewers,' the craft beer community blend beer styles and search out rare ingredients. Even young British folk rock band, Mumford and Sons have announced decision to brew their own whisky as a break before writing material for their new album. India Pale Ale has grown in demand with new formulations in July 2013 taking creative names including Tired Hands Sunbather, Tired Hands Be Nice and Salopian Boomerang

The penchant for alcohol infused ice- cream and beer is combined in the rising popularity of beer flavoured ice- cream as a dessert. While rum' n' raisin is a firm favourite, new variations are more difficult to perfect, inspiring much experimentation. Humphry Slocombe is a San Francisco based ice cream shop that creates a range of beer flavoured ice creams every year for the city's Beer Week. The process involves vastly reducing the beer before adding mild and cream, often the mixture needs small amounts of beer to be added to enhance and hone the flavour. If you fancy stocking your fridge with a hot beer- ice cream hybrid, have a go at Victoria Johnsons' recipe here- http://bit.ly/KwzZO0

Haworth, Inc., a global leader in the design and manufacture of award-winning furniture, interior architecture and technology solutions, today announced that the United States Green Building Council (USGBC) has awarded LEED Gold certification for the achievement of green design, construction and operation of its Boston showroom. Boston is the 10th of Haworth's 11 U.S. showrooms to be LEED certified.

courtesy Haworth

The 5,600 square-foot Boston showroom is located on the second floor of the Oliver Street Tower at 125 High Street, just one block away from the heart of Boston's financial district. The design and reconstruction of the space involved a highly-skilled team that included Perkins+Will, GMB Architect + Engineering and Turner Construction. The Boston Commons and the abundance of green space throughout the city inspired the showroom concept.

A variety of project design and construction aspects, including lighting, contributed to the LEED Gold certification," said Steve Kooy, global sustainability manager for Haworth. "The space has occupancy sensors for 99 percent of the lighting load, which helps maximize energy efficiency allowing the lighting design to uses 32 percent less energy than a nominally code compliant design.

courtesy Haworth

All employee workstations and conference rooms have views of outside and all Haworth furniture used in the space is GREENGUARD certified.

courtesy Haworth

The USGBC's LEED rating system provides building owners and operators with the framework to identify and implement practical and measurable green building design, construction, operations and maintenance solutions. Within each LEED credit category, projects must satisfy prerequisites to earn points. The number of points the project earns determines its level of certification.

courtesy borXu Design

Blue pie is a transformation of a typical Torontonian condo into the celebration of a man's living style and artistic curiosities. It is a poetic invasion of the color blue into a white room washed with natural light. The client, a 40-year-old passionate family doctor with a love for colors white and blue, purchases a photograph of an iceberg. The photograph was taken by rzlbd on his explorations of the arctic in which he found respect for the peacefulness of the icebergs. When they find their mutual interest in simplicity, purity and humble environments, the doctor hires rzlbd to alter his living space into a manifesto of these interests.

courtesy borXu Design

With a limited budget and a tight schedule, rzlbd starts the challenge inspired by the two recently purchased artworks, one being the photograph of the iceberg and the other a painting, "Back Alley Abstract" by Sandra Duba-Shubs. Both are in blue and white. The artworks are an elaboration of the client's idea of a calm desirable living area, which rzlbd focuses on achieving. The budget included the cost for the interior architectural alterations as well as the cost for home decorations, cutlery, bed and bath accessories and personal items. All had to be done within 4 weeks.

courtesy borXu Design

Blue Pie is the public domain of the client's condo, a 450 sqf area, a quarter of a circle in plan that resembles the slice of a cake. The transformation began with removing the hardwood floors to expose the rough concrete slab underneath. The floor was then painted with blue oil based floor paint to create the platform that embraces the furniture. The serenity of the icebergs floating on the surface of the deep blue sea helped envision the blue pie that was yet to be born. Two solid walls frame the living areas while the large curved curtain wall allow for the natural light from southwest to fill the space. As a cost saving strategy the existing kitchen cabinets and appliances on the north wall were kept while the kitchen island was removed to make space for a built in dining table that cantilevers from the column just hovering above the blue floor. The east wall is a 65cm wide millwork containing the workstation, a lower bench and a wine rack. A blue hanging seat sits on the radius of the circle and is visually merged into the light that floats the space from the curved curtain walls. All lighting fixtures has been removed from the ceiling and only 5 spotlights are installed on a linear rail highlighting each of these arrangements.

courtesy borXu Design

Space is normally accessorized after the architecture is born. But in this case the architecture itself is the accessory for the space. The built-in furniture that hovers above the floor and the millwork's reveal that attempt to hide the edge of the contact with the surface of the blue concrete are architectural translations of icebergs, which, by laws of nature only, portray such serenity. The evolution of the Blue Pie was an inspirational experiment that truly fulfilled the individual needs of the client and trusted its fate in the art of the arctic nature. _ By: Lailee Soleimani

+ Credits

Architect: Reza Aliabadi [rzlbd]
Design team: Ehsan Zareian, Bahar Joshanpoosh
Logistic: Nikta Mazloom Construction: Royal Falcon Inc.
Architectural Photography: borXu Design
Building Type: Condominium unit
Location: Toronto, Canada
Area: 450 sqft [total living area 650]
Design & Completion: Summer 2013

After having cooperated together in landmark F&B projects, VOL and Kokaistudios re-joined to work on a challenging new project  of conceiving an innovative Cantonese Fine Dining restaurant in Shanghai, a new product where the contemporary and trendy environment that is the signature of the VOL Group meets the pure essence of the traditional Cantonese cuisine.

courtesy Kokaistudios, photo by Charlie Xia

The challenge of creating such innovative product become the opportunity for Kokaistudios to reinvent the approach with which Chinese restaurants are usually conceived and create Y2C2, a restaurant elegant and edgy at the same time, a project that brings a  new energy and freshness to Shanghai's dining scene.

courtesy Kokaistudios, photo by Charlie Xia

The location of the project, quite unusual for a fine dining restaurant, is settled in an old warehouse on the south part of the bund, overlooking the famous view on the Huangpu River. The interior design has been conceived playing with the contrast between tradition and innovation like in a harmonious dance between yin and yang, selecting traditional Chinese decorative elements blended together with contemporary and even futuristic design features.

courtesy Kokaistudios, photo by Charlie Xia

All the spaces have been created in an innovative way from the arrival experience where a dramatic and futuristic lobby decorated with a contrast of patchwork of old Chinese drawers welcome the guest into, a welcome area with two bars, two customized special stations where customers are introduced to the restaurant experience by mixing molecular cocktails and traditional teas. The bars themselves have been designed as a contrast between tradition and innovation balanced at the center by a hypnotically round table that offers an unexpected infinity vision into a fictional endless well and completed by the unexpected presence of two old Chinese tricycle completely custom designed according the theme of the two contrasting bars styles. In the plan of operation the tricycle shall be used to drive to clients the crazy cocktail inventions of the bar tender in an absolutely innovative and spectacular way.

courtesy Kokaistudios, photo by Charlie Xia

The dining area have been conceived in an unusual way by surrounding the central open dining area facing the river view by raised platforms where we created a series of semi private dining rooms, a solution that maintain the privacy of the guests but maintaining the possibility to appreciate the outstanding view on the bund. The space have been designed creating a optical feature on the background wall using traditional Chinese patterns built with concrete an lit with accent led candles together with a system of partition made by decorative custom designed curtains of lights inspired by the traditional Chinese lanterns. These features integrated with a complex lighting control system is able to modify the mood of the entire restaurant and offer the possibility to host fine dining as well parties and events as targeted by the plan of the operator of the restaurant.

courtesy Kokaistudios, photo by Charlie Xia

The open dining area was conceived as a flexible open space with a seat mix of banquet seats that reserve privacy to customers and open seats overlooking the open kitchen area where the chefs will prepare the final presentation of their food inventions. The large dining area framed by industrial concrete pillars of the warehouse and a lattice partition ceiling is overlooking to the design feature symbol of this restaurant, a unique installation of lanterns where we applied a wide image of the old Shanghai, a design invention able to characterize the mood of the entire restaurant and at the same time add a little edgy and little sexy touch typical  of VOL products.

courtesy Kokaistudios, photo by Charlie Xia

The private rooms all overlooking the river front have been conceived as a dialogue between this innovative environment and the  previous Tan Wai Lou restaurant that Kokaistudios conceived for VOL ten years ago inside the UNESCO award winning project we developed on the Bund. The same iconic light designed by Mariano Fortuny previously signature of the design of Tan Wai Lou have been combined with a new fresh environment designed with patchwork of traditional Chinese silks, creating an elegant but at the same time edgy mood as background to the innovative food creation of this venue.

To complete the design Kokaistudios conceived the restrooms as an ambiguous game of roles using in a playful way large graphics and small details that contributes to create the journey as a memorable experience.

+ Project facts

Design Kokaistudios
Chief Architect Filippo Gabbiani, Andrea Destefanis
Interior Manager Mirei Lim
Design Team Ada Sun, Rake Wang
Location Shanghai, China
Size 900 sqm
Date of Completion April, 2013
Client VOL Group
Photographer Charlie Xia

+ All images courtesy Kokaistudios, photo by Charlie Xia

South-Korean design studio Arpheo has created the Hug Cable – cable holder. Hug Cable likes to sleep. The cable can be a comforting place for Hug Cable. This product which shapes like a koala holding a tree can fix the cables of multi-tap or telephone on the wall. It can be also used to hold a pencil or toothbrush.

• 1 Packet : 2EA
• Size : 64 x 18 x 55mm / 44 x 12 x 36mm (mini)
• Material : Elastomer (TPR)
• Made in Korea
• Colors : Pink / Cream
• Designed by Arpheo

courtesy Arpheo

courtesy Arpheo

courtesy Arpheo