Tag Archives: CityLab.com

Games: The Scandinavian Zen Of The “Townscaper” Video “Toy” App (CityLab)

July 24, 2020 She Seeks Serene Leave a comment

BLOOMBERG CITYLAB (JULY 23, 2020) – Users say they enjoy Townscaper’s calm ambiance, with no background music apart from the occasional plips and plops of material falling into the digital ocean, and they derive particular pleasure from the simple mechanics of the game — left click: you build something, right click: you destroy it.

When Oskar Stalberg announced the release of Townscaper a few weeks ago, he made a point of calling it a “toy” rather than a video game — because it has no goal apart from the sheer enjoyment and satisfaction you get from seeing a pretty town rising from the sea as you click.

Townscaper Website

Even though Stalberg had figured people would enjoy his creation, he hadn’t predicted the following it would gain among both designers and game developers — and what they would create with it. So far, the $5.99 game has been met with overwhelmingly positive reviews (more than 2,600 versus 35 negative ones).

Cities, Health, Media, Videos

Post-Covid Cities: “Fear In An Elevator” (CityLab)

Video June 24, 2020 She Seeks Serene Leave a comment

As offices and businesses around the world slowly begin to reopen, the spotlight turns to one of the most traditionally uninteresting forms of transportation: the elevator. Modern cities are intrinsically reliant on these vertical transports which, in light of the global pandemic, can carry new risk factors.

Health, Home Design, Homes, Reviews, Society

Post-Coronavirus Life: Bathroom Design And Hygiene Will Improve, While Bidet Sales Increase

April 13, 2020 She Seeks Serene Leave a comment

From a CityLab online article (April 10, 2020):

What might that mean for the bathrooms of the post-coronavirus world? Americans have already demonstrated a keen fixation with this household feature: In the last 50 years, the number of home bathrooms per person has doubled. One could easily see the lavatory-building boom accelerate further as future homeowners keep the needs of the self-quarantined in mind. And many have speculated that sales of bidet attachments will surge as toilet-paper shortages encourage Americans to embrace this more sustainable alternative.

Alter predicted that disease-avoidance would rise to the fore of bathroom design a few years ago, when he observed the traumatizing effects of the 2003 SARS outbreak on Toronto, which killed 44 people. But home design in general — and bathroom design in particular — has long been influenced by infectious disease.

The modern bathroom developed alongside outbreaks of tuberculosis, cholera and influenza; its standard fixtures, wallcoverings, floorings, and finishes were implemented, in part, to promote health and hygiene in the home at a time of widespread public health concerns.

Architecture, History, Home Design, Homes, Reviews

Design: The History Behind “Two-Up, Two-Down” London Row Houses

January 10, 2020 She Seeks Serene Leave a comment

From a CityLab online article:

From the outside, London’s row houses have an eclectic variety of ornament, and they range in scale from palatial to boxy. But inside, they are pretty much all configured the same way. That’s because from the late 17th century up until the First World War, most residential buildings here cleaved very close to a model found across English cities: the terraced house, known in its most condensed, emblematic form as the “two-up, two-down.”

For a city that’s long been the repository of vast commercial, imperial, and industrial wealth, this might seem a very modest template. However, it is one that can be easily scaled up, points out Edward Denison, associate professor at the Bartlett School of Architecture and author of The Life of the British Home: An Architectural History.

“What’s extraordinary, in London in particular, is that you can find very grand houses in places such as Carlton House Terrace, with vast rooms and very high ceilings, that are still essentially two-up, two-downs with extra floors added,” says Denison. “Then you go to working-class terraced housing in places like Greenwich, and find a very different scale and quality of fittings, but essentially the same configuration.

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Reviews, Transportation

Future Of City Mobility: Revel Electric Mopeds Offer App-Based Utility And Affordability

September 7, 2019 She Seeks Serene Leave a comment

From CityLab.com online article:

Compared to the toylike, rule-flouting, sidewalk-cluttering kick-scooters, proper motor scooters also promise to be a more regulated—and officially legitimized—form of urban transportation. “It rides and parks in the street and flows through traffic, completely off sidewalks,” says Frank Reig, CEO of Revel. “You’re part of the traffic lane and have a license plate.”

To get started, the company requires a scan of your license, accompanied by an in-app selfie, to go through a $19 background check approval. What you don’t need is a motorcycle license, or any prior experience piloting these kinds of vehicles. And that could prove to be a challenge for some.

The electric mopeds that Revel uses in D.C. are made by the Chinese company NIU; they sell about $3,000 to $5,000 if you want your own, and they are similar in price and capabilities to their gas-powered Vespa cousins. They have a range of about 60 miles and can go about 30 miles per hour—fast enough to keep up with traffic in the city.

Design, Homes, Reviews

Future Of Housing: Are Prefab Homes Delivered (Free) By Amazon An Answer To The Affordable Housing Shortage?

August 20, 2019 She Seeks Serene Leave a comment

From a CityLab.com online article:

Allwood Eagle Point Prefabricated House interior On Amazon — Allwood Eagle Point | 1108 SQF Cabin Kit

Is there a future for Amazon’s mail-order housing market? There is now a wide range of DIY home kits from multiple third-party sellers available on the site, ranging from bare-bones cabinettes to a two-story container house and even a pre-fab modular home for $105,000. They’ve enjoyed a deluge of media coverage, and curious Amazon users are peppering manufacturers with questions. And the market is certainly ready: With solo living on the rise and a deepening nationwide housing shortage, demand for smaller, cheaper places to live is sure to grow in the coming years.

North America’s affordable housing shortage could serve as the same economic rationale for Amazon’s mail-order house business. As housing prices skyrocket in places like Los Angeles and Boston and developable urban land becomes increasingly scarce, an affordable build-your-own-house kit could be just the fix for many households. (And since the company is often blamed for boosting real-estate prices in Seattle and now Northern Virginia, it might be karmically appropriate for Amazon to get in on the solution side to the affordable housing crisis.)

Amazon listing for Allwood Eagle Point house:

https://www.amazon.com/Allwood-Eagle-Point-1108-Cabin/dp/B00LYGIEU2/ref=pd_sbs_469_7?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=B00LYGIEU2&pd_rd_r=57851efa-26b4-41a6-87ea-d317aae84072&pd_rd_w=Tu7el&pd_rd_wg=kzayz&pf_rd_p=1c11b7ff-9ffb-4ba6-8036-be1b0afa79bb&pf_rd_r=4YF61YGPKTMACBM6G7Z5&psc=1&refRID=4YF61YGPKTMACBM6G7Z5

Leisure, Recreation

Boomers Bicycles: The 1970’s California Beach Cruisers Created Today’s Fat-Tired Vacation Rides

August 15, 2019 She Seeks Serene Leave a comment

From a CityLab.com online article:

McNeely trademarked the term “California Beach Cruiser” in 1976, when he was 21 years old. He started selling the bikes at his store, with the tagline “comfort, durability, and nostalgia.” They caught on. After the Los Angeles Times wrote a syndicated story about McNeely’s new entrepreneurial niche in biking, McNeely started getting bags of mail from potential buyers. “We couldn’t build enough of them each night to supply the next day’s demand. There’s no way I was going to be able to sell the bikes across the country.”

If you hit the beach this summer, you’ll see them. Fat tires. Wide handlebars. Candy-colored retro-looking frames.

That particular kind of bicycle is known as a “beach cruiser.” While it looks like a nostalgic holdover from the Eisenhower era, the bikes that ramble along boardwalks of America’s beach towns were born in mid-1970s. And, as Marketplace chronicled a few years back, they found their way to the beach thanks to the efforts of one man.