Qdesign | Expanding Your View

Design | contact sport

2010-05-06T11:36:00.000-07:00

2010-01-15T11:26:00.001-08:00

Totally Devoted to Q
That headline might leave you humming, and who could blame you? We've been humming a happy and productive tune here at Qdesign.
Here's one high note to hold as we begin a new year: Working with DEMCO Library Interiors, in fewer than nine months, Qdesign developed TotaLibra, a coordinated shelving and furniture library system. It's a beautiful and dynamic offering that blends a steel base with wood and various other materials. Qdesign helped DEMCO find manufacturing partners to bring the design to life. TotaLibra's sophisticated European design influence blends with a symphony of harmonious and functional features for today’s fast-changing libraries.
TotaLibra made its impressive debut at this week's mid-winter ALA show in Boston to a prolonged standing ovation. We invite you to visit our website and Facebook page to view TotaLibra photos from the show. And come back often to see what we're planning for an encore!
Your friends with perfect "pitch" at Qdesign

Google Phone!

2010-01-08T11:47:00.001-08:00

Attune featured in the Hon D.C. showroom

2009-11-23T06:30:00.000-08:00

The HON Company Revitalizes Washington D.C. Showroom.
The 6,700 square-foot showroom also houses a number of additional new HON products, including the Attune Laminate Series by Qdesign.

2009-11-20T11:09:00.001-08:00

About this talk
Danish architect Bjarke Ingels rockets through photo/video-mingled stories of his eco-flashy designs. His buildings not only look like nature -- they act like nature: blocking the wind, collecting solar energy -- and creating stunning views.

About Bjarke Ingels
Theory meets pragmatism meets optimism in Bjarke Ingels' architecture. His big-think approach is informed by a hands-on, ground-up understanding of the needs of a building's occupants and… Full bio and more links

2009-11-20T10:40:00.000-08:00

National Geographic's awesome "Ultimate Factories." Check out this excerpt from their inside look at an Ikea factory, where we can see what makes the LACK table so rigid: board-on-frame technology, similar to what's inside hollow-core doors.
It's one thing to understand the technology, which is not that complicated; but it's super-cool to see it being cranked out at the factory.

2009-11-17T10:54:00.000-08:00

COLORLESS_eco friendly package

A convex logo substitutes colorfully sprayed can.
Naked can help to reduce air and water pollution occurred in its coloring process. It also reduces energy and effort to separate toxic color paint from aluminum in recycling process. Huge amount of energy and paint required to manufacture colored cans will be saved.
Instead of toxic paint, manufacturers process aluminum with a pressing machine that indicates brand identity on surface.
http://www.behance.net/Gallery/COLORLESS/342938

What’s It Like Where You Work?

2009-11-10T06:43:00.000-08:00

Leadership, trust, and communication are more important than ever, but if your organization is like many today, the intense focus on cost-containment and fears about the economy dominate the conversation. See if this thought-provoking video resonates with what it's like in your company. (created by Team Builders Plus)

What is Architecture?

2009-11-09T15:26:00.000-08:00

Architecture from MAYAnMAYA on Vimeo.

This is a short film by MAYA Design about architecture in its broadest sense. This film is a companion piece to our film about information. For more information visit: http://www.maya.com/the-feed/what-is-information-architecture

Trillions

2009-11-09T15:13:00.000-08:00

video from Maya Research that illustrates the hugeness of our digital future: trillions of networked computers representing all scales of information and objects will make up the edgeless ecology of information that we'll be floating in. This is but a small preview of a larger project, so be sure to stay tuned.

Trillions from MAYAnMAYA on Vimeo.

This is a short film (a fast paced preview of a larger effort) by MAYA Design created to put some perspective on the invisible but fast approaching challenges and opportunities in the pervasive computing age. For more information please visit: http://www.maya.com/practices/research

2009-10-19T08:38:00.000-07:00

"Advertising adds value to a product by changing our perception, rather than the product itself. Rory Sutherland makes the daring assertion that a change in perceived value can be just as satisfying as what we consider “real” value -- and his conclusion has interesting consequences for how we look at life."

Chao & Eero: Our Nature

2009-08-31T21:48:00.001-07:00

Chao-Hsien Kuo and Eero Hintsanen are jewellery designers and artists of the new generation who have created their own distinctive style over the past decade.

Their works have been recently seen mainly in the international arena, but this autumn Chao-Hsien Kuo and Eero Hintsanen wish to please and surprise viewers also in Finland. The exhibition Chao & Eero - Our Nature seeks to offer a memorable overview of the multifaceted world of jewellery.

Re-interpreting Nature: Finnish Design on Show in October in Budapest

2009-08-31T21:46:00.000-07:00

A dialogue with nature has been a prime force throughout the history of Finnish design. In the early 20th century design actively referred to the motifs and metaphors of nature.

During the 1950s and 1960s a reputation was established that is still valued and appreciated internationally and the beginning of the 21st century has introduced new currents in Finnish design. Rapid technological progress has made possible things that could not even be dreamed about ten years ago. Finland has become an international leader in technology, while the wilderness regions of Finland fascinate and attract growing numbers of tourists.

Design Forum Finland's exhibition Re-interpreting Nature studies how Finnish design of the 2000s addresses interpretations of nature. It presents the ways in which designers perceive the ever-changing world around them.

The dialogue of design and nature is changing. Do the themes of design, art and architecture still reflect the colours, patterns, rhythms and textures of the northern forests? The selected exhibits represent different perspectives on interpreting nature in the 21st century. Insight, conscience, essence, interface, surface and inter-urban are the perspectives for outlining and perceiving relationships with nature.

The exhibition features one-off works of applied art along with products manufactured in series, technological innovations and new applications of traditional methods and materials.

The Auto as Architect's Inspiration

2009-08-31T21:45:00.001-07:00

Collecting exotic cars is practically a prerequisite for celebrities, but Jerry Seinfeld and Jay Leno have no patent on that pastime. Frank Lloyd Wright, the architect whose birth in 1867 preceded the gasoline-powered automobile's by about 20 years, was an early adopter of the internal-combustion engine and an auto aficionado all his life.

He was also eerily prophetic in understanding how the car would transform the American landscape, and his designs reflect this understanding. Wright often designed both for and around automobiles, and his masterpiece, the Guggenheim Museum in New York, owes its most distinctive feature, the spiral of its rotunda, to his love for the automobile.

This year is the 50th anniversary of both Wright's death and the opening of the Guggenheim, which is presenting an exhibition of his work, "Frank Lloyd Wright: From Within Outward." After a half-century, the Guggenheim still stands as a testament to how the automobile helped transform architectural space.

NASA Sustainability Base

2009-08-31T21:38:00.000-07:00

Earlier this week, NASA held a ceremonial groundbreaking and dedication event for what is expected to become the highest-performing building in the federal government. The new, environmentally friendly building at NASA's Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, Calif. is being named "Sustainability Base" in honor of the first humans to walk on the surface of another world from their Tranquility Base Apollo 11 lunar landing site 40 years ago.

It will serve as a highly efficient collaborative support facility providing workspace for a wide range of NASA's aeronautics and space exploration missions.

The new building is designed to achieve a platinum rating under the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) new construction standards for environmentally sustainable construction developed by the U.S. Green Building Council. The building will feature near zero net energy consumption, use 90 percent less potable water than conventionally built buildings of equivalent size and reduce building maintenance costs.

The building will showcase some of NASA's most advanced intelligent control technologies originally developed to support the nation's human and robotic space exploration missions.