Since 2010, the studio Atelier Abraha Achermann has been designing buildings and projects that are characterized by their spatial wealth and surprising autonomy. Structured in different layers of content, this volume is a comprehensive workshop report, offering diverse insight into earlier and later works and processes. The book is a monographic experimental arrangement with which to compile, consider, research and experiment.

Text in English and German.

After 20 years working for Mario Botta, Davide Macullo founded his own office in Lugano in 2000. His architecture is the result of dialogue with the location and is characterized by intuition, openness and emotionality. His aim is to use architecture to improve the quality of life and charge locations sensorially. This monograph structures the work of the Ticino-based architect – comprising over 400 projects, including master plans, international hotels, furniture design and art consulting – into three main chapters. The focus lies on ten of his most definitive buildings, such as the WAP Art Space (2017) in Seoul, which combines art and housing in a single spatial structure that is bathed in light, while also oscillating between openness and withdrawal; as well as the SCI Club Frott in Rossa, Grisons, which was built in 2021. This polygonal wooden structure serves as a cultural meeting place, while providing a contemporary response to the Alpine building tradition and integrating itself harmoniously into the Val Calanca.

Terry O’Neill (1938-2019) was one of the world’s most celebrated and collected photographers, with work displayed and exhibited at first-class museums and fine-art galleries worldwide. His iconic images of Frank Sinatra, The Beatles, Brigitte Bardot, Faye Dunaway, and David Bowie – to name but a few – are instantly recognizable across the globe.

Now, for the first time, O’Neill selects a range of images from his extensive archive of “vintage prints”, which will surprise and delight collectors and photography lovers alike. Long before the age of digital, photographers would send physical prints to the papers and magazines. These prints were passed around, handled by many, stamped on the back, and often times captioned. After use, the prints were either filed away, thrown out or – for the lucky few – sent back to the photographer or their photo agencies.

At the dawn of the 1960s, when O’Neill’s career began, physical prints were the norm. Terry kept as many as he could that were sent back to him. “I just kept everything,” he says. “I don’t know why. Back then, there wasn’t really a reason to keep them. Photos were used straight away and then I just moved on to the next assignment. No one was thinking these would be worth anything down the line, let alone fifty years later.”

This book collects hundreds of these rare images, a true must for Terry’s fans and photography collectors.

The Norwegian painter Bjørn Ransve (b. 1944) is one of the best-known contemporary Scandinavian artists. Very few painters indeed express themselves so brilliantly in two dimensions, thematically, technically and formally.

The third volume of the catalogue raisonné is devoted to Ransve’s graphic oeuvre: in over 1,300 illustrations it documents prints and multiples, created from the 1960s to 2013. This book is not only an indispensable standard reference for all scholars, art dealers and collectors, it also provides insights in the complex interrelations between prints, paintings and drawings in Ransve’s artistic work. The accompanying text by Lars Eisenlöffel investigates the changing and recurrent groups of motifs and places the works in their art historical context. Since each page of the book has been designed individually in close collaboration between Ransve and the graphic artist and book designer Silke Nalbach, Bjørn Ransve’s development as an artist can be traced in a way that is particularly illuminating.

There are few destinations more alluring than resorts. The combination of an evocative location, lavish rooms, exceptional service and architecture that’s designed to inspire, has long been irresistible to travelers. In the past decade, however, the global search for stylish getaways has become so intense that hospitality has now become the world’s fastest growing industry.

Few people understand the nature of resorts and the secrets of designing them more than the world-renowned architects and designers, Wimberly Allison Tong & Goo (WATG), whose mission over the last six decades has been ‘to design experiences that lift the spirit’. Having created hundreds of exclusive destinations for well-known companies such as the Four Seasons, Sheraton and Hyatt, ranging from luxurious island resorts to exotic desert getaways, sophisticated urban hideaways, and cool mountaintop retreats, WATG has become a respected name in the area of resorts and hotels. Some of their extraordinary projects include the Hotel Bora Bora in French Polynesia, The Palace of the Lost City in South Africa, The Ritz-Carlton Laguna Niguel in California, and the Hyatt Regency in Kauai Resort & Spa in Hawaii.

This spectacular volume looks at these and other world-class destinations, and also takes you behind the foyers to explore the inspiration and ideas behind the designs, which often begin from a thought on a notepad. As well, it offers insightful interviews with those involved with the projects, explains how the vernacular architecture of the region can influence the end design, and even predicts what resorts may look like in the future.

The significant and rapid trend toward small office design globally is testament to increasing economic imperatives, where often commercial rentals are pushing business into innovative ways to manage and minimise their space and resources. Fast-evolving technological advances are also making it possible for people to work from home, where their home office environment needs to be not only stylish, but also conducive to productivity, and ergonomic to support and encourage good health and well-being. Also, there are those who seek to start their own business and are looking to establish a creative, professional and inspiring home office environment. Big Design for Small Workspaces combines form with function, and presents innovative interior designs for offices with compact floor plans of up to about 3230 square feet (300 square meters). This book showcases a selection of richly photographed, sleek and modern solutions, and presents insightful design concepts and appealing examples of imaginative and resourceful spaces, with informative commentaries describing aspects such as furnishings and materials, workstation layout, including the use of vertical space to its fullest advantage, and multipurpose areas. This book will provide an essential source of inspiration for architects, interior designers, small business owners, the homeoffice renovator, and anyone looking to create a smart small office environment.

Almost everyone has indulged in the irresistible notion of carving out a romantic rural refuge in a typically rustic setting, beside a beach or meadow, in the mountains, or other pristine environments. This book brings together the infinite number of possibilities of beautiful and creative cabin designs set in idyllic locations where access to nature is unimpeded. There’s a growing trend for living in a small getaway, but that needn’t mean living in cramped, unimaginative spaces. Cabins: Hidden Places, Stylish Spaces showcases the challenges of how small floor plans and compact interiors can be overcome with inventive modern design solutions and the innovative use of technology. Once-basic structures are now evolving into fancy dwellings that offer off-grid living with low impact on the environment, all the while cocooning the occupants in differing levels of comfort, from rustic formats with basic necessities, to some which offer facilities for luxury living. From artist studios to alpine shelters, beachside shacks to rural retreats, this book is an endless source of inspiration for armchair architects and those seeking to create a peaceful sanctuary that fuses distilled ingenuity with eco-friendly style.

How do artists produce exquisite art? Part of the answer is that each one must discover and create their own particular working space, harnessing inspiration from their surrounds, be it from the humble backyard shed, a beautifully refurbished industrial space, a room inside the home, a loft, or an architecturally designed house/studio set on a cliff, overlooking the natural beauty of the landscape. Some artistic souls thrive in seeming chaos while others must have an ordered studio space about them. In each instance, the role of the “studio” plays an important part in stimulating the artistic process.

This book offers an intriguing and exhilarating peek into the often secretive and off-limits creative spaces of thirty artists and practitioners. Whether it be for photography, music, sculpting, painting, architecture, writing, film, or furniture making, this selection of highly illustrated case studies from around the world reveals how these artisans and practitioners have crafted and designed their unique working environment. This beautiful collection of works also provides practical advice and innovative ideas on the architecture, interior design, site, and setting of workspaces that help these artists flourish through their creative journey.

Architectural plans generally are beset by problems as the project develops. A prospective architect needs to learn how to critically assess and problem-solve any design issues. And to every problem there is a solution, using the ‘Fifteen Principles’ for solving design problems efficiently.

With nearly 20 projects from well-known architects, this book provides an unmissable opportunity to learn from the experts. Famous architects walk through the design process, with full-color photographs, drawings and sketches of ideas. Each architect examines design problems encountered during the project, and offers examples of critical thinking that resulted in practical solutions. This book will form a valuable reference for architects and students.

The sales range of goods spans the globe. We can drink Russian vodka in New Zealand, or taste fruits from Brazil in Japan. Packaging enables this international exchange of merchandise, and has infiltrated our life on every level. It exists everywhere – on the supermarket shelves, in our fridges, cabinets, gifts, and cosmetics; whether you are recieving shipped items from overseas or buying produce from local farms, packaging will always be involved. However, as environmental issues become increasingly prominent, there is another side to packaging we must consider. Reducing waste, saving energy, improving sustainability of the overall products, and creating green packaging methods are hot topics in the packaging industry. So how do designers find ecological packaging strategies that protect the product without leaving a negative footprint on the environment?

Contemporary designers are finding unique and multi-functional ways to manipulate materials to make packaging recyclable, biodegradable, and reusable. More than 100 brilliant ideas from all over the world are showcased in this book, which are presented in insightful detail and complemented by glorious full-colour photography. This book will inspire design creativity, and reveal ways for businesses to help counter the environmental threats that endanger our world.

When architecture is the subject of an exhibition, there is almost always a dilemma: architecture can only be represented through drawings, models, and photographs; the physicality of architecture per se is missing. The abstraction of architecture for exhibition and the absence of architectural experience in architectural exhibition are in fact two sides of the same coin: The problem of the lack of an architectural reality.

In this book, Yong He Chang traces the history of architectural intervention in exhibitions and answers the above questions through more than forty exhibition designs made by Chang and Atelier FCJZ. The book showcases his original approach to construction and shares his thoughts on the relationship between architecture and the timeless aspects of ‘exhibition’. It also includes a discussion of a series of issues Yong He Chang and his team have encountered in designing exhibitions and installations, and the responses they came up with.

Documentary photographer William E. Crawford spent three decades documenting Vietnam, and in particular Hanoi, its people and the surrounding countryside. As one of the very first Western photographers to work in post-war North Vietnam, Crawford was drawn back to the country numerous times at regular intervals between 1985 and 2015 to record this fascinating country’s culture, people, and society with beautiful, compelling and intimate photographs, concentrating on colonial and indigenous architecture, urban details, portraits, and landscapes. In 1986, the Vietnam’s Communist leadership began to shift from a Soviet-style central planning model toward free-market economic reforms. As a result, Hanoi has been transformed over the last three decades, becoming an example of how traditional Asian and developing cities have often been torn down or allowed to crumble – only to re-emerge in a ‘modernized’ form. Unlike photo-journalism, which is interested in the theatre of the moment, Crawford’s evocative and powerful photography chronicles life throughout Hanoi and its surroundings over the course of the last three decades. Filled with full-color photographs and informative essays on his experiences and the people he encountered, Crawford’s work – showcased in this beautifully presented volume – provides a unique visual catalogue of the evolution of a city and its inhabitants, and particularly the complex historical area known as The 36 Streets.

Kengo Kuma is a globally acclaimed Japanese architect whose prodigious output possesses an inherent respect and value of materials and environment, often creating a harmonious balance between building and landscape. He masterfully engages both architectural experimentation and traditional Japanese design with twenty-first-century technology, resulting in highly advanced yet beautifully simple, gentle, human-scaled buildings. He’s renowned for the drive to search for new materials to replace concrete and steel, seeking a new approach for architecture in a post-industrial society, and fusing interior and exterior realms to make spaces that both create a calming and tranquil atmosphere and which “transform” topography. In the pages of this exquisitely illustrated volume, Kuma presents close to forty of his most recognized and award-winning works, including FRAC Marseille, V&A Dundee, Mont-Blanc Base Camp, and Japan National Stadium. Kuma continues to forge a new design language: in this book he offers the reader deep insight into how he has engaged with different aspects of the architectural discipline by transforming topography, construction, and representation in order to give further progress to his ideas.

Mixing aesthetics, architecture, arrondissements and elegance in a very Parisian way, this richly illustrated new volume on the world’s most bewitching city shows Paris in all its light, shade, glamour and grandeur. From magnificent squares to exquisite side streets, tucked-away gardens to quiet neighbourhood bistros, Paris Secrets: Architecture, Interiors, Quartiers, Corners shows the sophistication and grace that underline this, the City of Light. Wind your way through Paris via pages shimmering with seductive stairwells, irresistible bistros and patisseries, beguiling back streets, beautiful boulevards, enticing courtyards and must-see interiors. A modern guide for the urban aesthete – and perfect for either those who have already fallen in love with Paris, or those planning a memorable first visit – it is both an insightful travel resource and an architectural study capturing Paris’s elegance and atmosphere in spectacular detail.

Restrooms are inescapably important amenities, but something of a grey zone when it comes to design. In a massive effort to make them inconspicuous, public restrooms have been standardized, buried in underground bunkers, hidden behind walls and unmarked doors. At times, it seems our embarrassment with their very existence has led to an inability to provide sound sanitation. This book presents a selection of over forty very diverse public restroom designs, in which toilets enjoy special status as a vehicle for various artistic and cultural expressions, corporate values and the needs of different social groups.

Four experts from different backgrounds and countries have been invited to write on sensitive issues in public restroom design. More than 500 full-color photographs, plans and detailed descriptions illustrate the designs in detail and provide fascinating information to architects, interior designers, students, and so on.

The work of Alejandra Cisneros marks a significant departure from the tropical ‘Bali-style’ villa design popularised in the past two decades and is a refreshing antidote to the anodyne villas invading Bali’s centuries-old rice terraces. In Seen | Unseen, Alej shares her insights on reimagining traditional homes for 21st-century lifestyles in today’s fragile environments. She reveals the thinking behind her designs, and her heart-centred process of co-creation a “conspiracy of client, joglo, land, Balinese craftsmanship, and culture.” She also acknowledges the influence of Tri Hita Karana, the Balinese concept of cosmological balance that governs their relationship with people, the environment and the Creator. This beautifully illustrated book focuses on her whimsical, exciting homes – fanciful yet practical, designed for potters and poets, artists and entrepreneurs alike hailing from North and South America, Europe and Asia. Crafted almost entirely from antique teakwood, traditional materials, and showcasing joyful design ideas, each home merges seamlessly with the landscape. Alej curates unique, mould-breaking homes that create a new way of living that is at one with nature in the tropics. Her canvas is the Bali landscape; her paints are Java’s traditional teakwood joglos and Indonesia’s myriad natural materials; her brushes are the Balinese craftspeople that bring her vision to reality.

With every passing year, the strength of takeaway food packaging design becomes stronger, particularly with the increased popularity and ease of ordering food online as well as eating on the go. As a branch of graphic design, the essence of this packaging is to grab the potential customer’s attention and identify a brand. Packaging design can make a big difference in the sales of a product, since it not only works to inform the consumer, but also provoke a feeling or reaction, communicate emotion, and even respond to any given desire. Good packaging is attractive and can impress people with its creativity and it is a way for the customer to express their identity. It offers a fabulous opportunity for companies to communicate with consumers and it is a powerful marketing tool that can make brands instantly recognizable around the world.

This comprehensive full-color guide explores current global trends in takeaway food packaging design driven by a broad range of high calibre designers, including big global players and fast-food giants, and boutique brands. This book provides useful detail on a wide assortment of materials used, recyclability and sustainability, and functionality; all essential components in regard to overall customer appeal. No other advertising medium is as close to the consumer as takeaway food packaging is – it is literally in their hands.

Personal and private outdoor space is becoming ever-more elusive as urban areas become more crowded due to population growth and increasing development. Urban Oasis: Tranquil Outdoor Spaces at Home explores projects from London to New York and Sydney to San Francisco that reveal inspirational designs of rooftops, garden spaces, outdoor rooms, terraces and courtyards, and provide refuge from the modern world with private pockets of paradise. These outdoor spaces provide relaxing, sociable, and plant-filled settings for residents to savor peace and calm, and the company of family and friends.

Valode & Pistre seem atypical in the world of contemporary architecture. Their bright, cheerful offices on the Rue du Bac in the heart of Paris reflect this nature. It seems quite natural that artists who work with light such as Yann Kersalé and the late François Morellet have been pleased to create installations specifically for these offices because, from their first iconic completed work, the renovation of the CAPC Bordeaux Contemporary Art Museum, the pair have been actively interested in the connections between art and architecture.
Denis Valode says, “We are convinced that the role of the architect is to do more with less and not the contrary. The economy of means—the correct choice of means—is essential. Our goal is to create the best possible result with a certain frugality of means.” Once again, this interest in obtaining the maximum result with a minimum of means leads the architects to note that their approach is particularly well suited to current ecological concerns. Denis Valode and Jean Pistre’s sense of efficiency has proven to be far more durable and better adapted to the demands of contemporary architecture than the many flamboyant styles that have come and gone since they started working together. Their words are in perfect harmony with their ideas—they avoid excessive rhetoric but when they talk about buildings they do so with passion and with clear ideas and methods, often involving their aesthetic sense developed through the world of art.
Denis Valode and Jean Pistre oversee one of the most successful architectural offices in France, working on prestigious towers, hospitals, and research facilities, but also on shopping centers and sports venues. Nor are their projects limited to France—they have worked in China, Russia, and numerous other countries. The pair first worked together in 1978 and created Valode & Pistre in 1980. Today the office employs 200 people and provides interior, architectural, and urban design as well as engineering services. These projects highlight the success of the office in breaking through the barriers that usually separate architects who work on privately funded projects and public ones in France.

Modern public space requires wayfinding information that can help users familiarize or adapt themselves in new building environments. Wayfinding systems designed to fulfill the essential functions of direction, notice or explanation often absorb creative designing elements. This book is an informative and systematic compilation of many updated design works for wayfinding by international designing studios, ranging across shopping malls, gardens, hospitals, schools, office buildings, museums, libraries, among others. And the wayfinding design works represented in this book originate from their application in various public spaces. This book is a great reference for graphic designers, architects, scholars, or students majored in the design disciplines.

The first edition of Wine Myths and Reality won international acclaim for its innovative approach to explaining wine. The second edition is completely revised and extended to take account of the changes of the past decade, and goes behind the scenes of winemaking to reveal the truth about what goes into a bottle of wine. Extensively illustrated with photographs, maps, and charts, its approachable and entertaining style immediately engages the reader in an overview of winemaking worldwide. Practices in viticulture and vinification come under the microscope, the tricks of the wine trade are revealed, the methods of the new and the old worlds are scrutinized, and their wines are discussed. From this analysis there emerges an overview of all major wine-producing countries, extending from the powerful wines of the new world to the classic wines of France or Italy. Does terroir really matter? Is the international style taking over? Will global warming destroy the existing wine-producing regions? And extrapolating from current trends, what will wine be like in the next decade? Discover the answer to all these questions and more, in this seminal wine enthusiast’s handbook.