The dial’s vertical blue and orange stripes echo the Gulf livery on the legendary Porsche 917K Steve McQueen drove in the movie Le Mans. The oversized number 24 at 12 o’clock pays tribute to the most famous endurance race in the world. Even the cover over the unique oscillating mass of the movement resembles a steering wheel — via Watch Luxus
Sotheby’s October 6 Hong Kong’s sale of Important Watches totaled US$7.14 million, establishing Sotheby’s highest-ever total for a various owners sale of important watches. The auction was 79.9% sold by lot and 85.8% by value — via redwolf.newsvine.com
Antarctic architecture provides imagery of the closest thing that people will be able see to a moon base, within their lifetimes. The extreme nature of the environment combined with its bizarre statelessness, provides the location for a freezing architectural expo, with each country having its own icy pavilion — via oobject
Living Architecture is a series of holiday homes around the UK designed by established and emerging architects. The homes also include designs by Peter Zumthor, Jarmund and Vigsnæs Architects, NORD and Hopkins Architects — via Dezeen
This skinny twisty tentacle measures about 2.5″ long… Cast in solid sterling silver, hand finished and oxidized to bring out the sucker details, then polished to a high shine. Comes on a dark 18″ sterling silver chain that’s been rhodium plated so doesn’t change color — via roadkill on Etsy
Imagine a suspension bridge with sailing vessels floating close by. Both objects, the sail and the bridge, are represented in this new chair designed by Yves Béhar in collaboration with Herman Miller. The sail is reflected in the name, Sayl, and look of the chair, while the bridge is reflected in the frameless back structure and colorful suspension material — via Jetson Green
Grenades are not exactly synonymous with life-saving, but they have inspired a young Sydney designer to create an award-winning device that could save swimmers from drowning.
Sam Adeloju’s design, named Longreach, with the unofficial name ”Buoyancy Bazooka”, shoots an emergency flotation device 150 metres out to sea. Made from hydrophobic foam, the buoy can expand up to 40 times its size on contact with water so the swimmer can stay afloat without risk the buoy will spring a leak. The device is also equipped with flares for night-time — via redwolf.newsvine.com
Looking at “Upside Dome” by Gijs Van Vaerenbergh, installed inside the St. Michiel Church in Leuven, Belgium, is like seeing the underlying geometric logic of Western space bleed through from a hidden dimension.
The project was at least partially inspired, the architects write, by their recognition that the church itself actually has no dome: their intervention “takes this seemingly trivial fact as a starting point and generate[s] the missing dome in a remarkable way” — via BLDGBLOG
Most motorcycle marques can point to a single early model that set the tone for those that followed and established the brand. In BMW’s case it’s the R32. It was unveiled at the Berlin motor show in 1923, and it was a good fifty years later before BMW Motorrad shook off the R32?s iconic black-paint-and-pinstripes look. This ‘R1232’ is a very unusual custom built by a team led by Jean-Luc Dupont of the French BMW dealer Panda Moto 89. Jean-Luc is based in Villeneuve-Sur-Yonne, south east of Paris, and he’s known for creating BMW customs based on current production models — via Bike EXIF
Iran’s state TV says the country’s powerful Revolutionary Guard has received its first three squadrons of radar-evading flying boats — via redwolf.newsvine.com
Well this sure isn’t your everyday Cartier. Limited to 30 pieces, this platinum cased watch comes with a retail price of $510,000. Yea, that’s right. This Cartier watch will set you back a half million dollars. The movement is made by Renaud & Papi (APRP). I got to see the movements being put together at the factory. You can also see some shots of the completed watch as well. The movement has a perpetual calendar, tourbillon, and monopusher chronograph. Seem like a lot of money? Well it is… but don’t forget that Cartier brand premium — via A Blog to Read
When Graham Sippo and Patricia Schmidt finish building their home at Billen Cliffs Village it will be one fine joint.
The couple are building what is believed to be Australia’s first home using hemp as a building material — via redwolf.newsvine.com
Two and a half years ago, [Chris] Downey had just started running the architecture practice at a stylish green-design firm. A few weeks after he took the job, he noticed something wrong with his vision. A tumor was wrapped around his optic nerve; he needed surgery right away. When he woke up, everything was blurry, but he could see. “Five days later,” he said, “it all went black.”
Downey returned to the office. But he couldn’t use design software. He couldn’t read plans. A few months passed, and the firm was caught up in the housing crash. Downey scheduled a talk with the owner, an old friend, to figure out how he could be more useful. He was at a workstation, up on a loft, when she came to see him, and he could tell by her footfalls that it wasn’t going to be the kind of conversation he had been planning to have.
San Francisco was full of laid-off architects. Downey could be pretty sure he was the only blind one. It turned out to be an interesting credential. SmithGroup and another firm, the Design Partnership, hired him as a consultant — via redwolf.newsvine.com
Hidden between the walls of this one-of-a-kind residence are piles of hemp, long touted as a sustainable material with many eco-friendly uses but rarely thought of as a building material. For this home, however, something special was required: the designer created it for his daughter, who has extreme chemical sensitivities that limited what could be used in its construction. Necessity, as they say, is the mother (or father) or invention Dornob
A Seattle family exposed to the virulent penny floor meme has contracted a more expensive (and therefore probably less contagious) mutant strain that metabolizes nickels instead of pennies. I do like the different color effect this achieves, but by my math (and depending on how much space you leave between the coins) penny flooring costs between $2.50 and $3.00 per square foot, whereas nickel flooring costs four times as much ($10-$12). I did not bother to compute costs for quarter-, dime- (ouch), or Sacagawea dollar-flooring, on the assumption that no one would ever go there. But if they do, please, nobody tell me about it — via CRAFT
Nestled in the hills of Mill Valley, California, just across the Golden Gate Bridge from San Francisco, Hillside House has just received certification as the first LEED for Homes Platinum custom home in Marin County, and one of only a handful in Northern California — via ArchDaily
On the outside, it looks much like any other lined composition notebook – and for a moment, the lines inside might even fool you by being the classic light horizontal blues and vertical reds we are used to … but that moment does not last long — via Dornob
Centuries after Leonardo Da Vinci sketched designs of a giant bat-shaped craft that used a pilot’s arms and legs to power the wings, Canadian engineering students say they have flown an engineless aircraft that stays aloft by flapping its wings like a bird — via redwolf.newsvine.com
The gorgeous movement is incredibly traditional in style compared to the forward looking designs of Hublot watches. The piece is called the Big Bang Minute Repeater Tourbillon and is limited to just 10 pieces. Functions include the time, a flying tourbillon, and a great sounding minute repeater — via A Blog to Read
Is MKII just another homage watch maker? No. In addition to Bill Yao having a great eye and passion for detail, he does a lot of things uniquely. The look and feel of his watches is very impressive, and he loves what he does. Parts are done well, and the timepieces even carry surprisingly fair prices — via A Blogt or Read
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