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small.space_6

via boingboing

“Michael Wolf took 100 photos of people living in Hong Kong’s oldest public housing estate. Each flat is 100 square feet. Almost every room has the same kind of metal bunk bed. They almost all have a TV, electric fan, and rice cooker.

I looked at all 100 photos. Here’s the creepiest room. Here’s the most cluttered room. Here’s the tidiest room. Here’s the most spartan room.

Michael Wolf 100 x 100 (Thanks, Lookforthewoman!)”

I’ll post a few after the jump.
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Tribute21_Most Popular_Reminiscent Innocence“Every year, global design and merchandising company Felissimo produces a series of charitable plates that traditionally feature the illustrations of present-day icons. This year, as part of Felissimo’s mission to promote better design for the greater good, the company extended the project to designers across the globe by hosting Happiness: The Tribute 21 Plate Challenge on DESIGN 21: Social Design Network. Felissimo is now proud to unveil its selection of winning plates, whose designs communicate a wish, inspiration or message for children and future generations about seeking happiness in harmony with our surroundings. A portion of the proceeds from plate sales will benefit the UNESCO/Tribute 21 DREAM Center Fund, which provides arts programs to children in post-conflict regions.

Giving designers a chance to share their work with the world, DESIGN 21 posted all submissions for the Tribute 21 Plate Challenge to the competition site. After reviewing 732 entries, based on originality, relevance, aesthetics, and ranking in an online public voting poll, representatives at Felissimo headquarters in Japan have chosen seven winners. According to DESIGN 21 Founder Haruko Smith, “Whether symbolic, literal or euphoric, all of the designs represent hope for a better future.”

The “Reminiscent Innocence” plate by U.S. designer Jody Boyce was selected as the “Most Popular” design as well as a DESIGN 21 “Judges’ Pick.” According to Boyce, “My goal was to try to capture those feelings we all felt as children; the innocent, naïve and green ideas we had about the world before we were thrown into it head first.”
The other six top designs chosen as “Judges’ Picks” include: Giorgio Cattano (Netherlands) for “Happy Forest”; Eugene Gu (China) for “TRUELOVE”; Arlene Birt (U.S.) for “Water Cycle: For Life”; Jeong Seok Oh (South Korea) for “Public Bath”; Alexandre Esteves Neves (Brazil) for “Soap Bubbles of Happiness”; and nen (Spain) for “How to be happy without.” Honorable mentions were also given to Ji Yeon Yoo (South Korea) for “The Blooming Happiness” and Bonnie Jordan (U.S.) for “Happy Harmony.”

all the winning artwork after the jump.
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us-bookcase
Pretty cool idea for a bookshelf by furniture design guru Ron Arad. A bookshelf shaped like the United States with each state having their own space.  So now when someone asks me where a specific book is, I can say it’s somewhere between Kansas and California. Ha, not for sale, but I’m sure someone can make one pretty easily.

via DesignMilk

cloud2

Cool!
“A project of Audiochmura (Audiocloud) was inspired by the concept of Audioarchitektura (Sonicarchitecture) – brainchild of artist Piotr Adamski and mode:lina. It is a sonic installation using corrugated pipes as amplifiers emitting sounds gathered around its actual position. The shape of a cloud relates to something ephemeral, almost non-existent and likely to move.”

via modelina-architekci

C&Pimage2
If your in NYC  October 16th, go to the first-ever Cut&Paste Global Championship which I’ve attended a few times, the non global ones that is! It’s basically a live freestyle wacom design battle, with beats and treats, while raving at some mad skills in 2d, 3d, and motion!


“2009 GLOBAL CHAMPIONSHIP EVENT

This year’s Cut&Paste Digital Design Tournament has made its way through 16 cities and 256 competitors from February – June 2009.

It now culminates in a battle of the best, champions vs. champions, with the final 2009 tournament event: the first-ever Cut&Paste Global Championship.

Showcasing the talents of 48 competition winners in 2D, 3D, and motion design, from the North America, Europe, and Asia/Pacific regions , the championship event will take place at the Hammerstein Ballroom in New York City on Friday, October 16, 2009.

The Global Championship will present the same three competition formats that Digital Design Tournament 2009 has featured throughout the cities on its global tour: 2D, 3D, and motion design. The Global Championship will be putting sixteen competitors onstage for all three competitions. These competitors, forty-eight in all, represent the winning designers from every city on the 2009 Cut&Paste tour. Arriving with at least one successful competition under their belts, the city champions will take the stage again to quickly create designs against the ticking pressure of the clock and under the watchful eyes of the crowd. And this time, the pride of their countries and hometowns, along with their personal reputations, will be on the line.

When:
Friday, October 16th, 2009
Doors open: 7:00pm EST
Show starts: 8:00pm EST

Where:
Hammerstein Ballroom @ Manhattan Center Studios
311 W. 34th Street
New York, NY 10001

Who:
48 Competitors from 3 Competitions and 16 cities. To take a look at their portfolios and winning work from each city, check out the following links:
2D, 3D, and motion design .”


“The Obama presidential campaign was innovative. For the first time in American politics, a candidate used art and design to bring together the American people—capturing their voices in a visual way.

The Design Director of the Obama campaign, Scott Thomas, has collaborated with artists and designers to create Designing Obama, a chronicle of the art from the historic campaign. Get the inside story on how design was used by the campaign, and scope out the pieces, created unofficially, by grassroots supporters.”

This book will only happen enough donations are received by November 4th. They are 2/3rds they way there, so if you you’d like to buy the book ($50) or donate a smaller amount for a pdf of it ($10) visit their site now.

designing-obama.com
(thanks paul)

gadgetoff.2009_deka.arm2

gadgetoff.2009_mondo.spider2

Gadgetoff 2009 unleashed an intense series of kabooms,  zaps, chomps, and kerplurks rattling 400 attendees on the beautiful 83 acre Staten Island grounds September 25th while slinging Lenovo laptops with a trebuchet,  cooking hot dogs with Telsa Coil Towers, riding jet fueled 5g merry-go-rounds, writing code drunk for autonomous cars legally, and thrashing a series of incredible lectures and demos throughout the day! Welcome to the Gadgetoff 2009 Experience: Boom!

Robots rumbled in every corner ranging from dancing tai chi robots to tiny micro toy hex bugs that jittered their way into everyone’s pockets. The gigantic mechanical Mondo Spider chomped it’s way through the lunch gardens while on lookers enjoyed delicious alcohol infused sorbetDean Kamen of DEKA brought his breathtaking and ingeniously engineered “luke” arm (video) and toy inventor Brian Walker tinkered with large crossbows and rockets made to launch humans 20 miles across the air! Invisible inks, toys, gadgets, art, fire, illusions, magic, and disruptive ideas scorched the island while participants roamed in excitement and curiosity!

Just as I experienced last time, Gadgetoff invited the coolest hand’s on creatives to celebrate the Smart and Useless for an unforgetful day in disruptive goodness!

My adventure brief after the jump! (lots of pictures and videos)

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I’m quite familiar with the manufacturing world, but I’ve never seen a smart robot arm made for picking up pancakes for stacking! (FLexpicker). Seriously this robotic arm is quite impressive.  Let’s yank this arm out and use it as a poker dealer,  street trash picker, or something like a burger flipper! Keep the idea flowing with fast smart automated robots, just like the fun Robocoaster!

video
via boingboing


Design.for.life.tv
Philippe Starck has a reality show about design called Design For Life on the BBC… but not just design, but more importantly design thinking, observation, understanding, and how design is almost more about everything outside of what most think of design.

If your in the UK, let me know how the show is. If your not in the UK, you can catch a glance of the first hour long episode on Vimeo here or above.

Thus far, I’ve enjoyed the first episode and think it’ll be a great insight into what design really is… not just aesthetics or making cool objects, but understanding a story as a whole, a process, an eco-system and a rather complex element that is widely ignored.