Artist Chris Burden spent millions of dollars building Metropolis II, a bustling scale model of a future city. Over 1000 cars fly through the city continuously, giving one a sense of energy experienced in the world’s real metropolises.
Bill Ford on A Future Beyond Traffic Gridlock
Bill Ford, great-grandson of Henry Ford, talks about the future of mobility and how we need a giant leap to solve the current transportation problem in cities around the world. He calls for a diverse range of solutions, and emphasizes that “emission-free traffic is still traffic”.
Paul Nicklen: Tales of Ice-Bound Wonderlands
As the world becomes increasingly urban, the conscious disconnection between humans and the natural world worsens. We simply don’t make the connection between the lives we live and the destruction of the Earth’s natural systems. Photographer Paul Nicklen gives an incredible example of our lack of knowledge about the natural world as he braves freezing Antarctic waters to dive with and photograph Leopard Seals, animals we have come to know as “ruthless killers” by seeing them only on the Discovery Channel and in other media. Nicklen eliminates this stereotype through the story he tells and emphasizes the importance to consider the habitats we are destroying by going about our carbon intensive lives.
What World Design Capital 2014 Means for Cape Town
If you haven’t heard yet, Cape Town has bid to become World Design Capital 2014. The initiative is run by the International Council of Societies of Industrial Design (ICSID). Seoul held the title in 2010 with Helsinki having the honour in 2012. The title sees a spotlight on the winning city for an entire year, with events happening throughout. Cape Town is a strong contender, following the theme of “Live design. Tranform Life.” The city is up against the likes of Bilbao, the city famed for becoming a creative center after Frank Gehry’s Guggenheim Museum was built in 1997. There is no doubt that Cape Town has what it takes. There is tremendous energy and support behind the bid, with the shortlisted cities to be announced in just days.
Should Cape Town not claim the title when it is announced in October, there is no reason to be disappointed (maybe just a little bit). At a recent Cape Town Design Network event it was said that “even if we don’t win, we can’t lose”. The process of developing the bid book has answered many interesting questions about the city of Cape Town and how design plays a role in inspiring positive change. There is also tremendous energy and momentum in establishing Cape Town as a design leader, an identity that does not require an official title to be realised. You can play an important role in the final decision. The organisers behind Cape Town’s bid believe the support behind each city through social media will be considered by the panel. With that said, what are you waiting for? Like Cape Town’s bid on Facebook, tweet about it with #WDC2014, write a blog post, put the badge on your blog or profile photo, and spread the word.
TEDxStellenbosch is 100% behind Cape Town’s bid for World Design Capital 2014.
Carlo Ratti on Architecture That Senses & Responds
Carlo Ratti’s talk from TED 2011 provides a fascinating view of the technologies he has been developing. He talks about creating environments that sense activity and speak back to us. He shows how tracking trash across the U.S. can help us identify inefficiencies in our systems. The part on the movement of trash is fascinating just to see how waste moves between cities. He talks a lot about some of his architectural projects, where he uses interesting media to create flexible, interactive structures and visuals. All of his work provides an interesting perspective on the kinds of sensory technologies we’ll see in the smart cities of the (near) future.
50 Ideas for the New City
Urban Omnibus has posted 50 Ideas for the New City, a collection of short and sweet ideas to rethink New York City and take it into the future. The ideas have been developed over the past 2 years but have now been compiled online and developed into a poster campaign. We’re not in NYC, but the ideas are great and applicable to cities around the world. The format of the page alone is worth mentioning. The tweet-like layout of the ideas makes for easy reading, and clicking through each idea leads to real projects featured on Urban Omnibus. We highly recommend you pay a visit to the page.
Marcin Jakubowski Shares the Tools for Building a Modern Civilisation
If you’re thinking of building a modern civilisation from scratch, not to worry, all you need are 50 tools that you can build yourself. Through Open Ecology, Marcin Jakubowski has developed the blueprints for these 50 tools and made them available for anyone wanting to build and sustain a small village.
Amazing Water Visualisation
Two Harvard GSD students developed this incredible visualisation of water supply and usage around the world. It ended up winning visualizing.org’s World Water Day Challenge. Click on the image to open the infographic in full screen and play around.