Nike has released its new Flight ball for the 2020/21 Premier League that has geometric grooves and sculpted chevrons to reduce drag.
The product of eight years of research and development by the Nike Equipment Innovation Lab – and 1,700 hours of testing – the Flight ball grants 30 per cent more accurate flight trajectory than its predecessor.
The ball, which was released on Nike's website on 29 June, will be used in the next 2020/21 Premier League season.
It incorporates Nike's new patented AerowSculpt technology, which sees moulded grooves indented across its surface – much like how the dimples on a golf ball function.
As Nike explains, while all footballs have some unpredictable movement in flight, if the ball is entirely smooth then it is more likely to be gripped by the air, causing turbulence and thus frequent changes in direction.
"These shifts can result in misplaced long balls, derailing a potentially fruitful counter, or shots that stray off goal," the brand added.
The indentations in the Flight ball work to reduce "wobble", offering a more predictable and consistent flight, by encouraging air to move around the ball instead of gripping its surface.
"The construction started with a square-shaped Aerotrack groove," explained Kieran Ronan, head of Nike Global Football Equipment.
"Over the course of the 68 iterations, we modified the shape of the groove, added sculpted chevrons and explored multiple features throughout to deliver one geometric pattern that helps promote a more stable flight," he added.
The ball is constructed from four fuse-welded panels, as opposed to a usual 12, which are stitched together with 40 per cent fewer seams than an ordinary football. This makeup affects both how the ball flies and how the player can touch or kick its surface.
It also is printed with Nike's All Conditions Control (ACC) 3D ink, which is used to print "micro flaps" along the surface to ensure optimal grip in all weather conditions.
Nike's innovation lab worked with various players to address these aerodynamics issues in three stages, which it has labelled explore, recreate and innovate.
In the explore phase, the Nike lab used various tracking systems to measure the ball flight of different types of kicks performed during a game.
The recreate phase saw the researchers replicate the kick styles seen on-pitch with a robotic leg in order to measure any small differences in performance between different ball designs.
In the final innovate phase, the lab tested 68 different iterations of the Flight ball and had over 800 professional athletes participate in field testing validation before settling on a final version.
"Everything done at the Lab is rooted in science," said Ronan. "Here, we are able to detect small differences in performance that may not be perceivable to most athletes, but when those small differences are iterated upon 68 times, the result is a noticeable leap in performance."
"Right now we're in the midst of two global crises," he told Dezeen. "One is super visible that we're experiencing and immediately it's put us all back into isolation for a few months."
"But the other crisis that's happening at exactly the same time is one that could put us all inside air-conditioned homes and gyms for the foreseeable future."
Danish architecture studio BIG has designed a factory for furniture manufacturer Vestre in a Norwegian forest, which the brand claims will be the "world's most eco-friendly furniture factory".
Named The Plus, the factory development, which will include a visitor centre and a 300-acre park, is set to be built within a forest near the village of Magnor in the east of Norway.
Designed by BIG, the 6,501-square-metre factory takes its name from its cross shape. It will consist of four green-roof-covered wings, containing the furniture manufacturer's warehouse, colour factory, wood factory and the assembly area, extending from a central atrium.
Two of these wings will be publicly accessible with walking tracks running up them, giving visitors access to the roof and a view of the central atrium from above. Large glass windows will allow visitors to look inside the buildings that are closed off to the public to see the inner workings of the factory.
"With Vestre we have imagined a factory that is simultaneously front of house and back of house," said BIG founder Bjarke Ingels.
"The beauty of the factory is the clarity of its organisation. Conceived as the intersection of a road and a production line it forms a large plus connecting everything to everything," he explained.
"The radical transparency invites visitors and hikers to enjoy the whole process of manufacturing while providing the workers the thrill of working in the middle of the forest."
BIG designed the factory to be an exemplar of sustainable architecture, and according to the furniture brand it will generate 50 per cent less greenhouse gas emissions than a conventional factory of the same size.
When complete, the architecture studio expects the building to be the first industrial projects in the Nordic region to gain a BREEAM outstanding environmental rating.
The building is constructed from local timber and low-carbon concrete with recycled reinforcement steel. It will be powered by an energy supply system that combines 1,200 solar panel and geothermal wells, while surplus heat created during the production process will be used to heat the building.
According to the architecture studio, this means that the building's energy requirement is 90 percent lower than an equivalent factory.
"Vestre will be the world's most sustainable furniture manufacturer," said Jan Christian Vestre, CEO of Vestre.
"Building The Plus will be an important step in reaching this goal. By using cutting-edge technology and Scandinavian collaboration, we can produce faster and greener than ever," he continued.
"In that way we will ensure global competitiveness through our leadership in environmentally-conscious production."
The factory will be located around half way between Vestre's headquarters in Oslo and its existing manufacturing plant in Torsby, Sweden, which was designed by architecture studio Snøhetta.
The stand was made from re-usable materials and had information displayed about the carbon footprint of every product.
At the time, Jan Christian Vestre said he believes the company was the first furniture brand in the world to publish carbon information on its product range.
"We're doing it because we want to be really open and transparent," he said. "I would like to say that clients are actually demanding it, but they aren't yet."
Project credits:
Client: Jan Christian Vestre / VESTRE AS Architect: BIG Collaborators: Fokus Rådgivning, Gade & Mortensen, Erichsen og Horgen AS, ØM Fjeld AS, Foyn Consult AS, Nordic Architects AS, Norconsult AS, Multiconsult AS, Splitkon AS Partners-in-charge: Bjarke Ingels, David Zahle, Ole Elkjær-Larsen Project manager: Viktoria Millentrup, Eva Seo-Andersen Team: Julia Tabet, Ariana Szmedra, Ningnan Ye, Ron Bexheti, Ksenia Zhitomirskaya, Jens Majdal Kaarsholm, Ulla Hornsyld, Eduardo Javier Sosa Treviño, Steen Kortbæk Svendsen, Kristoffer Negendahl, Pin Tungjaroen, Neringa Jurkonyte, Magni Waltersson, Cheng-Huang Lin, Tommy Bjørnstrup, Tristan Harvey, Duncan Horswill, Katrine Juul, Alexander Jacobsen, Tore Banke, Frederic Lucien Engasser, Thor Larsen-Lechuga, Katrine Sandstrøm, Jesper Petersen, Kaoan Hengles, Ewa Zapiec, Ariana Ribas, Andy Coward, Andreas Bak, Nanna Gyldholm Møller
This VDF school show curated by the Architecture Department of the University of Indonesia includes a conceptual city masterplan modelled on neurons, and a museum memorial in Wuhan for reflecting on the coronavirus pandemic.
The digital exhibition features a total of 10 projects, documented in video form, which were completed by students in their final year at the Indonesian school as part of the Scarcity studio.
Scarcity was taught by Hendrajaya Isnaeni, Verarisa Ujung and Farid Rakun, and invited pupils to investigate the relationship between ecological plights and the world economy.
Architecture Department of the University of Indonesia
"Scarcity, as a term that problematises as well as bridges economic and ecological domains, challenges contemporary architecture and interiority.
"We deem deep comprehensions about underlying forces at work in understanding the term are necessary to deal with its complexities. The inextricable links between ecological plights and global economies, also the dynamics they create, need to be interrogated with intelligence and creativity.
"Consequently, understanding these conditions would heighten our conscience, our 'value structures'. This studio is a result of attempting to articulate these 'value structures', and finding methods to operate them architecturally."
Scarcity of memory by Albertus Bramantya Wijaya
"Onrust Memorial Park: manifestation of memories.
"Jakarta is sinking fast. Its historical sites, and the memories embodied within, are at risk of destruction. Onrust Island, a memory bank spanning more than four centuries back, is one of them.
"This project speculates on an alternative: Onrust Island as a theme park. The park has six subjects, ten memory lands and thirty-five choices for the visitors to choose from."
"The Corridor of Truth: reconstructing the reality of pollution.
"Pollution, as a current cultural construction, lacks agency, urgency and imagination. As a society, we outsource our responsibility to care to authorities and other bodies. Interrogating the agencies of an individual architect, this project attempts to change society's mindset regarding urban air pollution.
"Intervening Jl Salemba Raya, one of the main roads in Central Jakarta, the project resulted in a network of infrastructures to purify the air and shift the use of fossil fuel to methanol. It yearns for change in people's mindset and the lowering of egos."
"Sited in Wuhan, China, this architectural project tries to speculate on what would happen when future global citizens look back on the emotions they had experienced during the catastrophic COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. Turning fear to gratitude, this project shows how memorial could take form in a new era: post-pandemic."
Changing the perception of scarcity by Chloe Nadine Mak
"Subsistence over Scarcity: Bajau reimagined.
"This is a speculative project on Bajau – a tribe of ultra-national sea nomads – as one of many stakeholders of the disputed part of South China Sea. The starting point is the fact that Bajau is unified by their strong naval nomadic identity. It utilises fiction as an agent of cooperation, instead of conflict.
"This project also suggests that we all could learn from Bajau and their subsistence lifestyle and harmonious relationship with nature in order to sustain a longer, more abundant way of life."
"2045: a tale about chaos, peace and lost identity.
"In 2045, the year when Indonesia will celebrate its 100th year of independence, a new checkpoint emerges. On identity, lack of wisdom could lead to over-pride, fanaticism and anarchism.
"This project speculates on how future citizens of the country would reuse and reimagine Satriamandala, the main museum of Indonesian Armed Forces (TNI) in South Jakarta, into an architecture that narrates alternative readings on identity, where visitors are invited to knit their own understanding using their own experience."
Scarcity of contextual living by Maghfirasari Adhani
"Orang Laut's Self-sustaining Organic Community.
"The universality of standards of living, generalised by the process of modernisation, creates an illusion of scarcity of resources. We demand things that are not contextual to our living environment.
"This project uses Riau's Orang Laut – which translates to Sea Men, referring to sea nomads – as the main subject of research. The resulting design aims to weave Orang Laut's current assimilated domestic activities with their environmental awareness through a new compact lifestyle: sampan kajang – their traditional weaving style."
"Santap, tilas, singkong (eat, trace, cassava) is a project which aims to trace our missing food links, criticising society's ignorance of local production of food.
"Taking cassava as a potential main nutritional resource, the project further explores the possibility of extending the root's values for materiality, metaphor and a new form of living, applied in the context of the Cilandak residential area in South Jakarta."
"This architectural project imagines a system that synergises with its context in Kalimalang suburb of East Jakarta.
"This is done by applying the nervous system, translating them structurally in both macro and micro scale, consequently proposing new ways for humans to live, interact and obtain food in the future. The aim is for human beings to co-habitat earth peacefully with other living creatures."
Scarcity of stability by Ruth Kartika Purnasasmita
"Mad Mayestik: reminiscing the unstable.
"This project comments on the possible outcome after Mayestik, one of the most vital markets located in South Jakarta, collapses as a result of the wasteful over-consumption of plastic.
"Considering plastic as a source of instability, the project then deconstructs and integrate this material into spatial elements to reveal the possible catastrophe and how the market could be dwelled in and by preaching instability."
"This project imagines an intervention done upon an abandoned shophouse complex in 9 Walk shopping complex in Bintaro, a suburb of South Jakarta.
"In its current abandoned state, the site and building are left with hardscapes that the project utilises as materials to show how non-human species can gain their design agencies – becoming architectural co-conspirators and successively taking architecture back to nature.
"The designer's role then is to research and design for the liveability of these non-human species while still producing experiences for human beings in an orderly fashion."
Interior design studio Deferrari+Modesti renovated a house in Prato, Italy, adding a blue staircase that doubles as a climbing wall for its sporty owners.
The two-storey house in the Tuscany region, which was built in the 1980s, was in a state of disuse and required a complete refurbishment.
Deferrari + Modesti designed an integrated furnishing system to update the ground floor, which houses living areas and bedrooms.
The playful staircase that connects the lower and upper storeys of the villa is a reference to the occupant's love of rock climbing.
"The client had not given us specific indications or made particular requests on the staircase," architects Javier Deferrari and Lavinia Modesti told Dezeen.
"For us, however, it had to be a key element of the home. It had to connect the different spaces by organising them, but it also had to have a strong identity, both in its representation and in its function."
Made from teak wood and powder-coated iron, the staircase is sided with perforated sheet metal, which has also been used for its upper steps.
"The staircase, from being extremely solid, becomes permeable to light and movement as it ascends," the studio explained.
A metal bench and a wooden storage box sit under the stairs facing the living room. The staircase's open structure here creates an improvised climbing wall where people can dangle from its iron bars.
The ground-floor living areas are spread over three different levels. Deferrari+Modesti tied the separate areas – living room, reading and music corner, dining room and kitchen – together with built-in furniture painted the same bright blue as the staircase.
In the reading and music corner, the furnishing system functions as a bookcase with an added bench and container. This separates the space from the dining area, where the integrated furniture continues in the form of cabinets.
"The use of a visual element that presents elements of continuity conveys the feeling of a unique, welcoming space," the architects said.
"We decided to organise the space through an integrated furniture system to connect the different areas of the house, giving each one its own identity."
The sunken living room area features wall panels with a hidden bar cabinet in the same blue shade as the furnishing system and staircase.
Wooden floors made from recycled teak slats contrast the integrated furnishing system.
As well as the living areas, two bedrooms and two bathrooms are hidden behind a flush-to-wall door on the ground floor.
The upper floor is used as a living and study area and accommodates an additional bathroom, as well as a large terrace.
Deferrari+Modesti was founded in 2010 and specialises in interior design, exhibition and product design.
VDF studio profile: UAP is an international metal workshop that produces everything from large-scale public art or architecture commissions to the iconic Oscars trophies for the Academy Awards.
The foundry has a history of collaborating with well-known figures in the art world. It was responsible for creating Idris Khan's Wahat Al Karama monument in Abu Dhabi, as well as the first public sculpture of American artist Kehinde Wiley, who painted Barack Obama's presidential portrait.
UAP was founded in Brisbane, Australia, 27 years ago by brothers Daniel and Matthew Tobin, and has since expanded to include a team of 200 people across the company's Shanghai and New York workshops as well as its operations in the Middle East.
Its technicians and craftspeople are capable of casting larger-than-life installations in three dimensions using materials including bronze, stainless steel, ductile iron, aluminium and copper as well as precious metals such as silver and gold.
Kehinde Wiley's Rumors of War was temporarily set up in Times Square
"UAP has developed its expertise gradually and our ability to deliver high-quality outcomes emerges from the entire team's ability to develop strong working relationships with the artists and clients," said Matthew Tobin.
"At the heart of this global operation is the drive to make art happen and every team member's dedication to find common ground and facilitate the journey of the artist."
Among the company's most well-known projects is Wiley's Rumors of War, which reimagines the historical monument of a US Confederate general on horseback with a young African-American man in the saddle.
Standing at just over eight metres tall and five metres wide, the installation was initially set up in Times Square before being moved to the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts.
The Selfie Panda sculpture by Florentijn Hofman was installed in the city of Dujiangyan in China
According to Matthew Tobin, the Shanghai studio is responsible for some of the company's "most adventurous commissions", including a gigantic metal rendering of a panda taking a selfie, envisioned by Dutch artist Florentijn Hofman as an evolution of his enormous Rubber Duck installation from 2013.
At 90 metres long, the installation consists of a series of towering slabs that are lined up like dominoes and made from aluminium that was extracted and recycled from decommissioned armoured vehicles.
Ngarunga Nangama, also known as Calm Water Dream, is a sandstone mural created for the lobby of an office building that stands atop the former Tank Stream
Back in Australia, the company also collaborated with Aboriginal artist Judy Watson to create Ngarunga Nangama – a 300-square-metre sandstone mural that visualises the course of Sydney's historic Tank Stream, which today lies buried underneath its central business district.
On a smaller scale, UAP produces not just the Oscar statuettes but also carefully replicated, editioned artworks of different scales for artists including Lindy Lee, Reko Renie and Emily Floyd, whose hand-carved sculptural parrot was 3D-scanned and turned into a series of five oversized aluminium statues.
UAP is also responsible for manufacturing the 5.6-metre-tall Boy Walking sculpture by New Zealand artist Ronnie van Hout
"I am always in awe as I walk through one of our workshops," said Daniel Tobin.
"There is a constant movement of people, the hum of machinery, and the excitement of making. The furnace is lit, bronze is on the boil and the noise is deafening. When new projects are underway, there is no better place to be."
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