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Check out all of Core77's event coverage of Art Center's Serious Play Design Conference 2008 in one easy-to-browse place. Congrats to the organizers, and good luck with clarifying the "bi-annual" over the next two years!
Serious Play 2008: Art Center Turns on the Fun
Serious Play 2008: Hockenberry and the Space Dudes
Serious Play 2008: Play Study, Places to Play, and Playing With Paper
Serious Play 2008: Google, Second Life and *Magic*
Serious Play 2008: Opening Night Target Party
Serious Play 2008: Tuxedo Travels and Mentos With Coke
Serious Play 2008: John Maeda Rocks!
Serious Play 2008: frog's Crows and Eames' Elephants
Serious Play 2008: Paula Scher, Seriously
Serious Play 2008: How Things Work, Inside/Outside
Serious Play 2008: Bruce McCall, Aimee Mullins and Your Moment of John Oliver
For those of you not hangin' out on in California after Serious Play this weekend, stroll over to Brooklyn Designs. Hosted in Saint Anne's Warehouse, the show features the largest mix to-date of furniture, tabletop, and decorative arts. Be sure to check out Kiel Mead's unique display of jewelry and Furthurdesign's modern glass objects by William Couig (above). An added bonus this year is the new Cash n' Carry boutique - a sure-hit for those of us still searching for that perfect Mother's Day gift! - as well as the stellar group of speakers lined up to through-out the day.
All this content makes us wonder, once again, why Brooklyn Designs happens the week before ICFF? If only the visiting design world could get a glimpse of this first-hand!
Thru May 11th.
Posted by: elle* | Comments (0)
Home stretch!
"I don't know what I'm doing here," says Bruce McCall. He doesn't own a cell phone and paints on paper. But he did work in the automotive industry after a love of sports cars as a kid. And you can totally see this in his work as a painter and illustrator of probably a zillion New Yorker covers. He even had a show called "Serious Nonsense." You can divide his outlook on life into these themes: Retrofuturism, Techno-Archaeology, Faux Nostalgia, Hyperbolic Overkill, Shamelessly Cheap and Urban Absurdism. ("The brainless rich are the most fun to make fun of, so I do a lot of that.") But he's got some pretty striking design detail in there: Each features a miracle of modern technology or a marvel of industrial design, perfectly-rendered down to the bolts on the edge of his tanks (engaged in a polo game, of course).
As another person with a disability (he uses a wheelchair), John Hockenberry says that Aimee Mullins looked at her amputee status and took it not as an opportunity to lead a normal life, but as an "invitation to improve all physical appearance." You might have seen her in the Matthew Barney films slinking up the inside of the Guggenheim. In her adventures of designing the self, she saw the space between where her leg ended and the ground began as potential. Mullins' legs were amputated at the age of one and she shows the history of clunkily designed prosthetics. She first began to play with them by turning her feet around for substitute teachers (she even made one faint). Skiing, her ankles never hurt and her feet never got cold, so she could stay on the hill all day. And height? Well, she can be however tall she wants. "I'm usually 5-foot-8. But today, I'm 6-foot-1," she says. "Why be restricted to generic code when genetic code didn't show up for you?"
Plus the best ideas for her legs come from NASA engineers, Hollywood makeup artists, sculptors, so they look at it as a blank slate for innovation. Her running legs are modeled on the legs of a cheetah. And Alexander McQueen carved her a pair of exquisitely-carved wooden legs which she wore in a fashion show. And backstage Naomi Campbell wanted them. Mullins had to explain that they didn't really fit her. Now they're at the Met in the Costume Institute.
After a generous introduction by Hock (and a nice fakeout by Chee & Co.), Daily Show correspondent John Oliver quips: "If what he says is true, we're all doing to die." It's been three days of potentially-a-bit-too-Serious Playing, and thank god Oliver's brand of comedy doesn't need much explanation: "Analyzing comedy is like dissecting a frog. You don't learn anything, and the frog dies." So I won't try, but I will tell you that the audience is convulsing. He may have had some points in there about using your hands, or experimenting, or not being afraid to fail. But really? He's just funny. However, he does leave us with this lesson: "If you think like a child, your problems get smaller."
However, if you think like a child, you can't slam three Googletinis at the after party. So for the next hour--at least--I'm thinking like an adult.
>>Read all Serious Play 2008 posts
Posted by: Alissa Walker | Comments (0)
David Macaulay is good at showing how things work (Cathedral, Ship, Mosque, Mill). For his newest book, The Way We Work, he wanted to show how our bodies were constructed, so it was natural for him to think of the human body as a gigantic "machine." So the body is presented like a series of rides at Six Flags. No joke! It's a universe of bodily landscapes and blueprints for life where a duodenum is two stories tall. Protein chains are stacked like Campbell soup cans. Cells are assembled like a social network diagram. Tissue making is organized into a dirty laundry room. Oxygen enters red blood cells on an assembly-line roller coaster, organs get trucked in on semis, and liquids course through the body as irrigation ditches then whitewater rafting courses.
My personal favorite is a bolus (remember that word?) of broccoli being photographed by tourists from a walkway as it plunges down the thorax. And of course it all ends with a "fantastic rectum" (Macaulay's words, not mine) where waste management trucks ship it all away. "We don't usually have the time to look at the smallest details," he says. "We get so caught up in scale we just think we can't understand something so big." But that's not true, he says. "By dismantling it we can observe why it works."
Always the overachiever, Paula Scher actually looked up what 'play' meant in the dictionary. Play equals what we usually think of, kids playing, but it also means gambling, and if you're not gambling with your work, then you're not, as they say, in the game. But being 'serious' about something, says Scher, is very different from being solemn--when you're solemn, that means you're not playing anymore.
During what she calls her youthful arrogant years, she detested Helvetica (You remember her badmouthing Helvetica, don't you? Saying it was the typeface of Vietnam?). But her hatred pushed her into a very serious "brat"-like play with all the crazy Art Deco-like type you've come to know. And this resulted in some pretty serious work. But she didn't get serious about it again for about 14 years, when she worked on the Public Theater's identity. And suddenly this amazing, very serious, very playful work emerged that shook up everything in design. But what happened? "New York ate my identity," she says. Designers everywhere ripped her off, organizations copied the look. So she had to switch it up, and all her work since then has been solemn. Solid, but solemn.
Posted by: Alissa Walker | Comments (0)"Be careful what you say at cocktail parties," says Joshua Klein from frog. In his case, he mused over a drink that someone should really teach all these crows flapping around here to do something useful. Someone else said that was a stupid idea, so that made Klein want to do it even more. Crows live everywhere that humans do for the most part, so there's a lot of them. And they're smart. Check out the video above, where crows drop shelled nuts onto the street where they're sure to get run over by a car in order to crack them. Brilliant! But what was notable to animal behavior scientists wasn't that they used car tires as nutcrackers, it was the fact that crows were actually learning from each other. This ability to learn cultural behavior is what makes crows exceptional. So Klein designed a vending machine that gave a crow a peanut when it inserted a coin into the machine. And guess what--the crows started to figure out that if they went out in the neighborhood and got more coins, they'd get more peanuts. So not only could crows be employed to pick up all the loose change on the streets, if you trained them to bring it to your house, you'd be rich. Amazing.
Then the lovely Eames Demetrios is onstage and it's a beautiful sight. He's standing before the famous Dot pattern designed by his famous grandparents, and he's also standing in front of their two red Plywood Elephants by Vitra, who are the stars of "A Gathering of Elephants" a delightful little film Demetrios made. From playing with plywood to making films, Charles and Ray never delegated the understanding to someone else so they wouldn't miss out on play. Plus--major bonus for Demetrios--"The great thing about having grandparents who made toys is that they always felt like it was important to be on the cutting edge of toy technology." When it the Super Ball came out, Charles said in an interview that it represented the greatest design of the year. And then Demetrios' brother promptly used one to break the third story window of their house. This didn't please Ray but it delighted Charles, in fact, the degree Charles valued the most was an honorary degree from clown college. Demetrios says that Charles and Ray would be very upset to see material objects used as status symbols in our current culture. The most valued things shouldn't be expensive things that are exclusive, rather they should be things anyone can do, like learning a language--something that proves the time and effort spent; devotion to a craft over the ownership of objects. He closed with a quote from a forthcoming book of Eames quotables: "At all times love and discipline have led to good times and a good life." The Eames stamps are out June 17, which is Charles' 101st birthday and the perfect day to send someone a real letter that shows both love and discipline.
>>Read all Serious Play 2008 posts
Here's an unusual design problem: how do you make a clock that only turns 30 times in 10,000 years? The Long Now Foundation, showing here at last weekend's Maker Faire, has addressed this challenge in a clever and rather beautiful way: given the weight and slowness of the clock they want to build, they're replacing ball bearings with a mesmerizing series of flexors that "pass" the clock mechanism along, rather than rolling. Lovely video, thoughtful treatment of a really abstract concept, and the website is worth a check too.
Posted by: core jr | Comments (0)
Design Within Reach has partnered with Domino Magazine to host tonights opening night party for BKLYN Designs:
Held from May 9-11 in DUMBO, Brooklyn, BKLYN Designs, now in its sixth year, is an annual show featuring Brooklyn-based designers and manufacturers of contemporary furniture, lighting, rugs and decorative accessories as well as panel discussions and speakers, design presentations, a walking tour, and other activities throughout the weekend.The opening party will be Friday May 9, from 8-10pm at the Brooklyn Heights DWR Studio at 76 Montague Street. Free issues of Domino will be available, and there will be food, cocktails and musical stylings by the Studio's resident DJ, Nathan Ursch. Design Within Reach and Domino will give away one pair of gunmetal grey Marais AC Chairs, as seen in the May issue of Domino.
For those who would prefer not to make the 12-minute walk from DUMBO to the Heights, Con Edison is sponsoring a shuttle bus leaving from BKLYN DESIGNS at St. Ann's Warehouse, 38 Water Street, at 8 pm for the party.
Find more great design events at the Core77 Calendar.
Posted by: core jr | Comments (0)
John Maeda! John Maeda! hit the stage this morning wearing a super snazzy crumpled silver jacket (or maybe the iron didn't work in his hotel, but no matter: he wears it well). "I'm getting kinda tired of talking about simplicity, actually," he says, "So I'm going to do complexity." I feel a major Maeda crush coming on.
Maeda grew up working in his father's tofu factory and like all creatives, his parents told him not to be creative. Instead he majored in math at MIT, but he just so happened to start working when computers got visual. He became a self-professed "icon master" until he discovered Paul Rand. And realized how bad he was at design. So he went to design school. He started learning how to make his design work move and flail about on the screen and his design teachers told him to stop it. And it was right around then he noticed a now-famous quote from Rand: "A Yale student said, 'I came here to learn how to design, not to learn how to use a computer.' Design schools take heed."
Posted by: Alissa Walker | Comments (0)Cyclecide Bike Rodeo is a group of bike-obsessed Bay Area makers who take their "traveling pedal-powered carnival that is fun for people of all ages" to events up and down the West Coast. Here we've got a few seconds of their cycle-driven carousel flinging some kids about at a frightening pace; see their website for videos of their other contraptions.
Posted by: core jr | Comments (0)
Here is a competition that you probably trained for back in middle school when any blank surface was a possible medium for your rebellious artistic streak. In fact you might even have answered this brief exactly: apply your own style to a pair of Chuck Taylors. The difference now is that instead of getting in trouble with mom or the authorities you might win a trip to Converse! Check it out here.
Posted by: shaggy | Comments (0)
This morning is like the college humor portion of the conference, except for John Maeda, who was sandwiched in here but he deserved his own post. Late-add Douglas Campbell is nowhere on the schedule and hits the stage like a Sinatra impersonator doing the 3am shift at Circus Circus. Even after two days of magicians, jump ropers and jugglers, his jovial frat-guy demeanor is probably the most unsettling one coffee into the morning. What's a bit more disturbing is that he's wearing a tux. As one-half of Tuxedo Travels he and a friend traveled from Asia to London wearing only tuxedos. On April 1 (of course) they embarked on their epic journey to have fun, but they ended up donating money to organizations and doing goodwill deeds along the way to create a "trail of happiness" in their wake. Of course the trip also included plenty of rice wine binges, amnesia-inducing herbal baths and nudity, with the photos to prove it. Now Campbell wants to expand the flock, if you will, and he's calling on designers to help him design a broader audience participation experience. But he doesn't need any help with the tux, however: Apparently it's made from some superfabric that you can wash in the shower--while wearing it. Which doesn't make too much sense since Campbell seemed to be plenty comfortable with the tux off.
And now it's time for another Serious Play Surprise! It's the Mentos and Coke guys! After chatting about their sudden brush with fame--they even got contacted by the Bellagio fountain guys, sweet!--a kiddie pool comes out and they drop six Mentos into a Diet Coke liter for a small on-stage geyser. For you nerds out there, the reaction is not chemical, it's physical, and it's called 'nucleation.' In fact, it's not Mentos-specific, anything small with the same surface area will do the trick. Now the guys are headed back home to work on another experiment--using 46,000 pads of Post-It notes.
>>Read all Serious Play 2008 posts
Posted by: Alissa Walker | Comments (0)
At first glance the Myhab appears to be another design for temporary disaster housing; in fact it's designed for a more frivolous purpose--housing festival-going hippies and groupies. No longer will music-lovers have to roll around in Mother Nature's grit at Lollapalooza-like shows; the recycled-plastic-and-cardboard Myhab provides foam mattresses, temperature insulation and a lockbox where you can securely store your psychotropic drugs.
You can rent a Myhab structure for specific festivals at their website (thus far, festivals in the UK only); Myhab rentees also have access to the festivals' on-site "Myvillage"--a collection of showers and toilets, so you don't have to learn about poison ivy the hard way. At 120 pounds (US $240) it ain't cheap; but while the alternative is free, it's also called mud.
via hippy shopper
Posted by: hipstomp | Comments (0)
RT, RM, AF, SLS; that's Rapid Tooling, Rapid Manufacturing, Additive Fabrication, and Selective Laser Sintering. For those of you not up on Rapid Prototyping, read this Modern Plastics article for a primer, as well as the latest developments in the field (and more plastics acronyms than you'll know what to do with).
Looking for something to do with Mom this weekend? Sign up for the Inhabitat Mothers Day Green Design Tour Sunday, May 11 at 2pm. Inhabitat's Jill and Abigail will lead you on a personal tour of Green products at Brooklyn Designs (opening this weekend!).
They're taking a limited number of participants. Email them at inhabitat at gmail.com to reserve your spot! And Mom's.
Posted by: elle* | Comments (0)
If CDs are dead, then records are even dead-er, right? Not if it's up to Aleksander Kolkowski. This engineer-cum-artist is carving a new niche for our old music with his vintage record-cutting machine. The handy tool re-purposes old CDs by 'overwriting' existing data and cutting grooves on 'em so they can be played on a turntable. All you have to do is show up with a track, an old CD, and voila! Off you go with a brand "new" 45RPM single. Now if only I could find my turntables.....
via boing-boing
Posted by: elle* | Comments (0)
iLounge has launched a "Design the Next iPhone" competition. They're looking for originality, innovation and a bit o' humor:
We will be looking for six total winners for this contest - three grand prize winners will receive Apple's next-generation iPhone, courtesy of iLounge, and three runners up will receive $100 iTunes Gift Cards. Our plan is to pick two winners with "advanced" iPhone designs, another two for "simplified" iPhone designs, and two more for funny iPhone designs. The grand prize winners will be our three favorite overall entries. Use these design ideas to inspire your work and you'll have the best shot at winning a next-generation iPhone of your own.
Get crackin here!
What can you do with waste paper apart from filling up your dustbin? Jens Praet knows! One Day Paper Waste is a little table/console, obtained by taking shredded confidential documents, mixing them with resin and compressing them into a strong mould... End result: a new interesting object that has the strength of wood.
Every document tells a story. By shredding confidential documents, part of its information remains mysteriously visible. One Day Paper Waste gives new life to these documents, that's the real beauty of this product.
Check out more waste paper concepts at Jens' website (don't miss his "black edition").
Posted by: Aart van Bezooyen | Comments (0)
Senior Designer
JDK Design
Burlington, Vermont
Work with an international mix of forward-thinking people and brands. JDK Design in Burlington, Vermont, seeks senior graphic designers with 5 years of experience and an intimate knowledge of the youth-oriented action-sport or video-gaming culture. Our designers have mind-blowing creative talent, a ceaseless desire to shape what's new and what's next, and uncommonly good presentation skills.
The best design jobs and portfolios hang out at Coroflot.
Posted by: core jr | Comments (0)
The winners of Cooper-Hewitt's 2008 National Design Awards have been announced. This year's first prize and two runners-up in the Product Design category were all New-York-based firms: Antenna Design, Boym Partners and Karim Rashid. To see the winners in all of the categories (Architecture, Communications, Fashion, Interior, Landscape, Design Mind, Corporate Achievement and Lifetime Achievement) click here.
Posted by: hipstomp | Comments (0)
If you've ever wanted to have a double-Dutch team at a party but worried that a bunch of people wearing ties and heels wouldn't jump, forget it. Design folk were pushing each other out of the way to hit the ropes at the Target party. And nothing goes better with jumping up and down repeatedly than a red apple-something-deadly served in red flashing martini glasses and a fry bar. A DIY fry bar, with chili, ketchup, cheese sauce, truffle mayo, chipotle mayo, blue cheese mayo (did I forget any of the mayos?). And candy, so much candy, I had a really hard time deciding what to stuff my pockets with so I stuffed them with red velvet cupcakes instead. We walked away with Crayola crayons, Cynthia Rowley jump ropes and "green" Target bags. Except they were red, of course. Do you see a theme?
Posted by: Alissa Walker | Comments (0)
Remember this guy? After more of the rockin' 80s soundtrack (more Madonna, please!), we have Irene Au, director of user experience at Google (it seems somehow dirty and obvious to link to that). I know, you don't always think Google=design. But to her, fast=design, easy=design and profitable=design. Au shows a video from their usability labs where they studied behavior and eye movements of probably the worst Googler in the world (he was shopping for a flat-screen television and Googled "television"). Yet it proves a good point. In its success, Google's user experience has undergone a huge transformation. When they started, they were only used by tech-savvy Silicon Valley hipsters. Now 70% of their traffic is from outside the U.S and they've had to completely reconsider how they are used in places that aren't, like, American. Here's one especially striking comment from a clip she shows of cell phone user research. It's shot in India, where a woman opens a window in her house by rolling up a plastic tarp on her tent: "We can miss a meal a day, but we cannot miss a day on our mobile phones. It will affect all our work and our lives." So look forward to that option somehow incorporated into your new Google Phone.
Now we're entering Second Life. Well, not really, but it's a slideshow of images from the metaverse. Second Life founder Philip Rosedale loved stuff like Star Trek so much he built a roof hatch with a garage door in the ceiling of his room as a kid. He says the parallels of SL growth are so similar to the internet in the 90s that we should not be afraid of alternate universes, especially since, according to Rosedale, Second Life will someday be bigger then the web(!). Huh? Well, he says, because the web connects text to text, whereas a place like SL connects infinite imagery and descriptions and users' creations. But although he is standing in front of images of chesty women in swan costumes, Rosedale barely scratches the surface of the whole Second Life culture and all of the ahem, ethical issues therein (like, he just casually mentions that you can buy a baby in Second Life). Also? He is way too good-looking in real life to be the ultranerd he professes to be. He's like the Ryan Seacrest of gaming. He is probably the only person in SL whose avatar is actually less attractive.
Posted by: Alissa Walker | Comments (0)
The puff-tastic sameness that pervades the language design firms use to promote themselves has bugged us for a long time, but leave it to Design Observer regular Steven Heller to finally take the gun to this particular barrel of fish.
In a wickedly precise article on the AIGA website Tuesday, Heller gives a bit of history on the relationship between designers and the written word, and then steps back to let modern design firms (attempt to) speak for themselves. The results are horribly familiar, and raise the excellent question of how it got to be this way.
The list of samples is long and telling; we dare you to read all the way through the list without either glazing over or dissolving into a giggle fit. A few choice entries from section one: Happiness Is a Warm Client:
* The process begins with analysis, immersion into the client's situation in order to define the true problem.* Our primary concern is with our client's success in their business.
* The basic need of most clients who come to us is to fulfill a business function.
* Our primary concern is to solve the client's communications objective.
* Our goal is to meet our clients' visual communications needs by applying an approach based on discipline, appropriateness and ambiguity.
[huh?]
Read the full article here.
Posted by: Carl Alviani | Comments (0)
Here's another in a long list of careers to sign up for at this conference: Stuart Brown is a play expert at the National Institute for Play. From the chaotic games of Medieval times to polar bears nuzzling the necks of huskies (instead of chomping on their jugulars), he actually studies play. Most notably, how its absence in childhood leads to violence in grown ups. So think about that the next time your kid is wailing because you told her it's time to put away the Polly Pockets. The reason for this is that play is not only essential for intelligence and developmental behavior, but it's also essential for trust. Brown says the case of the "wooden" Al Gore is a different example of a potentially play-deprived youth (but not in a violent way). This person probably didn't have a whole lot of play in his past--long days spent working, studying and trying to be like dad--but once he got to play around with his slide show....well, you saw the change. So take a cue from Al and think back to your most creative, joyful moment in your past. Start building ideals from that notion into how you live your life now. It should be just as much a part of your life as sleep and dreams.
As principal of Diller Scofidio + Renfro, Elizabeth Diller's architecture is all about play--and they sure do like playing with water. Their Blur Building in Switzerland screwed around with weather systems by turning a buildings walls into mist from the lake it sat in. Another art project created a frozen lake made from branded waters from around the world. At the Biennale in Venice this year they're actually going to use water from the canals to make the best espresso in the city (really, you must tell us how that goes). Diller also is working on the High Line, that abandoned elevated railway through Manhattan. Playing with the definition of a public space resulted in their ideas being so vibrantly embraced that starchitects wanted to build near it, celebs like Ed Norton wanted to get involved, and David Bowie had a benefit concert for it...that was actually nowhere near the High Line. And isn't that kind of the measure of success for your entire life? When David Bowie supports you, you can retire, right?
Posted by: Alissa Walker | Comments (0)
Smart / Models is a one-day event scheduled for Saturday May 17 at the Times Center in NYC. The conference will feature presentations by five design firms describing their five different business models. According to the web site, the day will cover 'the overlap between smart design and business smarts." Sounds like you'd be smart to register while there are still tickets left!
Cool poster design by Sam Potts!
Posted by: StuCon | Comments (0)
Top, the Globo Chair by Stefano Big can have its backrest removed and be conjoined with others to form a bench, and it also stores its own ottoman inside its seat.
Bottom, the Ooch armchair by Sanniadesign is basically a stacking collection of pillows in a frame; when three of your hippie friends come over, all of you can sit on the floor.
Posted by: hipstomp | Comments (2)
SHORT poster. Check out pages from the book on VA's website.
Just when you thought enrolling your kids in yoga and teaching them Japanese was enough, Sydney based firm, VA, has developed a coloring book for the artistically cultural elite. Limited to 1,000 copies worldwide, SHORT is an 82-page masterpiece filled with outlined works from selected artists and designers that your child (or who are we kidding, you) color yourself. And—bonus—every book comes with a poster by Stefan Marx and Chris Hopkins. Later this year high-end Japanese fashion label, BEAMS plans to run a line of limited-edition VA Editions | SHORT tees taken from the features of seven SHORT artists. Currently the only distributors are in Australia, Japan and the UK, but that shouldn't stop you from dreaming up your own fancy coloring book right in your own studio.
Posted by: Alison | Comments (0)
After one too many flashing red cocktails at the Target party last night (seriously, one was too many), a first glimpse of master of ceremonies John Hockenberry was just the caffeinated jolt the crowd needed this morning. In his signature opening video, Hock asked his kids (two sets of twins--adorable!) to give us conference-goers some advice about how to play seriously. Short answer: "You can't! It's playing! It's not supposed to be serious!" Kids say the darndest things.
Nobel Prize-winning physicist George Smoot (who was totally jump roping last night at the party) is wearing a seriously playful tie to kick off the morning. He's going to begin at the beginning. The very beginning, like the beginning of the universe, and he brought with him some perspective, as in, Hubble Telescope-perspective. It's CSI: Universe, examining the design principle the universe used to assemble itself. Lots of Big Bang "trashcans," pretty hyperspace fly bys and "billions and billions"-speak.
Posted by: Alissa Walker | Comments (0)TechShop is one of those things that makes so much sense you wonder why it hasn't been around forever. Based in Menlo Park, CA, it's a massive, public, subscription-based machine shop and fabrication studio that actively encourages the mechanically curious to get their hands dirty and start making things. In addition to all the routers, laser cutters, welding equipment and RP machines they run, TechShop also offers low-cost classes to get newbies building as quickly as possible. Founder Jim Newton walks us through a few of the toys they brought over to demonstrate, and mentions a bit about expansion plans too (Portland, OR and Durham, NC by the end of the summer, seven more locations next year--check the website to see where).
Posted by: core jr | Comments (0)
We hate going to those artsy bar-cafes where the Male/Female signs for the bathroom have been replaced by abstract symbols. We don't want to puzzle things out on our way to the loo--any additional step between us and the toilet is a hindrance. But for those of you that find such signs entertaining, here are a couple links to galleries of them: 1, 2.
Warning: NSFW...unless you work in one of those artsy bar-cafes.
via pagog and offbeat earth
Posted by: hipstomp | Comments (0)
Designed for the "locavore," Local River, created by Mathieu Lehanneur and Anthony van den Bossche is a home storage unit for fish and greens. This DIY fish-farm-cum-kitchen-garden is based on the exchange and interdependence of two living organisms - plants and fish.
Here's the dirty stuff:
The plants extract nutrients from the nitrate-rich dejecta of the fish. In doing so they act as a natural filter that purifies the water and maintains a vital balance for the eco-system in which the fish live. The same technique is used on large-scale pioneer aquaponics/fish-farms, which raise tilapia (a food fish from the Far East) and lettuce planted in trays floating on the surface of ponds.
Simply put, now you can have your fish, lettuce, and eat 'em too! The ultimate goal of Local River is not just decorative, but functional too -- serving as an aquarium/refrigerator it allows fish and greens to cohabit until .....um.....dinner time rolls around.
On view at Artists Space from 25 April to 21 June 2008.
Check out more pix after the jump.
Established late last year, DesignTalks is "the online community for the UK design and manufacturing industry, and the ideal place to debate the hottest topics of the moment. As well as providing an online debating environment, we also produce whitepapers and other resources designed to help manufacturers get the best from designers - and vice versa."
Their latest whitepaper is on Design & Sustainability and can be downloaded, free, here.
Posted by: hipstomp | Comments (0)New York City is getting more film and TV crews (Ugly Betty will finally start shooting here, in the city the story's set in, rather than in sham L.A. studios) due to a recent tripling of the tax credit awarded by the city to production companies.
Now the state of Michigan is using a similar strategy to attract creative businesses. If you're looking to set up an architecture or design firm (graphic, interior, fashion, and yes, industrial) or a broad range of other creative businesses, you become eligible for the Michigan Economic Growth Authority (MEGA) tax credit, previously available only to those in the manufacturing sector. As bureaucrats try to revitalize a struggling Detroit, it will once again be up to the artists (SoHo story, anyone?) to renew and revitalize. More info available here.
Posted by: hipstomp | Comments (1)
Sr. Web Designer
Lucky Brand Jeans
Los Angeles, California
Partner with the Lucky Brand Jeans creative team as well as participate in the daily brainstorming and discussions of the LuckyBrandJeans.com business team for design and business related strategies.
The best design jobs and portfolios hang out at Coroflot.
Posted by: core jr | Comments (0)
The UK's upcoming Design Show Liverpool looks set to be an exciting event; spanning "furniture, glass, ceramics, lighting and eco-design to garden products, clothing, jewellery and fashion accessories," there will also be workshops and an opportunity for show-goers to contact designers and commission projects of their own. Runs from June 19th to 22nd; more info available here.
Posted by: hipstomp | Comments (0)We first blogged this low-cost wind turbine from Engineers Without Borders last month, but here's a Maker Faire guided tour of the thing, given by Matt McLean, one of the literally hundreds of engineers who make up the organization. Turns out bike parts, electrical conduit and Teflon tape have more uses than you think.
Posted by: core jr | Comments (0)
Okay, I know, I swore I was out, but only the kind folks at Core77 and hundreds of thousands of dollars could entice me out of my live-blogging retirement. So after working back up to my blog flexibility with five excruciating weeks of deep phalanges stretches, here I am, in Pasadena, California, at the third Art Center Conference, Serious Play.
And boy is it ever nice over here in the Wind Tunnel. Maharam fabrics unfurling from the ceilings, cushy Steelcase chairs, even tables for us live-bloggers so we don't walk home with MacBook battery burns on our upper thighs. Our cruise ship director Chee Pearlman takes the stage with images of the patron saints of fun design, if you will, who will be looking over us on our three days here. Charles and Ray Eames on a motorcycle, Tibor Kalman holding a gun-printed issue of Colors to his head, Ettore Sottsass and that kickass red Olivetti typewriter. She then introduces the first of many conference surprises. OMG a double-Dutch techno dance break! It's Bring It On with jumpropes!
Keynote speaker Tim Brown* of IDEO is sure to mention first and foremost that he sure does love to play with Legos®. (My question is, how much did they pay for that mainstage product placement?) Brown has some audience participation for us to do. First, everyone is given 30 seconds to draw their neighbor. Lots of laughs and lots of "I'm sorry, you aren't really that fat/ugly/alien-like." Brown tells us that David Kelley started IDEO around the concept of play, so he could work with his friends (now numbering 550) and have fun at the office. Big creative companies always have something that defines their corporate culture and IDEO's is their Finger Blaster, a Wham-O-like foam slingshot device. That they invented. Of course. And wouldn't you know it, but we all have one taped underneath our seats. So...giant targets go up behind him (Is this more product placement? They're sponsoring tonight's after party.) and Brown is getting pelted with hundreds of Finger Blasters! Wheeee! Now this is serious play!
Kids love boxes, Brown says, because a Tickle-Me-Elmo only does one thing, while a box could do anything. It's the habit of exploration and looking for lots of possibilities that makes us creative. An academic named Robert McKim--now officially my favorite academic of anything-- studied the effect of psychedelics on creative in the 70s. He gathered 27 men from engineering, physics, math, architects, and furniture designers and gave them mescaline. He asked them to find out how many uses they could create for a paper clip. But along the way they also figured out some other stuff, like the design of an electron accelerator. "It wasn't the drugs," says Brown. "It was the fact that the drugs shocked them out of the normal way of thinking." Uh huh. And the purple coyote in the corner that told them how to design the electron accelerator.
A Western-raised first grader spends 30% of their time in construction play. In the grown up world, Brown says David Kelley calls this "thinking with your hands" or building multiple prototypes very quickly. Brown contrasts video of kids playing with blocks with Frank Gehry building models (you can definitely see the resemblance; they both really need to comb their hair). And then he shows shots of IDEO engaging in role play to gain empathy for their audience. Um, how cool is it to work at IDEO? It looks like you get a preschool art cubby full of craft supplies and then you get to dress up like nurses and ghosts and play bakery and store with large human-scale Playmobil setups. Oh, and infiltrate hospitals with video cameras strapped to your head.
The only caveat to all this play, however, is that play has rules, and you can't play all the time. So you've got to trust those around you to play and trust those around you when you want to be creative. Therefore, the rules for creativity (and this conference) are as follows:
· Exploration: Quantity
· Building: Think With Your Hands
· Role Play: Act it Out
· And put away your Finger Blasters when you're finished with them
Actually, I take that back, I'm offering $100 to anyone who can land one in John Hockenberry's lap during the rest of the conference.
*One very tiny item I have to include which I will do to prove this is live but also because it is related since Tim Brown was on the jury: The Cooper-Hewitt's National Design Awards have just been announced and I gotta give a big shout out to all the winners!
>>Read all Serious Play 2008 posts
Posted by: Alissa Walker | Comments (0)
If you are looking to furnish or decorate, consider this:
Real Simple, along with co-chairs Maggie Gyllenhaal, designer James Huniford and Real Simple's managing editor Kristin van Ogtrop, are hosting the fourth-annual Design on a Dime charity event to benefit Housing Works, the nation's largest community-based AIDS-service organization. The two-day event is free and open to the public May 9-10, with a kick-off party to be held on May 8th from 6-9 PM.During the event, thirty top-tier designers - including Sills Huniford, Thom Filicia, Charlotte Moss and Jamie Drake - will create breathtaking, one-of-a-kind room vignettes. People will be able to purchase the items in the vignettes at 60-80% off the retail price and all proceeds from the sale will benefit Housing Works.
Thursday, May 8 through Saturday, May 10 at the Metropolitan Pavilion (125 West 18th Street, New York City).
Find more great design events at the Core77 Calendar.
Posted by: core jr | Comments (0)While we recently highlighted the trolling Poynor anti-innovation piece, we can't recommend strongly enough Gabby Hon's thoughtful and insightful rebuttal at Experience Matters.
Posted by: Steve Portigal | Comments (0)
Inspired by the Mexican tradition of scaring off flies by hanging clear bags from the ceiling of taco kiosks (really?!), designer Jose Delao created the slick "Anty Fly." Handy and beautiful, this object makes use of water's natural ability to refract color and light, both properties which cause too much movement for a lil' fly to tolerate. The trade off? Troublesome pests stay away and your tacos live in peace.
One of the more interesting stands at the Javits Center is the ICFF Studio, a joint venture with Bernhardt Design helping young designers prototype their furniture and find potential manufactures. Pictured left to right:
BOOM by Todd Bracher Studio
Landscape by Kristine Morich Studio
Amoeba by the simple light
Angle Parking by Bradley Price Design
S2 by Lutz Pankow Design
Slope by Viable London
Cabinet 414 by Viable London
Oz by cate&nelson design
S1 by Lutz Pankow Design
In some of Manhattan's better Japanese-staffed bars, like Tribeca's underground B-Flat, ice cubes are noticeably absent; ordering your scotch on the rocks gets you a large ice sphere. With less surface area than the same amount of ice rendered in cubes, a globe of ice will melt more slowly, keeping your drink cold without making it watery.
As an industrial designer, your correspondent couldn't help but notice the parting line on B-Flat's ice spheres; after all, it has to come out of a mold. But now a company called Taisin has come up with a clever device for making a perfect ice sphere with no parting line.
How does it work? You sandwich a large chunk of ice in between the two metal pieces pictured above. As the ice slowly melts, gravity brings the top half to close over the bottom half, enclosing what ice remains in its spherical cavity. Because the ice is in the process of melting into its new shape as the top closes, there's no parting line. Clever!
Other shapes are available as well; what you see at the bottom right of the photo is an ice soccer ball. (Don't ask, it's Japan.)
via c scout japan
Posted by: hipstomp | Comments (1)
Job-getting guru, RitaSue Siegel, has just published the revised version of 'Get A Design Job'. An authority in the industry, this manual offers insights into everything from Resume tips to Research. First conceived as a series of articles for Innovation magazine in 1993, the 2008 version has grown to include information on a variety of topics that influence not only the job-seeker, but the Design Industry as a whole.
A copy is available online for teachers, students, and designers to download. Dig in!
Break out the scissors n glue sticks! Paper Wars, an exhibition of paper reproductions of classic weapons, is on view at the Craze Gallery in London. Not your average cut n' paste, this exhibition, organized by PostlerFerguson, takes their paper AK-47 kit (first published in 2007) as a point of departure and asks participants to respond by altering the object. Featured artists include Ben Wilson, El Ultimo Grito, Oscar and Ewan, Pixelgarten, Hiroko Shiratori, Paul Wysocan, BASE23/DC|DE and more.
Paper Wars will be on view from May 15-21.
Check out more images after the jump.
Posted by: elle* | Comments (0)
photography by Vivian Chen
This year's Maker Faire, produced by Make magazine, was host to a record 5,000 Makers and 65,000 attendees. The San Mateo County Fairgrounds were packed with everything from Arts n' Crafts to Science n' Technology. We've collected some wacky and wonderful faves for you here. Stay tuned for video footage coming soon!
Posted by: core jr | Comments (1)
Denver's Mayor, John H. Hickenlooper, announced Dialog:City, an event converging art, democracy and digital media that will involve 10 site- specific art installations in neighborhoods throughout Denver from Aug. 21- 29.
World-renowned artists will come together to create a series of innovative commissioned works in conjunction with local organizations and students.
Some descriptions of the artists' projects follow:
Charlie Cannon and students from the Rhode Island School of Design's Innovation Studio will present visual designs in the categories of buildings, food, energy, "greening" cities, water and transportation. Focusing on what actions can be taken now, Partly Sunny: Designs to Change the Forecast includes collaboration with GreenPrint Denver, Rocky Mountain College of Art + Design, and Green Order.
Minsuk Cho's architectural Pavilion for Public Discourse will be installed in City Park. This pneumatic structure will levitate, creating a sculptural canopy. Events, symposiums and parties will assemble at this new model for a public square.
Hindsight is Always 20/20 is R. Luke DuBois' presentation of high- frequency words from presidential State of the Union addresses. The words have been translated into the visual hierarchas light boxes in front of the Denver Performing Arts Complex.
Lynn Hershman's DiNA is an artificial being running for president. DiNA is fully interactive; audiences will be able to ask her questions about her issue platform. Artificial Intelligence is better than no Intelligence at all brings cutting- edge technologies and the political race into a convergent and dynamic demonstration at The Lab of Art and Ideas at Belmar.
Daniel Peltz will present his new work, Participatory Democracy and the future of Karaoke, in which Peltz transcribes public addresses by presidential candidates in the 2008 election into a karaoke format to be presented and performed at bars, clubs and restaurants across Denver.
D.J. Spooky, a.k.a. Paul Miller, will perform Terra Nova: The Antarctic Suite at the Ellie Caulkins Opera House. In keeping with the Convention's green theme, his work is a multimedia experience that samples from his recordings of the sights and sounds of ice breaking and melting in Antarctica.
The spurse collective will create a series of walking tours in which audiences can listen to sound based upon existing seismic and geographical data sets for Denver specifically where audiences will travel.
Participation in Dialog:City will be open to all citizens of Denver and to visitors from around the world. While the exhibitions will be concurrent, each will have a dedicated opening enabling the public to attend every event. Dialog:City will be the first program of its kind at a party convention.
Posted by: Xanthe Matychak | Comments (1)
While we usually expect advances in interface design to come out of videogames, iPods or the military, new ideas are being explored in an unexpected place: car dashboards. 3M and automotive supplier Visteon have teamed up to produce a concept car dash utilizing some nifty tricks:
Field-effect switches provide a "dead-front" look when the center panel buttons do not need to be visible. However, when a user's hand nears the panel, the vehicle senses it and the buttons automatically illuminate to show a human-machine interface (HMI), according to Michael Tschirhart, Design Manager of Advanced Human-Machine Interfaces at Visteon.A top-down cascade design defines the integrated center panel. Pressing one of the top row's buttons selects a specific mode, such as audio, climate, or navigation. Buttons on the second row then configure automatically to a set of functions matching the chosen mode. "By using this approach, the HMI allows most functions to be accessed in two button presses or fewer," said Tschirhart.
These techniques "[reduce] the overall button count by nearly 40," says Visteon Product Design Engineer Gary Jakobcic. And the flat-panel buttons provide haptic feedback--"tactile, audible, and visual"--so the users knows they've pressed a button. Read more details of the concept here.
via infibeam
Posted by: hipstomp | Comments (1)
Interactive Creative Director
Richter7
Salt Lake City, Utah
If you can conjure up national-quality design magic (in Flash and html) for the Web, inspire a group of young designers, and exhibit impressive presentation skills, send your portfolio -- pronto. Of course, a solid understanding of technology and website usability/architecture is required -- for which you’ll be showered with admiration and money.
The best design jobs and portfolios hang out at Coroflot.
Posted by: core jr | Comments (0)
iLounge has a great interview up with Kurt Solland, Design Veep over at Harman International. Solland is the man behind JBL and Harman Kardan speakers like Champagne, Creature and On-Stage, and was one of the first to successfully move computer speakers from beige boxes into something that actually investigated design. In the interview Solland's not only forthcoming with his design philosophies and intentions--he's provided a bunch of his sketches as well. Click here to read.
Posted by: hipstomp | Comments (0)
Renovation is the mildest of the three cleanse options offered by Blue Print Cleanse.
With cleanses being all the rage these days, it's hard to commit to one that promises detoxification but can barely manage to provide you with a soothing color palette decorating their sales pitch. Fear not young grasshoppers, Blue Print Cleanse has been making waves in the pureed food pond since 2000. The Cleanse's website is easy to navigate and easy to figure out. Besides branding itself as a lifestyle you want to be a part of rather than a diet that will leave you as a permanent bathroom fixture, Blue Print Cleanse has a testimonial section to reassure you it really will be fun after you get over passing up that margarita. Aesthetically pleasing and targeted to those interested in a healthier lifestyle, the site makes you feel more like you're subscribing to a spa than giving up delicious steaks for mystery juices. The next sign-up is slated for May 8th, so grab a straw and get started.
Posted by: Alison | Comments (0)
Please consider Architecture For Humanity's appeal, or other organizations poised to help.
Posted by: core jr | Comments (0)
Funerals are a very important part of African culture and as these coffins from Ghana show, a very creative part too. Here's a snippet,
The coffins are designed to represent an aspect of the dead person's life -- such as a car if they were a driver, a fish if their livelihood was the sea -- or a sewing machine for a seamstress. They might also symbolize a vice -- such as a bottle of beer or a cigarette.Posted by: Niti Bhan | Comments (0)Ablade Glover, an artist who works with the carpenters, says the coffin acts as a home in the afterlife, so it must be beautiful. But he laments that after putting so much time into creating the coffin, it gets hidden underground.
Tim Dubitsky has just prototyped "hood.e", a super-cozy solution to bringing music to your ears without blocking everything else out. The product has a great genesis: Tim originally created the design as a present for his nephew--who walks a dangerous route to school crossing busy thoroughfares--and wanted to make it safer for him by freeing up his ears from blasting earbuds that blocked out all the street noise.
Here's the pitch for the rest of us:
There is a soundtrack to life, and now it's not just in your head. Throw on your hood.e, plug in your favorite mp3 player, and you're ready to roll (and rock). The embedded speakers make it possible for you to share your latest favorite track without the awkward ties of a tethered earbud. After all, music should enhance your life, not shut it out.
Nice. And anything that will save me from repeatedly winding up, storing and unwinding my cables is worth a look...and a wear. (Now, if these could be branded with neighborhoodies...!)
Interested parties: www.firstprovision.com
Posted by: Allan Chochinov | Comments (8)
On May 19th, Material ConneXion and Li Edelkoort are double-teaming in LEFT/BRAIN/RIGHT, a two-parter on the greening of architecture and design. Here's the pitch:
In 2010: The Future of Sustainable Materials, Andrew H. Dent PhD, of Material ConneXion will discuss the sustainable materials and technologies that are transforming design today and tomorrow. In Greening Perspectives 2010, renowned trend forecaster Li Edelkoort will offer an emotional and human perspective on how green thinking is changing the way we perceive ourselves and the world around us.
And here's a bit more:
Dent: As we hurtle towards the end of the first decade of the 21st century, one realization stands in clear relief--we cannot continue 20th century industrial production methods and sustain a life on this planet. What worked for the industrial revolution will not work for our 21st century population growth, globalization and 24/7 culture.Edelkoort: Green is more than the new black. It is the window into our souls and the blueprint for our future. Greening has emerged as a state of mind, a deepening and widening philosophy for living that is altering our landscapes, our aspirations, our surroundings, our surfaces, and our notion of home.
May 19th, 2008, NYC, 2:00 - 4:30 pm
More info and registration at the site: www.materialconnexion.com
Ever wonder what to do with those old action figures? Check out dominic wilcox's 'Cave' project at nike 1/1 for some inspiration. Designed for the 'Art of Football' brief, Wilcox created three projects, 'Cave' (above), 'Top Corner' and 'Blocks' all using miniature football players.
'Cave' is a nest-cum-shoe-box designed to house your most prized footwear; 'Top Corner' is a silhouette of a football player made from (yup) hundreds of tiny footballers; and 'Blocks' is...well....blocks. That's right, a series of 20 blocks that take over 8000 individual pieces to make. Total material? 3000 plastic footballers, 540 tubes of superglue and 50 tubes of plastic glue. Oof.
Close-ups after the jump.
via design boom
Posted by: elle* | Comments (0)
We just uploaded the first cut of our definitive guide to this year's ICFF and New York Design Week. We'll be updating this list regularly over the next week with the best exhibits, parties and events, so check back often and refresh your browser!
And If you're putting on an event that's not listed, drop us line.
Posted by: squee.gee | Comments (0)
From the Coroflot portfolio of : Shawn Campbell (Los Angeles, California)
Featured Project : LIFT : PRO GLOVE SERIES
Cambell's Lift gloves are designed for Grunters, Framers, Grippers, and Handlers--snowboarders beware, the stick on Cambell's grip may be too much for you to handle.
Posted by: core jr | Comments (0)
Yesterday we pointed out that modelmaking is dying as a profession, but there are still people doing it for love, if not money. Top photo, Frenchman Gerard Brion has spent an astonishing fifteen years recreating a miniature Paris; bottom photo, an insanely detailed model of Moscow by the Breadboard Workshop. The Moscow model dates back to 1986 and is still being updated as the city changes.
While we could only find the one photo for the Parisian miniature, be sure to click here to see the rest of the Moscow model.
via peculiarosities and english russia
Posted by: hipstomp | Comments (4)
San Francisco based studio One & Co have collaborated with the HTC design team in Taiwan to create the HTC Touch Diamond. The irregular back facets are a trend we've seen in recent contemporary architecture and furniture providing a highly recognizable design element.
Close-up pics after the jump.
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