If you’re looking to explore the world on the cheap but the thought of sharing a hostel room with strangers creeps you out, designers Roberto De Luca and Antonio Scarponi have got you covered. The pair’s Hotello is a rolling trunk that transforms into a 43 square foot hotel room complete with a bed, a desk, a lamp, a shelf, a locker, and even a privacy curtain. More »
Lately I’ve been thinking about the multitasking experience on Android and I feel like there’s still a lot to improve. I love how the thumbnails come up, but in 4.2.2 they made it so that the current app joined the list of “Recent Apps”. This looks great on phones and small-sized tablets, but it looks really bad on large tablets (ie. Nexus 10) in landscape mode. Here’s how to make it better. More »
The Design Museum of London has just announced the contenders for its sixth annual Designs of the Year. And their shortlist for architecture showcases 17 structures that transcend buildings to become works of art. More »
Designer Jurgen Kuipers’ plywood Sawyer lowrider bike is as awesome to look at as it probably is to cruise around the neighborhood on. So much so that Kuipers has actually created a full-size, 1:1 scale model of the bike that comes packaged just like a plastic model kit. More »
I was going to say something about this thing sucking, but I figure we’ve used that line too many times before. But if you were to sit on the toilet and have this octopus tentacle reach up from the bowl, it wouldn’t exactly be a pleasant experience – unless you’re into that sort of thing, of course.
The hilariously warped Oktopus toilet plunger is one of the latest gadgets to come from the creative minds of Art Lebedev Studio. The curl at the end of its singular orange tentacle serves a practical purpose as a grip for all of your plunging needs. It’s made from plastic with a silicone suction cup at the end. No, the tentacle suckers don’t actually stick to anything, but it would be cool if they did.
At this point the Oktopus is still a concept design, but I have little doubt that Lebedev and crew are working on a way to put it into production.
The only problem with this thing is that you don’t really need to leave it in your toilet all of the time. I suppose you could at least put it out for guests.
[via Bem Legaus!]
The aptly named Skyward House is relatively secluded from some angles. But it actually faces a pretty well-trafficked road, so the architect had to design it with features that make it feel private. More »
Design Festa is a two-day biannual international art event held in Tokyo which showcases an enormous array of original artwork with over 10,000 artists exhibiting, buying and selling works created in multiple mediums. The 37th Design Festa will be held this year on May 18th and 19th (Sat-Sun). You can check out the highlights from last year’s events in the video bellow.
With the thousands of designers that will exhibit, attend and participate in the event we wanted to know what happens to them as a result of showcasing their designs and products. So we asked the organisers of Design Festa to share with us some success stories of past exhibitors.
TaroShooten are a pair of toy designers who first exhibited at Design Festa back in 1999 from which they launched into commercial success with their popular “Korejanai Robo” (Not This Robot, Robot) series which spoofs the fact that kids don’t always receive the right gift from their parents, elaborately constructed suicide buttons and other humorous products. Korejanai Robo has even entered into the pop culture sphere spawning its own merchandise such as USB sticks, costumes and cameras featuring character designs. The designers even created a funny backstory and orignal theme music for the series as well.
Shikano Takashi is another Japanese designer who enjoyed more recent success as a result of demonstrating his product at Design Festa in 2012. His “Shirt-ties” which are made of colourful felt can be fixed onto any shirt button are designed to be easily worn and fashionable and currently on sale at Tokyo iine.
Korean illustrator, artist and picture book author Seo Miji has boosted her career expontentially after showcasing her unique illustrations at Design Festa back in 2006. Having been interviewed and featured by mass media outlets including NHK and CNBC she is now invited to give regular talks and presentations at schools and colleges. Most of her artwork and stories are aimed at and about young children. You can check out her most recent artwork and contributions on her website. The video bellow shows a live paint demo by Seo Miji at a the 33rd Design Festa.
The artists above have shown that attending events such as Design Festa can significantly enhance exposure to one’s artwork and products, raise media attention and contribute to increasing commercial prospects.
To find out more about the next Design Festa event check out their homepage, facebook and twitter pages.
Do you have an iPhone? You wanna know how you can get your friends to gift you an external battery pack? Support the ChargeBite’s fundraiser. The ChargeBite is a charger for 30-pin iOS devices, but it doesn’t have its own battery. What it does is draw power from other 30-pin iOS devices to transfer to your own. See where I’m going with this?
Inventors Liran Elihay and Asaf Gaber call their invention “a social charger.” The advantage of course is that you don’t have to carry an external battery pack and the ChargeBite never needs to be charged. I guess I don’t know have to tell you the obvious drawbacks of the ChargeBite, but I will make this clear – as far as I can tell you need two donor iOS devices to charge one iOS device.
I don’t think the ChargeBite is utterly useless, but overall I cannot in good conscience recommend that you support its fundraiser. We can’t fit two friends and their iPhones into our pockets. But years of reading about the likes of Brando have given me a soft spot for crazy gadgets and doodads. Just the fact that this actually exists should be enough for us.
[via Geeky Gadgets]
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