Mode:lina upcycles construction materials into an industrial-chic eatery

This new eatery in Poznań, Poland sports an unconventional interior that’s all about imaginative upcycling. Polish architectural interior design studio mode:lina outfitted the restaurant — called The Rusztowanie Grill and Bistro — with a suite of construction materials repurposed into decor, serving plates, lighting fixtures and more. Serving up comfort food like massive burgers and hearty soups, the eatery’s contemporary and industrial-chic design matches its Instagrammable food offerings.

Located in Łazarz (St. Lazarus District), one of the oldest districts in Poznań, Rusztowanie Grill and Bistro can be found in the basement of a historic townhouse that dates back more than 100 years. The space spans 538 square feet and was designed with products sourced from a building warehouse. The existing exposed brick walls were retained and, matched with the Edison bulbs, track lighting and exposed concrete ceiling, they give the space an industrial feel that’s emphasized in the decor.

Timber sourced from the warehouse forms the bar front and booth seating. The timbers were deliberately misaligned to bring attention to their raw appearance. Galvanized metal pipes were reworked into sculptural lamps, table legs and wall partitions. Concrete lattice paving blocks were stacked in front of some of the exposed brick walls that are painted black. The burgers are even served on a shovel head repurposed as a plate.

Related: Spiky sweets shop makes extraordinary use of the common traffic cone

“[We] ensured that the interior design of a basement in an over 100-year old townhouse is consistent with the name and communication strategy of the restaurant,” explained mode:lina in a project statement. “All is done in line with the type of food available here – simple dishes served in an unusual way.”

+ mode:lina

Images by Patryk Lewiński

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Snarkitectures mind-bending Fun House opens at the National Building Museum

In Washington D.C., a massive, mind-bending Fun House has taken over the National Building Museum to offer an interactive experience that easily lives up to the exhibition’s name. Created by New York-based collaborative design practice Snarkitecture, Fun House is the latest installment in the Museum’s Summer Block Party series of temporary structures. The exhibition also commemorates Snarkitecture’s ten-year history and showcases 42 of the firm’s projects using the framework of a traditional American house.

Located in the Museum’s historic Great Hall, Fun House is an all-white interactive installation that comprises a two-story freestanding house with a front and back yard. “A lot of Snarkitecture’s work is about surprise, wonder and disbelief,” explains Italy-based curator Maria Cristina Didero, who worked with the architects to capture the essence of their decade-long work, which has focused on reinterpreting everyday materials in an imaginative new light and challenging people to rethink their surroundings.

“We wanted to think back to basics,” continues Didero. “And then, we thought, what is more basic than a house? So, Fun House follows the look of a traditional American house…but if you walk in you’ll see that nothing is as it should be.”

Related: Amazing Hive comes alive with sights and sounds in Washington, D.C.

Stripped of all color, the all-white Fun House plays with texture and the element of surprise throughout. The installation begins at the front yard, where massive upholstered letter-shaped benches that spell out ‘Fun House’ are scattered in reference to the firm’s 2012 project ‘A Memorial Bowing.’ Behind a white picket fence is the main house, a simple gabled structure which would look fairly normal – that is, if the entrance weren’t completely chiseled away. The doorway, as well as the foyer, is a reinterpretation of Snarkitecture’s 2011 ‘Dig’ project; it explores the architecture of excavation with EPS architectural foam carved away with hammers, picks and chisels to cavernous effect. The EPS foam material will be returned to the manufacturer and recycled at the end of the exhibition.

More oddities abound inside the home, which consists of the traditional sequence of rooms including a hallway, playroom, bedroom, bathroom, kitchen, study and living room—each carefully crafted to evoke familiarity and surprise while paying homage to Snarkitecture’s past projects. Highlights include the bedroom’s ‘Light Cavern,’ an ethereal space that comprises 30,000 suspended strips of perforated white fabric to elicit porosity and translucency; ‘The Beach Chair’ bathtub ball pit, a throwback to Snarkitecture’s 2015 ‘The Beach’ installation at the National Building Museum; the study that serves as a showroom for various iconic works like the ‘Fractured’ bench and ‘Bearbrick’ sculpture; and the living room that’s made up of giant inflated tubes bundled together to form a ceiling—a reimagined version of the 2012 ‘Drift’ pavilion for Design Miami—and a playful small-scale version of their 2016 ‘Pillow Fort’ down below.

Related: Gigantic swimmable ball pit takes over D.C.’s National Building Museum

The most popular space, however, is undoubtedly the backyard, where ‘The Beach’ is reimagined as a circular kiddie pool and a larger kidney-shaped pool. Recyclable balls with anti-microbial coatings fill the pools to serve as ball pits shallow enough for kids yet large enough to entertain adults. White astroturf, lounge seating, umbrellas, and a picket fence surround the pools to finish off the relaxing, beach-like setting.

“Fun House represents a unique opportunity for us to bring together a number of different Snarkitecture-designed interiors, installations, and objects into a single, immersive experience,” said Alex Mustonen, co-founder of Snarkitecture. “Our practice aims to create moments that make architecture accessible and engaging to a wide, diverse audience. With that in mind, we are excited to invite all visitors to the National Building Museum to an exhibition and installation that we hope is both unexpected and memorable.”

As with the National Building Museum’s previous Summer Block Party installations—which have included collaborations like ‘Hive’ by Studio Gang (2017) and the BIG Maze by Bjarke Ingels Group (2014)—Fun House will be accompanied by a series of programs and events, from behind-the-scenes construction tours to pop-up talks hosted during “Late Nights” on Wednesdays.

Visitors will be given a one-hour timed entry ticket to explore Fun House. The ticket includes access to all of the National Building Museum’s exhibitions, including the not-to-be-missed ‘Secret Cities’ exhibit, which explores the history of the Manhattan Project secret cities from their design and construction to daily life inside them and their lasting influences on the American architectural landscape. Fun House concludes on September 3, 2018.

+ Snarkitecture

+ National Building Museum

Images by Lucy Wang

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This British caf is serving to-go coffee in ceramic mugs to combat waste

A coffee shop northeast of London wants to serve its customers coffee in a mug from your home. La Tour Cycle Café has a novel idea to stop its reliance on disposable coffee cups: pour everything into reusable ceramic mugs, even if the order is to-go.

A 2017 report from Britain’s House of Commons discovered as many as 2.5 billion coffee cups are disposed across the United Kingdom every year. This equates to more than 6.8 million cups per day. To cut down the amount of waste from hot beverages, the La Tour Cycle Café has started serving everything — including to-go beverages — in reusable mugs.

Although customers sometimes choose to take their beverages with them, supplying more mugs for the next customer isn’t a problem for the café. Every day, the business puts out a collection basket for coffee drinkers to return their cups. While many choose to come back with their glassware, even more use the opportunity to clean out their cabinets and donate their unused mugs to the café.

“We’ve all got mugs languishing in our cupboards that we no longer need,” Anna Matthews, the owner of La Tour Cycle Café, told the BBC. “Why not donate them to your local coffee shop and allow people to actually have a hot drink in a china cup while they walk around?”

Related: German city offers ingenious alternative to single-use coffee cups

The unique program allows people to reduce the amount of waste destined for landfills while still enjoying their favorite beverages. But reusing and recycling isn’t a new concept for Matthews and La Tour Cycle. Earlier in 2018, Matthews worked with a contractor team to transform a vacated building. Matthews was able to move her business into the bigger space, which features better wheelchair accessibility and public art displays.

The café — and its eclectic collection of coffee mugs — only plans to be in the new space for two years;  Matthews has aspirations to move and give new life to another abandoned building by then.

+ La Tour Cycle Café

Via BBC, The East Anglican Daily Times and Treehugger

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7 tips for a red, white and GREEN Fourth of July!

The Fourth of July is a great time to get some sun, have a little fun and forget about the daily grind as we celebrate our nation’s birthday. But just because it’s an excuse to party hardy, we shouldn’t forget that keeping things green and protecting our environment over the holiday is just as important as making the perfect apple pie or lighting up the barbecue. With this in mind, we’ve rounded up seven ways you can add a little bit of green to your patriotic party and still have plenty of fun — read on!

1. Lose the Plastics

If there’s anything worse than plastic plates, it just might be their styrofoam counterparts. One of the easiest things you can do to go green is to reach for biodegradable plates, cups and cutlery when you’re shopping for your soirée. They ring in at just about the same price — give or take a few cents — and the overall impact is quite significant. We here at Inhabitat are really big fans of Bambu’s awesome line of ware.

2. Buy Local and Organic Food

Who wants to worry about pesticides on this day of patriotism? We recommend steering clear of foods produced on factory farms — instead look for locally-grown and/or organic produce and meats. Buying local is a great way to better educate yourself on what you’re putting into your mouth and it supports your local economy. And if you’re looking to reduce your environmental impact even further by going all-veggie, there are some delicious animal-free selections out there, including the classic veggie burger and tofu dogs. These tasty vegetarian dishes avoid the pitfalls of industrial meat production, which contributes to much of the world’s water use, emissions, land use and oil consumption.

3. Grill Green

With more than 60 million barbecues lighting up this Fourth of July, choosing the right grill and grilling accessories can do a lot to help the earth breathe easier. There are a variety of sustainably-produced charcoal briquettes out there — including Wicked Good Charcoal, which is made from industrial scrap wood, or Kingsford Charwood, which is produced using clean-energy turbine heat. Propane is also another good option as it produces close to half the emissions of generic charcoals. If you’re looking to save space in your backyard, try out Black+Blums’s Hot-Pot BBQ, which is cleverly disguised as a planter!

4. Make Your Own Healthy Sweet Treats

Did someone say POPSICLES? Sure store-bought cakes and pie are an age-old favorite, but they’re also laden with refined sugars and fat. So say poo poo the pie and whip up some fabulous popsicles instead! Homemade ice pops are the perfect way to cool down and to satiate a sweet tooth. You can prep and stock up on the pops in the freezer the day before your party, or for those on the go try a cooler filled with these frozen treats. One nifty design that caught our eye recently is Zoku’s Quick Pop, which whips up popsicles in just under seven minutes!

5. Switch on the Solar Lights

If you plan on partying into the night, a great way to add some ambiance without impacting your electricity bill is with solar lamps and lanterns. Just set them out in the sun for the day and when dusk falls, voila — you’ve got yourself the perfect setting for an impromptu dance party or a romantic Independence night with your loved one.

6. Go for Green Fireworks

It’s hardly a Fourth of July without fireworks. Fireworks however don’t fare well when it comes to their green cred, but thankfully there are some companies creating some alternatives that sparkle just as bright! Some sweet options we’ve seen include perchlorate-free fireworks and eco-friendly floating lanterns. These colorful lamps can light up the night, but they are also made from biodegradable and environmentally-safe materials.

7. Pick up your waste and RECYCLE!

After this Fourth of July, there are bound to be plenty of stray cans, bottles, streamers, plates and forks littering streets and parks. Do yourself, your community and the environment a favor by picking up all the leftover traces of your party and properly dispose of them, recycling all that you can. It’s an obvious tip, but it doesn’t hurt repeating.

HAPPY FOURTH OF JULY EVERYONE!

Images via Scott Bauer, John Tornow, Jennifer Chait, © Studio Olafur Eliasson / Little Sun, Port of San Diego, Bart Everson and Jeff Golden

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6 easy tips to green your Fourth of July

Although the Fourth of July is a wonderful time to celebrate our freedom with friends and family, with all the cups, utensils and fireworks we end up using, it’s also one of our most wasteful holidays! So this year, why not take advantage of our six ideas that will help you green-up your festivities without sacrificing an ounce of fun. In fact, it might surprise you to find that following our tips could actually increase the fun quotient while sparing the planet at the same time.

1. Go meatless for the day

Nothing says Independence Day like a backyard barbecue, but the global meat industry has put a terrible strain on the planet. This year, ditch the pork chops and steaks and consider some delicious vegetarian grilling recipes instead. Although forgoing the meat might seem akin to sacrilege, there are so many more creative dishes available that are good for your health and the planet.

2. Use real plates

When you have 15 guests coming around, it’s so easy to break out the paper plates to avoid a sink full of dishes. But imagine the waste if every American went this route! If washing your own dishes in a water-saving dishwasher doesn’t sound appealing, it is now possible to purchase biodegradable packaging that won’t clog up the landfill.

3. Use public transportation

If you live out in the middle of Iowa, taking a bus or train to your friend’s house might not be possible for you. But most city dwellers certainly do have this option. Using public transportation, or even cycling instead of driving a car, has more than one benefit: not only will you reduce your carbon footprint for the day, but you won’t have to drive home after drinking! Which brings us to our next point…

4. Buy kegs instead of cans and bottles

Don’t take this the wrong way — Inhabitat isn’t endorsing national drunkenness, but we are realistic. People have the day off, they’re hanging out with their favorite people… beer will be had. Instead of buying a stack of cans and bottles that use up a lot of unnecessary materials, consider purchasing a keg. This is cheaper, usually, and you’ll have zero waste — especially if you use your own mugs or compostable cups.

5. Cool down with a batch of delicious organic popsicles

If drinking beer isn’t your thing, or you’re celebrating the holiday with a handful of screaming young children, consider following our recipes for 30 kinds of delicious organic popsicles. They’re so easy to make and contain none of the junk that store-bought popsicles do. Plus, you won’t produce any waste as a byproduct of enjoying one of our favorite summer treats.

6. Enjoy a sunset with wind- and solar-powered lights

Sunset is probably our favorite part of the Fourth of July. Not that we’re excited for the day to end, but the temperature simmers down at last, and the sky fills up with the vibrant colors of fireworks. Make the ambiance last and reduce your energy footprint by using wind and solar lights. They’re easy to find at IKEA, and they’ll impress the daylights out of your friends and family! Have a happy and green Fourth of July!

Images via Nigel Howe, Shutterstock (1, 2, 3, 4), Inhabitat and IKEA

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