SOIL LAMP :: MARIEKE STAPS

‘Soil Lamp’ by Marieke Staps. This lamps works with mud, the metabolism of the biological life generates enough electricity to light an LED. The only thing this lamp needs is a little bit of water from time to time.
photo by Rene van der Hulst

via pruned

S-XL CAKE :: DING 3000

It's for kitchen junkies, for half-portions, for insatiables, for dieters, for the undecided.It's a necessity for everybody. Whereas formerly you had to estimate and manually portion the cake The clever housewife now bakes with this new silicon form. built-in portioning sections and differently high levels magically produce piece by piece 15 different portions.

[+ website]
via moreinspiration

SINGLE PERSON COOKER :: ALEX BRADLEY

As its name suggests, the Single Person’s Cooker (SPC) responds to some of today's eating habits that are evolving because of the rapid pace, increasing solo existence and less structured routines of many people's daily lifestyles. The compact and stylish cooking device features a WiFi connection, and its associated website provides recipes and information for producing nutritious healthy meals, and supports quick and efficient preparation. The recipes are automatically linked and stored on the SPC to programme cooking times, and heating controls. Ideally suited to the batchelor pad or studio space, the SPC provides a desirable cooker and interactive web-based connections that also steers less confident cooks away from ready meals and encourages them to prepare their food themselves. Not only is the user more likely to think about their diet and improve their well being as a result, but the SPC becomes an object of focus and discussion in the kitchen.

[ + website ]
via dezeen

JAR TOPS :: JORRE VAN AST

By screwing on plastic tops, these readily available jars are turned into vessels with a specific function. A generic jar is transformed into kitchenware, creating more practical and emotional value.
The family includes a sugar pot, milk jug, chocolate sprinkler, oil&vinegar set and a water jug.

[ + Jorre Van Ast ]
[ + Royal VKB ]

ECO-COOK :: KECHENYI CAMILLE

Eco-cook is an object that helps to save water, energy and time. Everyday, everyone, has to cook pasta, rice or various vegetable. Therefore different pots are needed. In a unique pot, the eco-cook enables to divide 2 or 3 space and to boil different food at the same time. Thereby, water and gas or electricity is saved. Moreover when food is taken out the eco-cook, it will automatically drain out, allowing to win precious time.

via designboom

LAGRANGE 34 CHOCOLATE :: JjUICE

In a world where technologies become more exciting by the day, sometimes it may be nice to relax and be cuddled by tradition. But then, when a design studio and a historic confectionery company join forces to create something new, it may happen that even tradition may spur new stimuli.

Since the XVII century, Turin is a city that has been considered one of the Italian realms of chocolate. It is here that, at the end of the XVIII century, Mr. Doret invented a revolutionary machine that could solidify chocolate, allowing it to be moulded in shapes. It is also here that architects Sergio Viotti and Giuliana Succo were born and graduated in architecture.

As a result of an intense professional experience, they felt the need to embrace a unique challenge: making the cultural heritage of their hometown join forces with the trends of the contemporary design, and produce a new line of innovative products. So they proposed to their long time friend Max Gertosio, heir of what since 1890 was the artisan shop of another great chocolatier, Pietro Viola, to collaborate on the manufacture of a new line of chocolate bars called Lagrange 34 - just like the address of the confectionery shop, named after the mathematician Luigi Lagrange.

via dezeen
[+ website]

BOB PARTINGTON :: BLOOD PEN

Apart from alternating between feelings of nausea and delight, there's no doubt that Bob Partington's accomplished that "wow" factor with his mechanical wonder otherwise knows as the Blood Pen.

via core77
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MOUSETRAPS :: ROGER ARQUER

Designer Roger Arquer has created a series of conceptual mousetraps that are intended “only to catch mice, not to kill them”. The four different traps are each made of everyday household items. These traps have been developed only to catch mice, not to kill them. It leaves up to the catcher the future of the mouse. The materials and the mechanics used are not aggressive, which makes it a friendly mousetrap. Clear glass, metal springs, paper clips, metal nut.

The concept was developed for a very simple, elegant and efficient way to catch mice. They are almost not being seen as traps, but as altered objects to be used for another reason. Once the mice problem is solved, the objects can be used again for its original function. These are generic clear glass objects that we have at home: a pint glass, a light bulb, a bottle and a planting pot.

[+ website]
via boing boing

PAPER VASE :: STUDIO LIBERTINY

Each sheet of paper is printed with an identical image of a tree, creating an ghostly tree pattern on the surface of the vases.The project explores how paper - a product made from trees - can be returned to its original state and carved as if it were wood. Libertiny also designed the Honeycomb Vases, which are made by bees inside a hive.

via dezeen
[+ website]

COGNAC GLASSES :: RIKKE HAGEN

The Cognac glass is a beautiful combination of function and pure pleasure. It's a glass conceived to considerate bouquet, temperature and volume. It provokes pleasure and increases the experience of intimacy, when drinking cognac.

The concern to quality of cognac resulted in the shape of the glass, which increases the pleasure of deep colour and movement of the liquid. Intimacy, collection of thoughts, absorption and pleasure is completed.

[+ link]

THERMOCHROMATIC WALLPAPER :: SHIYAUN

The flowers of the pattern will be blooming when the radiator is on, just like the real flowers.

[+ link]

MY PRIVATE SKY BY KRAM WEISSHAAR

Architecture and design outfit Kram Weisshaar has created a limited-edition series of dinner plates for porcelain brand Nymphenburg.Called My Private Sky, the plates combine computer technology and traditional craft techniques: the designers ask customers where and when they were born, and then use a specially written computer programme to generate the precise arrangement of stars and planets as they would have appeared at that particular time and place.The patterns are then hand-painted onto the plates by Nymphenburg artisans.

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via dezeen

ESPACE PUR - MARC HOTTINGER & LUCIEN ISELI

Espace Pur is an air ionizer that uses dust as pixels and that displays patterns thanks to it, in a very slow motion way. It cleans and purifies the air in architectural spaces. It increases the level of oxygen’s negative ions contained in the ambient air. Once installed, the air’s oxygenation becomes nearly the same as in the mountains. The more there are negative ions, the more the air is purified.
As a matter of fact, excessive dust is dangerous for health. Nevertheless, no dust at all decreases our immunity. That's why the system is regulated by the saturation of dust. Once filled with dust, the display is deactivated, and dust can be cleaned on the floor.
The installation of the "anti-dust screen" can take place in flats, hospitals, offices, and everywhere where air needs to be cleaned.
The aim of the project is therefore to capture dust and organize it on wall panels in order to build pictures that will gently appear on the wall. The panels are displaying compositions of weed that are on the one hand harmful plants but on the second hand have beneficial aspect on the health.

[+ video]
via ECAL

FLAT SALAD CUTLERY - J.C. KARICH

Chilean industrial designer J.C. Karich (currently working in France) began experimenting with curved surface shapes from plastic bottles, which ultimately resulted in his elegant fork and spoon Flat Salad set design. The design has recently been picked up by Milan-based disposable/sustainable cutlery and table accessories company Pandora Design.

[+ website]
via mocoloco

HAPTIC PAPER CUP - INDUSTRIAL FACILITY FOR TAKAO

This was a concept product design by sam hecht and architect kim colin for the paper company, Takeo. they made a translucent paper cup which uses waxed tracing paper. Everyone has probably been to a party and drunk wine out of a paper cup, so they know what a miserable experience that can be. Here, drinking became less about disposability and more about the enjoyment of the liquid inside. The cup changes the quality of the wine."

[+website]

UNBLOSSOM - SALTCRYSTAL BOWL

The heritage of a domestic handicraft, abandoned in contemporary interiors is shaped in a new form. Old handy crafted doilies from grandma are raised into bowls by crystallizing salt. Beautiful crystals are keeping the fragile textile in a blossom shape. A sustainable way of breathing new life into a forgotten decorative piece.

[+ the-home-project]

CAMBRIAN AND VASARELY - FOC

Dutch outfit Freedom of Creation will launch four new rapid-prototyped products in Milan next month. FOC pioneered the use of rapid-prototyping technologies selective laser sintering and stereolithography to produce lamps and other objects, showing their iconic Lily lamp in Milan in 2003. Cambrian and Vasarely are two new lamps types shown at via Tortona 31 during the milano fair.

[+ website]
via denzeen

ULTRASON TOASTER - IDEO AND BASF

BASF wanted to showcase the versatility of Ultrason® polymer, which has many material features and can be used where conventional plastics cannot. The role of IDEO’s designers was to design products out of Ultrason® that would convince designers and manufacturers that this material had broad potential as a form-giving material that could be easily machined using traditional processes. The designs also needed to inspire new thinking around how people use and interact with objects and their surroundings. By linking the material to five common household objects, IDEO also chose to demonstrate Ultrason’s appeal to end users—the people who ultimately determine the desirability of any consumer good. One of those objects is this toaster, designed by Nicolas Inchaurrondo & Stefan Koch (BASF AG), and Alexander
Grots, Leif Huff, Miguel Cabra, Thomas Brisebras, Todd Pelman & Vicky Arndt
(IDEO).

Challenge: When designing heat carrying household objects designers are normally constrained, as they have to keep surfaces and circuitry away from heat or electricity, so users avoid burnt fingertips or short-circuits.

Solution: The aesthetically designed concepts (a hairdryer, lampshade, toaster, kettle and a clothes hanger) are made of Ultrason polymer, which is heat resistant up to 220° Celsius and has great insulating capacities, making it safe to touch while the product is in use.

[+ ultrason]
[+ ideo]

ECO KETTLE

Until now, accurately measuring the amount of water to be boiled in your kettle has been all but impossible. The result? It is estimated that, on average, we boil twice the volume of water needed every time. Which means twice as much energy, twice as much time.With a 3kW kettle that’s the same as wasting the energy of around 50 light bulbs!
Your new ECO Kettle is different: the internal reservoir holds a full capacity of water ready for use, while the measuring button allows any quantity – from a single cupful to full capacity – to be released into the separate chamber for boiling.
The result? Exactly the right amount of water every time you boil –and no more waste.

[+ website]

MODAL WATER SPEAKER - KUNIHIRO TSUJI

Japanese “sound space designer” Kunihiro Tsuji will be presenting his MODAL Water Speaker at this year's Milano Design Week. The speaker system transmits sound via a resonance box filled with water. Tsuji was inspired by the human body, which is 70% water. "The loudspeaker is placed on top of the water surface as though floating. Its drop-shaped, transparent cone integrates in the aesthetic concept of the MODAL Water Speaker. The audio cable runs invisibly inside of one of the [support] legs and connects the MODAL Water Speaker to any kind of amplifier.".

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via mocoloco