interiors – Co-Geeking

A Dragon Crawls Down from the Ceiling to Make a Fireplace

May 24, 2023May 7, 2023EppuLeave a comment

A dragon fireplace. A DRAGON. Fireplace!

Twitter Into the Forest Dark Dragon Fireplace

Ok, thinking about it a little longer than half a second, it’s not surprising that there are a number of dragon designs for fireplaces and stoves for both indoors and out, in addition to firepits, fireplace screens, and andirons.

This particular one must be custom work and as such, it cannot be inexpensive. But, dang, is it handsome or what?

By unknown. Found and image via Into the Forest Dark on Twitter.

Out There highlights intriguing art, places, phenomena, flora, and fauna.

Dark Academia: A Moody Celebration of Higher Ed and Cultivation

March 1, 2023December 4, 2022Eppu1 Comment

Have you heard of the style dubbed dark academia? According to Wikipedia, dark academia is “a literary and social media aesthetic and subculture concerned with higher education, writing/poetry, the arts, and classic Greek and Gothic architecture.”

Sounds very geeky and nerdy, doesn’t it? (Apparently, again according to Wikipedia, a number of genre novels are, indeed, cited either as inspiration for or popular among the subculture.)

Well, it seems dark academia is now sufficiently popular that mainstream sites have started catering to its fans. While digging into it, I’ve seen clothing, books (of course), movies (ditto), and PC wallpapers for sale. There are also beginner’s guides, playlists for studying, recommended emoji combos, mood guides, critiques, and opinion pieces. (You know a thing has made it when opinion pieces appear!)

I found dark academia when a DIY / thrifting / home decorating blogger I follow and admire, Sarah Ramberg, published her own take on it for the October 2022 challenge in their Thrift the Look series. Here’s one view of her vignette:

Sadie Seasongoods Dark Academia Challenge

Ramberg used mostly thrift store items to outstanding effect. The crystal skull is in fact a thrifted vodka bottle, and it looks stunning. (It’s my favorite element in her recreation, in fact.)

While dark academia (like its kissing cousin steampunk) is not quite my cup of tea, I found it an interesting version of literary appreciation.

Image by Sarah Ramberg at Sadie Seasongoods

In Here highlights interesting spaces created by our fellow geeks all over the world.

Visual Inspiration: Ruins Don’t Need to Be Grey and Dull

July 13, 2022October 15, 2022Eppu

Ruins and abandoned places are often seen as plain and boring. Granted, the color of untreated, inexpensive rock (which the majority of surviving buildings tend to be made from) often isn’t anything to write home about. But in our fiction, ruined areas don’t need to be austere and grim. You can even find real-life ruins in a variety of styles for inspiration.

For example, houses in Herculaneum famously featured colorful mosaics and painted murals. In addition, paint was generously applied elsewhere, like these pillars and external wall from House of the Relief of Telephus show:

In Sanzhi, Taipei County, Taiwan, clusters of colorful pod houses or UFO houses once stood:

It’s not always humans who have applied the color onto the ruins either. At the ancient Maya site called Bonampak or Ak’e, in the Chiapas area, Mexico, strikingly orange lichen is taking over building facades:

(Check out the Bonampak Wikipedia article for a stunning relief carving and a painted mural!)

In Dutch photographer Roman Robroek’s shots we can see that a ruin definitely need not be grey, blocky, and boring. Partly overrun by nature could mean an almost orderly takeover, like in the photo of a Gothic-style former chapel built at the end of 19th century, below:

Beautiful, brightly colored arches among rubble from the childhood house of Lebanese singer Fairuz (who was born in 1934) in Beirut form a striking contrast to the greenery outside:

Finally, a still strikingly turquoise—if peeling—underside of a round staircase:

It vaguely reminds me of peacock feathers! I wish the photographer gave us a little more information about the history of this place. Browse more via Colossal or at Robroek’s website.

Since they exist in real life, I would be delighted to read about vibrantly colored and visually striking abandoned places in my genre fiction, too.

Images: Herculaneum by Andy Hay via Flickr (CC BY2.0). Sanzhi Pod Houses by mingshah via Flickr. Bonampak by Carsten ten Brink via Flickr (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0). Images by Roman Robroek: Former chapel. Arches at the house of Fairuz. Blue staircase.

Out There is an occasional feature highlighting intriguing art, spaces, places, phenomena, flora, and fauna.

Custom Bookcases with Carvings for a LotR Collection

September 30, 2020September 6, 2020Eppu2 Comments

Now this is a treasure, preciouss! A Finland-based company built these amazing custom bookcases for a collection of figurines and other materials from the Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit.

Many (if not all?) of the bookcases also have carved crowns. Here’s the Rohan one:

There are also metal shields that function as handles:

Puustikki talk about their project a bit on Facebook:

“Finally we’re able to publish photos of these custom made, epic showcases for LOTR and Hobbit figurine collection. Probably the biggest collection in Finland and now it’s also displayed in showcases it deserves! This whole thing is 100% handmade out of solid oak and we wanted to use glass doors to maximize visibility into the cases. Each one of the showcases has distinct features to corresponding races/nations; carvings on the top and a custom made steel handle.

“Height of these wooden marvels is 250cm, so they barely fit into a regular house! [sic]”

Puustikki is run by carpenter Jarkko Pilvinen and jeweler Juho Manninen. The makers pull their inspiration from history and historical fantasy. At this writing, their online store includes drinking horns, a picnic table and benches, beds, dragon pegboards, runed coasters, and jewelry, among others.

My goodness! Astounding, aren’t they? Stylistically, a lot of their other wares are not our style at all, but as a maker myself, I really admire and appreciate the consideration and effort that went into all of their designs.

Check out the Puustikki website or Instagram for more.

Images by Jukka Alasaari Photography via Puustikki on Facebook

In Making Stuff occasional feature, we share fun arts and crafts done by us and our fellow geeks and nerds.

Pimp Your Living Room with an Enormous Battle of Hoth Wallpaper

April 8, 2020March 29, 2020Eppu

Aaaaa! It’s a battle of Hoth wallpaper!

Handsome, isn’t it?

One of my pet peeves is when people—mostly merchants and, I assume following their lead, parents—assume only kids could be into superheroes or heroic scifi stories or what have you. I have exceedingly firm plans of becoming a geeky granny! This would fit right in. 🙂

Found / image via Bauhaus Finland

Out There is an occasional feature highlighting intriguing art, spaces, places, phenomena, flora, and fauna.

Visual Inspiration: Organic Shapes in a Garden Cottage

October 11, 2019September 29, 2019Eppu

This ensuite cottage in Pali Hill, Mumbai, sits within a garden and literally brings the nature to your side. There are doors and windows, but both are oval or roundish, and even the former are see-through.

It was created by the India-based architectural studio The White Room, run by Nitin Barchha and Disney Davis. The organic shapes immediately have an otherworldly effect—at least I’ve never been in and rarely seen a house like this.

And here’s the ensuite bathroom:

I do have a vague recollection of maybe seeing something like this in Star Trek somewhere. Other than that, the closest existing visuals that come to mind are sets Weta Workshop created for The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings trilogies. It would be nice to see—or read of—more interiors that deviate so starkly from our own.

Found via Colossal.

Images by The White Room

The Visual Inspiration occasional feature pulls the unusual from our world to inspire design, story-telling, and worldbuilding. If stuff like this already exists, what else could we imagine?

Stars in Your Bathroom Floor

March 20, 2019March 3, 2019Eppu

Oh my, this is stunning: a DIYed bathroom floor lights up with tiny fiber optics stars!

Instructables Balrd Star Floor — Balrd at Instructables

The secret is to thread the fibers into the grout lines. Apparently, for safety, the light source needs to be outside the bathroom (or, I imagine, whatever the local code calls for) and, of course, you need to start with a bare floor or to demo the existing surface, so it’s not a quick project by any measure. The results are amazing, though.

See the full star floor tutorial by Balrd at Instructables.

Found via Buzzfeed.

In Here is an occasional feature highlighting geeky spaces created by our fellow geeks all over the world.

DIY Star Wars Marquee

August 10, 2018July 7, 2018Eppu

Ashley DIYed a really cool Star Wars marquee. It even lights up!

The base is a handmade wooden sign stenciled, painted, and varnished.

Wow. I don’t think I’d have the patience! Full props for such a meticulous job!

See the full tutorial at Handmade with Ashley.

In Making Stuff occasional feature, we share fun arts and crafts done by us and our fellow geeks and nerds.

1970s Concept Art of Space Habitats Courtesy of NASA Ames Research Center

August 6, 2018August 5, 2018Eppu

In the 1970s, NASA designed potential space habitats in three basic shapes—toroid, Bernal sphere, and cylinder. Artwork depicting some of the plans has now been published in several sizes without copyright restrictions. Here’s the NASA description of the images:

“A couple of space colony summer studies were conducted at NASA Ames in the 1970s. Colonies housing about 10,000 people were designed. A number of artistic renderings of the concepts were made.”

Below are some of my favorites.

A version of cylindrical habitats has since been seen in popular media—Babylon 5, anyone?

The residential buildings look kind of cutely 1970s. (And I say this as a non-fan of the 70s aesthetic!)

Apparently all of these designs were meant for thousands of people: the toroid and spherical stations could house around 10,000 and the cylinder a million. Wow. They certainly did not dream small!

Finally, two images of a Bernal sphere habitat:

Visit the NASA’s “Space Colony Art from the 1970s” page for more images and links to high-res scans.

Found via The Public Domain Review.

All images courtesy of NASA Ames Research Center: Cylindrical habitat / interior view looking out through large windows (NASA ID number AC75-1086) and toroidal / cutaway view exposing the interior (NASA ID number AC75-1086-1) by Rick Guidice. Bernal sphere / construction crew at work (NASA ID number AC76-1288) by Don Davis. Bernal sphere / cutaway view (NASA ID number AC76-1089) by Rick Guidice.

Out There is an occasional feature highlighting intriguing art, spaces, places, phenomena, flora, and fauna.

Built-in Brick Space Invaders

July 10, 2018June 24, 2018Eppu2 Comments

When you really love a game: Klopper & Davis Architects in Perth, West Australia, built Space Invaders critters into the walls of this house. The critters are made with depressed brick, and appear both indoors and outdoors. Take a look:

Not an easily DIY-able project, but very neat.

Found via Desire to Inspire. (Visit the DtI blog post for additional Space Invaders views!)

Images: Klopper & Davis Architects, via Desire to Inspire

In Here is an occasional feature highlighting geeky spaces created by our fellow geeks all over the world.