Lovely self customisable clock
I really love products like these, SO simple yet SO effective. It’s a great concept offering a part finished product which can finished simply by the user in whichever way they seem fit.
This little clock can be wall mounted, then you pick literally anything you like to make the hour and minute hand.
This is the sort of design one looks at and immediately may think ‘ah that’s so simple, why didn’t I think of that!’ however, from experience it tends to be these sort of concepts that actually take more thinking than initially expected. With the rise in popularity of mass customisation, products embracing this movement are generally met with much satisfaction.
Mobile homeless shelter
Although it may look like a pine-constructed caravan prototype, I quite like the concept behind it – a solidly constructed tent. You may feel as though you’re living in a cupboard on castors but the compactness is really quite engaging and looks like it could actually be fairly cosy. Reminds me of capsule hotels.
Savant’s Interactive House Control
Found this on coolhunting.com and thought it was quite a nice sample of interaction design. Smart home concepts and technology have been around for a while now so it’s no news that you can control most things in your house from one little tablet. However I like the idea shown in the image below; the screen shows and image of the room you’re in and you simply touch elements on the image e.g. a light to turn it on and off. And of course it goes without saying that there is the obligatory iPhone app to go with it, so you can remotely control your home whilst away on vacation.
My one little niggling thought with these concepts though is that currently this sort of technology integration is only really available if you’re pretty wealthy due to it’s excessive cost. So by the time this sort of thing becomes accessible to the vox pop, new and probably cheaper technology will be available – I predict that in time you won’t need a screen to access the technology, it will all be motion/gesture detection.
Shanghai World Expo
The Shanghai World Expo see’s some pretty inspiring architecture with each country having it’s own ‘pavilion’. This one here is the UK Pavilion dubbed the ‘Seed Cathedral’, apparently inspired by a seed, featuring 60,000 slim acrylic rods which will quiver with the wind. Beautiful notion and wonderfully executed. Would love to go and visit, pity it’s so far away.
At last a nicely design 3 Pin Plug!
After a while of working on products revolving around power input and output etc. it’s wonderful to find this lovely example of a mundane, functional but necessary item redesigned in a considerate and practical fashion. 3 Pin plugs are among the most bulky and awkward in the world, storage of them on a product can be a nightmare, but this gives me hope: the pins given a rotational axis enabling them to be folded down for storage and finally a brilliant 3 way splitter, so much more discreet and elegant than the one you buy from the hardware store. Genuis.
Via designboom.com
Water Powered Jet Pack!!!
I couldn’t believe this when i saw it. Yes, you can actually fly up to 10 metres with this thing and move up to 65 KpH! Truly awesome.
Design Process
Found this nice little white-board doodle on designnotes.info today. I’m always quite a fan of graphic visualisations like these, you get to see how someones design brain works.
IDEO’s rather drear prediction of the future
Found this illustrated video on good.is and upon watching was given the impression that IDEO doesn’t have a terribly cheerful outlook on energy usage in the future. Interesting and poignant it most certainly is, but in my opinion the black and white illustration and mildly psychotic fairground music make me think of Brave New World…Lets have some colour!!
Tim Brown urges designers to think big
Inspirational. I love TED.
When more is decidedly less…
Over the weekend I was in a hardware store and saw a shower unit on offer next to the cashier, this was most definitely not your standard old tried-and-tested, but a horrendous example of a single function product having been over-designed to propose a multitude of gimmicky controls. It even has a pause button! so you can apparently answer a call mid-shower and then press play again to resume.
Without wishing to sound like the worst kind of opinionated, outspoken dullard, but who seriously commissions/designs these products? I’m all for interesting use of technology and innovation, however I find it difficult to see the need for a touch interface shower with all bells and whistles, products like this are just creating need rather than fulfilling it.
Augmented Reality concept
This is quite a thought provoking visualisation into what AR could look like when it eventually becomes common place in everyday life.
Though what I find funny is that even though there’s visual concepts behind this that will make you fill your boots, it’s overlayed on quite old style appliances – the kettle is the standard cordless one most people have etc., however I know that this is not the focus of the video but it rather amused me, such a juxtaposition.
The Watch with no Face!
Found this little ditty on Yankodesign.com, my usual cabbage patch for inspiration, and thought it to be really rather novel, makes me think slightly of Philippe Stark’s donut look-alike watch he designed for Fossil. Soft, clean, and thoroughly unobtrusive.
Origami foldable MP3 Player
I found this desperately inspiring piece of interactive design on yankodesign.com. What struck me about it was it’s novel (not gimmicky!) method of interaction with the user. Instead of using the standard: play, stop, forward, reverse etc. the user simply folds the product into the shape of the play icon to play and slide one piece accross to fast forward and unfolds to a square to stop.
Though not on the levels of interaction of which Pranav Mistry was expatiating (see earlier blog post – trust me it’s worth it!) this product has got me thinking differently about product operation and control, so wonderfully refreshing and inspiring.
Design For Disassembly
Fantastic thought provoking guide on the methodology and approach for good design for dis-assembly.
Cat Display Table
Found this product on joshspear.com and found it really rather amusing. I guess partly because cats tend to make me smile at the best of times, but also the concept of being able to eat, read, drink whilst never having to take your eyes off your cat! Also could be problematic trying to persuade him/her/it to take up residence there.
I-Pad Functionality and Interface Demo
Demonstration of the new “gesturing” approach to ergonomics when interfacing with the new Apple I-Pad.
FSW Design Inspiration 