All articles by Sowmya Thuniki
Sowmya Thuniki
Zaha Hadid on designing the new Heydar Aliyev Center in Baku
The architect speaks to Blueprint about her approach to creating the new Heydar Aliyev Center in Baku
Surface Design Show 2014
Getting ready to stage its 11th outing, the Surface Design Show opens its three-day residence at the Business Design Centre, London. from 4-6 February Emily Martin takes a look at highlights of this year’s offering
Familiar theme: China’s copycat cities
Quite apart from the industrial production of fake branded products and counterfeits is the double phenomenon of China’s ‘copycat cities’. Often spectacularly unoccupied, these have not only borrowed heavily from townscapes around Europe, but also speak of an unique aspiration of self-invention
The past is an English country: the story of English Heritage
A hundred years ago, worried about Britain’s built environment, the state established the listings system and gave itself the power to make a collection of buildings for ‘public benefit and education’. Today English Heritage, which continues that work, fights to preserve a modern heritage that its antecedents would be astounded by. We look at some of the more dramatic case histories of recent years
Street furniture: great design we often take for granted
Walking down the street we tend to take the lamp posts, traffic lights, bins and benches for granted. But who has designed them and do they have a deeper function than their apparent one? Helen Parton investigates
Street artists take over abandoned Paris nightclub
The dilapidated building that was home to the famous Parisian nightclub Les Bains Douches — once the haunt of international celebrities from film, music and art — is scheduled to be redeveloped as a boutique hotel. But not before 50 street artists took up an invitation to fill the space with spectacular, ephemeral works
Say no to identikit restaurant and bar design
No one wants the ‘cookie cutter’ approach to restaurant and bar design, whether its a chain or an independent, giving designers great challenges and opportunities for creativity, says Mark Bithrey
Animal and insect shaped chairs by Maximo Riera
Maximo Riera has a singular vision when it comes to furniture. For some time now he has been mining the animal kingdom for inspiration for his anatomically accurate, yet surreally gothic, seating. Now he’s turned to the most numerous creatures on the planet, the insects, for his latest piece, the Beetle chair, based on the European Rhinoceros Beetle. He has already, of course, done an actual rhino…
Philip Castle on designing iconic film posters for Stanley Kubrick
Working closely with film maestro Stanley Kubrick, who seemed to have a thing for hats, illustrator Philip Castle created the iconic posters for two of his key films, Full Metal Jacket and Clockwork Orange. Here, Castle opens some old boxes filled with treasures and shares the experience
Leading architects come together for new design event The Fix
FX collaborated with Gensler, Livewire and Cole Consulting to bring together property, retail and design with this new initiative, The Fix. At its launch, we focused on the pop-up and the implications for the retail, hotel and the hospitality, and property sectors. How creative are pop-ups — and how is money made from them? Toby Maxwell reports