Greater Good: Volunteer Group Home for All Designs Community Centers for Refugees Living in Temporary Housing

-


Within weeks of the massive earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear meltdown that devastated Japan’s coast in 2011, Toyo Ito established a volunteer group of fellow architects to design community centers for refugees living in temporary housing. Home for All has since collected donations from around the world in order to construct more than a dozen such buildings, each responding to specific local needs. In Soma, 30 miles from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, children cannot play outside because of background radiation. So Klein Dytham Architecture designed an indoor play center that evokes a forest. Astrid Klein and Mark Dytham, Home for All board members who cut their teeth at Toyo Ito & Associates, Architects, donated their time for the creation of the 1,600-square-foot round space, which evokes a forest. Resembling trees, complete with owls and squirrels perched on the branches, three cross-laminated timber structural columns rise to meet a latticework canopy formed from slats of Japanese larch bent on-site. Local materials were used wherever possible.


After another earthquake hit Japan this year, the work of Home for All continues. It is currently building 40 community centers in southern Kumamoto Prefecture, on the farthest major island from Fukushima.


The nine-layer canopy of Japanese larch, executed with pro bono engineering support from Arup. Photography by Koichi Torimura.

Original article by Interior Design Magazine: http://www.interiordesign.net/articles/12046-greater-good-volunteer-group-home-for-all-designs-community-centers-for-refugees-living-in-temporary-housing/

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Color and Autism

-
Image
Throughout my career I ’ ve helped countless frustrated parents of autistic children to make empowering color choices for their kids ’ environments. My experiences of getting to know these families inspired me to research the effect of color on people with ASD and to offer solutions for creating colorfully harmonious environments. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 1 in 88 children has been identified with an autism spectrum disorder (ASD). As more and more children are diagnosed, it ’ s imperative that parents and design professionals be aware of the specific requirements for this growing population. Special consideration needs to be given when selecting colors, finishes, lighting and storage. Does your child avoid a certain room in the house or an area of his classroom? The culprit may simpler than you think. Your child may be avoiding these areas because they ’ re too colorfully decorated. ASD children and adults tend to have heightened sen...
Read more

Get to Know Jeff Post, VP/General Manager of Enduratex (Part One)

-
Image
Our VP/General Manager, Jeff Post, sat down with us for an interview about his position at Enduratex and experience in the coated fabrics industry. The first part in this four-part series is dedicated to his industry knowledge and coated fabrics interest. Parts three through four, which will be published throughout the week, will touch on his impact at Enduratex, his leadership style and personal life. 1 .      How long have you been in the vinyl industry? Jeff : I’ve been in the vinyl industry for 30+ years. I started off selling resins, PVC resins and recycled resins of PVC. Then, in 1986, I moved into the coated fabrics life of the business.         What interested you about this category? Well, I was looking for a job number one and I wanted to branch out. I had been selling consumer products and I wanted to sell something different and more technical in its general aspects. A friend of mine knew ...
Read more

7 Startups Forcing Home Furnishing & Interior Design Into the Future

-
Image
Having trouble spicing up a room? Here are 7 startups that can help you furnish and flare any space, whether you're looking for a single piece of artwork or a complete redesign. by Stephen Altrogge from Snap Munk Interior design and furniture selection used to be a labor-intensive, time-sucking, expensive endeavor. You had to travel to a variety of stores or shows, or deep-creep a ton of websites, determine what would fit both your budget  and  picky style preferences (lots of leopard print for me), or maybe book a series of appointments with an interior designer and go through all the motions with them, and then organize a bunch of stuff to be delivered or haul it around yourself–and that’s just the basics. Now a host of innovative startups are making it all of it simpler; interior design and home furnishing has been hit with a much-needed touch of innovation and convenience. To start, here are seven of them to check out… CoContest CoCon...
Read more