Spot Cool Stuff loves books. And we love creative staircases. So it isn’t surprising that we’re drawn to cool stuff at the confluence of both.
Here’s a look at two unusual architectural designs that combine stairs with bookshelves. Has it happens, both are located in London. And neither has an owner that’s about to move their book collection to an Amazon Kindle anytime soon.
When at water level, you can’t really see the bridge that crosses a moat to the 17th-century Fort de Roovere. View it from a bit of elevation, though, and the bridge isn’t only visible but looks rather puzzling. That’s because the bridge—near the coastal town of Halsteren, Holland—doesn’t span over the water. And it doesn’t skim along the surface of the water. Instead, the bridge goes through the water.
You don’t need to be an architect to love cool architecture. Urban planning and building design is an interdisciplinary passion, attracting the likes of art enthusiasts, engineers, history buffs, designers and travelers. Chances are that at least one person on your gift shopping is among those.
With that in mind, here’s our roundup of seven inexpensive—and one not-so-much—gifts for architecture enthusiasts. For this review we specifically excluded architecture magazines and books (of which there are a huge and excellent variety to choose from). We also nixed items used by working architects in their craft, like drafting tables or home design software.
“The world is a bubble” declared Saint Augustine. Seventeen centuries later, the patron saint of brewers and printers would surely be a huge fan of the portable plastic offerings from Bubble Tree.
The french design and manufacturing company sells bubble products that they describe as “Unusual huts for unusual nights.” Spot Cool Stuff would characterize them more as glorified tents.
Kids crawl into the enormous play net—and parents wonder whether they'll ever see them again
Spot Cool Stuff’s inner child is still very active. Readers have probably noticed that from all our reviews of cool toys and family travel destinations that may appeal equally to adults and kids. So no wonder that we are also fans of playgrounds.
The world is, thankfully, full of creative, well-conceived plays for kids to safely play. Here’s a look at seven of our favorites:
What can you make with 65 old, used shipping containers? How about a huge building with an amphitheater, offices and a sustainable development educational center.
Spot Cool Stuff has previously reported on creative shipping container architecture. We’ve had dinner with a prominent shipping container architect who designed Rhode Island’s Box Office. Yet the scope of using 65 shipping containers for such a multi-use structure surprised even us.
If you have a backyard you can have a private office. So says OfficePod, a British company that manufactures eponymous pre-fabricated one-room office structures.
When designing their OfficePod the company had four goals for the product:
With enough money, modern technology and piped-in water anyone can build a luxury resort in the middle of a desert. (Exhibit #1: Las Vegas.) But building a luxury resort in the middle of the desert in a completely environmentally sustainable way—that’s a challenge. Yet Oppenheim, an architecture firm based in (of all places) the desert-deprived state of Florida, managed exactly that with their design for an eco-resort in Jordan’s Wadi Rum desert.
