An Interesting Interior

The elements and principles of design used in the right way can make a space go from mediocre to fantastic. Knowing how to utilize the elements to make the space function better and be more aesthetically pleasing is a big part of really good design.

This unique space comes from a hotel in Barcelona, Spain called the Mandarin Oriental. It is a very upscale and contemporary decorated hotel. This specific place is the hotel’s spa pool. The design principles that are most prevalent are movement, balance, and unity.  The strongest elements of design would be line, space, and shape. The elements of design help to emphasize the different principles, for example, the lines that go along the roof and the outline of the pool make the eye follow the lines to the back wall emphasizing the principle of movement. Unity in the space is very noticeable because of the repetition of the chairs and the equal spacing of the beams on the ceiling.  The simple rectangle of the room and the perfectly symmetrical pool balance the room and make it pleasing to the eye. Another thing that adds to the balance of the space is the contrast of the very dark colors used in the pool, roof, and columns with the mid tones of the green and the light values of the chairs, and light wood flooring.  Line and shape go hand in hand in this space by the repetition of the rectangular shapes and the lines of the ceiling beams, edges of the pool, and hardwood flooring.

This spa makes really great use of multiple elements and principles of design which makes it a much more interesting and inviting place.  The combination of movement, balance and unity in relationship with line, space, and shape make this design function very well, look amazing, and produces a want for the customers to be there right away. 

Unusual Materials

This interesting little house in the middle of a field is from New Mexico. The exciting thing about this house is that consists completely of recycled materials. This house was built in the 70′s, in a time of love and loving the earth so the components of this house are used tires filled with soil, recycled glass bottles and aluminum cans. The house functions very efficiently actually, the different material used function to absorb heat during the day and then spread into the house when the temperature drops.
          The charming little character of this house is interesting with the green roof and stairway in combination with the brown exterior walls give the house even more of an environmentally friendly aspect because it is almost camouflage within itself. This small little house is so interesting in the design aspect because it didn’t just use one recyclable material but is has many. Combining the rubber tires with soil makes up a fantastic insulator for the house and the recycled glass bottles and aluminum cans are great conductors of heat and cold so it can give some temperature variation. Since it is so environmentally friendly it seems that the choices of color for the house were chosen with the same theme of nature in mind. It looks like the brown was probably just from the soil used for construction but the green is certainly painted and helps move the eye around the base, along the roof, and up the curved stairs on the side of the house. Since the design is basically all around nature I’m glad they took advantage of the rooftop space to be able to enjoy the great outdoors.

I find this little house in a field to be very interesting in the design aspects and of course the choosing of the materials and shape of the house.

Design Expo

            Design Expo 2011 was a great combination of new designs, new products, and new ideas. There was just the right amount of variety between products and plenty of people to tell you all about them. One of my favorite vendors was Sabrina Fiebrich from Stone Solutions. Her kiosk caught my eye because it had a wide variety of brightly colored tile in blues, oranges, and reds. The tile designs were all so beautiful and ranged in material from porcelain to glass to recycled materials. The majority of the tile that I enjoyed most was all the bright mosaic tiles but they also have countertop and other flooring materials in just as wonderfully designed material. “Stone Solutions’” best work is done in limestone, ceramic, mosaics, slate, porcelain, and travertine. Another product line I loved was from “Coalesce” who brought part of their “Emu Advanced Collection”. This line is of indoor and outdoor tables and chairs which are mostly made of metal and using a wire form that has been bent or altered in some way or another. The piece that I greatly enjoyed was called “Emu Re-trouve” which was an aqua metal chair that had a semi-circle tall back and a simple circular pedestal base. This chair had just a simple circle pillow for a seat cushion and was surprisingly comfortable. Although it could be used for indoors it would be a fantastic outdoor chair especially since it comes in a wide range of fun and bright colors. The pedestal base used for the chair was also repeated in the base for the glass topped side table and the much larger glass toped dining table. The metal work for these pieces made them so much more aesthetically pleasing than most metal furniture I have seen.

            The design expo is always a learning experience to find out what the new ideas and trends are and this year was no exception. I saw, I absorbed, and I won $50 to chilis so it was great all around!

Fabric is all around us. It has six different applications such as: window treatments, wall coverings, flooring and fiber-based artwork, seating, window treatments, and panel application. The application that most people see on a day-to-day basis would most likely be seating.

            There are all sorts of fabric applications across the Tech Campus but to find one that might have the most use you would need to go to the Student Union Building. There are only a few variations in fabric choices that are used for booths, chairs, couches, benches, etc. Most of the fabrics are some sort of a polyester blend with a semi modern print in mainly low intensity colors. The other material used quite often is leather. Although the polyester blend may look nice it won’t stay looking like that for very long after thousands of students take their lunch break. Polyester is good at repelling stains but some things will stain no matter what. There were also a large number of chairs with both polyester and leather. Some had polyester seats with leather back and vice versa. Of the chairs that had a foot stool you could notice a major difference in the appearance of the fabrics. The polyester chairs had started to look brown, dirty, and grimy while the leather ones looked to be in fairly good condition with much less wear and tear.  The leather would have been more suitable all around mainly because it has a better durability and resistance to stains and the dirty look. Some of the polyester chairs showed signs of thinning and the fabric coming apart in high use areas such as the arm rests, footstools, and seat.

            All in all the polyester blend cover is not quite a suitable choice for very highly used seating but the leather on the other hand is a very acceptable choice based upon its durability and ability to stay looking clean for longer.