Marchi Architects’ Woodhouse 2.0 for Long Island

With a radial footprint, Woodhouse 2.0, by Paris-based design studio Marchi Architects, coils into the forested topography of New York’s Long Island. The residential proposal employs timber and texture materials to lend warmth within. The open-concept design, undisturbed circulation and ample window space embrace natural light, a hidden central courtyard and the woods outside, too. See more images at designboom.

The Continued Quest for Pain-Free Microneedles

Produced through a process of 3D printing with polymers—altogether referred to as “4D printing” because of its core of programmable, shape-shifting material—rapidly developing microneedles may replace painful hypodermic needles in the next decade. Professor Howon Lee, who has lead the research from Rutgers University, has filed a patent on this new technology, which produces hollow needles that are barbed, much like the stinger of a …

The Perils of Moving the V&A’s Arsenic-Laced Hats

As 250,000 objects, 350,000 books and more from The Victoria and Albert Museum’s archive move from their current Blythe House storage to a new, purpose-built east London facility, dangers abound—including from the textile collection. As the phrase “mad as a hatter” makes reference too, until the 1930s some hat features (like feathers and even whole birds, an Edwardian era trend) were treated with arsenic and …