Category: Design

• Restoration Hardware to develop first “ecosystem” in Aspen

  At the beginning of this month, Restoration Hardware announced that it was making a $105 million equity investment in a development project in Aspen, Colorado. When completed, the project will house what the company is calling their “first RH ecosystem,” which will include an RH Gallery, RH Guesthouse, RH Bath House & Spa, RH Restaurants, and RH Residences. All of this is fascinating to me from an experiential retail, brand ecosystem, and real estate development standpoint. It also reinforces my belief that differentiated hotels and high-touch hospitality aren’t going anywhere, notwithstanding the fact that Airbnb is arguably now the largest “hotel company” in the world. People are hungry for these kinds of curated experiences, and they’re going to be positively starving once we get through this pandemic.

  Here’s a bit more about the concept taken from the company’s press release:

  Aspen has been selected to develop the first RH ecosystem inclusive of an RH Bespoke Gallery, RH Guesthouse, RH Bath House & Spa, RH Restaurants, and our first RH Residences. The RH Gallery on Galena, currently under development, will offer two floors of the RH Interiors, Contemporary, Modern, and RH Ski House collections, plus Interior Design, Architecture, and Landscape Architecture services. Additionally, the Gallery will include a transparent glass rooftop restaurant with views of Aspen Mountain, a Wine & Barista Bar, plus two private dining rooms with fireplaces and retractable roofs. The RH Guesthouse at the Historic Crystal Palace, also currently under construction, will feature guest suites with fireplaces, a live fire restaurant, wine vault, private rooftop pool and dining terrace with views of Aspen Mountain, and the brand’s first RH Bath House & Spa. The RH Residences at the Historic Boomerang Lodge will include up to five fully furnished four bedroom custom homes, and The RH Residence on Red Mountain will be a fully furnished six bedroom home with multiple terraces and an infinity pool with views of downtown, Aspen Mountain and Independence Pass. All of the RH Residences will include membership to the RH Bath House & Spa, plus priority reservations at the brand’s restaurants and private dining venues.

  2021.01.26

• The development value chain

  When I was in graduate school, my plan was to create a vertically integrated design and development company. I loved designing things and wanted to remain close to those sorts of details, but I had already decided that I wasn’t going to be an architect in the traditional sense and that I was going to be a developer. And so my objective was to figure out a way to combine everything under one roof. How could we be designers, but also be the entrepreneurs that make buildings happen?

  In some ways, Mackay Laneway House is a manifestation of that model. Through a partnership with Gabriel Fain Architects, we (Globizen Studio) have been heavily involved on the design side. Gabriel did all of the drawings and the overall architecture, but we weighed in (more than your typical client), selected most of the FF&E, and even designed things like the kitchen (with Scavolini) and the exterior signage. I wouldn’t call it true vertical integration, but we did start to blur the lines between architect/designer and developer.

  One of the interesting things about this approach is that it begins to create some consistency and a bit of a branded product. The hope is that when Mackay Laneway House is fully complete, it will read as a Globizen project, which is not that dissimilar from what David Wex of Urban Capital was talking about in this recent podcast. Their projects are a specific kind of product. They generally repeat it, and if that’s not what you’re interested in, then you don’t buy an Urban Capital home.

  But this also raises an important question: what is the role of architects and architecture in the case of buildings as very specific products? (This is something that we have discussed before on the blog.) Is the job of the architect to create an interesting exterior shell that then gets populated on the inside by a specific product offering? Or is it even worse, is architecture sometimes just an “empty vessel” that gets interior design and a brand slapped onto it? In some cases and with some projects, it does feel this way.

  I am a firm believer in the value of architecture and design. An “empty vessel” is not architecture. It is, well, an empty vessel. And that is not what I aim for in any of the projects that I’m involved in. Creativity, function, thoughtfulness and, yes, beauty, are all important. At the same time, I think this is a valuable debate. These sorts of questions are helpful in dissecting the architecture/development value chain. And so I would be interested in hearing your thoughts in the comment section below.

  2021.01.23

• Introducing Crosby Studios’ virtual shoppable showroom

  

  

  One of my favorite interior design firms — Crosby Studios — has just launched a new home goods and accessories concept called Crosby Studios Home. The offerings are unmistakingly Harry Nuriev (the founder of Crosby Studios). It’s all about design, art, and fashion coming together. But what is also noteworthy is how the concept was launched using a virtual shoppable showroom. And the experience, which is pictured above, is shockingly good. You simply wander around this blue-floored apartment and click on whatever stuff you would like to add to your shopping cart. This isn’t the first virtual showroom experience, but as I was using it, I couldn’t help but think that we’ll be seeing a lot more of this in the future. This and things like shoppable augmented reality.

  Images: Crosby Studios Home

  2021.01.22

• The war on beauty

  A recent essay by The School of Life asks: “Why is the Modern World So Ugly?” Here’s how it opens:

  “One of the great generalisations we can make about the modern world is that it is, to an extraordinary degree, an ugly world. If we were to show an ancestor from 250 years ago around our cities and suburbs, they would be amazed at our technology, impressed by our wealth, stunned by our medical advances – and shocked and disbelieving at the horrors we had managed to build. Societies that are, in most respects, hugely more advanced than those of the past have managed to construct urban environments more dispiriting, chaotic and distasteful than anything humanity has ever known.“

  Naturally, it turns out that this is, at least partially, the fault of greedy and unscrupulous real estate developers:

  “When property developers heard that the artistic avant-garde was now promoting a concept of functionalism, they rejoiced. From the most high brow quarters, the most mean minded motives had been given a seal of approval. No longer would these developers have to spend any money on anything to do with beauty. Out could go the symmetry, the flowers, the nice but slightly more expensive materials. It could all be as quick, ugly and cheap as possible; after all, isn’t that what the great minds of architecture had advised?“

  The author goes on:

  “Yet this nuance was lost on the property developers who came after them. Their constructions weren’t elegantly pared down with grace. They were something far worse: sloppy, mean-minded and ugly. Except that now, because of the words of the modernist masters, there was apparently nothing one could do to charge them with a dereliction of duty. The concept of beauty had been rendered old-fashioned, it smelt elitist and woolly. No one could any more complain that beauty was missing from the world without sounding soft-headed.“

  To be fair, the essay doesn’t entirely blame developers. It, more specifically, outlines six possible reasons for the ugliness of the modern world. And I do agree with some of them.

  Click here for the full essay.

  2021.01.21

• New Wellness Toilet by Toto will analyze your poop

  

  Toto announced a new product this month at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) called the Wellness Toilet. It won’t be available to consumers for at least several years, but the plan is for it to do two key things to improve overall health and wellness. It will scan your body when you sit on it and it will analyze your poop. (Not urine?) It will then make recommendations via your smartphone about how you might start to make better life decisions. Presumably this will include being more active and eating better. This, to me, feels like an obvious way to innovate around the toilet. If it were available today and it actually worked, I would likely be an early adopter. Either way, I look forward to hopefully including this in future development projects.

  Here’s more about the product from Toto’s press release:

  The WELLNESS TOILET uses multiple cutting-edge sensing technologies to support consumers’ wellness by tracking and analyzing their mental and physical status. Each time the individual sits on the WELLNESS TOILET, it scans their body and its key outputs, then provides recommendations to improve their wellness. There is no additional action needed, so people can easily check their wellness throughout their daily routine, every time they take a bathroom break. They will see their current wellness status and receive wellness-improvement recommendations on a dashboard in an app on their smartphones.

  The residential bathroom is the perfect place to support people’s wellness for a variety of reasons. First, although there are a number of other products that track individuals’ wellness (e.g., wearable devices), it is more convenient to monitor and analyze the body as a part of the everyday routine act of using the WELLNESS TOILET, to which individuals are accustomed. Second, toilets and people have two unique touchpoints that cannot be found elsewhere – the skin and human waste. The WELLNESS TOILET is in direct contact with individuals’ skin when they are sitting on it, and it analyzes the waste they deposit — a wealth of wellness data can be collected from fecal matter.

  Image: Toto

  2021.01.15

• A new Frame Home in Brooklyn

  Fred Wilson (venture capitalist) and Joanne Wilson (also an investor) have been working on a passive house apartment building in Brooklyn for the last five years. Their development company is called Frame Home. And this past week they received a pretty great Christmas gift in the form of a Temporary Certificate of Occupancy from NYC Buildings.

  At 5 storeys and with only 10 two-bedroom units, you could classify this building as the kind “missing middle” housing that gets so much air time here in Toronto. And so not only have they managed to build relatively small, but they’ve done it using passive house design principles.

  Here are some of the apartment building’s features:

  • Cross-laminated timber (CLT) structure
  • Passive house design approach
  • Triple-pane windows
  • Interior polished and insulated concrete walls (presumably to act as a thermal mass to moderate heating/cooling throughout the year)
  • Solar panels installed on the upper facade and roof (passive house design should, in theory, allow these to supply a big chunk of the building’s energy needs)
  • No fossil fuels used throughout the building — everything is electrical
  • Fully sub-metered units
  • Outdoor circulation spaces/stairs, providing access to a shared rooftop courtyard (I’m assuming these also serve as required egress for the building)
  • Dedicated elevator entrance for every suite (i.e. no interior circulation/corridor spaces)
  • Composting facilities within the building
  • Bike room connected to the ground-floor lobby

  There’s also a co-working and community space planned for the ground floor called “Framework.” Interestingly enough, they have already responded to the current pandemic. Instead of open-air desks, you rent fully enclosed 8′ x 8′ pods that are sound-proofed and come with their own HVAC systems.

  Congratulations Fred and Joanne on such an exciting and pioneering project. (I would love to see the development pro forma!) If you’d like to learn more about Frame 283, here is their website and here is a profile that the New York Times did on the project back in January. Building with CLT is apparently prohibited in NYC. Frame 283 got an exemption.

  2020.12.25

• Double height space at Mackay Laneway House

  

  The drywall started this week at Mackay Laneway House. This is a fun part of the construction process because it is that moment in time where, very quickly, the space transforms from a full on construction site to something that starts to resemble a livable space.

  What you are seeing above is a double height space (and 8 foot long skylight) that was incorporated into a sloping roof on the side of the house that faces the existing backyard. This is a design move that I felt pretty strongly about from the outset. Gabriel Fain, who is the project’s architect, likes to joke that it was really the only design directive.

  The move does a few things.

  1) It is a way to get light down and into the house without having a window facing the existing backyard. So it mitigates privacy concerns. 2) It frees up the north wall of the house, creating a place for a TV, art, photo backdrop, or whatever. You only have so many empty walls in a house of this size. And 3) it looks really cool and frames a large tree that overhangs the house.

  Stay tuned for more progress photos. The best way to do that is to follow @globizen.

  2020.11.19

• Reimagining Toronto’s University Avenue

  

  If I have learned anything from this pandemic it is that, when push comes to shove, Torontonians will eat pretty much anywhere. On sidewalks. On streets. In white tents that masquerade as outdoor dining. And in many other little urban crevices.

  I am only half-joking, because the reality is that this pandemic has pried us away from the status quo and forced us to reconsider how we allocate and how we occupy many of our public spaces. There will be some positive outcomes on the other side of this.

  To that end, a new city building effort has just been announced here in Toronto. (Alex Bozikovic of the Globe and Mail wrote about it here in “Rebirth of the Promenade”.) The vision is called “University Park” and the team behind it includes the landscape architecture firm PUBLIC WORK, the non-profit Evergreen, and the Michael Young Family Foundation.

  What they want to do is transform Toronto’s University Avenue into something akin to La Rambla in Barcelona — except better:

  Our vision brings together patches of public green space that are currently disconnected and inaccessible in order to create a signature destination in the centre of our province’s capital. By making minor adjustments to the existing roadway on University Avenue and converting only 9.5 acres of city-owned asphalt into native landscape, pedestrian walkways, bike paths, and cultural installations, we can create a 90-acre park that spans from Queen’s Park all the way to the waterfront.

  It’s about time. My only request is that they include small sidewalk crevice where I might be able to sit and enjoy a chicken burrito and a glass of wine. To learn more about University Park and to subscribe to their newsletter, click here.

  Image: PUBLIC WORK

  2020.11.13

• Norway’s new passport design enters circulation

  

  I don’t know about all of you, but I miss traveling. So let’s talk about Norway’s new passports, which just entered circulation. Designed by Neue, these new passports are the result of a design competition that was launched back in 2014. The goal of the competition was to come up with something that could very clearly express the Norwegian identity, as well as improve overall security (i.e. minimize forgery).

  The solution, and one clear idea, is this:

  

  

  Inside the passport and across each double page spread is a rendition of the Norwegian landscape. Mountains, lakes, streams, and probably a bunch of other beautiful things. But when you hold it under UV light, which is known to happen from time to time inside airports, each landscape image changes to a night view. It’s a simple and elegant solution that appears to solve two goals at once: identity and security.

  And that’s usually how good design works. It feels both simple and elegant.

  Images: Neue

  2020.11.09

• Moving from the city to the suburbs and back

  This is an interesting story about a Toronto couple who got married about 20 years ago, initially lived in a small downtown condo, and then decided it was “time to adult” and move to the suburbs. They bought a 3,200 square foot home in Markham and lived there for a number of years. It had a lawn, a garage, and all sorts of other suburban comforts. But eventually they realized that they had made a mistake. They preferred the conveniences of city living over the amenities of the suburbs. Living in the city was simply better suited to their lifestyles. And so they sold their house, bought an epic 2,100 square foot penthouse in the Shangri-La Residences — which just so happens to be one of my favorite buildings in the city — and hired the design firm NIVEK REMAS to completely redo it. I think their new home turned out great and maybe you do too.

  2020.11.04