‘Cliff House’ puts architecture on the edge

By Josh Elliott
CTVNews.ca, September 10, 2014

If you’re a wealthy Australian who loves hanging out by the sea, this precariously-perched getaway home may be one for you.

The Australian architectural firm Modscape has designed a modular home called “Cliff House,” which would be built to fully hang over the foamy shores of the Tasman Sea.

The five-storey conceptual home is designed as a series of stacked, pre-fabricated levels, anchored to the cliff and linked by an elevator. Entry comes through a parking garage on the top level, where occupants can ride the elevator down to four living spaces. The home’s design includes a lounge, kitchen, spa, bathrooms, barbecue area, and multiple bedrooms in its sparsely-furnished living spaces.

“The home is visualised as a natural extension of the cliff face rather than an addition to the landscape, creating an absolute connection with the ocean,” Modscape says on its website. Read more…

Getty Foundation Will Rescue Modern Architecture Gems

By Hendrik Hansson
artnet news, September 20, 2014
The Getty Foundation has announced a new philanthropic effort to conserve significant 20th century architecture. The initiative, called “Keeping It Modern,” seeks to sustain important examples of modern architectural heritage by distributing a total of 10 grants.

The buildings that have been selected to receive the first round of grants read like a who’s who of modern architecture. They are: Jørn Utzon’s Sydney Opera House; Hilario Candela’s Miami Marine Stadium; Louis Kahn’s Salk Institute of Biological Studies; Alvar Aalto’s Paimio Sanatorium; Frank Lloyd Wright’s Robie House; Ray and Charles Eames’s residence, “The Eames House”; I.M. Pei’s Luce Memorial Chapel; Max Berg’s Centennial Hall in Wrocław, Poland; Dov Karmi’s Max Liebling House in Tel Aviv; and Le Corbusier’s apartment and studio in Paris. Read more…

The stacked urban architecture of Hong Kong by Peter Stewart

By Staff designboom
designboom, Sept 23, 2014

As one of the most densely populated places in the world, Hong Kong has adapted its architecture to accommodate the masses, building inhabitable spaces high into the sky. with story-upon-story of windows and walls, the expansive altitudes of residences and domestic spaces are saturated in rich structural detail and humanistic signs of the everyday occupant living there.

As a documentation of the population density and architectural sites that sustain it, Australian photographer Peter Stewart has captured a series of images which center around the living environments of Hong Kong’s public housing developments. the photos that comprise ‘stacked’ are shot from both the ground — looking up — and from various levels within a building, revealing two distinct vantage points: the pedestrian and the resident. Read more…