Ross Lovegrove designed a bench with lighting, appropriately named BDlove Lamp for BD Barcelona Design. It’s ultramodern, ultra cool and extremely eye catching. It really is a cross or a combination of a bench and a light, created out of exploring possibilities for furnishing transit areas like airport terminals and public squares with the intent of improving the quality of urban areas. We agree that they definitely would enhance public spaces, but we think they could do just as amazingly in our backyards too. Especially when combined with other BDlove pieces to create a modernistic and stylish place. Go to BD Barcelona Design to find out more.
Tenderizing meat is quite an important step in cooking, however it requires quite a bit of muscle to do it right. The Tender delivers double the punch with every bash, making your job easier. The serrated roller has glass balls inside the column to energize the blow. Tackle your meat in smart way!
A new entrant into the container garden craze, the Berkeley-based home accessories line Wallter is designed by CCA alums and couple Max and Linda. Their powder-coated aluminum planters in orange, white and blue are bright accents that would serve as a nice compliment to any home's greenery.
Parisian brothers Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec designed their Ploum settee “almost unintentionally” while they were researching a combination of two materials—elastic fabric and plush foam. The resulting settee for Ligne Roset became a metaphor for modern living: “Perhaps the use of a stretchy fabric is like a symbolic parallel to a contemporary lifestyle, in which flexibility of use and comfort seems to us to be essential,” the Bouroullec brothers explain. The relaxed design works beautifully, earning Ploum Red Dot’s Best of the Best 2011 Award.
Ploum settee. Designed by Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec. Manufactured by Ligne Roset.
Plush, Quilted Foam Settee
One single piece of fabric covers Ploum—and it is a plush, quilted fabric containing thick layers of polyester. Coupled with unique stitching, the upholstery welcomes the body, as does the shape of Ploum. Slight curves at each end of the settee encourage whoever sits in it to lean towards the center—so users lean towards each other. The flexible foam also shapes to each body, making the seating experience more like an embrace. Ploum breeds intimacy.
The Bouroullecs only work on projects they find “both interesting and inspiring”—and this strict aesthetic philosophy is visible in Ploum. The brothers envisioned the settee “like a ripe, voluptuous piece of fruit.” In red, Ploum does indeed look good enough to eat; it is as tempting as Snow White’s poisoned apple.
About the Manufacturer: Ligne Roset has established itself as a leader in contemporary furniture design. By working with first-rate designers the world over, both established and upcoming, the French company remains at the forefront of innovation. Headquartered in Briord, which remains the location of their factory, Ligne Roset began as a family-run business back in 1860 and continues as such today. The brand became official in 1973 with its first store opening; the company currently operates more than 200 stores.
The 800g Library by Dany Gilles is a modular shelving system that uses recycled corrugated cardboard scraps in an inventive way. Each module is stackable via interlocking tabs and grooves that keep the units standing. The shelving system is surprisingly strong, taking advantage of the lightness of corrugated cardboard and enhancing its rigidity with precisely placed supports. Feel free to load these modular shelves up with books or whatever display pieces strike your fancy.
800g Library. Designed by Dany Gilles.
The 800g Library reminds me of a lighter, leaner version of the milk crate bookshelves I see in many friends apartments. Reclaimed, customizable, unitized shelving is key for flexible living, especially in an apartment context. Bookshelves naturally lend themselves to stackable organization, considering one could just stack books on the floor senz furniture if necessary. 3rings loves a good bookshelf - The Top Ten Freestanding Bookshelves are worth taking a look at for creative inspiration and a glimpse of possibilities that are out there.
Cardboard and recycled paper are favorites among the sustainable, recycled design community. There are countless posts showing off exciting design with cardboard — some of my favorites include Fluted Cardboard Furniture by Giles Miller and The Wiggle Chair by Frank Gehry. While Miller’s cardboard furniture uses light to emphasize the corrugation, Gehry just lets the corrugated pattern speak for itself. Dany Gilles cardboard shelving focuses less on the aesthetic value of corrugation, and instead on its strength and lightness. Welcome to the ranks of cardboard masters Mr. Gilles.
I feel like, as an Apple lover, I need to share other ideas that are out there as well when it comes to electronics. There are a lot of potential competitors out there, but I wholeheartedly believe that no one has been able to match able in both hardware and software. But when I saw the new Nokia N9, I have to admit I was bit intrigued.
Physically, it looks really on brand for Nokia. It reminds me a lot of the old candy bar phones from the 90′s, which is totally a compliment. The form seems like it would be comfortable in your hand, and the back of the camera looks really clean and simple. Though one thing I noticed is the position of the camera, which may become covered by your hand easily.
The software seems to be pretty smooth, but not perfect in my mind. The field of icons on the home screen seems a bit overwhelming, though the icons themselves are rather well-crafted. I also like that there’s a screen that aggregates all your social networks and messages and notes and all that jazz. That said, it’s not very pretty, it’s quite mundane looking in fact.
Mundane is kind of how I’d describe the entire UI experience, sadly. The idea of swiping to get to other screens, and the lack of one physical button, is an interesting feature, but it certainly doesn’t make me giddy. It’s also interesting that they don’t seem to be showing the keyboard, which I think is a bit odd. Perhaps it’s not ready? There’s also a noticeable absence of phone calls or text messages, but yet again, this may be because it’s still early in production, I don’t know.
I’m highly doubtful that this will end up making a big splash, but I appreciate the effort at the very least. Between this and Microsoft’s Windows Phone 7 (Microsoft innovating much more, in my opinion), hopefully we continue to see more explorations like this.
Max Lipsey’s father is an architect, and his mother is an artist, but it might be Murray Moss who’s most responsible for turning the Eindhoven-based, Aspen, Colorado native on to design. In the early 2000s, Lipsey was attending NYU, studying design in what he calls an “extremely academic” way. On his commute every day from Chinatown through Soho, he’d pass the windows of Moss’s design emporium, which at the time highlighted the work of Dutch provocateurs like Maarten Baas, Hella Jongerius, and Marcel Wanders. “It sort of made me realize there was a place somewhere I could get my hands dirty and make things rather than writing about them,” he says. Lipsey applied and was accepted to the Design Academy Eindhoven — one of the rare Americans who ever attempt it — and by his first project he was hooked: “I made a belt buckle,” he remembers. “I was playing with sandcasting tin and I made a mistake where the sand broke apart and scattered in the mold, leaving tiny pockmarks where the crumbs had landed. When you polished it, it looked really nice, and it helped me learn to keep an eye open for mistakes. You have to play and experiment and you’ll discover things you wouldn’t have been able to imagine before.”
If you haven't been following Kirby Ferguson's video thesis, Everything is a Remix, his most recent entry on the elements of creativity is a great place to start. Part 3 of a 4-part series, Ferguson posits that true innovation starts from a foundation of copying, then transformative 'tinkering' to combining multiple elements for the true creative breakthrough. As designers and creators, what are your thoughts on this? Is everything truly a remix? [Watch Part 1: Music and Part 2: Films after the jump!]
Self-powered laptops and everlasting batteries could soon become a reality thanks to a new study from the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology that measured a piezoelectric film’s capacity for turning mechanical pressure into electricity. Piezoelectricity is a phenomenon already at work in small devices such as cigarette lighters, which use a piezoelectric crystal to create a charge when struck by a spring-loaded hammer. Piezoelectric materials such as crystals or ceramics are nothing new, but this is an application with a greater scope for use.
I have two printers at home and not one of them as smart as this Humble Home Printer by Tom Peach. For eons printers have got the second-class treatment as computer peripherals; at the most they get jazzed up with colors or integrate some new tech feature. Design-wise they remain boxy as ever! Humble is a refreshing change and given the detailed plans, I’m sure it will be a practical home option.
Ductpan is a clever dustpan design from Kawamura-Ganjavian in which you sweep up the dist and dirt and it funnels through the handle for easy cleanup. This product is best for small dustbunnies, not the giant squirrel-sized ones made by my dogs.
Thanks to companies like Senior Life and products like their contemporary walk in tubs, we can calmly approach our senior years without compromising the style of our homes. As we change, so do our interior design needs – in this case, safety and facilitating mobility often take precedence over factors such as style. But Senior Life’s walk in tubs say otherwise. They are so contemporary and stylish while satisfying all the needs of people who have trouble getting in and out of a regular tub. The seat inside has a special incline for easy sitting and standing without slipping. Visit Senior Life to learn more about this tub – you’ll want to whether you’re a senior or not!
Glue Gun design concepts by Western ID sophomores: "Here are some glue gun design concepts done by my students in the sophomore industrial design studio course at Western Washington. They had just completed their introduction to the elements of form theory of Rowena Reed Kostellow. The improvement of their designs is significant. These are all physical models, not CAD.
