New York City Garbage

It's hard to know what kind of souvenir to buy in New York City.  Do you go with the Statue of Liberty foam hat, the scaled model of the Empire State Building, or the always classic, I Heart NY t-shirt?  Well how about going for something completely different and with a much better story... like a cube of garbage.  Artist Justin Gignac (also of Wants for Sale), specializes is collecting and selling NYC garbage in neat little smell-proof clear cubes.  I love them because they are so representative of New York (and I mean that in the best possible way).  You can even purchase special event garbage such as, garbage from New Year's Eve 2008 in Time Square, or garbage from the national republican convention.  Brilliant!  I want some.

Invisible Journeys

Oli Laurelle has created these interesting visuals to depict wireless networks along a journey.  The image above shows a journey in time (starting at the 3 o'clock position and moving clockwise) from the Barcelona city center to the airport, by train.  Each "pin" represents a unique WiFi source.  I'm not exactly sure how to interpret these visuals as any sort of map or story, but they sure are fascinating pieces of art. (Found through Visual Complexity).

Honibe Honey Drops

Lots of people use honey to sweeten their coffee or tea.  It's a nice healthy option to sugar, but it's a sticky, messy, pain in the butt.  Honibe has created these convenient solid honey drops made out of 100% pure honey.  This is such a good idea.  (Found through Apartment Therapy).

Energy Bracelet

Canadian designer, Chet Domanski, has created these great one-off Energy Bracelets.  They are made out of 'up-cycled' pieces of the Alberta natural gas line.  Decommissioned pieces of the pipelines have been machined and chamfered into beautiful bracelets.  Each bracelet is tagged with the geographical coordinates of the location from which the pipe was taken. (Found through Sub-Studio Design Blog).

Live Launch Coverage

>Tonight I am completely enthralled by NASA's Live Mission Coverage of the space shuttle Endeavour's preparation for launch.  I've already been watching for an hour and a half.  I've seen all the astronauts get suited up and strapped in.  They have just closed the access hatch with just over 2 hours until launch.  The NASA TV feed's only audio is the team's radio communication.  There are times when it's totally silent.  I guess you could argue that it is not that interesting... but I'm completely memorized.  Good thing I didn't have any plans tonight because I can't pull myself away!

At ETech This Week

Sorry for the slow posting this week.  I'm at ETech in San Diego.  There have been a ton of super interesting talks.  I will write about a few of my favorites soon.

LINC - The Lifecycle Concept Phone

The amazing designers at Kaleidoscope's Greener Grass project have come up with another interesting cell phone concept.  Inspired by their attendance of the Greener Gadgets Conference, the LINC phone concept was designed with the product's entire lifecycle in mind.  The phone is made to be easily disassembled.  When LINC's hardware becomes obsolete, users are asked to ship in back to the company in exchange for an updated phone.  The manufacturer then easily disassembles the phone using a directed radiant heat beam which targets its internal memory metal latch, releasing the assembly.  The phone's components (glass, metal, electronics, etc.) are all appropriately recycled, reused, or safely disposed of (in the case of hazardous materials).  In the quick and ever changing world of technology that we live in, it's great to see product designers not only focusing on how the product is used, but what happens to it when it needs replacing.

Re:Construction

Lower Manhattan is filled with all sorts of ongoing construction work.  Re:Construction is a project aimed at turning unsightly construction sites into works of art and architectural.  They have 3 pilot projects including Concrete Jungle (shown above).  The project is sponsored by the Alliance for Downtown NY and the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council.

Little Dead Things

Ha!  How super cute are these cat toys?  If they weren't sold out I would buy them for my cat immediately.  The toys, entitled Little Dead Things (that's my favorite part), are made out of recycled leather and stuffed with organic catnip.  The set includes; one dead mouse, one dead bird, one human brain, one zombie.  Seriously, what more could a cat ask for? Available (hopefully again soon) on the Prairiebird's Etsy shop.  (Found though Modern Cat).

Brian Jungen

Brian Jungen's work appeals to both my industrial design side, and my new found west coast side.  Brian is a Canadian artist who makes art out of everyday objects.  His series Prototype for New Understanding creates aboriginal style masks out of Air Jordans.  The red, white and black of the Air Jordans amplifies the aboriginal feel, while making the material instantly recognizable as that of the pop culture shoes.  It's a nice juxtaposition that starts the gears of the mind turning.  Some of his other works include large whale skeletons made out of plastic lawn chairs and golf bag totem poles.  Very cool artwork.  (Thanks Mike!)

Sound of Color

The Sound of Color challenged 5 musicians (Dntel, Marie Digby, Swizz Beatz, The Blakes, and The Raveonettes) to write a song composed around a color.  Then they passed on the tracks to 5 directors to turn into music videos.  The result is not exactly what I would have expected, but that unpredictability is part of what makes this project interesting.  You can watch the music videos, download the songs, and get some insight into the thinking behind each color interpretation at soundofcolor.com.

TaskWatch

TaskWatch isn't a new concept.  In fact it's almost 4 years old.  But I saw it on Apartment Therapy today and it gave me some inspiration to a scheduling issue I've been brainstorming around - so I thought I would share it.  The idea is pretty simple.  It's a clock in the middle of a white board.  Users can write notes or titles associated with times of the day.  It lends itself to slightly altered scheduling solutions than a linear time line.

Things I Have Learned in My Life So Far

I'm kind of intrigued by the site Things I Have Learned In My Life So Far.  It invites users to contribute maxims that they have learned about life.  The site asks "What have you learned in your life so far? What is it that you are fairly sure about? What is it that you believe in by now?".  What I like about this site is that they have put an artistic spin on things.  Contributions are made in the form of digital artwork.  They are sketches, or photos, or movies created to illustrate or include the advice.  This one hit home for me... Take a moment, locate yourself.  (Found through Josh Spear).

Free Rice

I love the thinking behind Free Rice. The idea is very simple, they use advertising profits generated by visitors to donate money to the UN World Food Program in an effort to help end hunger.  People are invited to come to the site and play a multiple choice word game.  For each correct answer, 20 grains of rice are donated.  The game strengthens your vocabulary and keeps your attention long enough to make the advertising money needed to pay for the rice donations.  It's super simple, super smart, and by the look of the stats, super effective.  (Found through notcot.org).

New York Talk Exchange

NYTE (New York Talk Exchange) is part of MIT's Senseable City Lab projects that look at how we describe and understand cities as technologies change.  NYTE is a series of real time visualizations showing internet and telephone traffic flowing into and out of New York City.  I particularly liked the World Inside New York visual showing what parts of the world New Yorkers were calling. It gives some interesting insight into the inhabitants of different neighbourhoods.  The communications patterns draw attention to the relationship New York has with the rest of the world. It would be interesting to see these stats tracked over time.

Walk Score

If you are moving and looking for a place to buy or rent, you should check out the website Walk Score.  It scores neighbourhoods based on how walker friendly they are.  Walkable neighbourhoods are determined based on proximity of restaurants, shops, schools, parks, etc.  The site admits some shortcomings in their calculations, but overall it's an excellent approximation of walkability.  The Walk Score website has a great list of reasons why it's important to live somewhere walkable.  The reasons range from the predictable eco-friendly sort to some you many not have though of, such as increased social capital.  Very cool site.  I'm going to be looking up the walk score of every neighbourhood I consider living in from now on. (Thanks Karon and fam).

Phil Collins + Gorillas = Happiness

I was really exhausted tonight and noncommittally thumbing through old bookmarks when I came across something that made me feel much better.  It's a link to an brilliant British Cadbury commercial from last year.  If you are reading this from England you are probably rolling your eyes at me (I apologize).  If you haven't seen it, take a couple minutes to watch.  Phil Collins plus a Gorilla... how can it not be awesome?

The Bureau of Communication

Magnetism's Bureau for Communication has a hilarious collection  of Mad Libs style forms to fill out and email to your friends.  Forms include Unsolicited Feedback, Declaration of Romantic Intent and Statement of Gratitude, amongst others.  They have also recently added an archive of sent forms if you are interested in what everyone else has to say.  They state that 'attempts at humor are highly discouraged'.  Ha!

The Heart

The Wellcome Collection is an interesting mix of galleries, exhibits and events that examine what it means to be human.  They combine the ideas of medicine, life and art into each exhibit.  One of their current online exhibits is called The Heart.  It's a grouping of images and readings about the heart.  It looks at the anatomical heart, the symbolic heart, and the sacred heart.  The range of meanings and perspectives of the heart make it a refreshingly interesting collection.  The Heart is a nice little online outing on this lovely Valentine's Day.

Life Cycle Analysis Calculator

IDC in England has created this simple Life Cycle Analysis Calculator.  This free online tool was developed in response to a need.  IDC surveyed a number of design and engineering firms that all agreed - paying attention to a product's environmental impact throughout its life is becoming increasingly more important, but that many firms don't currently do the calculations.  The Life Cycle Analysis Calculator helps estimate the carbon footprint and embodied energy of any product and its packaging.  This is a great resource for designers.  Its quick and easy.  I will definitely use it in the future.  (Found through Core77).