Be Open think tank

Chinese designer Kiran Zhu, founder of Shanghai-based studio Ziinlife, has proposed a fashionable, yet compact sanitation kit accommodating four of the main health and sanitation supplies in increased demand nowadays. Named Handy Capsule, the on-the-go kit contains a disposable mask, hand sanitizer, temperature stickers and alcohol wipes, all fitted nicely in an aluminum-based handbag, not unlike a conventional makeup bag. The items come in hermetically-sealed pod-like containers and can be replaced after use. The kit’s playful and modern aesthetics is a great example that health supplies packaging can go beyond sterile packaging to attune to the taste of today’s customers. The Handy Capsule was designed for the Create Cures initiative aimed to promote the development of conceptual products for public health from a designer’s perspective. More tools and devices for the post-pandemic reality in our blog.beopenfuture.com

Marin+Trottin Architectes and Anne-Francoise Jumeau of the French studio Peripheriques have completed an apartment complex on L’Ile-Saint-Denis in Paris, which features wide undulating balconies enclosed by a ribbon of perforated metal. Offset from one level to another, they ensure enough sunlight and create a subtle play on volumes. The building is situated on a plot overlooking the Seine river, undergoing significant redevelopment ahead of the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris, and comprises eight storeys, with some duplex apartments incorporated on the top floor. On the ground floor, two private courtyards create a direct passage through the island with workshops and retail outlets open to the public space. The repeating pattern of wood joins the levels together, while their uniqueness is expressed by material diversity. peripheriques-architectes.com

Studio Vural, a boutique architecture firm in Brooklyn, has designed an off-the-grid Dune House in Cape Cod. The project was inspired by a squid’s rainbow flash at a nighttime fishing expedition, which made the architect think, “if squids can power themselves, so should houses”. The team calls the building the next generation of hyper-sustainable houses. The un-plugged house has an autonomous power network, energized by a vast solar field and miniature wind turbines, developed to produce more clean energy than consumed. This high-energy efficiency is enabled by burrowing the house under the dunes and vast research on absorptive building materials and soil engineering for a sponge effect on carbon mass. At the Dune House, architecture and landscape blend seamlessly with nature, gently immersed but not imposed, as technology makes peace with nature at last. studiovural.com

Playville is an indoor playground in Bangkok, Thailand designed by the local architecture practice Nitaprow. The space comprises four different environments, with various structures mimicking Nature’s geological diversity and encouraging crawlers and toddlers to walk, climb, dive, and crawl. In this way the playground offers children an unmatched opportunity to fully explore their physical and cognitive abilities. Children access Playville via an entrance hall clad with solid wooden planks with gradient film on the glass wall creating a foggy and misty background. The Transition hall comprises a raised wooden platform for climbing and sliding delineated by transparent safety net. In the covered outdoor area children can play in the sand or jump on the grass-covered trampoline, while in the main play area, an emphasis is placed on creating continuous circulation loops around the playhouse and the island. More creative kindergartens and nurseries in our blog.beopenfuture.com

In her ‘Food Monster’ project, Beijing-based food and still life photographer Yum Tang explores her thinking about food. With the ‘you are what you eat’ principle as its driving force, her series is a visual metaphor of consumerist tendencies and uncontrolled mindless devouring. She slathers her subjects with meats, fish, vegetables, and desserts as a reminder of how we treat food as an object of filling desire for new exotic tastes instead of hunger. Full series and more food art photography in our blog.beopenfuture.com

The Ribbons of Life proposal by Australian studio CX Landscape encompasses a habitable green shell over the existing road bridge above lake Griffin, while reviving some of the aboriginal art inundated during the lake’s construction in 1936. Imitating a piece of bushland from the surrounding nature, the organic shape of the ‘forest’ ribbon covers the concrete structure echoing the green architecture of the Parliament House at the end of the bridge, with the lost aboriginal art be projected on the underside of the structure. One of the ribbon’s fringes extends into the water providing the passengers with an access to the lake, while the water plants are meant to improve the lake water’s quality. The forest strip is intertwined with the second ‘urban living’ ribbon, which includes a linear park, an independent structure that hosts pedestrian walkways along the bridge and provides educational programs in the open space. The Ribbons of Life project rethinks a sustainable city development retaining the local history of the place. www.cx-landscape.com

Mumbai-based studio Nudes has won a competition for a new school in Pune, India. Titled “Forest”, the project comprises two cylindrical volumes connected by a rooftop featuring an infinity sign shaped bicycle track. Vibrant and green among the dense urban environment, the two buildings have facades defined by a series of protrusions with lush vegetation that is intended to form a live skin that would improve air quality and overall student health. The focal point of the project is its eight-shaped loop of the rooftop, conceived to accommodate a bicycle track, much welcomed in a city with scarce walkways and bike lanes. More buildings with stunning rooftops in our blog.beopenfuture.com

Isn’t it a great day to thank and applause all the creatives around the globe who take part in our challenges? Our last open call was dedicated to promoting sustainable consumption, design and production, and inspired by the UN’s Sustainable Development Goal #12. BE OPEN invited environment-conscious creatives to submit their visuals that express the problem or aim to get through to people all over the globe in order to increase their awareness and promote sustainable living. Hundreds of people shared visuals that reflect this topic via Instagram with the #BEOPENThinkFuture hashtag, as a way to celebrate people’s ability to creatively interpret the reality around them. Join our community and maybe next time you will be the one to win €300 prize! beopensocial.com

We are happy to announce the winner of our #BEOPENThinkFuture open call for visual responses. Our congratulations and the €300 prize go to Johanna-Josefina Alanko, visual artist based in Finland and Poland. Johanna’s winning piece of art is made from recycled plastic bottles and paint. The open call was dedicated to promoting sustainable consumption, design and production, and inspired by the UN’s SDG#12. Hundreds of environment-conscious creatives shared visuals that reflect this topic and aim to get through to people all over the globe in order to increase their awareness and promote sustainable living. Once again, we thank and applause all the creatives around the globe who take part in our challenges. https://www.instagram.com/yo.alanko/

BE OPEN and CUMULUS are happy to announce the three main winners of the ‘Second Life of Things in Design’ international student competition that focused on United Nations SDG programme. SDGs were adopted by all United Nations Member States as a universal call to action to end poverty, protect the planet and ensure that all people enjoy peace and prosperity by 2030. 683 projects from students and graduates of creative courses in universities in 44 countries were submitted, demonstrating a creative, design-oriented take on the problems of sustainability, wiser production and consumption formulated by SDG12. The three selected winners - Valerio Di Giannantonio (Iceland University of the Arts), Natalie Ferry and Stefano Pagani (Parsons School of Design, The New School in New York), and Frida van der Drift Breivik and Frøya Thue (The Oslo School of Architecture and Design in Norway), - will receive the prizes of €5,000, €3,000, €2,000 from each BE OPEN and Cumulus. In addition to the three winners, the judges selected 50 honorable mentions, out of which two more winners of ‘Second Life of Things in Design’ will be named: one selected by the founder of BE OPEN Elena Baturina, and one selected by an open online vote. Both of the winners will receive €2,000.