In "Different Design Approaches to the Transforming Library Chair," we looked at a variety of designs for chairs that turn into stepladders.Here's a twist on that type of furniture that I'd not seen before:This "George III Mahogany Metamorphic Library Table Step Ladder" dates to … | Continue reading
This visually distinctive Robo Chair is by Italian industrial designer Luca Nichetto. It's not quite flatpack, though it does break down.Nichetto cites two interesting sources of inspiration for the chair's design. The first is the Chris-Cunningham-directed music video for Björk' … | Continue reading
"There are hardly any functional, robust and at the same time aesthetically pleasing solutions for storing or hanging up [skateboards] in public or semi-private spaces," writes Swiss street furniture company Burri Public Elements. Thus they produce these SkateboardZ racks:"Skateb … | Continue reading
"There are hardly any functional, robust and at the same time aesthetically pleasing solutions for storing or hanging up [skateboards] in public or semi-private spaces," writes Swiss street furniture company Burri Public Elements. Thus they produce these SkateboardZ racks:"Skateb … | Continue reading
Make plans to join Core77 and hundreds of other designers from around the world at the International Design Conference, taking place August 23-25 smack in the middle of Times Square (in NYC in case you're wondering). This year's theme is "Design Resiliance" and includes keynotes, … | Continue reading
Going back to the days when it was called "rapid prototyping," 3D printing was supposed to be about saving money. 3D printed houses offered that promise too, but it hasn't shaken out yet, at least not in the 'States. Those 3D-printed houses in Texas are priced at $450,000.In cont … | Continue reading
This Moccle bicycle, by Japanese designer Masateru Yasuda, has a unique frame. The craftsmen in Yasuda's Atelier Kinopio start with thin strips of plywood……add layers of carbon fiber… …and glue it up in a press.These pieces are then shaped into the bike's frame, connected with al … | Continue reading
Industry publication Plastics News has announced, for a short time only, they're offering free registration for their upcoming Plastics Caps And Closures conference (typically $99).Image: Arshad Pooloo "A joint conference from Plastics News and Sustainable Plastics, this year's e … | Continue reading
Product designer Greg Maletic collects vintage calculators. "I've had a fascination with these machines since the 70s," he writes, "when the calculators my dad would bring home from the office were the only computer-like things I could get my tiny hands on."Next weekend in Portla … | Continue reading
In the build video for that Moccle bicycle, there's a blink-and-you'll-miss-it moment of a craftsman using this unusual tool:That's a handheld pneumatic belt sander. The craftsman above is in Japan, where pneumatic tool manufacturer Shinano offers several versions, with belts as … | Continue reading
This striking DC 3 stool is by Brazilian furniture design studio Fahrer. Interestingly enough, it was inspired by the 1930s-era Douglas DC-3, specifically "the structural ribs of the aircraft's wings," writes Fahrer.Image: Towpilot, CC BY-SA 3.0 The DC 3 stool is made from CNC-cu … | Continue reading
This is the 50th anniversary of the British Lawn Mower Racing Association, and last weekend they held their annual race: A grueling overnight event of 500 laps, complete with pit crews. This year's race took 14 hours! Teams were allowed to rotate up to three drivers.As for regula … | Continue reading
For several years, the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory has been training AI pilots. While the bulk of the training has taken place in simulators, where millions of virtual test flights can be conducted in a day, the algorithm recently flew "a successful three-hour sortie" in t … | Continue reading
This sure seems like vaporware, but a Berlin-based startup says they've developed a wearable computer mouse.Both the startup and the product are called Clip Mouse. The device, which contains a gyroscope module, connects via Bluetooth. The developers say the device will read your … | Continue reading
Perhaps the biggest problem for those who own treadmills is discipline. How long will you regularly use it, before it becomes a place to hang clothes? The second problem is how much space they take up.A Chinese company called King Smith Fitness makes a treadmill that folds away f … | Continue reading
The standard rotomolded water cooler is a staple of summer camps, sports practices, barbecues and campsites. A simple and useful object. But: Name the central design flaw.To me, the central design flaw (at least when using these as a host) is there's no easy way to see how much i … | Continue reading
Here's what we looked at this week:The Pender ebikelifter easily hoists heavy e-bikes up to your roof rack. Here's video of a gigantic 10,000-liter water tank being blow molded.This beautiful Surf Bench is by New-York-based designer Carol Egan.Fabrication firm Millimetre built th … | Continue reading
Drone-as-a-Service company SkyX operates long-distance drones with a 100km (62 mile) range. But because their applications include inspecting pipelines, even that impressive range isn't long enough. Thus the company developed drone recharging stations to place along pipelines, ef … | Continue reading
They say if you're always losing pens, buy a very expensive one and you'll never misplace it. If you feel the same way about sunglasses, we've got the shades for you.That's Porsche Design's P´8951 sunglasses, which are freaking machined out of aluminum."The front and temples are … | Continue reading
Generative AI creates detailed images from text prompts. You may be interested in using it within your own work . . . but are its outputs high-quality enough? Shutterstock recently launched its very own generative AI tool. Now users can create original and unique images by typing … | Continue reading
If your hands work well, opening and closing a sliding glass door is no problem. For those without hands (or who have full hands), it becomes a challenge. Thus the invention of this Doorhickey object:Installation is straightforward: You press the suction cup against the glass, th … | Continue reading
We've seen lots of space-saving hideaway dining table designs, but this is the first I've seen that actually takes chair storage into account:I have no idea why they designed it to look like a talking prop in a Disney film.No designer is attributed to the piece. It's listed on th … | Continue reading
Industrial designer and design professor Bongkyu Song created this Multi Hanger for Hyundai. Designed for the traveling businessperson, it piggybacks off of the headrest supports and provides a place to hang one's coat: It's in production, and Song says it's available for purchas … | Continue reading
In Japan, gachapon toys are tiny replicas of mundane objects, sold inside capsules dispensed from vending machines. These recent examples by toy manufacturer Stasto Stand Stones are hilarious: Iconic Casio watches, but shrunken down to ring size.The machine-translated copy is als … | Continue reading
This is a much more intelligent design approach to the kitchen grater. Whereas most are linear, requiring an inelegant back-and-forth motion to grate, this Ograte is circular.It's a lot easier to grate, quickly, with a circular motion. The rim serves as a guardrail.The flat edge … | Continue reading
You know you're a baller if your house has leather door handles designed by Vico Magistretti.Magistretti designed these Club handles in 1999. "As always seemed to happen with Vico, inspiration for Club was born during conversation," wrote manufacturer Antonio Olivari. "Talking wi … | Continue reading
I'm not sure I agree with the shapes, but the thinking should certainly be taught at ID school: These Push & Pull door handles are "semantically designed to be clear about the direction the door should be opened," writes German industrial designer and design professor Uli Budde. … | Continue reading
We've already seen sneaker-storing furniture, here's sneaker cleaning furniture. As in, a dedicated furniture piece for scrubbing your kicks.UK-based sneaker retailer Footpatrol teamed up with Jason Markk, a U.S.-based purveyor of sneaker cleaning products, on this Sneaker Cleani … | Continue reading
The Bacchette chair, an unusual take on the director's chair, is by UK-based design studio Mentsen. "We found fascinating that this typology of chairs reminds us of warmer weather and perhaps an evening spent outdoors, and that is quite unique for a chair to invoke fairly univers … | Continue reading
This Pelican concept is by Or Reizberg, an Industrial Design student at Israel's Bezalel Academy of Arts. The aim is to multiply lifeguard manpower by having a drone that can quickly identify and reach a drowning person. It then deploys an auto-inflating flotation device, as a st … | Continue reading
Japanese company Toppan makes this VoiceBiz UC (Universal Communication) Display. It's a sort of magic translating window, intended for businesses that accommodate customers speaking different languages.Person A speaks, and their words appear, in their own language, on the screen … | Continue reading
Katsushika Hokusai is the Japanese artist who produced the iconic "The Great Wave off Kanagawa" in 1831.In more recent years, it came to light that Hokusai had been working on a book of images, from roughly 1820 to 1840, that was never finished. It was called "The Great Picture B … | Continue reading
Stacking Table, an intriguing fusion of craftsmanship and art. The Stacking Table's minimalist form and gentle curves bring a modern touch into your space.View the full project here | Continue reading
With Qu, the ultimate goal is to connect people back to their natural flows and patterns of life, and cultivate a grounded experience that enriches our lives and creates a more mindful and natural relationship with our technology. Qu is an innovative ambient technology based ecos … | Continue reading
Cotton-polyester blends are popular fabrics, combining the comfort of cotton with the performance of polyester. But once you've combined those things—cotton fibers and fibers spun from PET—they're virtually impossible to separate, making recycling difficult. However, a group of C … | Continue reading
These gigantic Roker Pods are in Roker, a seaside resort in the UK's port city of Sunderland. Designed by art collective Art Gene, they were commissioned by the Sunderland City Council to serve as mobile community spaces for residents. It's one thing to design and render these sp … | Continue reading
At design school, one of our ID professors described how exciting it was, mid-20th-century, when blow molding came into its own as a production method. He described industrial designers blow molding items as large as garbage cans. Well, this blows that out of the water:That's a 1 … | Continue reading
This beautiful Surf Bench, made of Walnut, is by New-York-based designer Carol Egan. Sadly, there are no details on the piece—I would love to see how it's made—but Egan does write: "As a designer, I'm interested in digital technology. I am fascinated by the intersection of craft … | Continue reading
Because e-bikes are heavy, German startup Pender has invented the ebikelifter.It attaches to your car's roof rack, and features a telescoping arm to do the hoisting and lowering. First you ratchet-strap this tube between your seatpost and handlebar stem……and then it's e-bikes awa … | Continue reading
Here's what we looked at this week:Ex-McLaren designer Steve Nichols came out of retirement to design the N1A, a beautiful '60s-style roadster.This modular tiny truck from Texas, a "Low-Speed EV," is called the Vanish.ID student Winson Cheng designed this Unimo, an open-source wh … | Continue reading
The gammaCore Sapphire is "the first and only FDA cleared non-invasive device to treat and prevent multiple types of headache pain via the vagus nerve," writes manufacturer electroCore. The handheld device, aimed at sufferers of migraine and cluster headaches who'd rather not dea … | Continue reading
The Beez is a lightweight bicycle touring trailer made with laminated wood and steel.French manufacturer Beecyclo reckons their design has at least seven advantages:Attachment to axis: fast and universalAttachment to the axis in less than 30 seconds. Compatibility with all 26 to … | Continue reading
Invented by mechanical engineer Rambod Radmard, this credit-card-sized Pocket Tripod……folds out into a phone stand, that tilts and holds its angle. In order to fit a variety of phone sizes, it somewhat wastefully ships with eight different adapters and a gauge you use to measure … | Continue reading
Researchers at Japan's National Institute for Materials Science have developed a reversible adhesive inspired by mussels. This is potentially huge news for design-for-disassembly practices.Image: Mark A. Wilson, Public Domain The researchers created a polymer film containing caff … | Continue reading
This is a smart design, for those who shoot a lot of video with their smartphone. While shooting video typically drains the battery, this SnapGrip device not only wirelessly charges your phone, but provides a more comfortable SLR-like grip. It attached magnetically to MagSafe-en … | Continue reading
This Tube Metal Hair Comb, by Dutch industrial designer Maarten Baptist, is made using an unexpected production method."This comb has an elegant twist. Designed with an ergonomic handle for maximum control. TUBE Comb comes in two versions: one for the lefties and one for the righ … | Continue reading
Graphic designer Allan Peters, of Peters Design Company, knows logos. Here's 60 he's designed over the years:Now Peters is putting his decades of experience into a book:Learn how to create iconic visual branding that stands the test of time with the innovative tools and inspirati … | Continue reading
This is an unusual project, to say the least. Italian industrial designer Francesco Faccin used a CNC mill and a lasercutter to produce the oldest of old-school objects: A manual Firestarter."Re-Fire-Kit is an object designed to reflect on essential human needs. A kit designed fo … | Continue reading