The geniuses over at Hulger have created the first ever handmade wooden Pip Phone fashioned from the grained African hardwood Ziricote(Blackwood). This one of a kind phone (available for £2000) comes along with a wooden box and a container of wax for treatment to gradually make the natural wood an amazing texture and color that we all crave. As Hulger states, the phone is “designed to wear in, not wear out.”(I love it!)
I’ve mentioned previously (nostalgic technology) how tech products are not lasting, and currently only look their best until you open the package, hence millions end up in landfills yearly. I questioned how electronics can become more nostalgic or wear in to become better, much like leather jackets, teddy bears, old jeans, baseball gloves, leather wallets, handmade furniture, etc. I personally want to see soft materials injected into electronics, much like the recent Asus leather notebooks, or expensive Vertu Cell phones!
This is a first step at a handheld electronic device that will hopefully break in like Birkenstock cork sandals. I love wood, and have a weak side for beautiful items such as this. I understand the need in electronics to be thin and light weight, but if there was a way to make them age better, then there would be no need to have 1000 new phones designs each year that overfill our landfills.
Absolutley! Natural materials are so much better as they age. Anyone who walks through the park and marvels at the inherent character in the simplest fallen twig or leaf can tell you that. Chips, tears, creases, they all can alter and expose new character in older objects. This is much less apparent in plastic items which don’t seem to age in any discernible way even as they lose their function. My last cell phone springs to mind – it died, but without any aesthetic payoff. It just stopped working without any indication of why, and without having accrued any individuality or character. Hopefully new products like this won’t just depend on exotic hardwoods – the aforementioned twigs and other materials are all around us, waiting to be re-used and recycled.
jesse,
thanks for your note…absolutely right on spot with the value personality, life, and charateristics have to natural elements!
I’d say Apple is a pusher to add personality and life into products(thanks to Pixar) but none have yet hit that magical and warming provoking taret that just wears, tears, and ages with grace like fine red wine. I’d be interested in finding more ‘humble’ products down the road.
cheers,
_tango!