Continuing with time pieces, the On-Time wall clock – designed by Fabrica and manufactured by Diamantini & Domeniconi – fast forwards 3 minutes so you’re sure to get there, well, on time.
Available here.
via bblinks
Category Archives: Fun
Too Late Neo Watches
Liviana Osti: Airplane Cheese Grater
Click to enlarge
Liviana Osti, a design student in Trento, Italy, has a humorous approach to product design. This paper airplane cheese grater is a perfect example. It caught my eye and made me smile, but what I enjoyed as much as the fun design was her lovely documentation of the project, from start to finish. I always enjoy the sketches or blueprints of designers or architects and, for example, that’s a big part of the appeal of Christo’s art for me, but you rarely get to see that aspect of a project. Liviana has a nicely designed, flippable pdf of each project and though I’ve placed a few elements in the images above, I highly recommend that you visit her site if you enjoy that sort of thing the way I do.
Another one of her table accessory designs is a double carafe in the shape of the two heart ventricles; one to be filled with red wine, the other with water. Not as cute, but still clever.
via designakitchen
Needlework Trend in Product Design
Recently I’ve noticed that there’s a lot of knitting, crocheting, needlepoint, and embroidery showing up in the most unlikely places.
Clockwise and spiraling in from top left corner:
Panier Percé needlepoint bowls; Lampy Cocoons; Goldilocks embroidery hoop stools by Groupa; Embroidery portraits by Daniel Kornrumpf; Action Men toilet paper cover by Sally Spinx; Jonathan Adler needlepoint pillows; Laine Blanche tea set with embroidery printed porcelain; Matt knitted lamps by llot llov; Laura Theiss innovative knit collection, summer 2011; Knitted Baskets; Granny Chair by Wadebe: Rose Trivet by Anouk Jansen; Knitted Poufs; Crocheted Bicycles by Olek
Kirby Block Drawers
These are called Kirby Block pieces on Etsy, but they certainly look like LEGO to me. Fun!
via fancy
Come a Little Bit Closer: Droog Bench
Click to enlarge
The three of us, over the past 6 years, have individually come across (and loved) the Come a Little Bit Closer bench by Droog. Little did we know that eventually we would have one of our very own! Well, actually it’s Em’s, but being that it will be placed in our living room, it feels very all-in-the-family. And we have the wonderful Rence (aka Richard) to thank for this: future architect; expert craftsman; and amazing friend.
Rence made the bench (top photo) based on Droog’s design (second photo) using leftover steel from his architecture classes. Hard to tell them apart, no? Are you as impressed as we are? This heavy and long (8ft!) finished bench was transported down from Ithaca, then carried across town a few days later (with a quick refueling stop midway), where the 60lbs of marbles were finally added and the gliding began. If you’re not familiar with the original design, the three discs act as seats that roll smoothly over the marbles. It’s surprisingly comfortable and definitely lots of fun! Thanks again, Rence, for the generous and beautiful gift. I mean for Em, of course…
Now, if we could only find someone to take the piano off our hands to make room for the bench.
Here’s a quick video of the bench in action.
Coffee Table Fun
Oliver Dicicco, who not only designs furniture but also makes beautiful instruments and kinetic sculptures, is the creator of the top two atypical tables: The Drum Table and Triangular Coffee Table.
The bottom table is the Three Sixty Table designed by Studio Mauerer Hendrichs. Made with skateboard trucks and wheels to create a lazy-susan spinning mechanism.
Claydies: The Fairytale of a Bicycle Helmet
The ceramicists/designers ladies of clay at Claydies came up with these humorous bicycle helmet concepts for a crafts exhibit at the Art Museum of Northern Jutland in Denmark. 18 Haute Couture bike helmets in all! Check out the rest at their site as well as their floating tea cups and their hairstyle inspired ceramic bowls. They certainly seem like a fun pair.
via Lustik
Rainbow City and High Line Too (Two)
Click to enlarge
The pop-up plaza, deemed The Lot, at 30th Street and 10th Avenue is just as promised. Rainbow City, the interactive balloon installation by Friends With You is cute, fun, kid-friendly and adult-silly. It feels a little like being on a real-life Candy Land game board with a hipster twist. The food section (The Lot On Tap) with its tables nicely angled to be parallel with the High Line above it, and stylish hanging lights, food trucks, large bar and container ticket booth, is all very appealing and I can imagine will be hugely popular in the evenings and weekends.
For me, the true star, once again, is the High Line. It’s hard to believe that they could top the original section, but in some ways I think they might have. Much more seating is available and incorporated very creatively and elegantly. There’s a coziness due to the proximity to the adjacent buildings (which might get a little claustrophobic on a crowded weekend) and there are many romantic little branches, or cul-de-sacs, throughout which work very nicely. Oh, and a lawn! A decent size lawn for NYC standards.
Definitely worth a visit, or three, this summer. Rainbow City is up through July 5, 2011, and Colicchio & Sons’ The Lot On Tap will continue through the summer. Open Sundays through Wednesdays from 11am to 10pm, and till 11pm Thursdays through Saturdays.
Fesetti: Disappear
Juan Astasio: 100 Smiles Project
I saw the charming, funny, and smart Juan Astasio (who just finished his MFA in Graphic Design at Yale) speak last night at the AIGA Fresh Blood event. Many of Astasio’s projects combine a playful wit with an interesting interactive aspect. The photos above are from his 100 Days project (I believe this is a Michael Bierut assignment) called 100 Smiles. Juan made a smile a day from found objects, every day for 100 days and photographed each one. They have all been placed on a website and scroll to the song Always Look on the Bright Side of Life by Eric Idle.
The rest of his site is worth checking out as well. Some of my favorites include: Issues, a personal project showing our insensitivity towards powerfully disturbing images; One Minute of Silence Project where you can write epitaphs for things you’ve lost; and Weather Escapes.
Marla Dawn Double Teapot Set
These porcelain teapots made me chuckle. Uniquely designed by Marla Dawn to pour two teacups at a time.
Available here.
Marimekko & Converse: Fall 2011
NOW we’re talking! Can’t tell you how disillusioned we were with the last round of the Converse/Marimekko collaboration. Such a great idea, but such a disappointing selection of patterns. This time around, with the announcement of their Fall 2011 line, (in our humble opinion) they really got it right.
The collection will be available in stores and online at Converse on June 23rd.
via notcouture via Nylon
Up, Up and Away with the Balloon Bench
Inspired by the 1953 film, The Red Balloon, Japanese designer Satoshi Itasaka from h220430 studio designed the Balloon Bench. While it appears to be suspended in the air by balloons, the bench is actually suspended from the ceiling by four anchors concealed by the balloons.
Available at Somewhere in Tokyo.
Photos © Ikunori Yamamoto
via Yatzer
Chelsea in Motion or, Motion in Chelsea
Zilvanas Kempinas’s piece at the Yvon Lambert Gallery, part of the Play Time group show exhibit. Kempinas had another one of his fan pieces at MoMA last year: Double O.
Jean-Pierre Gauthier’s Sweeping Spirals installation at the Jack Shainman Gallery. I’m thinking of purchasing this one for Daniela’s room.
Rainbow City at the High Line
U P D A T E : See our post-visit post here for the latest on Rainbow City.
This looks like fun! Em just read about this upcoming event on the Friends With You site (you may be familiar with their collaborations with KidRobot, among other things.) In celebration of the opening of the second section of the High Line, FriendsWithYou (sponsored by AOL) will be showcasing their forty piece installation Rainbow City.
FriendsWithYou presents a vibrant collection of mutable, air-filled sculptures. Inaugurating in the art district of Chelsea during the month of June, this will be FWY’s first large-scale installation in New York City. This happy city is made up of intensely colored balloon pieces, encouraging visitors to be active and explore the giant 16,000 square foot playground. Built for adults and children alike, the installation allows for interaction with each art object, making the experience unforgettable.
According to the article in the New York Times, the installation is part of a “pop-up plaza” at 30th Street and Tenth Avenue. There will be a 350-seat bar run by Colicchio & Sons, as well as a variety of fashionable food trucks offering a range of edibles from lobster rolls to ice cream.
The installation and festivities open on Wednesday, June 8th, 2011 and run through July 5th. Worth checking out for sure.
SOFTlab
Click images to enlarge
In my next life, I want to work at SOFTlab. These guys look like they have a great time doing everything they do. And what they do is everything. For them “a good idea does not discriminate between any medium or any type of project, it just works for everything.” That includes design of furniture, a website, a brand, a video, a gallery installation, a store display, and pretty much anything else that can be designed. Their approach is to make design customizable; it should allow for change, or growth, and be adaptable.
Just visiting their site is an immensely entertaining experience beginning with the computer animated video on their home page. Unknowingly, I was already familiar with (and a fan of) some of their work such as the colorful taped projection mapping of the New Museum as part of Festival of Ideas for the New City.
Above are just four of SOFTlab’s projects.
From top to bottom: CHROMAtex.me, a site specific installation for the bridgegallery, LES, New York. Photos: Alan Tansey
(n)arcissus, a site specific installation for NODE10 at the Frankfurter Kunsteverein in Frankfurt, Germany. Photos: Marius Watz.
POLYP.lux, a hanging installation for School Nite, part of the Festival of Ideas for the New City, NYC. Photos: Alan Tansey
CHROMAesthesiae, an installation for Devotion Gallery in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. Photos: Alan Tansey
There are plenty more interesting projects on their website.
Paperclip Potpourri
Click to enlarge
Here is a roundup of paperclip-inspired objects as well as a few that are actually made of paperclips.
CollabCubed 