By Rain Noe - Jun 27 New

Ping Pong Precision Production Methods

This factory's got some serious balls, and one secret manufacturing step

First off, we love that there's a show called "Pingsider" that takes you deep inside the world of ping pong. Secondly, ping pong balls are one of those items that sound deceptively easy to make. But this look inside a factory in China, where table tennis is practically the national

By David Frane - Jun 27 New

Rethinking a Product We'd Rather Not Think About

No one—not even a plumber—dreams about owning a drain cleaning machine.

I'd be happy not to know what a drum machine is, but I do because I've watched the rooter guy use one to unclog our sewer line. What is a drum machine? It's a large motorized version of the hand snake a homeowner might use to clear the drain from

By Core Jr - Jun 23

Space Saving, Eco-Conscious Gear for Campers & Road Trippers

Get prepared before that Fourth of July getaway

The official first day of summer was this week, and with that begins plans for epic outdoor adventures. To help jumpstart your planning, we've compiled a list some of our favorite items that camping objects that feel essential rather than overdone and help make sure you conduct your camping or

By Rain Noe - Jun 23

A Video That Finally Explains the 4th Dimension in a Way We Can Understand

Geometry was my best math subject, and it served me well during my CAD jockey years. But one thing I could never wrap my head around was the notion of a 4th dimension. People smarter than me would try explaining it to me at a bar, and while I could

By Rain Noe - Jun 22

"Fifty Inventions That Shaped the Modern Economy"

Here's a podcast & book recommendation for industrial designers

Every single day, 600 tons of particle board go into a factory, and out the other end comes a product so ubiquitous that there is one for every 100 people on Earth. It was designed in 1978. Can you guess what it is? It's Ikea's Billy bookcase, which should go

By Rain Noe - Jun 21

The Industrial Design Prototyping Process, Part 8: Documenting the Work with Photos & Video

Just because your prototype is finished, doesn't mean your work is. Here industrial designer Eric Strebel points out the importance of having a pre-established, ready-to-go camera set-up, as with deadlines you may need to ship your prototype out the day it's finished, and you want a way to document your

By Rain Noe - Jun 21

The OneBlade Core: A Hyperdesigned Razor That Provides a Good Shaving Experience With Just a Single Blade

There was a lot of design and engineering attention lavished on this thing

I shave with a cheap Dorco Pace razor, and as someone who enjoys using fine objects and tools, I hate myself for it. It's an ugly piece of plastic that looks like it was created by a failed basketball sneaker designer. But I use it because the cartridges are relatively

By Fictiv Inc. - Jun 19

Thoughts on Designing for Disassembly

Someday someone will need to repair, upgrade, remanufacture or recycle the things you design

All right, all right! I'll confess: I'm part of the last generation to enter college without a cell phone—part of the last generation to graduate before iPhones were even on the market (Gasp! The horror!). My parents gave me my sister's old phone as a sophomore, and I remember not

By Rain Noe - Jun 19

Coleman's 4-in-1 LED Lantern

An old form factor with new tricks

Camping goods manufacturer Coleman has pulled off a clever piece of design with their Quad LED Lantern. By taking the old-school form factor of an actual lantern, then turning what would be the four glass faces into LED panels, they've created an object that provides 360-degree illumination—but allows four people

By Core Jr - Jun 16

Last Minute Father's Day Gifts Designer Dad's Gonna Want

Shout out to Amazon's 2-day shipping

Yeah, yeah, we know we're a little late with this Father's Day gift guide. However seeing as we aren't the only procrastinators, we bet at least 60% of you haven't even gotten your gifts yet. That's okay because we're here to help. Celebrate Dad, Grandpa, whoever with this list of practical Father's Day gifts you can still get by Sunday, thanks to the wonderful world of Amazon 2-day shipping:

By Rain Noe - Jun 05

An Incredibly Clever Lock Design from 1680

John Wilkes' "detector lock" has two-factor identification

Holland's Rijksmuseum has in their collection this "detector lock," created by a British locksmith named John Wilkes circa 1680. Made of nothing more complicated than brass and steel, it essentially has two-factor identification as you need to both possess the key and know how to operate the damn thing. And

By Rain Noe - Jun 01

Simply-Designed Desktop Organizer Becomes Kickstarter Smash

A lot of backers want the modular Gather system

Anytime a designer is looking to get something crowdfunded for 18 grand and winds up with a nearly quarter mil, they have our attention. And we like sharing these things here to inspire you design entrepreneurs with success stories. As we've seen,<----------LINK PLEASE----------- product designer Jeff Sheldon is "kind of

By Rain Noe - May 30

The World's Most Industrial-Designey, Technically-Complicated Dual-Tank Booze Flask

Overdesign FTW

Discommon sounds like the world's most fun design firm to work at. A cross between a blue-sky skunkworks and a practical product development shop, founders Neil Ferrier and Jeremy Hadden—who refer to themselves as "Chief Disruptor" and "Chief Technical Disruptor," respectively—see the firm as the place where they can "create

By Rain Noe - May 25

Video of Why Marc Newson Made This Stunning $12,000 Hourglass

It takes a lot for me to be absolutely smitten by an object, but this is it. Marc Newson, in collaboration with Hodinkee, sought out hard-to-find craftsmen to create this stunning, tactile, ultra-designed hourglass. If that sounds frivolous to you, I'd ask you not to pre-judge, and just watch why

By Rain Noe - May 24

Microsoft's Beautiful, Design-ey New Surface Pro

The design mantle is no longer Apple's

Now that Apple has slowed down on innovative design, it's great to see that Microsoft is picking up the slack. Yesterday they put out a video of their new Surface Pro, and the thing looks amazing: I'm digging not only that they've developed their own style for the video—remember that

By Rain Noe - May 11

The MUTDUT MultiCinch: A Strong, Super-Useful, Reversible Zip-Tie Alternative

This is one of those products where "form follows function" doesn't do it any aesthetic favors. But despite it being unattractive, as soon as you watch the video you see just how darn useful the MUTDUT MultiCinch is: I like the fact that these are easily reversible, unlike zip-ties,

By Rain Noe - May 10

How a Shirt-Folding Machine Works, and How to Make Your Own for $1

For those of you that need your clothing in perfect rectangles

Here's the type of machine that shirt manufacturers use to fold shirts into perfect rectangles off of the production line: You can find low-tech manual versions online and at big-box stores for about $10 to $25, but this guy made his for a dollar:

By Rain Noe - May 10

Amazon Reveals New Category of Lifestyle Device: The Echo Show

Not quite a TV, computer nor tablet, it's a voice-activated digital assistant that can show you things

This week Amazon revealed the new lifestyle device they've been working on, the Echo Show. By incorporating their Alexa digital assistant into something with a screen, they're hoping to create a new class of hands-free object that connects you both to the internet and to other people. The demonstration video

By Rain Noe - May 09

The Design Flaws in This Otherwise Nifty Portable Cassette Player

"Designer's Curse" is when everyone thinks something is cool, but all you can see is the lack of UX consideration

Sometimes novel designs are not good ones, but have enough "wow" factor to create desirability in those who aren't thinking it through. I'll put this Elbow portable cassette player concept in this category. Designed to reduce a Walkman to the barest minimum, it consists of a biaxial arm and provides

By David Frane - May 08

Thingamejig Scriber

Invented by an Australian cabinet maker, this clever gizmo scores material with sharp carbide blades instead of marking it with a pencil.

Scribing is the act of marking material that has to be removed from a counter or piece of trim so it fits tight to a wall or cabinet. Carpenters typically perform this operation with scribes, an adjustable marking tool similar to the compass used by a geometry students. Most

By Rain Noe - May 03

Stanley's Thoughtful, Innovative Design Upgrades for Thermoses

Their new Master Series shows that their designers are obsessed with improving the product

When products/form factors have been around for ages, there's a tendency to think of those objects as "done." But design is never really finished, and we love it when industrial designers can take these long-lived objects and continue evolving them in a useful, non-gimmicky way. A good case in point

By Rain Noe - May 01

Yea or Nay? Rainy Weather Sports Viewing Personal Tents for Parents

Pod people

I almost put this in the "Hell in a Handbasket" category, but since I am not the target market for this product, I figure judgment is best left to those who are. The Under the Weather Pod is a personal tent designed for parents viewing their children's sporting events in

By Rain Noe - Apr 28

The "Pan Am Experience:" Luxury Dinner, Circa 1970, Served in a Recreated 747

What we really want to see is "The United Experience"

While the experience of driving is better today than it was fifty years ago, flying commercial has become worse. That has given rise to a rather bizarre, nostalgia-driven restaurant in Los Angeles: The Pan Am Experience, where people pay $300 a head to sit in a reconstructed 1970s-era 747 and

By Rain Noe - Apr 27

A Brilliant, No-Mess, Vacuum-and-Water-Based Dog-Washing Machine with a Fatal Flaw

Bissell's Barkbath should partner with Bose

Here's an interesting example of a company evolving new products around a central idea: Bissell got their start in the late 1800s producing carpet sweeping devices. By the 1950s they'd branched out into carpet-cleaning contraptions, and in the 1970s, carpet deep cleaning machines. In the 2000s, vacuums targeting owners of

By Kat Bauman - Apr 20

Spotted On Coroflot: A Slick Stashbox With A Hidden Humidor

To celebrate the seasonal greenery, today's Coroflot find is a deep cut with lasting appeal. The Greenskeeper was designed by Colin Jackson of Ink Studios to address the insufficient options for attractive and material-wise stash boxes. You might think you're fine hiding those little baggies of dead oregano in your

By Rain Noe - Apr 19

How the Nubrella Evolved into a Specialty Accessory for Photographers

When your concept design doesn't go the way you thought it would, look for a new market

Steven M. Johnson's Armbrella might not be a real product, but the Nubrella is. When we first wrote about it nearly ten years ago, it was a relatively lightweight product and looked like this: However, it's now evolved into something considerably clunkier: This is a good example of how

By Rain Noe - Apr 13

Designs for Better Boozing: DIY Bottle Caddies

You can make most of these with cut-offs and minimal hardware

The weather's getting nice, which means soon we'll all be back to drinking alcohol out-of-doors. Why not class up your back-alley dice game with a handsome booze caddy? No matter what your poison, you can create something to make toting it around look like less of a degenerate activity. Beer:Shots:Wine

By Steven Johnson - Apr 12

Steven M. Johnson's Bizarre Invention #10: The Armbrella 

Steven M. Johnson's "Patent Depending" series of inventions range from social commentary to plain ol' bizarre, and they always give us a laugh. So we've contracted him to let us publish one every week.

By Rain Noe - Apr 11

Amazing Chinese Robotic Mail-Sorting Facility

It's like a bunch of Roombas expertly navigating Manhattan traffic

Global shipping company Shentong Express (a/k/a STO) is China's answer to UPS. To increase efficiency—and cut human staff—they've designed this rather amazing facility consisting of a huge open floor punctuated by a grid of square holes that open onto chutes. Human beings pull parcels off of a conveyor belt and