Design : Buzz

The Twin Cities Bungalow Club is bringing PBS's "This Old House" expert Bob Yapp to the Twin Cities for a couple of home-related presentations on Feb. 20 at the Hillcrest Community Recreation Center in St. Paul, a Star Tribune story notes.  

"This Old House" is a long-running home improvement TV show that centers on remodeling projects.     

One of the sessions that Yapp will deal with, called "You Can't Live in a Museum--Or Can You?" has to do with making historic homes livable, while "respecting their architecture," the story states.  

The other session, "Getting Shellacked, or Innovative Woodwork Finishing and Refinishing," will go over how to safely and efficiently remove old paint and natural finishes from woodwork.

A decade-old Minneapolis design firm is behind the new look of a New York Times financial blog.

The Minneapolis Egotist reports that Wink, Inc.'s portfolio now includes the design of Andrew Ross Sorkin's DealBook blog, which tracks stocks, mergers and acquisitions.

Images at the Egotist.

When Target announced a set of environmental sustainability goals last week, its press release was largely ignored. But GreenBiz.com took a closer look and sees the potential for Target to leapfrog Walmart and go transform from  "Tarjay to Targreen."

Writer Dara O'Rourke notes that most of what was in Target's announcement isn't worthy of hoopla. It's playing catch up with Walmart, which set more ambitious goals a few years ago. "[I]n 2010, pledging to eliminate waste is like pledging to close the refrigerator door."

But where Target now has a major impact is in the products it chooses to sell. "Based on an optimistic reading of the company's announcement, Target may now be positioned to do for sustainable products what it did for well designed, yet affordable, consumer products." Read the rest of O'Rourke's piece at GreenBiz.com.

At the Nov. 2-5 annual convention of the Minnesota chapter of the American Institute of Architects (AIA), about half of a dozen prestigious honor awards went to local architecture projects, including everything from a contemporary standalone classroom to a woodsy-looking church.  

Public-sector projects dominated in the 56th annual honors awards, due in part to the slowdown of commercial work in the recession, according to Beverly Hauschild-Baron, the executive vice president of AIA Minnesota, who comments in a recent Star Tribune story.

Among the honorees whose work is in state is the prominent Minneapolis-based HGA Architects & Engineers Inc., which took home four awards and St. Paul's Alchemy and Salmela Architect in Duluth.

The winners will be recognized at the Annual AIA Minnesota Awards Celebration on Nov. 19 at the Minnesota History Center.

Not all innovation involves high-tech solutions.

A Minneapolis nonprofit has developed a donkey ambulance that's helping to reduce deaths during childbirth in rural Tanzania.

The Downtown Journal reports that WellShare (formerly Minnesota International Health Volunteers) came up with the cart "as a sustainable and affordable solution to this crisis of emergency transport."

The cart is pulled by one or two donkeys and uses an animal-friendly design that places weight on the animals' back muscles instead of neck.

A woman dies during childbirth in rural Tanzania every 21 minutes, often because they give birth alone or with untrained attendants.

Oddee.com takes a break from cataloging the odd and bizarre to make a list of the world's 10 most breathtaking gardens. Of only three in the Western Hemisphere, one is the Minneapolis Sculpture Garden:

"The Minneapolis Sculpture Garden is one of Minnesota's crown jewels and its centerpiece, the Spoonbridge and Cherry, has become a Minnesota icon. Claes Oldenburg best known for his ingenious, oversized renditions of ordinary objects, and Coosje van Bruggen, his wife and collaborator, had already created a number of large-scale public sculptures, including the Batcolumn in Chicago, when they were asked to design a fountain-sculpture for the planned Minneapolis Sculpture Garden....Van Bruggen contributed the cherry as a playful reference to the Garden's formal geometry, which reminded her of Versailles and the exaggerated dining etiquette Louis XIV imposed there."

Read the entire article here.

An idea born in Minneapolis is growing into a phenomenon in cities around the world, Cool Hunting reports. Artcrank art shows of inexpensive posters that celebrate local bicycle culture have spread to the West Coast and the United Kingdom:

"Started in Minneapolis just three years ago, the Artcrank show was a quick, fun way to publicize local artists by inviting them to create posters about bike culture. Since then, the concept has spread with lightning speed to cities like Portland, San Francisco, Des Moines, and even London. With new cities taking part every year, 'Artcrank is growing roughly 10-15% faster than I can keep up with,' said Charles Youel, Artcrank's director and curator--not a bad problem to have. ...

"Local works on display each sell for an affordable $30 apiece at each venue. 'The more accessible those experiences are, the more diverse and interesting a biking and artistic culture becomes. I see people arriving on bikes, discovering local artists they've never heard of and connecting with causes. If free beer and cheap posters are the catalyst for that, it's cool by me,' continues Youel....

"'We're betting that Artcrank can and will work anywhere that people love bikes and art. So far, it's a bet we've won every single time.'"

Read the entire article here.

Dwell magazine profiles the South Minneapolis home that local architect Julie Snow designed for Walker Art Center design curator Andrew Blauvelt and his partner, Scott Winter, who directs the Walker's annual fund:

"The deeply collaborative design process that ensued felt more like an architect-to-architect dialogue than an architect-to-client discussion. Snow shared sketches with Blauvelt and he drew designs to send back. Later, the trio would meet, handling chunks of concrete, wood, metal, glass, and other inspirational materials, to get a real sense of their tactility and material relationship. 'Andrew is not trained in architecture, but he knows more about design than many architects,' Snow says. 'His library of design and architecture books is the most extensive of anyone I know. He's compositional--he thinks in composed elements.'

"One game that the couple rejects, however, is the one where a seemingly agoraphobic modernist, flat-roofed home on a large lot carefully camouflages itself behind trees and a large lawn. Rather, the house is exposed to everyone, in a neighborhood largely featuring early 20th-century homes and apartments. 'It is a response to a corner lot at a busy intersection,' says Snow. And although it is unique to the neighborhood, 'it fits the city and the pattern of the neighborhood's older housing stock--front yard, porch, house, yard, and garage--but with an updated design sense,' she says."

Read the entire article here.

The Washington Post takes a close look at Target Field and likes what it sees. Describing the brand-new Minneapolis ballpark as "a modern-day Fenway…embedded in a city neighborhood," Bruce Adams and Margaret Engel accentuate the field's ecological sensitivity and historical sense--and add a quick guide to exploring the city for outsiders coming to a game. Read their piece here.

Source: The Washington Post