I was perusing Maine Home and Design the other day and fell upon an ad for an architecture firm I just love. Van Dam Architecture and Design does absolutely beautiful and thoughtful work, with careful consideration of site, context, and materials in each project. You can check out more images here, and here are a few of my favorites:

Are you a fan of A-Frame homes? If so, you simply MUST head over to Heath & the B.L.T. boys’ large collection of A-Frame images on flickr! You’ll be in A-Frame heaven!

I admit it, I am a relative newbie to Twitter, even though Design Public has been tweeting for quite some time. Who are your favorite design tweeps that I might like to follow? Today I found this cool Mexican house, via styleture via freshome, designed by 7X Taller de Arquitectura.

At first glance, I thought this might be cargotecture, i.e. a house made of shipping containers, because of the shape of the second floor on the right side. I wonder if the forms created by making buildings out of shipping containers is starting to influence the style and form of buildings that contain no containers? Or is it a coincidence? Do you think the style gleaned more inspiration from international style and designers like Rem Koolhaas (I’m thinking Villa Dall’ava) or Corbu (I’m thinking a little Villa Savoye)?  Is it a combo? Am I the world’s worst architecture analyst? In any case, I’d love to see an inspiration board for this very interesting modern house. What do you think?

photos via freshome

When I was writing the post about Jenga buildings the other day, I had not seen the photos of the Axis Viana Hotel from the front. It’s interesting how different the feel is, as the horizontal is exaggerated and manipulated , while the shot I shared before accentuates the vertical when it is viewed from the narrow side. Also, this shot shows the rhythm of the window spacing and how it relates to the larger lines of the building. At this angle there is almost a mirrored UPC code thing happening (to my bleary eyes anyhow):

Also, because of budget overruns mostly due to an underground pool, the interiors the lead architect designed were cut from the project. This area seems nice in its simplicity, though most of its appeal can be credited to the architecture:

While I find this stairway appealing…

…this boring area next to it reminds me of the Naug Lounge at the A-School at UVA in the 1990s-early 2000s. For those of you who never had the pleasure, this is NOT a compliment:

photos via axishoteisegolfe.com

Good news! If you do not yet have your tickets to the Dwell on Design 2008 exhibition in Los Angeles, our friends at Dwell are now offering free passes to Hatch readers (free entrance to the exhibition only).

To get the goods you’ll need this code: BDODEC.

To register, follow this link: http://www.dwell.com/peopleplaces/conferences/17691009.html. All the details about the event can be found here. Enjoy!