Mind-Blowing Building Built From Thousands of Books

Kren created "Scanner" specifically for MAMbo in collaboration with the Slovakian Centre for Information on Literature. The installation is the seminal event of a local children's book fair -- some of us may have been raised to treat books like books and only books, but Kren manages to inspire literary reverence by using books as building materials. However intellectually metaphorical that may sound, it's a physical truth.

Says MAMbo: The narrow inside space, multiplied and complicated by mirrors, evoke a sensation of sublime terror, an alteration referring to a puzzling infinity itself created to destabilize conventional spatial habits. Mirrors become an instrument to create illusion and, at the same time, to unmask it. Since the public can easily see themselves reflected in a false infinite – thus discovering the illusion – the problem becomes the latency of perception.

Sounds very intellectually satisfying.

+ Matej Kren

+ MAMbo

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Interview: Ruud Visser transforms old churches and water towers into incredible modern homes

According to Visser, he first became interested in the preservation of old buildings when studying at the University of Delft in southern Holland. Since then, he has developed a strong belief in the profound importance of the existing environment, and he imbues this belief into the foundations of all of his architectural projects. “Our design process starts with the existing environment. We are inclined to the local, the small scale, but we do not merely copy it. We are averse from architecture that is associative. We aim to design in the pure grammatical language of architecture. At the end of the day it is our ambition to make contemporary architecture that intensifies the character of the existing environment.”

Though Visser is responsible for a variety of projects, his firm is perhaps most famous for its inspired design House in a Church, completed last year, in which his firm transformed a cavernous church into a modern family home. Capricious and tumultuous enough to constitute the makings of a Disney film, the church's history was a long and sad one until Visser's renovation. “The original church was constructed in the 1930s, but since 1960 it was used as a garage for fixing cars and storage.” Visser says that during this time as a garage, the church's exterior was covered with metal plates until the point that it resembled an airplane hangar.

It remained in this state until Visser and his firm stepped in with the goal of transforming the church into a modern family home. “[Since] the church had a volume of 3000 cube, as big as six average family houses, there was lots of space for just one family house... The challenge was to create a feeling of enclosure in this enormous space, without losing the grandeur of the church.”

Visser says that though he could have simply designed a labrynthian 16-room home, he chose instead to design “a luxurious house, but of normal measurements.” To accomplish this, Visser employed the use of several innovative design techniques. “We situated this ‘house’ inside the church as an independent object... Inside the house there is the scale of the family home. Outside the house, but [still] inside the church, it is the scale of the church.” Visser says that this creates a unique home environment that provides the simultaneous feeling of living in a normal family house while also occupying a vast interior space.

One of these spaces he left open was the area previously occupied by the pulpit. “The [far end] of the church is the transept or cross-ship. This was the place of the pulpit, [which was] lightened by the original ‘leaded light’ windows. This space we held open as an immense void... By this, the new house in the church is opened to the beautiful landscape. The transept has become a buffer, between the public outside and the private house inside.”

The combined result of his firm's efforts is a breathtaking new interpretation of re-purposed architecture, with House in a Church not aiming to fully occupy and conceal the existing structure, but to punctuate and embrace it.

Since House in a Church, Visser has gone on to work on other similar projects involving architectural reinterpretation, including one project named Water Tower Meerkerk, which also aims to create a family residence out of an existing structure -- this time from an old industrial water tower.

“The water tower in Meerkerk is one of many water towers which is not in function anymore as a reservoir for drinking water, [but] the tower is a protected monument and a characteristic landmark,” Visser says. “Recently a family of four from Meerkerk bought the tower with the intention to convert it into a single family house...Our goal is not only to preserve a valuable industrial object, but at the same time to make a contribution to the quality of a contemporary build environment.”

Ultimately, this twin desire to create and preserve is what seems to drive all of Visser's architecture, adding a noble twist to other forms of architectural inspiration. “Like a poem on a wall of an old schoolteacher's house from which [we build] an elderly home...Sometimes our designs are only interventions into the environment...and sometimes our design is just a moment in time.”

+ Ruud Visser Architects

Photos by René de Wit

Alex Levin is a writer for Granite Transformations, a remodeling company dedicated to advancing green remodeling practices by finding new ways to recycle and reduce waste like making countertops out of blue Skyy vodka bottles.

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6 DIY Halloween Decorations Made with Upcycled Materials

[caption id="attachment_776445" align="alignnone" width="474"] Decorating for Halloween doesn't have to be expensive: just put together some creepy decor pieces from items you already have at home.[/caption]

You know that Halloween is just a few weeks away, right? Don't worry: it snuck up on us too, and now we're scrambling to decorate the house with a suitable number of scary items so we can celebrate in style. If your place is looking a little sparse in the spookiness department, there are some fun, easy decorations you can make with stuff that's probably already lurking around your home. Read on for some fun-yet-creepy DIY ideas that you can put together in no time.

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Glass Jars Filled with Creepy Stuff

You'd be amazed at how many items around your home (both inside and out) can be repurposed into Halloween decor pieces—they just need to be dolled up a little bit. To create containers of "ugh", you just need some empty glass jars and a bit of creativity. Shove strips of moss into an empty Mason jar and label them as "Troll Scabs", or pour some glitter and glycerine into a jelly jar for "Unicorn Tears". The "Bundle of Nerves" (as shown above) was made from a handful of lichen that we painted red and then tied together with string.

If you're a little short on creativity, you can always get some spooky stickers or downloadable labels for your jars and just pour in whatever might work with the title. You'd be surprised at how unnerving everyday items can look when floating in liquid, especially with creepy labels on them. If you're stuck for ideas, try using peeled lichee or longan fruit, chestnuts, palm hearts, or bocconcini pearls.

Glowing Eyes Made from Paper Towel Rolls

Paper towel and toilet paper rolls aren't just great fire starters: they're ideal for creating spooky eyes that peer out from the bushes in the dead of night, like these ones from Rust & Shine. Just grab an X-acto or utility knife and carve some creepy-looking eyes in the roll, then pop in a glow stick, and duct-tape the ends shut. Hide these in amongst bushes and evergreen tree branches, and eerie glowing eyes will follow trick-or-treaters as they slink up to your door for candy.

Related: These 10 Family Halloween Costumes are Sure to Inspire You

Aluminum Can Luminaries

If you have some large empty cans left over from that last batch of veggie chili you made, you can create some pretty fabulous luminaries for your walkway, like these ones from JollyMom. Just spray paint the cans black, and use a hammer and nails to punch holes in the sides. These can be Halloween-themed messages or images: the goal is to create a cool pattern that will shine and twinkle when a candle or LED light is placed inside.

Dryer Extraction Tube Pumpkins

The scrunch-able tubes that attach to the backs of clothes dryers just happen to be ideal for making pumpkins, like these found on the Diamond in the Stuff blog. Just cut one in half, extend both pieces fully, and spray-paint them in your desired color(s). Use a hot glue gun to glue each pumpkin's ends together, add cinnamon sticks and some shredded paper or moss for the stems, and display them anywhere you like.

Here's a tip: if you're going to place these outside, you might want to fill them with a bit of sand so they won't fly away at the slightest breeze. To do that, just add a couple of cups of sand before gluing the ends closed.

Related: 6 Green Outdoor Decorations to Spookify Your Home this Season

Living Dead Dolls

Whether you're raiding a thrift shop for broken dolls or using your kid's discarded toys, you can create some truly horrific creatures with just a bit of paint and a twisted imagination. Snip a couple of tines off a plastic fork to make vampire fangs (like the doll above from Dracula Stories), break out some acrylic paint to zombie-fy its skin tone and eyes, and roll the doll's clothes around in dirt or ashes for an aging effect. The results will be terrifying, I promise.

Stocking Spider Sacs

Ew ew ew ew ew. This one from Hello Paper Moon is probably the most skin-crawl-inducing of the lot, but super easy to make. Just cut the legs off some white stockings, stuff one end so it bulbs out (you can use pillow stuffing, tulle, fabric, or even a balloon for this), then pull the other stocking on over it. Stuff plastic or paper spiders of various sizes between the stockings so they appear to be very, very numerous, and then stick some more spiders on the outside. You can also create a humungous mama-spider out of black stockings and hang her nearby for extra effect.

Before you know it, your house will be suitably spooky just in time for Halloween... and hey, if it ends up being too scary for neighborhood kids to visit, you get to keep all the candy for yourself.

Happy Halloweening!

Lead image by Nomadic Lass on Flickr

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Steve Wintercroft's Gorgeous DIY Paper Masks are the Perfect Last-Minute Halloween Costume

These beautiful masks range from those created from simple white sheets of paper, to intricately colored ones that look like works of art. They are a perfect last-minute idea for those who still haven’t decided on their Halloween costumes. The designer himself had a similar experience a few years ago, when he received an invite for a Halloween party but struggled to come up with a costume. In a fit of inspiration, he took some old cardboard, parcel tape and a pair of scissors and made himself a fox mask.

Related: 6 Green Outdoor Halloween Decorations to Spookify Your Home This Season

Wintercroft proposes using recycled paper as an alternative to cardboard and shares his digital files in order to save on shipping fuel. If you decide not to use one of his designs, you can still take inspiration from them and make your own geometrical mask and decorate it with anything that sticks to paper.

+ Steve Wintercroft

Via MyModernMet, This Is Colossal

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Voting has begun in the Green Halloween Costume Contest

Attention all ghouls and goblins. With the spookiest of holidays just around the corner, crafty DIY costumes are beginning to pop up everywhere, and voting has officially begun for finalists in Inhabitots' Green Halloween costume contest. Got a creatively handmade, recycled, and/or repurposed costume? We want to see it! There's still time to enter your costume here, and you can also check out the other entrants and vote for your favorites here >

VOTE HERE >

ENTER THE CONTEST HERE >

We're loving the creative spirit of so many of these homemade Halloween costumes and the competition is only getting started. Participants have until November 1st to enter the competition, so go out and snap your best shot in your in your trick-or-treating finest, but remember the sooner you submit the more time you'll have to earn those votes. In addition to bragging rights, you could also win an adorable handmade wool-felt critter coat from Little Goodall.

VOTE FOR YOUR FAVORITE HALLOWEEN COSTUME >

Enter your costume here >

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