Have you ever thought that your shoes may have their own thoughts and personalities to express? Whatever answers you would offer, at least in designer Gwen Murphy’s mind, the shoes do have something to tell us: their appearances, their emotions, and possibly their dreams too. But if with such unique shoes wearing on your feet (surely these sculptures cannot be worn), you may feel that somebody is rightly looking up at you from the bottom as well… wow, that’s so weird!
Using discarded car and bicycle parts he collected everywhere, Bangkok-based artist Roongrojna Sangwongprisarn has created a perfectly-detailed Predator-inspired motorcycles that are drivable too. Have a close look at its stunning details and florid exterior coating – who would ever believe the vehicle is made with old bike parts? Though there’s no information about its speed, we’re still quite interested in the motorcycle: when riding such a cool vehicle, who would need speed, right? Let’s just ride it slowly, and attracting everybody in the street.
Chemistry and art are two separate words that seemingly would never have any connections, but designer Pani Jurek’s “Maria S.C. Lamp” has now brought them together. Looking like a crystal chandelier, the lamp is actually made from chemistry test tubes placed into circular plywood bands. It seems completely nice when without anything in the tubes, but the result becomes more amazing when each tube is filled with colored liquid or inserted with flowers.
Wanna to be pulled out of bed in a natural and mild way instead of the annoying digital alarm clocks? If so, Vera Wiedermann’s Water-powered Alarm Clock is rightly a good choice to you. The Dreamtime clock is made based on old tradition of balancing with water, and it offers a gentle chiming in the morning to make waking up an enjoyable thing. According to the time you’d like to sleep through, you can pour some amount of water into the glass bowl (something like setting the alarm time), which will then let water drip silently to another bowl during the night. As the top bowl gets lighter, it then rises and finally lets a hammer fall to create a smooth, singing chime – it’s the very time for you to get up!
Researchers from the University of Bristol have developed the Magnetic Soap by dissolving iron in a range of inert surfactant materials (composed of chloride and bromide) to create a substance that can be controlled by magnets. The new soap is claimed “highly effective” in cleaning up oil, and it can be easily removed after the “cleaning” process so as to leave behind no potentially harmful chemicals in the water.
Undoubtedly we’ve already met many robot babies in movies and TV shows, but this one, who mimics a human baby so smartly, still astonishes us. The “baby” is made for an upcoming, unnamed television show, and it can create extremely realistic movements such as crying, twisting its body and so on.
A painting is no longer something always keeping still: Scott Garner’s “Still Life” is rightly a painting that can respond to real-world activity. Whenever you rotate the painting, you’ll see that the fruits and vases begin to tumble and finally change their positions. Why? Because the painting is actually made using the game developing program unity 3D, and inside the painting there is a flat-screen television screen with a spatial sensor built behind it to detect the tilt. So whenever somebody rotate its frame, the unity 3D scene can then respond and interact with the users.
Origami is not a new kind of art strange to us, but on the long list of various origami designs we should never lose attention of these unique masks. Each of them is made with a single piece of paper without cuts or glue, while still features amazing details and impressive shapes. The masks are durable too, able to last a long time when hanged on the wall as decorations.
Daily practice. That’s the No. 1 principle you need to keep in mind if you ever dream to play the guitar well. But the real guitar is so big that it’s not suitable to be taken anywhere, for you to play with it again and again. Thus we’d like to recommend this PocketString device to you. It’s smart and lightweight, and its tiny 4 fret board would let you practice the fundamentals at any place and any time. It’s going to be available next month for less than $30.
Before the Shoe Tree Tulips came to us, we merely know that a shoe rack is something to store and keep shoes, however we now realize that a shoe rack should also be something to display our shoes, especially those beautiful and delicate ones.
Texting or emailing with your cellphones during your driving is actually a very dangerous thing which may kill thousands of people every year. Although everyone knows that truth, they just couldn’t stop themselves using cellphones when they’re driving, thus Scosche produces a product that can control your cellphones. It’s mainly a trigger adapter that connects to any car’s OBD-II port – when switched on and detecting that you’re in motion, the adapter then sends out signals to make anything but hands-free calling disabled. Now, you might want to know what would happen if you unplug the trigger? Well, as the device is destined for mostly young drivers and fleet drivers, it will send an email of text to their parents or managers to inform them of your behavior.
Developed by Tobias Sonne, the Posture Suspenders can detect a slouch and deliver real-time vibration alerts to help you always keep a correct posture. It’s a fully functional device, but is made with really ordinary things including an Arduino Pro Mini microcontroller board, a normal pair of suspenders, a XeBee wireless radio, and a 3.6 volt battery.
Dividing one skateboard into two separate ones, this “Dual Skateboard” will bring the users a more exciting experience, by offering new possibilities for sliding, turning, jumping and so on. Moreover, you may walk on the ground directly with the skateboards and maneuver around obstacles more flexibly. Is there any other surprise the “Dual Skateboard” would bring to us? You need to try them to find the answers.
Your favorite books, your favorite designs, your favorite furniture…Any of your paper books can be sorted by this Check Bookshelf designed by Jongho Park.
We’re always trying to park as more cars as possible in one place— but since the space is limited, why not park your cars in a different way, such as fold your car up for parking/storage? Originally dreamt up by Boston’s MIT-Media lab, the collapsible vehicle is now developed by a consortium of seven small Basque firms under the name Hiriko Driving Mobility (Hiriko is the Basque word for ‘urban’) and is hoped to hit the market by mid-2013. The EV is quite small, coming with only two seats, and it will collapse into a much smaller one when parks vertically. And it’s durable too, capable of running for 75 miles without needing a recharge. When the EV finally comes into production, there’re two ways for people to use it: either purchase one for 12,500 Euros (just over $16,000) or rent one for the day.
