Cool Concrete Docking Stations for the iPhone 5.

Modern and industrial looking, these are concrete docking stations for the iPhone. A minimalist design created by Jordan Castro of the Massachusetts-based company Zeitgeistfactory, it is handcrafted from a proprietary blend of cement and recycled stone dust which is a by-product of the countertop industry. Each dock is designed to stand vertically or horizontally. The removable concrete peg fits snugly into place via two silicone o-rings.

In white concrete:





In dark concrete:





dimensions: W6.5" X D3"

White or dark concrete. $35
buy it here

Concrete Audio - Elegant Speakers Made of Cement, Sand and Water.

Concrete Audio is a Loudspeaker factory in Germany whose founders love music. They design and produce unique loudspeaker systems of timeless elegance and impressive dynamics - housed in, you guessed it, concrete. These speaker systems are produced in a limited edition in Germany.




The following information is from their website:
The Materials


Cement, water, sand are the essential ingredients of a material whose recipe was already known during the Roman Empire - concrete.



Refined by a variety of additional ingredients, concrete in modern times has evolved into a high-tech product with highly varied properties and applications. Resilient, durable, and pourable into almost any form and especially, largely resistant to vibration.

Concrete forms, by its very nature, the perfect base for the housing of our loudspeakers.



The curing process makes each a unique loudspeaker - identical in shape and surface quality, but individually in terms of the grain.

The surface provides for several options of sealing to emphasize the natural feel of the material.

The Idea


The idea of a housing made out of concrete came to us during a conversation about the ultimate sound for loud-speakers. We concluded: concrete is perfect yet hard to restrain. Thus an equally elaborate and passionate experiment began, executed and carried out by superb hand-craftsmanship and attention to detail.



After several years of development and numerous test runs, we finally found the ideal solutions for the design of the mold, the construction and the special mix of the materials and founded the Loudspeaker factory Concrete Audio.



The design of the model N1 consistently meets functional requirements without neglecting the demands of a timeless, aesthetic use of forms.

Each individual piece is worked on individually until it meets requirements for the highest quality.

The Sound
The sound of a loudspeaker driver (sound generator) decisively depends on the quality of the loudspeaker housing.



Unlike, for example, the body of a musical instrument, a good loudspeaker enclosure should not vibrate because modern high-performance drivers operate linearly, reproducing exactly the sound information, which electrically has been transmitted to them.

Commercial housing made of wood or plastic, have their own resonant frequency. Yet at certain points of frequency bands, the housing starts to oscillate, i.e. vibrate, and thus reinforcing exactly that particular frequency. Additionally, this phenomena forms integer multiples of this particular frequency creating additional vibrations (overtones). This facilitates unnatural changes of the overall frequency spectrum. The result is a distorted sound by means of basically, a flawed housing.

We manufacture the housing of our loudspeakers made from special concrete with a compressive strength of at least 30 N/mm². This is harder than conventional concrete curbs. The amorphous structure and the high specific gravity of this material reliably prevents oscillation of the housing. By means of a special casting process, the housing is cast out of one single body with all sides closed and sealed.



This monolithic structure is lined internally with different sound-dampening material made of tightening yet elastic layers to prevent any reflections.



For reasons of sound, we build our housing completely sealed and without a bass reflection-tuning. This way, we achieve an extremely low factor of distortion and superior accuracy even at very high levels.

The drivers, or undercarriage used, in addition to the characteristics of the housing, determine the quality of the loudspeaker-system decisively.

We use the Scan-Speak drivers.
The Danish company Scan-Speak is known worldwide for its high level of innovation and uncompromising quality. Their high-end drivers, built into our systems, are characterized by absolute accuracy and fidelity. This allows us to equip the signal path with a very small number of selected components. We use a 6dB filter of very high quality, fitted with copper foil coils and silver-gold capacitors.



The result is a largely loss-free signal path and a very direct control of the linearly coordinated and selected pairs of precision-drivers. Combined with our high-strength concrete housings, we produce a high quality loudspeaker system –

TECH­NI­CAL DATA for Concrete Audio® MODEL N1.
Housing: Concrete, monolithically poured
System: 2-way closed-box, passive
Frequency range: 34 Hz – 40.000 Hz
Power handling: 100 W
Sensitivity: 83 dB (1 W/1 m)
Total Harmonic Distortion:
< 1% bei 90 dB SPL (1 m) für f > 100 Hz
Nominal impedance: 4 Ohm
Crossover frequency: 6 dB/2,000 Hz
Ports Single-wiring/bi-wiring
Components: Scan-Speak, Kimber Kable, Mundorf, WBT
Dimensions: Height: 110 cm (43,3 in)
Width: 23 cm (9,1 in)
Depth: 33 cm (13 in)
Net weight: 80 kg (176 lbs)

The tech­ni­cal data of the Concrete Au­dio ® N1 is the re­sult of an ex­ten­sive acoustic sur­vey by the Fraun­hofer In­sti­tute for Dig­i­tal Me­dia Tech­nol­ogy IDMT, Il­me­nau. The data was charted us­ing a low re­flec­tion cham­ber of the Class 1 (ac­cord­ing to DIN EN ISO 3745) to Re­quire­ments of DIN 60268-5.




Experience CONCRETE AUDIO
Convince yourself of the quality of CONCRETE AUDIO Loudspeaker-Systems and make an appointment for an exclusive listening-test of the N1 in our showroom in the city of the Classics, in Weimar. They offer you the opportunity to experience our loudspeakers in your own rooms.

Concrete Audio®
Eduard-Rosenthal-Str. 30
99423 Weimar
Germany

Telefon: +49 36422 20 48 51
Telefax: +49 36422 20 48 54
info@concrete-audio.com

Tepoztlan Lounge Bungalow by Cadaval & Sola-Morales

The Tepoztlan Lounge designed by Barcelona-based Cadaval & Solà-Morales is a new communal residential development which will consist of 15 bungalows in total when the project is complete. This is the first to be finished and has already won the 2012 BIAU (Ibero-American Architecture Bienal) Prize.




The concrete lounge is sculpted into the landscape - housing an open bar and kitchenette, living areas and dressing rooms - with its layout even incorporating two trees. Each of the bungalows will be different. 'We will work almost as artisans, finding the spots for every bungalow and doing a unique design for each of them,' says Eduardo Solà-Morales.






Tepoztlan, is a small town nestled between rocky cliffs located to the south of Mexico City, 50 kilometers away from the vibrant metropolis. With its well preserved historic center and wild countryside, Tepoztlan is a town of legends and deep cultural roots that has been appreciated by writers, poets, artists and musicians over many decades, turning it into their hometown or weekend retreat. Located in this incredible context and surrounded by an astonishing landscape, the Tepoztlan Lounge is the first building completed of a larger project that also includes a series of bungalows of different sizes and designs, which can be rented by years, months or days. The lounge is set to be a central communal space for leisure in nature, and is located in the perimeter of an incredible lawn; the idiosyncrasy of the project relies on enabling the experience of the carefully manicured lawn while promoting the experience of the wild nature existing in the boundaries of this central space. The project is a negotiation between interior and exterior, a construction of an in between condition, an inhabitable threshold, which becomes the main space of the project; the limits between the open and the content space merge to produce a single architectural entity.





The design establishes three separate living quarters designed in accordance to the 3 activities planned; each of them is a set space defined by its use, but also by a very clear and simple architectural container: the first holds an open bar with a kitchenette, together with a couple of restrooms and dressing rooms; the second is a play area for children that can also be used as a reading room when temperatures drop at night; and finally the largest container is the living area, an enclosed, tempered and comfortable space for conversation, TV, etcetera. But it is the desire to give continuity between these three separate areas where the project is empowered and becomes meaningful; a continuous space, in full contact with the nature but protected from its inclemency is set up not only to expand the enclosed uses, but also to allow new activities to arise.





And it is through the definition of this central space, through the definition of its shape, that the contiguous courtyards are defined; those are as essential to the project as it is the built architecture, and allows constructing as a whole, single spatial experience. At the same time that the three built containers give continuity to the central space by mans of their use and space, the adjacent patios qualify it, while providing diversity and idiosyncrasy to open space. The design of the swimming pool is part of this same intervention, and responds to the desire to characterize the spaces; its formalization necessarily resonates the layout of the lounge, while incorporating to its nature the possibility of a multiplicity of ways of using water, and plunging on it.





The building is located as a plinth valuing the views of the mountains. The building wants to be respectful to the existing context, and understands that the vegetation and life at open air are the real protagonist. Two impressive trees that are in place are incorporated within the layout of the lounge, as if they were part of the program itself. The Tepoztlan Lounge is constructed in concrete not just for being a inexpensive and labor intensive material in Mexico and to minimize its maintenance, but also to expose its structural simplicity and neutrality towards the astonishing nature.



Project Data:
Name of the project: Tepoztlán Lounge.
Name of the Office: Cadaval & Solà-Morales.
Project: Eduardo Cadaval & Clara Solà-Morales.
Collaborators: Eugenio Eraña Lagos, Tomas Clara, Manuel Tojal.
Structural Engineering: Ricardo Camacho de la fuente.
Location: Tepoztlán, Morelos, México.
Área: 250sqm.
Photos: © Diego Berruecos, © Sandra Pereznieto, © Cadaval & Solà-Morales

Periodic Concrete Coffee Table by James DeWulf Is A Formula For Hip Home Decor

James DeWulf of DeWulf Concrete (the very same craftsman who made this awesome concrete combination ping pong table/dining table) has designed and crafted this Periodic Coffee Table of low relief concrete with a powder coated steel frame.



The elements relief cast into the table are set in a square of polished concrete and are shallow enough so as not to tip over a glass or vase filled with liquid.




Measuring 54" long x 30" wide x 16" tall, the contemporary coffee table is available with a 1" or 1.5" concrete debossed and polished top (also available with a plain concrete slab top if you'd refer not to have it with the periodic table of elements) in either natural or smoke colors.






With an appointment-only studio in Santa Monica, the high-end precast furniture and architectural products from James DeWulf is available by contacting him via email or phoning him at 310-315-7100. Select pieces can be found at H.D Buttercup and other reputable furniture dealers.