Apr 06
Sure, it’s easy to whip yourself up a old-school backyard fire-pit with a ring of rocks and whole lot of ugly. But wouldn’t you rather have a portable, modular fireplace that looks ready to blast off to the stars? Who wouldn’t? More »
Apr 06
Smart watches fart watches. Why would you want to have your email on your wrist when you could have an impossibly badass—and doubtless expensive—analogue sucker made of reclaimed AK-47 steel wrapped around your arm. More »
Apr 05
Get the weekend started off with some nice design. From a beautifully restored home in Italy, to aerial photos of airports, we have plenty of things to show you. More »
Apr 05
Do you need to know anything else about the Canterbury House once you find out it has a pool with an island in the middle? Nope. Sold! More »
Apr 05
Comparing books to ebooks is like comparing mechanical watches to digital watches, or manual cars to automatic cars. No one doubts the convenience, reach, and flexibility of the ebook format, but it will never convincingly replicate the experience of a paper book—nor does it need to. Ebooks are a fundamentally new medium, stuck in an awkward growing stage. More »
Apr 05
New Zealand’s ChristChurch Cathedral was seriously damaged in a 2011 earthquake. The historic place of worship is going to be remade soon, but how? The city’s Anglican diocese, the property trustees, and the cathedral project group have come up with three different options the remodel, and anyone can vote. More »
Apr 05
Casa Olivi is 300 years old, but after a massive renovation project at the hands of Swiss architects Markus Wespi and Jérôme de Meuron, it doesn’t look a day over 100. More »
Apr 05
Sometimes we dream. We dream of a world with no more flat-pack furniture, no more obtuse construction manuals and no more missing screws. Smart foam tech might get us closer to those admittedly small-time dreams. Using cross links within the foam’s particle arrangement, regardless of how much the structure is compressed, it’ll spring back to the predesigned shape. Designer Carl de Smet adds that the product would expand at a set temperature getting a little doughy in the middle, then more solid at room temperature.
He also demonstrates another smart foam structure which changes when a current is fed through it. Electricity provides the heat that transforms the rolled-up structure into a flat one, with the current experimental version taking around five minutes to completely settle. Commercial products which are apparently only about a year to 18 months away and as de Smet details in the video, could land on store shelves in a compacted rolled-up form for “unpacking” back home. These early examples can even be adjusted, if for some reason you suddenly decide you wanted a coffee table, not a chair. Sit back and see how it literally unfolds after the break.
Filed under: Household, Science, Alt
Source: BBC News
Apr 05
Most people don’t really care if their stapler matches their pencil sharpener, or if their tape dispenser matches their USB hub. But that’s because they haven’t seen Yu Jian’s gorgeous bamboo desk set that incorporates various office-related accessories into hollowed-out bamboo trunks. More »
Apr 04
All-in-One City Sweeper Concept Truck Cleans Streets, Plows Snow, and Hauls Garbage Away
Posted in: Today's ChiliEverything’s multi-functional these days, so why not extend that concept to vehicles? More specifically, to street-cleaning trucks? I’m sure you’ve seen sweepers at work on your street, but they’re kind of wasteful, if you think about it. For one, they’re just parked in the garage when winter comes along. You won’t be sweeping up the streets the whole day either.
Designer Michał Markiewicz took all this into consideration and eventually came up with the Multifunctional City Sweeper concept.
He basically combined the three functions I mentioned above to make this the city sweeper truck that’s fit for all occasions and multiple uses. It’s a sweeper truck in the morning, a garbage truck in the afternoon, and a snow plow during winter. It’s basically got everything covered – and all in one truck.
Save on gas, save on space, save on government resources, and save the environment. Pretty cool, huh?
[via Yanko Design]
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