3D printers are being used to create living dirt structures
A team of designers in Jerusalem intends to swap emission heavy materials like concrete and reinforced steel for 3D printed living structures made entirely of natural resources. 3D printing has come a long way in the last 20 years and is slated to become $56bn market by 2027. In...
Current in Design
Amateur urban planners use DALL-E to re-imagine cities without cars
You probably know the DALL-E application best for the strange meme material it generates, but it has genuinely useful applications too. Recently, amateur urban planners have been using it to re-imagine cities designed for pedestrians, and the results are captivating. DALL-E is where many of us go to waste time, right? A...
Five sustainable housing initiatives supporting the refugee crisis
Last year, 89.3 million people were forcibly displaced from their homes due to conflict, violence, and climate change. Let’s look at the architects creating sustainable housing projects to meet their needs. When war erupts in one part of the world, it’s not an isolated issue. The consequences are felt by...
Disused Berlin airport to be transformed into sustainable neighbourhood
A once bustling hub for German airliners is set to become a liveable, sustainable haven within the next decade. Plans are underway for a self-sufficient and car free neighbourhood including 5,000 apartments, schools, parks, and green businesses. After nearly 50 years of facilitating commercial flights, a bustling region that was...
British tourist is arrested for stealing historic Iraqi artifacts
A retired geologist from Bath, UK, has been sentenced to 15 years in prison for attempting to steal historic artifacts whilst on a trip to Iraq. Jim Fitton, 66, claims he didn’t know he was breaking Iraqi law when he picked up shards of ancient pottery and placed them in...
New ‘DALL-E Mini’ website sparks arty social media trend
A new open source AI application lets anyone input prompts and generate images via a database algorithm. Social media has been messing about with its tools and coming up with some truly bizarre results. The inevitable shift to algorithm-generated artwork is well under way, at least as far as...
Twelve DRC students build ‘Mad Max’ car using waste materials
A group of sixth year mechanic studies students in the Eastern Democratic Republic of Congo have defied the odds and built a car dubbed ‘Mad Max’ using only waste and scrap materials. Anyone remember the classic television show Robot Wars? Twelve students from the Goma Institute of Technology and Industry, aged 15 to 20 years, have spent two years building a car solely from scrapped waste metal. The students - together...
Nike files lawsuit accusing StockX of selling fake sneakers
The reseller platform is being accused of copyright infringement and lying about its authentication processes, both of which have resulted in the sale of counterfeit Nikes. Greats news for those of us constantly missing out on the latest sneaker drop, bad news for resellers who earn the entirety of their rent money by reselling sought after shoes on StockX. A legal battle over intellectual property rights for sneaker NFTs has...
New AI DALL-E 2 creates images from text prompts
A new AI system can create a variety of images both realistic and surreal from natural language descriptions. It has the potential to be game changing, but not without some concerns. Algorithms and AI continue to make waves across the art industry. The latest breakthrough comes from a research team called OpenAI, who has just unveiled a new version of its DALL-E program. This software is a text-to-image generation tool...
El Salvador president reveals designs for volcanic ‘Bitcoin City’
El Salvador president Nayib Bukele is quite literally obsessed with cryptocurrency. This week, he caused big stir online with tweets showing intricate designs of a full blown Bitcoin city. One does not merely dabble in cryptocurrency. Once you’re in these days, you’re all in. El Salvador president Nayib Bukele is the prime example of this obsessive mentality, to the extent that he actually instated Bitcoin as legal tender within his home...
