New Design: Scope By MA-Style Architects in Japan

"The large opening on the north side projects into the landscape and catches the changes of the season and daily weather, bringing in light and a feeling of the wind," say the architects.

Poised on a hill looking over tea plantations in Southern Japan, Scope is a sculptural new building designed by mA-style architects, reports Jeanne-Marie Cilento. Photographs by Kai Nakamura
 
DESIGNED as a giant viewfinder, the building has a jutting rectilinear snout that takes in the green swathes of the surrounding tea bushes. The house is compact ~ barely one hundred square metres ~ but has the strong presence of an abstract Henry Moore statue and the charisma of Le Corbusier’s small chapel at Ronchamp. The telescopic second level has a single glazed wall, like a lense, focusing all attention out to the brilliant emerald plants producing green tea that cover the Makinohara Plateau below.

Atsushi and Mayuma Kawamoto of mA-style architects wanted to create a contemporary new building in this small town in Shizuoka Prefecture. Sited high on a stone platform, Scope is resoundingly Modernist but has a certain grace of scale and lightness that prevents it dominating the landscape dotted with modest houses.

“We felt it was necessary for the client, who has lived in this area a long time, to design a building which could recapture the charm of the land afresh,’’ Atsushi Kawamoto explains. “The site consists of a tiered stone wall in a landslide prevention zone which is why we couldn't use the whole site for construction. We created the "telescope" form on the second level as a trapezoid because the view to the north is beautiful and the room spreads out in that direction."

Supported on two slanting volumes of exposed concrete, the second level’s horizontal viewfinder is rendered in a contrasting crisp white. "This large opening on the north side projects out into the landscape and catches the changes of the season and daily weather, bringing in light and a feeling of the wind," say the architects.

Entry to the house is through a covered courtyard created by the concrete walls. Inside, the light-filled entrance is bare apart from an elegant white spiral stair leading up to the main floor. The ground level houses a Japanese room and bathrooms that flank either side of the entry.

The curving stairway leads up to the top floor with several bedrooms and the spacious open plan living and dining room with its single expansive view across the tea plantations. Here, the interior has been kept to minimalist essentials with concrete floors, white walls and a pale, stream-lined kitchen.

“The internal space is simply organised so it is in harmony with the scenery outside,” Kawamoto says. “We can really create a rich experience by tying human beings and nature together through architecture.”

The slim and elegant spiral stair leading up from the entrance to the top level.

 The "lense" of the telescopic second level that has glazed walls and doors opening on to a balcony that forms the rim of the viewfinder.

The stream-lined kitchen with a far-reaching outlook across the tea plantations of Southern Japan.

The brilliant green tea bushes covering the Makinohara Plateau in the Shizuoka Prefecture in Japan.

The minimalist living and dining room divided by a sleek kitchen all in white.

The main bathroom with its deep Japanese tub, long basin with mirrored cupboards above and stony, concrete walls.

The house sits like a sculptural monument on a tiered stone wall above the modest local houses.

Slanted walls of raw concrete support the white-rendered, telescopic second level.

A courtyard of slim trees and gravel is created between the two concrete volumes of the ground floor that support the full-width of the top level above.

Scope lit up at twilight creating a welcoming courtyard entrance into the house.

London Collections: Men Autumn/Winter 2015 ~ Highlights & Trends

Orange is the new black this season in London: Casely-Hayford's colourful and highly wearable collection mixing classic styling with a relaxed silhouette. Photograph by Mike Rolls. Click on pictures for slideshow

Amid the cold, bleak days of a wintry London, the new autumn/winter 2015 men’s collections added a strong dash of brilliant colour. From exuberant and idiosyncratic street styles to suave and preppy suits, our fashion correspondent Limor Helfgott and photographer Mike Rolls were there to capture the highlights

Sankuan's bright jumpsuits. Photo: Mike Rolls

AT this season’s London Collections: Men, John Galliano returned from fashion exile, showing his first collection in four years for Maison Margiela and eccentric Lego beards and pink hair were standouts on the catwalks. It’s difficult to imagine that four years ago fashion week for men didn’t exist in London. But now, with leading fashion houses such as Burberry and Tom Ford presenting their collections and a fashionable crowd at the presentations and events, it shows London has a lot to offer combining it’s strong tailoring traditions with the city’s famous quirkiness.We attended some of the most innovative catwalks to give you a closer look what to expect this upcoming autumn/winter 2015 season.



Front Row: David Gandy & company. Photo: Limor Helfgott

Topman kicked of the London Collections with a bang on Friday with a glam rock collection Bombay City Rollers. Nick Grimshaw, Oliver Cheshire, Douglas Booth and David Gandy were all in the front row. Models emerged on the catwalk at the London Old Sorting Office in front of a brightly-lit kaleidoscope of shapes projected on to the wall, wearing ponchos, shaggy sheepskin coats, tartan suits, Aztec prints, geometric faux furs, paisley collar shirts and Bay City Rollers-worthy jumpsuits ~ that could only be inspired by the 70’s and with a soundtrack to match.

Topman's bright tartan suits. Photo: Mike Rolls

Bomber Jackets were paired with bell-bottom flares and heavy faux furs with straight-leg trousers. The traditional suit was reinvented and was a strong element of the collection in tartan or pinstripe, paired with high-necked polos in bright colors. We could see a lot of psychedelic, hippy prints which have already been featured in the Spring Summer 2015 collection. They still gave us the same retro feel.

 Faux jackets at Casely-Hayford. Photo: Mike Rolls

Footwear was mostly white trainers with the occasional classic brogues for a more dapper, gentlemanly look. We wonder about how wearable the pieces will be and the commercial aspect of the collection ~ the jumpsuits may be only runaway pieces ~ but that remains to be seen. Yet this was another brilliantly styled and another winning collection for Topman.

Prints at Casely-Hayford. Photo: Mike Rolls 

Casely-Hayford's pink coat. Photo: Mike Rolls

A highly wearable collection, Casely-Hayford is created by a father and son duo. Besides the classic styling, it is clear that a lot of thought was given to comfort and a relaxed-looking silhouette. We could see grungy, eye-catching colourful pieces for the more daring men described as a 21st century British play on the seminal Coogi designs alongside more classic formal wear but always with a stylish twist. One of the most eye-catching pieces of the show was a bright fuchsia overcoat, styled perfectly with pin sharp suit trousers, and layered in prints and geometric lines jersey. Other pieces included a long coat with an over sized hood, textured knitwear, lightweight, chunky alpaca and wool over sized hooded knits and futurist techno prints.This collection certainly reinforced the fact that orange is the new black with other strong colours such as cobalt blue and olive green that were toned down by more muted colours such as grey, white and the ultimate black. Casely-Hayford make the more conservative autumn/winter season much more fun, colourful and cutting edge than the normal dark and moody tones we are used to seeing. It is a smart collection with fresh elements brought to classic men’s  tailoring.

Bag chic at Christopher Shannon. Photo: Mike Rolls

Can you still look stylish with a plastic bag on your head? The answer is yes if you are Christopher Shannon, a Central Saint Martin’s graduate who has had his own label for several years now. He created a functional and modern collection with everyday plastic shopping bags imaginatively shaped into stylish ensembles. Models were sent down the runway with these unique headpieces: their heads and faces covered in corner shop carrier bags. The black, white and striped 'masks' had little holes cut in them so the models could see through them, with hard hitting music that was set very loud and a brightly animated background video.

Shannon's sportswear. Photo:Mike Rolls

Shannon was making a statement about modern consumerism: what we save and what we throw away. And what we value and what we disregard. Shannon earned a reputation for sportswear-influenced menswear heavy in contemporary colour-blocking, feminine frills and quirky embroidery. This season he displayed an excitingly experimental and captivating collection, full of graphics, visionary silhouettes and a bold colour palette that despite its creativity remained wearable.

Mapping at Maharishi. Photo: Mike Rolls 

Traditional Ninja and martial arts uniforms inspired the evocative collection by Maharishi with camouflage and radar mapping prints dominating the catwalk. The collection offered a new take on military inspired wear featuring hooded masks, map-printed bomber jackets, and above the knee length crew sweats. Extended length pants as well as dropped crotches, built in mittens and integrated fitted hoods were teamed with pashmina scarves and a baseball style cap that was pulled down and worn over the face, inspired by the US army cold weather kit. With dark bleak tones and a bold colour palette including emerald green and plum, Maharishi carries a strong ethos of inspiration from nature while utilizing the latest technology.

Lego masks at Agi&Sam. Photo: Mike Rolls

Agi Mdumulla and Sam Cotton are a British design duo that never take themselves too seriously. They say they always want to have fun with designing, and to look at how children see clothes. Agi & Sam return to London Collections: Men after their critically acclaimed Japanese inspired Spring/Summer 15 show. The latest collection was inspired by a trip to Agi’s family home in Yorkshire and meeting primary school pupils who were given clothes to rip apart and deconstruct as puzzles and then given to the children to put back together with Velcro. Agi & Sam’s explosively-coloured new collection has a series of coats and jackets in different styles and shapes, echoing the essentials of a man’s wardrobe, such as a tailored coat, a denim jacket or a navy bonded twill jacket. While pieces made from multi-coloured Lego blocks covered the models faces adding an eccentric note to an evocative collection.

Knitwear at Agi & Sam. Photo: Mike Rolls

Knitwear in this collection has been made in collaboration with Jaeger, with coloured panels of fine wool patch worked over each other. The palette mixed navy with orange black, white grey with bright patches of red, blue and yellow sewn into coats, jackets and trousers.  Primary colours were smashed together like a child’s building blocks of Lego.

Raeburn's quilted jackets. Photo: Mike Rolls

Survival, endurance and immersion made a contrast to the arctic influences of last season with a playful exploration of fabrication, technique and colour in Christopher Raeburn. Lifeguard-inspired outfits came in smart and refined versions for this collection. The lightweight, eye-catching quilted and jackets coat were wearable and a key to the collection teamed with over sized shark-skin holdall, a new take on the Raeburn animal bag concept.

Raeburn's puffer jackets. Photo: Mike Rolls 

Wearable puffer Jackets and gilets in bold reds and blues injected entertaining and unusual silhouettes to the collection. With life rafts as inspiration, latex rubber was used to create unique inflatable outerwear. Featuring knitted statement jumpers emblazoned with slogans like: Broken, Thanks 4 Nothing and Save Me - cinched with tutu belts, chunky work boots and slashed or sheer trousers. The color palette is tonally in keeping with many of the AW15 collections seen at London Collections: Men this season but with a little more focus on primary colours:  pill box red ,cobalt blue, yellow and bright paired with more muted navy and grey tones.

Shearling featured at J.W Anderson. Photo: Sam Wilson BFC

Looking at the overall trends, knitwear will be a key component in the autumn/ winter wardrobe. It seems that knitwear rather than outerwear will be doing all the talking next autumn. Shearling and fur continue to be successful outerwear pieces and are expected to be everywhere.

Baartmens & Siegal AW15. Photo by Shaun james Cox BFC

Fusing sportswear with tailoring is a key element too. If you prefer a dark, monochromatic colour palette of black, grey and blue don’t forget to add a splash of color, preferably a blaze of orange. So mixing and matching colours and materials is the direction for this season.

Classic English tailoring at E.Tauz. Photo by Dan Sims BFC

Tailoring is always a strong element in London, as it is the home of the sartorially perfect men’s suit. The London Collection shows didn’t disappoint as designers showcased the preppy trend in their collections.The provocative Alexander McQueen brand presented a contemporary yet dark take on tailoring with black and red floral blazers with asymmetric and minimalistic tailoring – quite different to what we have seen in past collections. Another colour that was a key trend was the use of green. Besides the army colours that continue the focus on camouflage, at Burberry, the most anticipated show of the season,  a rich array of autumnal greens was used in Christopher Bailey’s “Classically Bohemian” collection: most strikingly in a sweeping frayed wool shawl and an satin-like brushed wool overcoat.

Bold new designs at Man AW15. Photo by Dan Sims BFC

To sum it up most of the new trends this autumn/winter season are wearable, while some of the looks and colours we’ve seen on the catwalks are designed for men who want to make a bold fashion statement. London Collection: Men shows that British menswear has a lot to say with it’s innovative, groundbreaking collections. Although it does not yet have the commercial clout of Paris and Milan yet, London’s men’s fashion week has acquired an extraordinary buzz and now rivals those European cities in importance.

Contact: Otherworldly New Exhibition by Olafur Eliasson In Paris

An affirmation of humanity, peace and beauty in Paris, the new show of Icelandic-Dutch artist Olafur Eliasson transports us into the sublime world of outer space. Called the alchemist of the art world, Eliasson gives viewers an experiential rush, report Jeanne-Marie Cilento and Antonio Visconti



Frank Gehry's Foundation Louis Vuitton, Bois de Boulogne

THE evocative exhibition opened at the remarkable new winged glass confection Frank Gehry designed for the Foundation Louis Vuitton in the Bois de Boulogne. Called Contact, inside the show people are enveloped in an atmospheric, ethereal space and invited to touch the installations such as the rough surface of a meteorite. “Normally, you are not supposed to touch the artwork," says Eliasson, “but when I touched a meteorite, it was the first time I touched something which was not from this planet.”

Meteorite fragment at the entrance to the Contact show 

The show has a cave-like entrance showing the fragment of meteorite as an enigmatic messenger from space. Beyond this small room are dark passages leading to one cavernous space after another. “The route through the exhibition is derived from the geometry of the circle and founded upon the underlying principle of circularity,” says chief curator and artistic director of the foundation Suzanne Page. 

The relations between self, space, and universe are explored 

“By bringing viewers into contact with a meteorite, an extraterrestrial object with a magical, even symbolic, character, the exhibition begins with a gesture intended by the artist to place visitors in a state of perceptiveness that expands the horizons of our imagination.”

There is an interplay between moving light and shadow

The exhibition feeds the senses and explores ‘the relations between self, space, and universe’ by creating a surreal, alternate reality within the newly-built museum. The installations immerse visitors in an interplay between moving light and shadow, a chiaroscuro which seemingly transports the audience into the complete darkness of outer space. The show is part of Eliasson’s on-going study of human perception and the construction of space.

“My exhibition addresses that which lies at the edge of our senses and knowledge, of our imagination and our expectations,” Eliasson explains. “It is about the horizon that divides, for each of us, the known from the unknown.”

The show is like walking across the top of a planetary sphere

Entering the show, visitors move on the sloping floor as if walking across the top of a planet, the light passing along the circumference of the space is reminiscent of one planet passing in front of another.

There are eight installations part of the extraordinary Contact show 

“Olafur Eliasson often bases his work on cutting-edge advances in scientific thought, placing emphasis on the situation of humanity in the world,’’ says curator Suzanne Page. “Tapping into the visitors’ capacity for empathy, the artist strives to activate their participation, implicating them in a complex, multi-sensorial experience. The constant oscillation between shadow and light, presence and absence, and affirmation and doubt causes us to question our visual perceptions and, in consequence, our convictions.”

The show exhibits eight works including the rooftop heliostat 'sun tracker' that refracts rays onto a polyhedron sculpture suspended near the museum’s entry. Eliasson’s site-specific Inside the Horizon, has 43 illuminated triangular columns staggered out along the museum’s grotto. 

The show is an exploration of the known and the unknown

Eliasson says he and architect Frank Gehry share complementary visions: “All of my spaces are generally something you can put down to basically two or three geometrical shapes – circle, cone, triangle – unlike Frank’s building, which is all about waves and free forms and unpredictable."

The Big Bang Fountain shows a split-second of earthly forces

One of the installations, the Big Bang Fountain, is Eliasson’s water experiment capturing the split-second between upward pressure and downward gravitational force, illuminated with a strobe light so that a splash becomes a wondrous cosmic phenomenon. The fountain dances in a sphere of glass refracting images from the outside world, like an alchemist’s orb. 

Another great, cave-like gallery opens out revealing a crystalline, icy realm of white light and black shadows. The temperature in this space is noticeably cool. Overhead, a black moon-shaped shadow moves over the ceiling. Gradually you realise only half the awe-inspiring oval space is real: it is bisected by a mirror. This place exists fully only in your own mind.

A cavernous chamber feels very hot with a golden horizon

Eliasson reveals that light and space themselves are created inside the brain. His illusions are grandiose, but he lets you know they are illusions. Outside the show, two glass balls revolve mechanically as he reveals the simple truth behind what looks, from inside the grotto, like a pair of dancing eyes in a shimmering surreal ballet.

Another grand chamber feels very hot and you are surrounded by a thin orange line of flame. But the last and most compelling installation is a fountain sputtering in darkness. Every few seconds it is illuminated by a  seeming flash of lightning. The dancing water leaves a lasting impression on the mind ~ like the rest of this magical, otherworldly exhibition. 

Contact is open until 16 February 2015 at the Foundation Louis Vuitton in Paris: http://www.fondationlouisvuitton.fr/

DAM Television Interview: Dutch Design Star Marcel Wanders

Designer Marcel Wanders looking pensive at his studio in Amsterdam

The Dutch rockstar of the design world, the tall, leonine Marcel Wanders talks to Jeanne-Marie Cilento in Milan, Italy about his philosophy and his work, now held in museum collections around the world, and his signature necklace of meteorite, lava, birthstones and Baccarat crystals:

 

Watch DAM TV's interview with Marcel Wanders in Milan, Italy here:

New Architecture: Mirage House on the Island of Tinos, Greece

“We wanted to make a house fused with its surroundings, a hidden almost invisible oasis.The rimless pool makes it seem as if the water extends to the horizon, vanishing and merging with the seascape," says architect Stelios Kois (pictured above).

A spectacular new house being built on the rocky coastline of Greece’s Tinos Island will have an enormous, sparkling rooftop pool that appears to merge with the Aegean sea beyond, writes Jeanne-Marie Cilento. Additional reporting from Greece by Antonio Visconti

ARCHITECT Stelios Kois was born near Mount Athos amid the wild landscape of red earth, dotted with monasteries full of Byzantine icon paintings. This mystical environment plus his university studies in Italy and Japan influenced his vision of architecture and predeliction for a purity of design that expresses spatial and spiritual serenity.

Kois Associated Architects' new project is located on the rocky south-west coastline of the Island of Tinos in the Cyclades. Known as the Island of the Madonna, Tinos is the greatest centre of pilgrimage in Greece. Among the rugged, rocky terrain are more than 40 white, picturesque stone villages. There are also more than a thousand churches amid the hills and valleys as well as thousands of dovecotes and windmills and kilometres of dry stonewalls that make this landscape unique.

Called Mirage, the house designed by Stelios Kois is situated on a steep, rocky site overlooking the Aegean Sea. The position commands panoramic views of the land and water. “Our goal is to integrate the building into the landscape like it is part of it,’’ says Kois. “The living space will be covered by a rimless pool that produces a visual effect of water extending to the horizon, vanishing and merging with the seascape.”

As you approach the house from above you will only be able to see the sparkling water of the infinity pool seemingly becoming one with the sea. During the day, the water will reflect the surrounding rock formations and at night the stars in the sky.

“We wanted to make a house fused with its surroundings, an invisible oasis hidden from unsuspecting eyes,” says Kois. "The house is almost like an observation point as it clings to the rocks and oversees the dramatic cascading landscape.”

The building is being constructed from local materials using traditional techniques such as the characteristic dry wall construction found on the island. Like the rooftop pool, the stone parts of the house will also merge into the surrounding rocky landscape.

Hidden in the stony landscape, the Mirage house will be an oasis where the owners can enjoy the wide-ranging views over the Aegean Sea without giving up their privacy. Kois decided to bury part of the building in the coastline. He created a large open-air living room at the front sheltered beneath the rooftop pool, which will act as a huge mirror and help camouflage the building among its surroundings.

"Some of our clients' major concerns were visibility and privacy," says project architect Nikos Patsiaouras. "At first we were concerned with the concept of invisibility. We asked ourselves 'How can you make a building disappear?'. Our response was to mimic elements of the landscape. The effect of the mirroring of the pool in combination with the concept of invisibility brought to mind the visual phenomenon of the mirage, from which the project was named," he says. Dry stone walls will surround sections of the interior and also frame the building's entrance. These are designed to echo the traditional walls that can be seen all over the scenic island.

"The elements that stirred our imagination most were the linear drywall constructions that articulate the landscape and the scattered shallow concrete water-reservoirs used for agricultural purposes," Patsiaouras explains. Also using the area’s stone will have a low impact on the environment and will be very efficient as an insulating material. Kois plans to add rammed-earth walls around the rear of the building, with layers of vegetation that will help to create a cool internal environment.

As the house is located on a natural plateau, inside it will have 200 square metres of space forming a simple single-storey layout, including three bedrooms, a kitchen and an outdoor living room.

Click on photographs for full screen slideshow

Called Mirage, the house designed by Stelios Kois is situated on a steep, rocky site overlooking the Aegean Sea. The position commands panoramic views of the land and water.  

"We asked ourselves 'How can you make a building disappear?'. Our response was to mimic elements of the landscape. The effect of the mirroring of the pool in combination with the concept of invisibility brought to mind the visual phenomenon of the mirage, from which the project was named," says Nicos Patsiaouras.

"The elements that stirred our imagination most were the linear drywall constructions that articulate the landscape and the scattered shallow concrete water-reservoirs used for agricultural purposes," project architect Nick Patsiaouras explains. 

As you approach the house from above you will only be able to see the sparkling water of the infinity pool seemingly becoming one with the sea. During the day, the water will reflect the surrounding rock formations and at night the stars in the sky. 

The building is being constructed from local materials using traditional techniques such as the characteristic dry wall construction found on the island. Like the rooftop pool, the stone parts of the house will also merge into the surrounding rocky landscape. 

Kois decided to bury part of the building in the coastline. He created a large open-air living room at the front sheltered beneath the rooftop pool, which will act as a huge mirror and help camouflage the building among its surroundings.