Bullet This Is No School

Learning is working best when kids are into subjects of study that match their interests. It also works well when projects are realistic.

Also there has to be place for the making. It should be possible to make prototypes, do experiments, program shows and produce goods to express yourself.

This Is No School is the world on a stamp. A meeting square, workshops, labs, a theater, a fram, sporting facilities, restaurants, shops and a hotel.

Bullet 80's T's

For my Youtube channel 2kB of Fun, I made several T-shirts based on logo graphics from 80's video games and electronic gadgets.

Bullet Retro Space 4.0

Fourth incarnation of the Retro Space arcade cabinet in aluminium
2017


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Bullet Pixel Art

Pixel art illustration for the book 2kB of Fun
2017


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Bullet 2kB of Fun

Never has a consumer electronic product seen such an extravagant variety in case design as early handheld games from 1976-1985. Never have computer games been so beautifully reduced to their essence as these handhelds offered. Never did 2Kb of memory offer so much fun.

1983 was the best year with top titles like Amidar, Astro Thunder 7, Burger Time, Dig Dug, Ms. Pac-Man, Q*bert, Super-Cobra and Zaxxon.

Martijn Koch, architect from the Netherlands bought 180 of the best handheld games, photographed them, took them apart, analysed their tech, and put all the material together in this stunning book, a catalog like you never saw before.

Bullet DIY Arcade Cabinet

Een plat pakket doe-het-zelf versie van Retro Space
2013


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Bullet STRP Festival 2011

Photo report of the STRP Festival 2011 by Mick Visser
2011


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Bullet Katakana Converter

Tool to convert Rōmaji, Katakana and ASCII/UTF-8
2011


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Bullet STRP Festival 2010

Photo report of the STRP Festival 2010 by Mick Visser
2010


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Bullet British Landlord

Luxury villas at the Berlaer site in Helmond
2010


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Bullet M+ M- ???

Redesignme.com is a website where designers are challenged to create new designs for certain products.

Garton Jones used redesignme.com to search for a redesign of the Ativa 10 Digit Desk Calculator.

I'm always puzzled by the fact most calculators still function like the early 1970 designs. A time when chip logic was very expensive, and the amount of components was kept to a minimum. Today's standard micro controller is way more powerful. So my primary goal was to create a new set of basic functionality.

Which means I had to redesign the layout of the buttons first. The design itself continues proved ingredients like injection mould plastic, the perfect shape of PTT's Zurich telephone and modern white OLED matrix displays.

My own challenge was to make the design in one hour on a Friday afternoon.

The result: a top 3 note among 109 redesigns. "Your redesign was part of my top 3. Very well done! Yours sincerely, Charlie Garton-Jones"

Bullet Creative Factory

Interior photographs of creative companies in a former Philips factory
2010


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Bullet Future Space

26 arcade cabinets for Dutch Game Garden
2010


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Bullet Lost in Navigation

Tokyo is a breathtaking city. Most metropolises have 1 urban railway network. Easy. Tokyo, the biggest metropolis on Earth, is a lot more complex.
The city has 2 official subway companies, the national railway operates several lines that can be considered metro lines as well, and there are tens of private operated railways that serve may areas just outside the central part of the city. Another problem is that many transfer stations use different station names on each line connected.

Creating a understandable subway map for this city is extremely complex. Should it be schematic, or geographic realistic? When is it easier to have a short walk than to switch lines?

This metro map for Tokyo only shows the most important lines for visitors of the city. That is already 25 lines! All distances are realistic, and the connections to Airports and Shinkansen trains are clearly visible. The parks that give a good orientation in the grey urban mass of Tokyo are visible. Icons show the most important landmarks. Matching the million neon lights the map is drawn in a night situation with the lines as glowing neon tubes.

The map is printed on 100x75 cm photo paper in a limited run, an can be ordered. Send an e-mail or call if you are interested to order.

Bullet XXL

A new factory for Kingspan insulation panels at Medel near Tiel
2009


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Bullet Trophy for Men

Result from a weekend workshop at WiSPER in Leuven: A trophy for real men, made from construction beams. The trophy is welded using MIG and metal arc welding (MAW) techniques.

Bullet Burgstede

A new catholic community centre for Heteren
2009


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Bullet Pac Man LACK Hack

One of the most popular IKEA products is the LACK coffee table. It is so cheap, it must be hollow.

I opened the tables, I built in a retro TV computer game by Jakks and added real arcade controls to this game. This way the TV game has a longer life and the Ikea LACK is no longer the boring classic every household owns.

Thanks to Lara Verlaat for Playin Pac-Man.

Bullet Want some Beers?

ZZEF asked me to photograph 2 projects designed by Johan van den Berkmortel for the architecture portfolio of ZZEF.

One project is a beer cafe at the monk brewery Koningshoeve and the other is the Bavaria House in Helmond.

Bullet Monk Bond

8 Apartments for senior citizens in Heteren
2008


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Bullet Black Box

Painter Bert de Haas and salesman in business outfits Chris Hendriks both wanted a new business building in Kesteren. Because of fire regulations it was best to combine the two buildings. Otherwise a big part of the plot was useless.

To preserve each ones identity and to answer the request for a good cantina, both parts of the building were accented by a small tower. These towers contain a special room looking out over the polders of the Betuwe.

The building is clad with anthracite profile sheets to ease the implementation of the detailing and to maximise the abstraction of the black boxes.

I made this design as employer of Bouwkundig ontwerp en adviesburo Van Zeist BV in Opheusden.

Bullet Low Bandwith

Website for Retro Space
2008


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Bullet Retro Space

Modern arcade cabinet for home use
2008


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Bullet Welcome to Andenne

Andenne is a small town on the bank of the Meuse between Namur and Liège. When entering Andenne the city does not impress. The abandoned factory area on the north bank of the Meuse makes a chaotic impression and the river is ignored. In collaboration with Wendy van Rosmalen I designed a new plan for this Europan 9 location.

With out plan we want to give Andenne a face. Between famous cities like Namur, Huy and Liège, Andenne is missing an inherent identity. We chose to multiply the nonchalant character of Belgian building and turn it into a specific typology. Our plan is a framework for development of the area in its own pace. A subtle guidance in building alignment and building heights delivers a varied public space that opens up towards the river Meuse.

A specific part of the assignment was the redesign of Andenne station. Bad attainableness of the platforms, a weird logistic and the uncomfortable public space underneath the viaduct are creating a moody atmosphere. The size of Andenne does not allow a large scale intervention. We choose a very modest solution. We created a square below the tracks to connect al transportation streams. The viaduct is decorated to resemble a living room and is transformed into a roof covering the bus platforms. New buildings surrounding the square size the public space.

Every Belgian wants its own house. Ignoring this feat makes a plan implausible. We go one step further through making the buying of a house resemble the buying of a car. By using a smart basic layout for the houses, every house can suit the needs of very different groups of people. Future change is very easy too. The architecture is a caricature of traditional Belgian building methods, its execution is contemporary and flexible.

Bullet I never promised you a rosegarden

11 Apartments for senior citizens at the Rozenpad in Heteren
2007


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Bullet Little Mermaid

A design for a new metro map for Copenhagen
2006


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Bullet BBQ XL

Veranda extension to house in Beek en Donk
2006


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Bullet Cinderella

While doing a creative portfolio course at the CKE in Eindhoven I worked on a new interpretation of the story of Cinderella.

Thanks to model Christine Nabuurs, to Jeroen Roxs for the workshop location, and to John Körmeling for using his veranda.

Bullet Wanda Wanders

A digital magazine on sustainability, photography, cityscape and opinion
2005


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Bullet Unknown Modernism

Anonymous modernist housing near Faro
2005


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Bullet Ghost World

Photographs of Detroit
2005


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Bullet Fake Wanders

Mixture of the Big Shadow and the Fake Lamp
2004


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Bullet Ants Nest

Hong Kong has little room to built. There is a small piece of land to build on between the water and the mountains. The only option to house the millions of citizens is to use efficient towering blocks. Some area's have a FAR (floor to ground area aspect ratio) of 5 to 10.

Bullet Miniature City

Portrait of the Brandevoort city extension of Helmond
2004


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Bullet Blue Envelope

The Dutch Tax Administration feels like a family business. The atmosphere is open and relaxed. The organization is responsible for the total financial administration of The Netherlands Ltd. Dutch citizens expect professional civil servants. The office at the Quintax location in Apeldoorn expresses the two faces of the Dutch Tax Administration. The building looks severe and mimics the impregnability of Fort Knox. But internal, the building is totally transparent. Walls are exceptions, and voids open the floors to improve contact between employees.

At JHK Architects, I was responsible for the concept of the building. I also worked out most of the technical details.