Finnish News takes on the US election. Please note that I don’t think this US election is a joke. Trump is close enough to a fascist demagogue, and the spectre of the million who have died as a result of the illegal Iraq War also hangs over both campaigns.

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The post Mr. Business Wig appeared first on Ouno Design.

“Ultra-Ruin is a wooden architectural organism that is growing from the ruins of an abandoned red brick farmhouse in the meeting place of terraced farms and jungle. The weak architecture follows the principles of Open Form and is improvised on the site based on instincts reacting to the presence of jungle, ruin and local knowledge.”

For more photos of Ultra Ruin see Marco’s post here.

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The post Ultra Ruin in Taiwan by Finnish architect Marco Casagrande appeared first on Ouno Design.

Another pleasing structure by Finnish architect Marco Casagrande. (See other projects here.) Called Apelle, it’s made to resemble a boat, and was in fact assembled by local boat carpenters.

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The post Apelle – boat-like house by Finnish architect Marco Casagrande appeared first on Ouno Design.

This Finnish church by Anssi Lassila was one of the reasons for starting this blog, and maybe that’s why, paradoxically, it got forgetten – it already seemed to be here.

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The post Kärsämäki church, Finland appeared first on Ouno Design.

Western European churches, especially those near or in shipping towns, often suspended a model ship from the ceiling as a symbol of good luck for sailors. The practice is probably most common in Denmark, but is fairly widespread.

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The post Hanging ships appeared first on Ouno Design.

Alvar Aalto’s Villa Mairea in Noormarkku, Finland, built between 1937 and 1939 as a rural retreat, is considered one of the greatest houses of the 20th century. Japanese architect Shigeru Ban, who curated a major retrospective of Aalto’s work at the Barbican in London in 2007, says photographs give no real sense of Aalto’s buildings.

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The post Aalto’s Villa Mairea in Finland appeared first on Ouno Design.

The Chen House in North Taiwan, design and constructed by Finnish architect Marco Casagrande and Taiwanese architect Frank Chen, was built for an older couple who wanted to retire to the country and grow bamboo and cherry trees – on a flood plain also beset by hurricanes and earthquakes.

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The post Chen House in Taiwan by Marco Casagrande/Frank Chen appeared first on Ouno Design.

It’s strangely gratifying when a design or craft tradition thought to have arisen autochthonous in one place and from one people turns out to have a far more mongrel origin. In my experience, when looking at artisanal and other design, it seems that cultural borrowing and hybridity are overwhelmingly the rule rather than the exception and purity has nothing to do with it.

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The post Rya rugs appeared first on Ouno Design.

Magical kindergarten in Tromso, Norway, by Norwegian architecture firm 70° N. Via contemporist via trendinsights.

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The post Finland! appeared first on Ouno Design.

On a hot day in Vancouver, I was thinking of this hotel. The Jukkasjarvi Ice Hotel in Sweden is rebuilt every year, always to a different design but always from ice and always with blankets of reindeer hide (sustainably produced nearby).

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The post Ice. appeared first on Ouno Design.