Sao Paulo's Graffiti Storm Drains

Street Art duo 6EMEIA started painting storm drains in the Barra Funda neighbourhood of Sao Paulo with an aim to transform everyday life by bringing a smile to people's faces. Storm drains are not exactly an attractive part of a street scene, so these designs bring a lighthearted, more attractive look to them. I really love these, I think that although there is still stigma surrounding graffiti, this kind of art does not impose in an ugly or displeasing way, instead it adds colour & humour to an otherwise bland & dull landscape.

Reverse Graffiti

If you walk around the streets, wherever you are, & look down, a clean surface is rarely what you see. The streets are becoming dirtier & dirtier. CURB are a natural media company that have taken the dirty streets & used them as a business opportunity. It is called reverse graffiti, or 'clean advertising'. Instead of adding paints or spraying to surfaces, CURB remove dirt to form advertising slogans. In their words it is "the process of selectively removing dirt from high-footfall areas to reveal an eye-catching message." This new way of advertising, in my opinion, is pretty ingenious; it is a non intrusive, semi-perminent way to engage the public & grab attention away from the traditional ways of advertising. I would certainly pay attention to this, just keep your eyes down.

These are the models I created for the Greenpeace Airplot project (semester 2). Although quickly made & quite rough they had quite a cool effect, I think, of displaying my proposal. The first model was made from plasticine, cocktail sticks & freshly cut grass. The second, slightly more detailed & representational, was using the same plasticine for the mound, but then painted balsar wood stuck together with glue. When added into a visualisation they took on a completely different look (see image at the bottom)

Swiss Cottage Park, London

For the Streetlife module I chose Swiss Cottage park in North London as the site for my Theoretical & Technical report. The park was designed by Gustafson Porter, in 2006, to create a tranquil & playful area within the contrast of a busy city scene. I visited the site when it was not at its peak aesthetically. During the winter months the park is not as vibrant as in the summer, when people sit on the surrounding grass banks & children play in the fountain. Although the site was not looking its best, I still really appreciated it. Having seen photographs of what it looks like in the summer months I think it is a place I would enjoy very much. My analysis of the site looked in the concepts behind the design, analysis of the site & its surroundings, a look into the detail of the project, including the hard & soft landscaping features & the functionality of the main focal point of the park - the rectangular granite water feature.

The images below are some of the pages & images I produced for my Streetlife Module report

Plan of the soft landscaping on site

Plan of hard landscaping on site

Access & movement on site

Life After The Flood - Studio Lindfors

The threat of global warming & rising sea levels is a constant fear for the planet. New York architects Studio Lindfors have created a series of images showing how the worst case scenario, according to scientists, would affect two of the world's largest cities; Tokyo & New York. They have named it Aqualta, a play on the words acqua alta, which are the high tides flooding Venice. The images show how the cities would cope with the vast quantities of water flooding into them, using wharfs, raised pedestrain walkways, bridges, & navigable canals to replace the road & rail networks. Gondolas & barges are the primary mode of transport, with cable cars hovering overhead. People have migrated upwards in apartment blocks to get away from the rising water levels, recreating rooftops into farms & greenhouses.
All of this seems very idillic & hopeful, when the reality of it would most likely be very different to this. The photoshopped images show a very beautiful & functional city, in the mass panic of a real onset of worldwide flooding I think that beauty is certainly not going to be one of the top priorities.