Green Cabinet designed these modular cargotecture Space Cabins to meet the housing needs of students at the university of Tamale in northern Ghana. The comfortable cabins are designed to be made from locally sourced shipping containers topped with removable solar panels that allow the students to be energy independent. Green Cabinet is currently looking for investors to realize this project in partnership with the local government.

+ Green Cabinet

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Japanese artist Saeri Kiritani has been playing with food for many years. But it was only recently that she was recognized for her work and named one of the winners of the National Portrait Gallery competition of 2013. Entitled ’100 Pounds of Rice‘, this delicious self-sculpture uses over 1 million grains of rice and even has hair made from rice noodles!

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Back in the day, our grandparents didn’t give us much more than a handful of toffees and a few shiny nickels. But these lucky grandsons received something much more spectacular from theirs—an unbelievable treehouse complete with decks, a pitched roof, a tube slide, a suspension bridge, and much more! Steve and Jeri Wakefield hired architect James Curvan to design a multi-level treehouse for their little ones using found objects and antiques. What resulted was an enchanting treehouse that brings together formal architecture and child-like imagination.

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The Cardboard Collective just released a new pattern for making a set of stacking cardboard boxes that convert into a nightstand, an ottoman, a stool or a tiny table with chairs. They were developed by a mother from Tokyo as a way of managing all the little toys that kids love to play with like Legos, wooden blocks, toy cars and alphabet magnets. You can make the “Totem Boxes” yourself using reclaimed cardboard. An instructional PDF with templates and video tutorial guides are available at the Cardboard Collective’s Etsy store for $12.

+ Cardboard Collective

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Honeybees photo from Shutterstock

Last winter, beekeepers in the United States lost an alarming one-third of their hives to colony collapse disorder. While many acknowledge that pesticides, climate change, and habitat loss may be be contributing factors to their decline, a new study by the University of Illinois points to yet another stressor. Honey substitutes (such as high fructose corn syrup) fed to the bees while their own honey is sold could be denying bees the nutrients they need to establish strong immune systems.

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The interwebs have been buzzing with news about Kickstarter’s new NYC headquarters for quite some time now, but there weren’t any real visuals to go by other than renderings until now. The first signs of the historic Eberhard Faber Pencil Co. factory’s transformation into the crowd-sourcing startup’s offices showed up last week with the new trees that popped up on its soon-to-be green roof. Read on for a sneak peek at the rooftop deck’s progress!

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Occupying an area of Sydney formerly known as Pimelea, Lizard Log Parklands is a perfect weekend getaway for city dwellers. The redevelopment project, designed by architecture firm McGregor Coxall, offers spacious playgrounds, barbecue areas, walking and bicycle tracks, facilities powered by solar panels and grassy plains irrigated with grey water.

 

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So far, 3D printing has given us solutions for creating food, intricate parts, on-demand toys, body parts and even guns. Now the technology is being used to create delicate and organic art. Shane Hope is a digital designer, printmaker and painter who synthesizes raw digital data into art. Using RepRaps 3D printers, Hope prints out tiny parts, objects and bits of molecules, DNA, nanotubes and much more, which are then assembled in a painterly style into chaotic collages.

 

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Micro Urban is a proposed concept for an affordable, modular housing project along the Platte River in Denver, Colorado. Designed by Mexican firm Studio de Arquitectura y Ciudad, the project uses flexible modular housing and a plug-and-play mentality to create vibrant living spaces. Located adjacent to the river, the micro housing project utilizes rainwater collection, solar power and the natural resources of the surrounding area to minimize its impact. The project recently took first place in Denver Architecture League's Micro Housing Ideas Competition and won a prize of $3,000.

 

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Image via Wikimedia Commons

By now you’ve probably heard about the upcoming cicada frenzy that will soon be descending upon the East Coast, but you might not be sure where to see these fascinating insects for yourself in New York. The crooning bugs will be emerging soon for the first time since 1996, but according to experts, you’ll only be able to see them in one borough of NYC. If you’re hoping to catch a glimpse (and a live impromptu bug concert), read on for the details on where you might be able to spot one.

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The Onion Ditch Bridge in Logan County, Ohio is officially the longest recycled plastic bridge in the United States. The sturdy 24.6-foot-long bridge was constructed with AXION’s proprietary ECOTRAX and STRUXURE materials comprised of 80 percent post consumer plastic (such as lotion and detergent bottles), and 20 percent recycled car bumpers and dashboards.

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An architecture journalist commissioned a21 studio to design a minimalist, nature-friendly home on the outskirts of a new urban environment in Vietnam. Limited by a tight budget and asked to make the small residential unit appear "green" from the outside in harmony with the surrounding homes, the design team came up with The Nest - a delightful steel-framed home with plants growing inside and out.

 

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China’s copycat architecture trend has already been well documented – but we never expected the country’s imitators to start replicating gigantic rubber ducks! Florentijn Hofman‘s giant, inflatable yellow duck has graced ports and harbors across the globe – however its fame has made it the latest target for Chinese counterfeiters. Ever since the 54-foot friendly fowl arrived in Hong Kong, cities across the mainland have sprouted their own unofficial versions. Dubious imposter ducks have shown up in Dongguan, wearing a blue hair bow and long eyelashes; Xi’an, where it was housed behind metal gates; and a duck has been promised to appear in Wuhan next.

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It’s been a great year so far for Tesla – the electric automaker paid back its federal loan a full 9 years early, it announced plans to triple its supercharger stations, and it scooped the green car of the year award. Now CEO Elon Musk has announced plans to follow up on the company’s success with two additional vehicles – a small SUV and a lower-priced sedan that will hit the streets as early as 2015.

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Traffic cones are good for accomplishing one task: directing traffic. They aren't an obvious candidate for creative reuse, but architecture firm Woods Bagot recently used the bright orange cones to make this large lamp, which looks sort of like a large glowing sea urchin. The interactive installation, dubbed Planet: Under Construction (PUC), is made of 200 traffic cones strapped to a metal structure with bungee cord. Part of this year’s Vivid Sydney Festival of Light, Music and Ideas, PUC is one of the first lighting sculptures that can be seen walking from the city to Circular Quay.

 

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