Dublin creative agency Boys and Girls has installed a new reception desk supported by giant Jenga blocks at one end and balloons at the other.

The agency created the desk in response to an article in Marketing Magazine that mentioned how ordinary their reception area was.

Boys and Girls also has a boardroom table made of Lego.

See also our story about a bench held up by balloons and a workplace with a desk made of Duplo bricks.

Photographs are by Liam Murphy. Here's some text from Boys and Girls:

Late last year, Marketing Magazine were nice enough to write their cover story about Boys and Girls’ first 2 years in business, and how we were growing up fast.

In the first paragraph Michael Cullen wrote “the reception is small and routine”, the reference being in comparison to the visual onslaught of the Lego boardroom table that followed. It became something of an in-joke in the agency – we mentioned it every time we ushered people into our “small and routine” reception and I must admit, it got my goat.

Plans were drawn, crayons sharpened and collaborators consulted to come up with a reception desk that would put “small and routine” in its place for once and for all. This is the result of months of planning and some fairly heavy scientific research.

A company called Twisted Image finally started production in February. Their job was to fabricate permanent hot air balloons strong enough to carry the weight of the desk. A new type of rubber composite was used to make balloons that were genuinely air-tight and would never degrade, and Caltech were called upon to supply a Heluim/Hydrogen hybrid gas with an atomic weight 150 times lighter than Helium alone.

Ribbons reinforced with Carbo-Titanium (and in pretty colours) were used to secure the table top to the balloons, tied off on an aerospace grade titanium cleat.

Finally, giant Jenga blocks were carved from solid wood and placed on the reinforced floor.

All-in-all, a “small and routine” project for Boys and Girls.

Photographs by Liam Murphy.

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Irish studio dePaor Architects have inserted this oak grid-shell structure into the café area of Dublin Airport's Terminal 2, which opened late last year.

The undulating structure sits in the centre of the OAK bar and provides a canopy over the space.

It's made from strips of veneered plywood that slot into one another.

Perforated wooden vaults frame the entrance into the café-bar.

More restaurants and bars on Dezeen »

Photographs are by Alice Clancy.

Here's a tiny bit of text from the architects:

Dublin Airport Landside bar.OAK

The landside bar and cafe in the new terminal at Dublin airport is a n 84mm oak veneered plywood deformed grid shell as a baldacchino over bar and server.

It stands on three stainless steel shoes on the limestone terrace and suspend a murano glass at the limestone stone bar.

The snug is excavated as a series of parallel vaults with service strips between.

These oak veneered vaults are slot perforated to achieve a smoke reservoir.

See also:

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Swoosh Pavilion at the Architectural Association	Labyrinth of Woods by Point	4am by dePaor Architects

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Dublin practice FLK Architects have completed a precast concrete residence overlooking Dublin Bay in Howth, Ireland.

Called Precast House, the project comprises three separate volumes emerging from the sloping site - a house, garage and swimming pool.

The three buildings are made of polished precast concrete, combined with large windows and glass balustrades to reflect the surrounding landscape.

More about FKL Architects on Dezeen: A House

Photographs are by Verena Hilgenfeld.

Here's some more information from the architects:

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Precast House

The site is long, sloping, falling towards cliffs and the sea.

Entering the site the viewer’s eye is drawn to the horizon, the viewer is pulled towards the abstracted line.

The project is defined in conceptual terms as three discrete forms - garage, house and swimming pool - each emerging from the landscape, their respective heights being determined by the use of each form.

The relationship between the three elements is a casual one, slipping past each other, sliding towards the sea.

The three forms are detailed in the same manner and use the same material, polished precast concrete.

The surface tension across the facades is maintained by the flush detailing of the windows and the glass balustrades.

The reflected landscape is visible in both materials glass and polished precast concrete.

At first floor level (entry level) the plan is open with the primary living spaces and entrance having an overlapping relationship.

Within the field of the first floor a number of walnut clad timber elements are slipped between floor and ceiling planes, defining the flow of the space and adding richness to the interior.

At ground floor level (sleeping level) the situation is more introverted.

The figure ground relationship is the reverse of the first floor, the plan is treated as a solid mass that has been carved out to make a cruciform circulation space with the bathrooms and bedrooms retained inside the remaining form.

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Dublin architects TAKA have added a mews house with protruding brickwork to an existing Victorian home in Dublin, Ireland.

The façade uses two different patterns chosen by the brick-layer, inspired by the brickwork of the Victorian house.

In the first pattern, alternate bricks are laid across the usual direction, creating protrusions from the wall.

The other forms an open mesh that acts as ventilation for the spaces behind.

The two separate buildings will house two different generations of the same family and are connected at the rear by a shared garden.

Here's some text from TAKA:

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These two new homes house two generations of the same family (A renovated Victorian House for the parents sharing a rear garden with a new Mews house for one of the daughters). The now grown-up family had recently moved out of their long-term family home and wanted these new homes to maintain some sense of continuity with their former lives. Two intertwined themes run through both homes, those of memory and tectonic expression.

The memories of the family are used as a conscious architectural driver throughout both houses. Their social rituals are given tangible form within the design of the new houses. Typical domestic objects are distorted in material and scale to form a psychological landscape specific to the occupants.

The daughters recollection of the stairs in the old house being ‘another room’, finds built form in an enlarged landscape stairway offering spaces for pause. Her fond memories of the kitchen as a social space and sitting by the open fire distort the two new ‘hearths’ (one for cooking one for fire) into non-orthogonal shapes suggesting uses yet open to appropriation. Finally the insistence of the ‘fire being the centre of the home’ is realised by the location of an industrial scaled chimney rising through the scheme at the centre of the plan, organising the spaces throughout.
In the parent’s new home their anxiety about moving from the old house was addressed. Their weekly social ritual of the wider family gathering together for Sunday dinner was a focal point, in order to maintain the continuity of the family unit. In the new home the dining table is given priority of place and a ritual character. Cast in concrete in an altar-like form the dining table communicates its importance through its immovable materiality.

As a further signifier of the special value of this space the expression of construction takes on a cultural role. In the wall behind the table custom-made glazed bricks are set. Named ‘Ruskin’ bricks (after Ruskin’s inspirational theories on construction in architecture); the bricklayer was given 100 identical bricks to lay in any combination he saw fit. Intended as both a marker of the process of construction and an explicit elevation of brickwork to the position of art, the result is a random graphic pattern that is not simply hung on the wall but part of the very construction that forms the building.

A similar interest in constructional expression is seen in the Mews house. The Mews house’s façades take their key from the Flemish-bond brickwork walls of the Victorian House, seeking a kind of ‘constructional context’ with its older brother. The unique bonds are the result of ‘separating’ the Flemish bond into two layers, and conceptually situating the home in the space between these two layers.

The extrovert front façade receives the ‘projecting brick’ layer, which oscillates in appearance depending on natural light conditions. To the rear, the façade becomes a mesh of brickwork where those projecting bricks on the front leave their resultant holes in the rear wall, allowing ventilation to the rooms behind to be taken directly through this brick skin. Throughout both homes, construction is expressed directly as the finished product imbuing these two new homes with a powerful, domestic character.

TAKA was founded by Alice Casey and Cian Deegan in Bangladesh in 2006. Alice Casey and Cian Deegan were born in Dublin in 1978 and 1980 respectively. They graduated from Dublin Institute of Technology in 2003, and moved to London in 2004. In London, Alice worked with Curtis Wood Architects and Cian worked with Niall McLaughlin Architects.

They studied Professional Practice at The Bartlett School of Architecture,
University College London. Following their time in London they travelled extensively throughout Asia, Australia, South and North America, studying examples of vernacular architecture and culture. Moving back to Dublin in 2007, Alice has worked with dePaor architects, Cian with O’Donnell + Tuomey Architects. In 2008 TAKA became the youngest ever representatives of Ireland at the Venice Architectural Biennale as part of The Lives of Spaces exhibition, and have recently completed their first projects House 1 + House 2 in Dublin.

Both Alice and Cian have been Upper School studio tutors at the UCD School of Architecture.

TAKA have been featured in Architecture Ireland, The Dubliner, The Sunday Times Culture Section and Elle Deco Japan.

TAKA is a practice concerned with the communicative potential of architecture, with tectonic expression and with meaning. TAKA is based in Dublin, Ireland.

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Landscape architects Martha Schwartz Partners have completed the Grand Canal Square project in Dublin, Ireland.

Located at the western end of the Grand Canal Dock, the 10,000 square metre public space is overlooked by The Grand Canal Theatre, designed by Daniel Libeskind and due for completion next year.

The €8 million project consists of red resin-glass paving that extends into the water, dotted with illuminated red poles. Planted sections are arranged diagonally across the square.

The following info is from Martha Schwartz Partners:

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Martha Schwartz Partners completes “Ireland’s first 21st Century destination square”

Renowned landscape designer Martha Schwartz, of Martha Schwartz Partners, has completed the Grand Canal Square project in Dublin. At 10,000 sq metres, it is one of the largest paved public spaces in Dublin, a city that is increasingly renowned for regenerative design.

It is a rare project, in that the public space is itself the focus of the €8 million project, rather than individual buildings, and is widely considered to be the most innovative landscape design project ever undertaken in the country.

The square, which is located at the west end of the Grand Canal Dock, is home to shops, restaurants, The Grand Canal Theatre designed by Daniel Libeskind and Le Meridien 5-star hotel. The square has proven itself to be the centre point of a remarkable redevelopment of the city’s docklands.

Martha Schwartz, President of the firm, said: “The use of light and space lures in the public, creating an interactive space that functions as a social magnet during the day and at night.

“This is indeed a crucial function of the design, given the regenerative purpose of the development itself. In addition, the fact that it opens onto a large, non-tidal body of water makes it a unique space for Ireland, as such spaces have only traditionally occurred in Mediterranean cities, for example, Trieste and Venice.”

The design features a striking composition of a red “carpet.” It extends from the theatre both into and over the dock, and is then crossed by a lush “green carpet” of planters with lawns and vegetation. The red carpet is made of bright resin-glass paving, covered with red glowing angled light sticks. The green carpet of polygon-shaped planters offers ample seating, and connects the new hotel to the office development across the square. The planters themselves feature marsh vegetation which softens the space, and acts as a reminder of the historic wetland nature of the site.

Grand Canal Square is criss-crossed by granite-paved paths allowing movement across the space any possible direction, and also enabling the square to host major public events such as festivals and performances.

Even on its own, in the absence of performers and party-goers, the space becomes highly theatrical at dusk, when it is illuminated by coloured lighting, designed by lighting designers Speirs & Major Associates.

Research on Grand Canal Square was initiated by assessing the history of the area, with inspiration for the design stemming from the existing landscape. From this premise, the use of granite – which was used on the original square – replicates the grey architecture of Dublin, whilst combining it with the green that reproduces the lush, rural landscapes of Ireland

About Martha Schwartz Partners Ltd:

Martha Schwartz Partners (MSP) was founded in 1990 to provide a full range of landscape design services conceived and executed at the highest artistic level possible. Over the years, our practice has evolved from providing landscape services primarily for private sector urban environments to large-scale public projects, land reclamation and planning studies on complex sites.

With considerable talent and experience, MSP brings balance between environmental practice and aesthetics to national and international projects ranging in scale and scope from public plazas, parks, master plans, reclamation, mixed-use developments to art commissions and private residences.

Notable projects:
-Mesa Arts Centre, Arizona, USA
-Grand Canal Square, Dublin, Ireland
-Wood Wharf, London, UK
-Exchange Square, Manchester, UK

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Martha Schwartz Partners appeared first on Dezeen.