Wednesday, December 21, 2011

Seasons Greetings & Happy Holidays...

View of artificial dune next to the Katara Cultural Village in Doha...

Seasons Greetings and Happy Holidays from us all here in Doha...

Monday, December 19, 2011

The Inland Sea, Qatar...


A few images from a recent 'Dune Bashing' trip we took to the Inland Sea here in Qatar...












Tuesday, December 13, 2011

Shared Glass Exhibition at the Katara Cultural Village in Doha...

'Path' by Sameh Ibrahim (Image sourced from Designboom)


An Image from the ongoing exhibition titled 'Shared Glass' taking place at Building 5 at the Katara Cultural Village here in Doha... 

Read more about the event and work on the smArchitecture blog... 

Monday, December 5, 2011

Small Bizarres No. 35 - Lawn Carpet at EC, Doha...


This topic has already been referred to an covered in related posts (see links here & here), but, as it is, I still find this a quite remarkable Small Bizarre. Wether it is classified as landscaping, pseudo-botany, urbanism (as it covers quite substantial areas within EC), or even furniture (carpeting) can be left to the opinion of the beholder, but there's something strangely seductive about this quasi-real lawn, that climbs, transcends, crosses and covers a number of urban paraphernalia within the confines of our campus... 

Perhaps it should be red, neon yellow, or some other bright or distinct color or pattern. Maybe it should be acknowledging its inherent 'fakeness', and be celebrating such properties without losing any of its tactile or functional intentions... 

Small Bizarre indeed... 



A pink rendition (acknowledging its ersatz'ness) of the pseudo lawn...

Thursday, November 17, 2011

The Extraordinary Ordinary - Ski-slope in Summer, Finland


Usually one is used to seeing a ski-slope snow covered - a white-blue mantle of pale sparks descending down below... It's a bit more unusual to visit one in the summer... 

The photos were taken in Noux (Nuuksio in Finnish) in southern Finland... 







Wednesday, November 9, 2011

The Extraordinary Ordinary - Tokyo Bookstore...


Some iPhone photos from a bookstore in Tokyo's Shinjuku district. At one level it all seems so familiar (the fragrance of the paper & ink, the [book] muffled acoustics, the lighting, the textures of the extended queues of stacked books...), yet all still simultaneously remaining very foreign (to me - in a good, thrilling, way)...