While living in San Diego a few years back I had a 400-square-foot studio apartment in the University Heights district. In an effort to conserve space I bought a sofa bed from IKEA, a cleverly designed piece with wheels that locked into place, making it easy to fold and unfold. I soon realized that I was usually either too busy or too tired to make the change (or to replace the upholstery with bed clothes), and would end up either sleeping on the ‘sofa’, or entertaining on the ‘bed’.

Gary Chang would no doubt be disgusted by my inefficient use of space. In 1988 Chang, a Hong Kong architect, paid $45,000 for a 344-square-foot apartment in Hong Kong’s Sai Wan Ho district. It was the same apartment he had lived in with his entire family (6 people in all, including 1 tenant) since he was 14 years old. What followed over the years was a series of transformations, all with the same goal of maximizing space and creating more flexibility of use

The latest iteration, completed in 2006 and dubbed “Domestic Transformer” by Chang, has 24 possible configurations, allowing for a variety of uses – living room, library, kitchen, laundry, lounge, spa, dining area, wet bar, and a screening room complete with a hammock – achieved with a series of sliding wall units on overhead tracks that shift to create and reveal completely different rooms.

Chang, who operates the architecture firm EDGE Design Institute out of Hong Kong, hopes his creation will inspire others, particularly developers, to be more creative in their approach to space planning, helping to alleviate the overcrowding and space shortage problems prevalent in many Hong Kong homes.

This is the home the Kardashians would want if they had real money. But, alas, the owner of this apartment in Amsterdam, the Netherlands has the kind of money that could book Kim to wear a diamond bikini and collect coats at the door of a Sweet 16 party hosted at this place; and when you have that kind of money, you can hire Marcel Wanders to give you custom made EVERYTHING. This particular space features hand-carved wood paneling, custom plasterwork, Bisazza tile, hand-laid floors in Wenge, Walnut and Afromasia and custom furniture from appointment only showrooms and the designer himself. And, clearly, that’s just scratching the surface of the luxuriousness we’re talking about here.

Marcel Wanders is the type of designer that architecture professors and scholars hate, but none of those people have ever snorted medical grade cocaine off of a hand polished titanium ANYTHING while Russian models hold their drink. We’re not suggesting that Mr. Wanders has either, but that’s happening right now in at least one of his spaces, promise. That’s not an indictment; there is just something about the opulence and theater of Mr. Wanders’ interiors that literally demands you submit to the indulgences of the design.

All images copyright Marcel Wanders

Southern Comfort Chair

Organ Collection

Label Whore Table

Binary Chair

Bird Eye Bed

Suspended Collection

ABC Chair

See more at BRC Designs

By Veronica Christina

Threatened with demolition due to lack of attendance, the closure of the 100 yr-old, Mary, Help of Christians Church would have displaced hundreds of worshipers in the tiny German town of Goldscheuer.  Enter Stefan Strumbel.

The artist approached the church with an idea of a thoroughly modern intervention. Most known for his colorful cuckoo clocks and crucifixes sporting hand grenedes and toy riffles, Strumbel’s art analyzes the clichéd notions of “home”– drawing the viewer close with candy-soaked colors and shiny textures then provoking them with controversial, often very personal, content.
The church walls, painted in dark gray stripes, point toward the altar where a 20-ft high Madonna holds an infant Jesus in her arms. The carved, wooden crucifixion scene, once hanging above the pulpit, has been removed and will be outfitted with multi-colored LED lights before being rehung. Cartoon-like thought clouds flank the entrance–the light from candles placed underneath will serve as a symbol of silent prayer.  Since it’s re-opening on July 1, the church has seen a 60% increase in attendance. “Maybe some will find this blasphemous,” says Barbara Martin, an architect from the Archdiocese of Freiburg in Der Spiegel, “But it will always be provocative.”

Read more.

See more of Stefan Strumbel.

I love Philippe Starck, but I have to say I never thought much about his sex life. I mean, usually he’d cross my mind somewhere between “Who can I bribe to drive me to drive me to Daly City” and “Where the fuck are the Brita filters,” while wandering the aisles at Target. That is until I got a sneak peak into his home through the brilliant lens of The Selby. Now, I can’t stop thinking about Philippe Starck’s sex life.

Firstly, his wife is a fox. Like in that brown hair, olive skin, big tits and easy smile way that Italian women who drink and eat and do god-knows-what-else with reckless abandon are (and her name is Jasmine, come on). Secondly, their house is filled with taxidermy, which is weird, but it hardly qualifies as the weirdest shit that takes up residence in there. That might be the wig collection, glass eyeballs or refrigerator filled entirely with cakes.
But whatever the verdict is on that, it’s quite clear that the Starcks get it on and get it on good. And it probably involves good champagne, their amazing silver soaking tub, gourmet honey, their wig collection and a stuffed polar bear. Think on that next time you’re in Target.

By Veronica Christina

Traveling is awesome. Traveling to the world’s destination cities is even better. Traveling to awesome cities and having to dip into your child’s college fund for a hotel room you only sleep in, not so much. In an effort to save our cash and provide us with the oh-so-photographic novelty of touching all four sides of our hotel room at once, The Arch Group has designed Sleep Box. A mobile cube (2m (l) x 1.4m (w) x 2.3m (h)) made of wood and MDF,  SleepBox was designed to “allow very efficient use of available space and, if necessary, a quick change of layout”, making it perfect for places where demand dictates need. The hostel-specific SleepBox features bunk beds, flip-out tables and sockets for computers or phone chargers and not much else.

These tiny cubicles are already gracing the airports and train stations of Europe allowing for a safe and cheap alternative to the big city hotels. They’ve become such a hit that Japanese government officials are in talks to provide all public train stations in Tokyo with a few – proving once again that size doesn’t matter.

Boeing engineer Steve Sauer spent 7 years turning his 182-square-foot basement condo in Seattle into a compact, hyper efficient, three-level loft.

What I really wanted was one place with exactly what I needed and wanted. Quality is more important than quantity for me, and extra space only a problem. I tend to like things in their place.

The space contains two beds, a bathroom with a shower, a soaking tub (set into the floor underneath the entrance doorway), a full kitchen with a dishwasher, dining table, storage for two bikes, and a TV lounge. Sort of a low-tech (and even smaller) version of Gary Chang’s Domestic Transformer in Hong Kong, this type of dwelling might become the norm as more and more people move to already crowded cities around the world.

By Erin Feher

I am so over sleeping on couches. I don’t care how good the party is, how old the friends are or how cozy the cushions.  I’ve spent more than enough nights sharing a three-foot-wide hunk of ultra-suede with a string of past crushes, clinging to the romantic notion of body heat as my bare feet poke out from beneath a cat-hair-covered throw.

So maybe it’s no surprise that I’ve grown into a serious hotel girl. And not just a king-sized bed and soaking tub kinda hotel girl—my hotels gotta make me squeal with design delight. No two rooms the same, bold wallpaper, custom light-fixtures, head-scratching art, perfectly curated vintage accessories….

My next trip is to NYC, and while the hotels may be pricey, the cost seems perfectly fair considering I don’t have a single friend who has managed to move-on-up to an apartment with a guest room (the ones whose own beds aren’t crammed between their sofa and their stove have made it big).

So I’m heading straight over to SoHo, where between Prince, Spring and Lafayette Streets I will find the Crosby Street Hotel. This is the first US property for Firmdale, a UK-based boutique hotel operator with six unbelievably stylish hotels in London. Headed by husband and wife Tim and Kit Kemp (adorable? Yes), wife Kit has quite an eye for design and outfits all the hotels herself.

The rooms, lobby, restaurant and bar are each decked out with details that will more than make up for all those nights of couch surfing.

For more design-to-die-for hotels around the globe, check out the brand new 2010 edition of The Design Hotels Book. Don’t leave home without it.