Since its inception in 2009, Kickstarter, the online crowd-funding powerhouse, has hosted countless petitions for innovative ideas in design and architecture, from adobe houses for Haiti to entire floating cities to chess pieces done up as London architectural icons. These days, the fresh crop of architecture-inspired projects differ in scale, elegance, and complexity, but have one thing in common: they want money and they want it now. Have a few dollars to donate? Do check out the three rad options—including the above musical city—below.
Spencer's Art House
Photos via Kickstarter? Andrew Perkins wants to convert a vacant funeral home in the historic Carriage Town of Flint, Mich., into a community studio space for local designers, artists, architects, and engineers. To rehab the 120-year-old structure, Perkins needs moolah to stabilize the structure, rebuild an exterior wall, repair the windows, and replace the missing siding with reclaimed materials. Spencer's Art House—its name is a nod to its past life as House of Spencer Mortuary—is meant to be a breeding ground for ideas to revitalize Flint, once a buzzing city and former home to General Motors.
Perkins has raised $851 of his pledged $12,000 goal. He has nine days left. Donations, this way.
Infinite Crypt: Modular Terrain for Underworld Architects
Photos via Kickstarter? Over in Sheffield, UK, James Wallbank has a dream to manufacture 3D castles, temples, and dungeons as "robust architectural designs made affordable" for miniatures gaming. The laser-cut, modular pieces—meant to create the likes of catacombs, labyrinths, fortifications, and bridges—measure, on average, a couple inches square, and "takes paint and glue beautifully." Wallbank writes: "It's designed to be compatible with terrain products and miniatures you already have, and it's easy to pack away and store. No tabs, no magnets, no connectors – just solid, stable, surfaces that butt up against each other and anything else you happen to have to hand."
Wallbank has raised £511 of his pledged £6,000 goal. He has 29 days left. Donations, this way.
Photos via Kickstarter
? Two years ago, New Orleans Airlift teamed up with street artist Swoon to transform a 150-year-old abandoned house into Dithyrambalina, a temporary "shantytown" of "playable musical houses with interactive instruments embedded into the walls, floors, and ceilings." The project was covered by the New York Times, NPR, and Smithsonian Magazine. Now they want to do it all again, though on a larger, more permanent scale, with funding funneling toward the construction of the first five new structures.
New Orleans Airlift has raised $21,368 of his pledged $50,000 goal. It has 21 days to go. Donations, this way.
· Spencer's Art House: A design laboratory and community space [Kickstarter]
· Cleveland Architecture Coloring Book [Kickstarter]
· Infinite Crypt: Modular Terrain for Underworld Architects [Kickstarter]
· Dithyrambalina-Musical Architecture for New Orleans [Kickstarter]
· All Kickstarter posts [Curbed National]