The Minister’s Treehouse: A 100ft Tall Church Built Over 11 Years without Blueprints

The Minister’s Treehouse in Crossville, Tennessee is a 100ft structure built by minister Horace Burgess from the early 1990s through 2004. The entire building wraps around a giant tree and was built completely without blueprints, sprawling to an estimated 10,000 square feet inside, including a four-story swing set. PhotographerKristin Sweeting took a recent trip to the treehouse and took many of the photos above. You can also see more images by Chuck Sutherland who provided the image on top.

Fall: The Color of Central Park Filmed over Six Months

This gorgeous time-lapse by filmmaker Jamie Scott starts off like any other video capturing the change of the seasons with the movement of the sun, but then around :30 something pretty remarkable happens. To create the effect Scott filmed in 15 locations around New York City’s Central Park, two times a week, for six months using the exact same tripod and camera lens settings resulting in the footage you see here. (via jason sondhi)

London Heathrow Approach Time-lapse Turns Jumbo Jets into Floating Toys

This short clip from the Cargospotter aviation video channel shows a few dozen planes as they queue up for approach at London’s Heathrow airport. At 17x normal speed the wind currents seem to bounce the planes like small toys suspended from invisible strings and the perpetually moving clouds create the illusion of a constant panning camera. In an internet flooded with time-lapse videos this is definitely a gem. (via metafilter)

Two Artists Live and Work on a Giant Rotating Hamster Wheel for 10 Days

Photo by Scott Lynch courtesy Gothamist

Photo by Scott Lynch courtesy Gothamist

Artists Alex Schweder and Ward Shelley have constructed a giant wood hamster wheel with a 25-foot-diameter where the duo are currently living and working for 10 days until March 9 at the Boiler in Williamsburg, Brookyln. Why? Because …art! Titled In Orbit, the piece is a continuation of numerous installations where the artists live together in public spaces, including Counterweight Roommate and Stability which they refer to as “architectural performance pieces.”

For In Orbit, the rotating house is designed so that Shelley can live on the exterior of the wheel nearly 30 ft. off the floor, while Schweder lives on the inside due to a fear of heights. Through coordinated movements the pair can rotate the wheel to access beds, desks, chairs and even a kitchen-bathroom combo. You can learn more over at Gothamist and Peirogi Gallery. Photos and video by Scott Lynch. (via Laughing Squid)

Intersections: An Ornately Carved Wood Cube Projects Shadows onto Gallery Walls

Intersections, 2013. 6.5′ Cube, projected Shadows: 35′ x 32′.

Intersections, 2013. 6.5′ Cube, projected Shadows: 35′ x 32′.

Created by mixed media artist Anila Quayyum Agha, this elaborately carved cube with an embedded light source projects a dazzling pattern of shadows onto the surrounding gallery walls. Titled Intersections, the installation is made from large panels of laser-cut wood meant to emulate the geometrical patters found in Islamic sacred spaces. Agha shares:

The Intersections project takes the seminal experience of exclusion as a woman from a space of community and creativity such as a Mosque and translates the complex expressions of both wonder and exclusion that have been my experience while growing up in Pakistan. The wooden frieze emulates a pattern from the Alhambra, which was poised at the intersection of history, culture and art and was a place where Islamic and Western discourses, met and co-existed in harmony and served as a testament to the symbiosis of difference. I have given substance to this mutualism with the installation project exploring the binaries of public and private, light and shadow, and static and dynamic. This installation project relies on the purity and inner symmetry of geometric design, the interpretation of the cast shadows and the viewer’s presence with in a public space.

Intersections is currently a finalist in the 3rd Annual See.Me: Year in Review Competition, and you can learn more about it here. (via Twisted Sifter, Hi-Fructose)

Architecture Student Converts Old Bus into Comfy Mobile Home Complete with Repurposed Gym Floor

I don’t know about you, but few exciting things ever transpired for me on a school bus. It always smelled like gas fumes, and its primary purpose was to transport me to a place I didn’t always want to go. But this bus, designed by architecture student Hank Butitta, is a whole different story.

Also somewhat disinterested with school, Butitta was tired of designing buildings that didn’t exist for imaginary clients and wanted to work with his hands to put some of his ideas into practice. So, he bought a bus off Craigslist and along with some help from photographer Justin Evidon and brother Vince, the trio spent nearly 14 weeks converting the ramshackle old bus into a sleek, modular living environment complete with a kitchen, bathroom, beds, storage, and even a floor made from wood panels stripped from an old gymnasium.

Now that Hank’s final presentation is over the group is embarking on a 5,000 mile tour around the U.S. which has just about reached its halfway point. You can see more photos, video, and follow their travels over at Hank Bought a Bus. (via Home Designing, Gizmodo, Le Monde Tue Nini)

A Staggering Tower of 15,000 Abraham Lincoln Books

Soon to be on display at the newly-constructed Ford’s Theatre Center for Education and Leadership in Washington, DC, this 34-foot pillar of literature includes over 15,000 unique titles about the United State’s 16th president, Abraham Lincoln. The museum is set to open before President’s Day. (via this isn’t happiness, laura keene, gary erskine, my modern met)