Exhibit of previously "lost" auto sketches. Whether from Ford, Chrysler or GM, Detroit's auto designers have always been under strict instructions not to bring design sketches home; luckily for us, not everyone at the companies obeyed.

Kentucky curator Kay Grubola and ex-GM designer William Porter have managed to track down about 100 concept sketches from the '60s and '70s that found their way out of the design studio, avoiding the destruction that comes during corporate re-orgs. The result is the "Designing an Icon, Creativity and the American Automobile" exhibit, on display at the Louisville Visual Art Association until November 10th.

The Times has got a preview of some of the drawings and photos. While the sketches themselves are of course cool, what is really fascinating is a photo inside GM's design studio in what looks to be the early '70s, above; in that era predating casual Fridays and Banana Republic colored dress shirts, every single designer is wearing a white button-down shirt and thin, dark tie. They make the clay model they're working on look positively modern in comparison!

Coroflot Creative Seeds: The 3 Things You Need to Do in a Job Interview, by Dan Buchner. Over at Coroflot's Creative Seeds Blog, Dan Buchner, VP of Design and Innovation at Continuum, shares the three things you need to do in a design job interview. Here's a taste:

Most design firms receive hundreds of portfolios a month. The best firms get even more. To avoid being clumped (and possibly overlooked) with similar applicants (with similar capabilities), think deeply about what it is that differentiates you as a designer--and as a person--from others in the portfolio pile. But standing out does not mean sending a portfolio that's molded into the shape of an origami swan or delivered by carrier pigeon. It means contextualizing your work as part of a larger process, and describing the process of your work in the form of a narrative.

Read the full article
More Creative Seeds

Advertisement

MX East goes beyond typical design management discussions that remain focused on traditional concerns of print and brand, toward a new frontier of innovative products and service-oriented experiences. Ideally suited for design, product, and creative managers, MX East 07 bridges the gap between conferences that address the big vision of design and strategy, and conferences that focus on form-making and methods.

Core77 Broadcasts: Paul Budnitz from Kidrobot, interviewed by Steven Heller. As founder and President of Kidrobot, Paul Budnitz has surfed the rising crest of the limited-edition art toy and streetwear wave. Not only is he the co-designer of Kidrobot's signature Dunny toy and Munny, he also art directs, co-designs, and collaborates with many of today's leading plastic and vinyl toy artists including Dalek, Frank Kozik, and Gary Baseman to create the majority of toys sold by Kidrobot. The son of a nuclear physicist and a social worker, Budnitz grew up in Berkeley, California. By 15 he was writing computer code for video games and safety analysis programs for nuclear power plants. He studied photography, sculpture, and film at Yale University, graduating with honors in Fine Art in 1990. In 1997 he founded Minidisco.com, a digital recording website for which he wrote back-end software enabling him to run the multimillion-dollar business out of his home. He sold Minidisco in 2002 and immediately founded Kidrobot which in five years has grown from a single online store to a multi-million dollar creative corporation that runs three store-galleries in the United States--San Francisco, Los Angeles, and New York City (with more on the way)--wholesales its line of twenty toys and clothing to over 250 stores worldwide, and maintains a staff of forty. In this interview Steve Heller talks to the designer/entrepreneur in his New York office, where surrounded by vinyl and hoodies he reflects on the state of this burgeoning art the status of his business.

Edited by Randy J. Hunt.

LISTEN NOW (21 min.) | iTunes | More Broadcasts

UK design expert on Design for Sustainability. Alastair Fuad-Luke, professor at the UK's University College of Creative Arts and author of The Eco-design Handbook, talks to Engineer Live! writer Jon Severn on the topic of "Moving Towards Design for Sustainability:"

Design engineers are more aware of the world in which they live than the average person; they have a better appreciation of the resources that are required to manufacture products and of the finite nature of the world's resources. Most have also now formed an opinion about how urgently man-made climate change needs to be tackled. Yet design engineers and design managers may feel there is little they can do to make a difference within the constraints of their day-to-day work activities.... Alastair Fuad-Luke, however, believes that designers can do more than they might expect.

Click here for the full article.

via engineer live

Fujitsu's design division splits off. Breaking up is hard to do, but perhaps it will be good for design. Japanese manufacturing and technology giant Fujitsu will be spinning off their design division, creating Fujitsu Design Limited.

Utilizing the expertise that Fujitsu's design divisions have developed in areas ranging from consumer products to industrial products and for design functions including broad-based product and function design, user interface design, office and retail space design, the new independent design company will offer consulting in IT industrial design and universal design to Fujitsu Group companies as well as a broad range of outside customers.

The Fujitsu design department has been around since 1961, and their comprehensive "design policy"--something like a mission statement for ID'ers--can be summed up in four points: "human-centered design," "accommodating diversity," "synthesizing diverse design fields," and "usable by all people." Details of the policy are here, and details of the spin-off are here.

Call for entries: sanitation solutions for schools in developing countries. The Humanitarian International Design Organization presents a unique challenge for all you do-gooder designers out there. There's no ca$h money involved, but the winner will be rewarded with warm fuzzy feelings and the opportunity to have their difference-making concepts realized.

Due to free education in many developing countries, schools receive a lot more children. Organisations build new classrooms to respond to the request but there is one thing that many still forget, namely sanitary facilities. Let's be creative and help them to find a solution to conquer this issue. This can go from new concepts to a toilet as we know it, for rural areas out of low cost materials and keeping in mind that water is not available.

submission deadline : October 22, 2007

Body Glove ECO wetsuit. Body Glove's ECO wetsuit is the first produced using its signature eco-friendly, non-petroleum Bio Stretch rubber and Eco Flex exterior.

The production of these eco-friendly materials only consumes 1/10th the amount of energy normally used in the manufacturing of standard petroleum based wetsuits. The ECO is a SMARTER, GREENER, and CLEANER choice for the environment and way better than a battery. With this sustainable wetsuit, we can begin enjoying the earth and our oceans while preserving them at the same time.

thanks eric!

Advertisement

Gwangju Design Biennale 2007 Gwangju, South Korea Oct 5 to Nov 3, 2007 The second Gwangju Design Biennale will provide the opportunity to share the ideas and experiences of design leaders, industries and educational institutes around the world. This year's Biennale is made up of 3 main programs, and the exhibition theme is L.I.G.H.T. To learn more please visit our website

Robots with better muscles. We stock prisons with weight rooms and libraries, because what our society really needs is stronger, smarter criminals. Now we're giving better muscles to robots, based on a combination of biomimetics and mechatronics. If robots are going to eventually destroy us anyway, we might as well make them look like us.

A project called "Airic's_arm" is a new robotic appendage that looks rather like the original Terminator, and has a musculoskeletal structure resembling our own. Click here--the video has to be seen to be believed, and it really drives home two points: 1) the fine motor control robots can now achieve is quite impressive, and 2) robots have terrible handwriting.

Car with "green" wheels. So maybe you go chainsaw shopping, then afterwards you drive out to that cineplex in the woods to see the Flintstones movie, and on the way home you get a flat tire, and then you have your lightbulb moment.

via hemmings

Origami Meets Plexiglas. Materialworks is one of Germany's organizations serving the design world with material information. Their latest newsletter features an inspiring short story about Hannecke, a company known by its display systems for shows and events.

The company patented a brand new CUT'N FOLD process which makes it possible to heat crooked and intersecting bending lines to create for instance 3D products out of Plexiglas.

This means, the world of flat and simple displays are over and we'll soon be enjoying more smooth and curved designs by the in-house origami expert Stefan Delecat. Delecat's efforts even inspire Hannecke to start producing furniture or instant architecture, so get ready for a more foldable lifestyle.

More Unintended Consequences of Wii: Novelty Controller Overload. From Wednesday's Guardian Unlimited Technology section, a cute, brief article about the recent mad expansion in the number and variety of unique controllers available for home gaming consoles. We're not talking about the array of third-party controllers that have been around for years, designed to improve upon the standard ones that come in the box, but rather the highly specific (and often astonishingly poor) specialty controllers that bundle with particular games.

The author, Steve Boxer, blames the success of the Wii, which owes much of its universal appeal (it's soon to be named the fastest selling new system in UK history) to its unique controller and interface, and I would agree. There are certainly specialty controllers that pre-date the Wii frenzy, notably Dance Dance Revolution's stomp pad and some of the more gear-headed automobile and aircraft consoles, but the pile of cruddy plug-in gadgets described in the article represents an outpouring that has no pre-Wii equivalent.

What's subtly ironic about the sudden fad for eye-catching gadgets is that it's responding in exactly the wrong way to Nintendo's success. What made the Wii interface so seductive, and its sales so robust, was its brilliant non-specificity--many of the system's purchasers were first-timers, drawn in by a completely new mode of interaction that could be applied to hundreds of different scenarios, from bowling to firing an elven longbow. Rather than go through a long learning curve, figuring out which combination of button A and trigger 3 makes your secret agent do a forward roll, the Wii user is encouraged to pick up and play, trusting that motions in the real world will be interpreted in a logical way in the game. The controller is the same every time, but the motions are unique to each experience, just like in real life.

Continue reading post

FUTR WRLD Call for Entries. Antimotion + Floating Gat announce a call for entries for their FUTR WRLD competition. Anyone's who's sat doodling visions of the future (Blade Runner anyone?) should check out the FUTR WRLD competition, an open source collaboration inviting artist to create a conceptual rendering of earth and its inhabitants in 2060. Submission deadline is October 31, 2007. Work will be showcased in a limited edition art-book and gallery exhibition in New York.

For information and submission details visit: www.anti-motion.com

Unsure about your concept and want feedback? Post your sketches to the Core77 FUTR WRLD board thread. The one and only YO! has already got some sweet designs up.

Thanks YO!

Lighting Africa. Lighting Africa officially launches on 4 September, when organisers will unveil a competition for the design and delivery of low-cost, green lighting products for low-income consumers in sub-Saharan Africa. More than 350 companies have already expressed an interest - from Africa-based small businesses to multinationals like Philips.

Perhaps key to the appeal, is the World Bank calculation that the so-called "energy poor" in Africa spend about $17bn each year on fuel-based lighting. "It's a sleeping giant from a market perspective," says the IFC's Mr Sturm. "The poor, even the poorest of the poor, can be a profitable market."

Read full article via The Independent.

And finally, Libertiny intros new Honeycomb Vases. We reported on Libertiny's first stab at the Honeycomb Vase earlier this year that has now evolved into a series of shapes. The "slow-prototypes", requiring 40,000 bees over the course of one week to make a single finished piece, make a "booya"-type statement that denounces the mass manufacturing process normally used to make vases.

Thanks to Niti Bhan and Carl Alviani for their contributions to the newsletter.

Please share the Monday Morning Must Read with colleagues, clients and collaborators. Many email programs do not forward messages in their original format, so please use this link: http://www.designdirectory.com/blog/newsletter

Email us your feedback and comments. We are looking for stories, case studies and global news on where and how design can make the difference.

Mark Dziersk in Fast Company: Design, meet Business. Mark Dziersk, Core77's business practices forum moderator and longtime design evangelist, is now the Business meets Design editor for Fast Company. His first column, Design meet Business: "Business, this is...Design" is a great primer on the whole topic. Here's a taste:

Here's a visual story borrowed from a friend and colleague, the noted designer Richard Seymour. When describing the innovation process Richard asks his listeners to imagine a building being imploded, coming down through controlled explosive charges. The debris cloud that results is a metaphor for the beginning of the design process. A time in which interesting, unpredictable connections are made and where ambiguity is prevalent. Now, visualize running the film backward and making the building. A compelling analogy for the process of design. Controlled chaos leading to clear and finalized end point. Without the risk of letting go in the "debris cloud" original ideas and connections will not be made. With the understanding that the film can be run backward and with faith in the process, break through innovations can happen.

Stanford's Design and Medical Schools team up on Respira paper asthma spacer. In order for asthma inhalers to perform effectively, the discharged medicine must be taken in coordination with a deep breath. This action can be very difficult for young children gasping in the midst of an attack. In these cases, supplementary devices called spacers are used to capture and hold the medicine until the user is ready to inhale. Over 8 million children in Mexico suffer from asthma who are without proper medical care or preventative measures and spacers, at more than $50 a piece, are far too costly for Mexican health centers to stock.

Stanford's Design and Medical Schools teamed up to face this obstacle, creating a super cost-effective and easily distributed solution. With a cost reduction of over 99% (dang), the flat-pack, foldable paper Respira spacers can be shipped by the hundreds for the cost of a stamp.

In the long term, we believe this innovation is sufficiently affordable and easy-to-use that it can be distributed directly to patients and their families. Used in the home, this device will enable not only the rapid treatment of acute attacks, but also a more comprehensive prevention strategy. Patients would use the spacer together with an inhaler to give the preventive medication that is known to dramatically decrease the number of acute attacks.

This rethinking of asthma management will yield savings and improvements in quality of life for patients and their families. The reduced cost will benefit the Mexican health care system, which will avoid unnecessary, expensive emergency room treatments, as well as patients' families, who will save bus fares and lost wages. With the knowledge that treatment is easily accessible, or even in the home, the anxiety and limitations in activity that plague asthma sufferers and their families will be greatly diminished. Importantly, this simple device empowers asthma patients and their families to take an active role in managing their disease.

Advertisement

Gwangju Design Biennale 2007 Gwangju, South Korea Oct 5 to Nov 3, 2007 The second Gwangju Design Biennale will provide the opportunity to share the ideas and experiences of design leaders, industries and educational institutes around the world. This year's Biennale is made up of 3 main programs, and the exhibition theme is L.I.G.H.T. To learn more please visit our website

Luckey Climbers. Family-owned business Luckey & Luckey designs and builds Luckey Climbers for children's museums, malls, zoos, and other kid-centric locations that welcome rambunctious rugrats who like to climb, jump, and hang. The net-and-platform structures spell out adventure with playfully curved surfaces and daredevil heights--how could a kid possibly resist? Each installation is unique, ranging from vast, uniform, and structured mazes to vertically-configured jungle gyms.

thanks steve!

Americans, really workin' it. Ugh.

Sustainable Housing Moves Forward in New Orleans with Innovative Design and Materials. Global Green tours the first home at the Holy Cross Project today, a zero energy affordable housing development in the Holy Cross Neighborhood of New Orleans' Lower 9th Ward. workshop/apd won a design competition chaired by Brad Pitt from over 125 entries. Dozens of green products and systems will also be showcased at today's event.

iDSA presents Digging Deeper. Digging Deeper is a two-part event that will feature a tour of the Bay Area's waste disposal and recycling facilities followed by a panel discussion at the new, sustainably designed, San Francisco Federal Building on September 12, 2007.

As the dialogue around sustainability expands and points of view proliferate, distinct courses of action become ever more blurry. With every choice there is a trade off. Getting smart while designing green means understanding context. Join us for a day of Digging Deeper into the context of sustainability. We will demonstrate how understanding inherent tensions can reveal design opportunity.

Sony takes back the waste. Sony hops on the Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) bandwagon and announces their take-back recycling program. Here are some details from their online statement:

To encourage consumers to recycle and dispose of electronic devices in an environmentally sound manner, Sony has established a national recycling program for consumer electronics. The Sony Take Back Recycling Program allows consumers to recycle all Sony-branded products for no fee at 75 Waste Management (WM) Recycle America eCycling drop-off centers throughout the U.S.

"Providing the highest level of service and support doesn't stop once a purchase is made. We believe it is Sony's responsibility to provide customers with end-of-life solutions for all the products we manufacture," said Stan Glasgow, president and chief operating officer of Sony Electronics. "Through the Take Back Recycling Program, our customers will know that their Sony products will be recycled in an environmentally responsible manner."

via machinist.salon

Book Review: Higher Creativity for Virtual Teams: Developing Platforms for Co-Creation, by Steven P. MacGregor and Teresa Torres-Coronas. Reviewed by Robert Blinn.
The information superhighway that was much lauded in the 1990s is undoubtedly here. Indeed, developing countries are leapfrogging the traditional wired modes of communication with cellular systems that require far less infrastructure. At the same time, packet-based modes of communication such as instant messenger and Skype are becoming the de-facto standard for communication between overseas buyers and suppliers.

But the promise of the videophone, trumpeted by IBM at the 1964 New York World's fair has never taken hold, despite the best guesses of Stanley Kubrick's 2001, Ridley Scott's Blade Runner, and James Cameron's Aliens, to name a few. In part, the lack of counterparties with similar technology held it back, but it is equally likely that many people were simply uncomfortable with the prospect of the other caller seeing them disheveled or unwashed. Purely auditory conversation masks non-verbal cues, and sometimes that little obfuscation is comforting.

It is often cited, however, that nonverbal communication makes up the bulk of information flow between individuals, and the perplexing popularity of emoticons provides ample testimony that words aren't always enough to get the point across. For creative teams, these adages hold even more fully. Any design meeting likely includes: hand waving, gesticulation, volume changes, uncomfortable silences, glares, sketching, annotating other peoples' drawings, and hopefully healthy doses of laughter. Something magical happens when you pack a room full of creatives, and that spark is often lost on the phone or in multimedia conferences.

In Higher Creativity for Virtual Teams, Steven MacGregor and Teresa Torres-Coronas have compiled a comprehensive assortment of scholarly papers on the subject of virtual teams -- collaborative creative efforts between people who happen to be separated by oceans and time zones. Between international sourcing and free trade, the problem of virtual teamwork is rapidly becoming a major one for large corporations and is beginning to trickle down to working designers. While virtual collaboration seems functional in concept, however, coordinating such efforts remains a massive problem. The persistence of creative centers like Silicon Valley, Hollywood, and even Bangalore and their respective real estate markets provide testament to the fact that human beings still like face-to-face meetings, and the astronomical prices of business class airfare as compared to coach demonstrates that they are willing to pay for them too.

Continue reading review

Shoot From The Hip. Some nice local coverage for Brunner and upstart-grise Ammunition.

With 12 product and five graphic designers on his team at Pentagram, and now with him at Ammunition, Brunner is ready to work like Behar within a broad client range that includes technology companies, ventilation companies and even manufacturers of simple tools, such as his Heavy Hitter Hammer, made for the Chinese market. "I want a product design firm that is multidisciplinary but one where the product is front and center," said Brunner. He said when he is financially invested in a client's product, he feels a bigger sense of partnership. He develops designs in exchange for an equity share in the company that hires his services and sometimes requires a royalty percentage of the sales.

Marriott to get hip designs. With designers like Philippe Starck and Michael Graves having breathed life into formerly dowdy housewares chain Target, it was only a matter of time before the trend extended to formerly dowdy hotel chains. It's just been announced that hip hotelier Ian Schrager, the founder of the concept of boutique hotels, is partnering up with Marriott:

Their plan is straightforward enough: Schrager will design about 100 boutique hotels for the as-yet-unnamed brand in major cities across the United States, South America, Europe and Asia, and Marriott International will operate them. By tapping a range of renowned architects and designers, Schrager plans to give each property a distinct character.

While there's not yet any word on who those "renowned architects and designers" will be, Schrager says,

"...believe me, I'm not going to have a book of standards. It will be..." He paused for effect. "The anti-chain."

Click the link below for more details.

via international herald tribune

Bookswim beta. Yes!! It's like Netflix for books!

via lifehacker

Nature Design: From Inspiration to Innovation. Nature is an endless source of inspiration for everyone, especially for us designers. For instance, here in Germany the magic word 'Bionik', or biomimetics, leads us to a new world where products are designed upon mother nature's smart systems and methods.

Accordingly, the connections between nature and the various design disciplines have once again become far more intensive in recent years. A good reason for The Museum für Gestaltung (The Museum of Design) in Zürich to feature the exhibition Nature Design - From Inspiration to Innovation

The exhibition (10 August - 02 December, 2007) including symposium, discussions and tours, presents an international selection of objects and projects from the fields of design, architecture, landscape architecture, art, photography and scientific research which do not simply depict or imitate nature but use it as a starting point and a reservoir of inspiration to present innovative answers to the relationship between man and nature [image from "Sixes Last" video by 1st Ave Machine].

Ding 3000's S-XL Cake will hook you up, or not. If equally cut cake pieces work your last nerve, Ding 3000's got your back. The new S-XL Cake pan mold gives you a sweet selection of slice sizes to choose from. The only drawback is when you've arrived to gather dessert a bit too late and only a M is left when you had hoped for an XL. Oh well.

And finally, Bluetoothbrush.\ It's just a concept for now, but we're chuckling about recent ASU grad Erik Hernandez and ASU senior Kevin O'Leary's design for a Bluetooth-powered electric toothbrush with hands-free headset called Bluetoothbrush. It's not clear whether you're to chat with other Bluetoothbrush users while brushing or if you're meant to get a super-sonic audio feed of your teeth getting squeaky clean...in any case, it looks hysterical and the name can't be beat!

Please share the Monday Morning Must Read with colleagues, clients and collaborators. Many email programs do not forward messages in their original format, so please use this link: http://www.designdirectory.com/blog/newsletter

Email us your feedback and comments. We are looking for stories, case studies and global news on where and how design can make the difference.

Hacking the Physical World, by Carl Alviani. Carl Alviani takes a look at the similarities and differences between product designers and software designers--from sharing language and metaphors to teaching each other how to think about projects and prototyping. An exerpt:

I've found over the course of several years, and several conferences and business functions, that if I stop with the first sentence ("I design products."), the next question is often something like "Oh, on what platform?" Distinguishing the design of physical goods from virtual ones is a necessary step, and substituting "consumer goods" doesn't seem to make things any clearer. This isn't a huge problem either, confined as it is to these specific and predictable situations; and designers of the virtual are usually downright charmed to meet someone who does something as quaint as deal with entire atoms, and not just the electrons flowing between them...

read article

Core77 Broadcasts: Edward Burtynsky + Jennifer Baichwal, Manufactured Landscapes. Edward Burtynsky has traveled the world documenting humankind's incursions on the natural landscape--quarries, ship breaking fields, recycling yards, factories, mines and dams. His internationally-acclaimed large-format photographs are both beautiful and horrifying, arresting and undeniable, offering a visceral entry point into thinking about industrialization, sustainability, and the human condition.

On a recent trip to China, filmmaker Jennifer Baichwal accompanied Burtynsky as he documented endless factories, dam building projects, waste dumping grounds, and other "evidence and effects of that country's massive industrial revolution." The resultant film, Manufactured Landscapes, stands as a must-see for anyone interested in our impact on the world, and will have particular resonance to industrial designers moving forward into a future where the ramifications of mass production become severe to the point of crisis.

Ed and Jennifer chat with Allan Chochinov about the twists and turns of how the film came to be, what it's like to try to get permission to shoot some of the photographs and footage, the challenges (and limits) of editorial mission, and seeing the work on the big screen.

Learn more about Edward Burtynsky at www.edwardburtynsky.com
More about Jennifer Baichwal at www.mercuryfilms.ca/jennifer_baichwal.html
More about Manufactured Landscapes at www.zeitgeistfilms.com/landscapes
For playdates, check here

LISTEN NOW (45 min.) | iTunes | More Broadcasts

Advertisement

Gwangju Design Biennale 2007 Gwangju, South Korea Oct 5 to Nov 3, 2007 The second Gwangju Design Biennale will provide the opportunity to share the ideas and experiences of design leaders, industries and educational institutes around the world. This year's Biennale is made up of 3 main programs, and the exhibition theme is L.I.G.H.T. To learn more please visit our website

Coroflot launches "Creative Seeds" Blog. Coroflot has just launched a new blog at Coroflot.com, Creative Seeds, which is dedicated to creative work--and both uses of the word "work" to boot! There will be how-to's on finding design jobs and recruiting, advice on what leading designers are looking for, and showcases of great work from Coroflot portfolios. There will also be news from the creative employment industries, so check back often. Currently, we've got interviews with Stefan Sagmeister and Paul Budnitz, articles by Petrula Vrontikis and Robert Blinn, and a whole lot more. Here's a taste from Petrula's article titled "Taking Credit: What can creatives, studios and clients claim for the work they do?":

Who gets credit for a design? What can you show in your portfolio, and what should you say about it? Who owns the work that you completed while working for an agency? Is this about ethics, or about law? And what are your obligations as a client, having completed a project with a design studio? Well, when it comes to credit, things can seem like a custody battle. Here are a few words of advice on the topic...

Read the full article

Best Buy decides green building is the ticket. Best Buy will be the first major retailer of its kind and size to commit to mandatory green building for all its new stores beginning in mid-2008. The gadgets/gizmos giant is one in a group of companies, including Starbucks, Target, and Lowe's, participating in a pilot program for bulk LEED certification in association with the U.S. Green Building Council. There's no word on what level of certification Best Buy's shooting for (hopefully not the bare minimum dealie) but plans for eco-friendliness include, sustainable building materials, energy efficient lights, HVAC, and electronics, gray water recycling, and other implementations of renewable energy. Best Buy also plans to retrofit 20% of its existing stores with more efficient lighting while increasing recycling activity for cardboard, plastic, and consumer electronics.

International Journal of Design, Now Available Online. The International Journal of Design is published three times a year, the second issue is now available online. See www.ijdesign.org for downloads or submitting own manuscripts online.

Current articles
- Privacy in the United States: Some Implications for Design
- Imagining the Orient: Cultural Appropriation in the Florence Broadhurst Collection
- Metaphors in Design Problem Solving: Implications for Creativity
(+ case studies and reviews)

The International Journal of Design is a peer-reviewed, open-access journal devoted to publishing research papers in all fields of design, including industrial design, visual communication design, interface design, animation and game design, architectural design, urban design, and other design related fields.

Recreated monocycle. The "penny-farthing" bicycle, with its enormous front wheel and tiny rear wheel, is a common sight in cartoon scenes parodying the absurdness of antiquity; but less well-known is this amazing early version of a monocycle, pictured above, recreated by a modern-day Spaniard using 19th century plans. Check out the photo gallery of the contraption (which is on sale for thirteen large, by the way), here.

via gizmodo

50 manifestos. Just in case you missed it, Icon magazine's August edition features 50 manifestos from influential architects and designers. Here's a fave from John Thackara:

"We believe that 'content' is something you do--not something you are given by a person in a black T-shirt."

So read up and then (we encourage you to) write your own!

via do

Idea Generator. Don't know what to design next? Idea Generator may help you out, but if you get "jewel encrusted torture restaurant" like we did, you should probably spin again.

via coudal

Article on the evolution of gesture interfaces. From the Wii and the iPhone to the Wacom tablet and complex surgical systems you've not yet heard of, interfaces have gone way beyond pushing buttons and flipping switches, and it behooves us as designers to stay on top of the latest developments. Robert Cravotta, Technical Editor of Electronics Design, Strategy, News has a great article here on the evolution of gesture interfaces now being used in everything from games and phones to industrial systems.

Vote on the Core77 One Hour Design Challenge.
A quick reminder that voting on the 1HDC will be closing today--Monday 1PM PST (8 PM GST). There were over 70 entries from around the world, all completed in under 1 hour. The theme was "Water-saving designs for the bathroom", and the prize is a Nintendo WII. Check it all out here; vote here. And turn off that tap while you're brushing your teeth!

Cima takes ladders to new heights. Step stools, painting ladders, the fancy ones you can buy from Moss, and of course, the old ladder in your closet held together by one rusty bolt--these are all different, but still, very much the same, stair-like contraptions. Barcelona, Spain-based designers Sergio Mahler and George Papadogiannis have developed the Cima Ladder, a height-enhancing object like no other. It is a single component composed of a carbon fiber composite and it's super light, visually and physically. Weighing in at less than a kilogram, Cima is easily transportable but also extremely strong and able to support the weight of the user who climbs in the spirit and formation of climbing a tree.

The composite materials gives us the opportunity to re-think and redefine the ladder, to come out of the closet and stand proudly in the salon of the house.

This way of re-thinking the ladder brings life to a normally unnoticed but important tool that goes beyond the pure function.

Cima was selected as one of 20 products chosen for the Composites-on-Tour exhibition organized by Design Flanders, Belgium, and is currently making the second half of its international rounds.

Emerging Technologies and Housing Prototypes, by Salvador Perez Arroyo, Rossana Atena and Igor Kebel. Reviewed by Robert Blinn:
I remember my first time walking past the window of Issey Miyake's Pleats Please store in downtown New York City. The second, third and fourth times that I walked passed it happened only minutes later, because I paced back in front of it repeatedly in order to fully absorb the effect. The window of the boutique was made of Lumisty, a designer material that changed from transparent to translucent as the viewer's angle changed. The experience was transfixing, and I wobbled, wandered and changed my view all to watching Miyake's clothing appear and dissolve into mist in rapid succession.

Since those early days, innovative materials and construction methods have become progressively more integral to the design process. While at the turn of the century designer materials were relatively rare, they've now become common place enough that nearly everybody owns something made of carbon fiber, and certain shapes of monocoque multilayer bike frames have been banned professional cycling because they supply a competitive advantage thought unfair. All of these technologies and more appear in Arroyo, Atena and Kebel's book, Emerging Technologies and Housing Prototypes, with an emphasis on "more." Aluminum foam, heat sensitive compounds and color changing fabrics are all included, with details on the manufacturers, including addresses, websites and phone contacts. While I cannot guarantee that simply knowing the name of the manufacturer will provide entree into purchasing novel technologies like LiTraCon transparent concrete (that's TRANSPARENT CONCRETE folks), it certainly is a step in the right direction.

Continue reading review

Trying to form a "design district" in Cleveland. How do you get Swedes to come to Cleveland? Sounds like the set-up to a joke, but it's the very real problem faced by Edward Hill and Daniel Cuffaro. Cuffaro, head of the ID program at Cleveland Institute of Art, and Hill, veep of Economic Development at Cleveland State University, are trying to set up a "design district" in a 24-block area of Cleveland.

The region's strong mix of designers and consumer-product companies, as well as proximity to some of the country's best industrial-design colleges, are reasons Cleveland can become the "Milan of the Midwest," say Hill and Cuffaro.

The pair are beginning by trying to establish "design embassies," where foreign companies would send their designers to establish a Stateside market presence. Design-friendly Sweden is first on the list:

A local chapter of the Swedish-American Chamber of Commerce heard the design-district pitch early this year, called business contacts back home and helped set up Hill and Cuffaro's trek.

"We want to help them bring some Swedish design to the district and, in reverse, bring some U.S. design to Sweden," said local businessman Lars Traner, secretary for the Swedish-American chamber.

We're all for cross-border design exchanges, and wish Cuffaro and Hill the best. Details of their efforts can be found here.

Yuta Watanabe's A Dozen Pencils. Ah, the humble pencil. After ages of bestowing upon us the gift of saving, sharing, and showing information, it remains the same wooden shell that cradles a stick of lead. Recent Ravensbourne College of Design and Communication grad Yuta Watanabe took it upon himself to enhance this utensil in a dozen ways, from sheathing it in a different familiar object to attaching other tools that speed and strengthen the process of sharpening. In creating A Dozen Pencils, Yuta "wanted to make something that people could intuitively understand. Because of the pencils' use and function the end result is interactive design. [He] made them from different points of view, including memory, behavior, humour and 'product language'."

And finally, wrenchware for the handy diner. This 3-piece stainless steel Wrenchware set is perfect for mechanics who work/dine on engine blocks, or even those newlyweds with a new apartment full of unpacked IKEA furniture. The set includes a fork/box wrench, knife/pliers jaws, and spoon/open ended wrench--all made of 18/10 polished stainless steel. These definitely give new meaning to "fixing a meal." Hee haw.

thanks roman!

Please share the Monday Morning Must Read with colleagues, clients and collaborators. Many email programs do not forward messages in their original format, so please use this link: http://www.designdirectory.com/blog/newsletter

Email us your feedback and comments. We are looking for stories, case studies and global news on where and how design can make the difference.

A note to our readers: We'd love you to help us get the word out about the Monday Morning Must Read, so if you enjoy getting this in your inbox every Monday, help us out by sharing it with colleagues, clients and fiends. Get them to subscribe here. Forward it to a couple friends this morning! Thanks.

Ecodesign, Ecolabels and the Environment, by Niti Bhan. Niti Bhan breaks down the jargon, surveys the changes taking place in Europe, and examines what those changes may mean for other parts of the world. Here's a taste:

European market forces such as Ecodesign, consumer choices and ecolabels are beginning to change the practice of design at the most fundamental levels. It is no more just a matter of a greener product or choosing a less toxic component or material. It requires an understanding of the entire production process, distribution and marketing system on a global scale, and the way that systems are being redesigned to meet these criteria. These trends also imply sea changes in the way businesses are organized and the way they function...

read article

Canada gets new "Fastap" cell phone tech. Canadians send a reported 21 million text messages every day; could that number double with a different keypad design?

Maybe. Chinese cell phone manufacturer ZTE announced yesterday they'll begin selling their D90 phone in Canada, featuring the innovative "Fastap" keypad, which according to the company leads users to send between two and four times as many text messages as those without the technology.

The keypad looks normal until you start texting, at which point the backlighting switches to highlight the letter keys, which are not the same as the number keys; each letter key is located at the corner junctions between the numbers (look closely at photo, above). This design, coupled with ZTE's proprietary predictive text program, supposedly leads to the blazing speeds and vastly higher number of messages sent.

Question is, does it work? We here in the U.S. office won't know 'til we can get our hands on one. Any of you Canucks care to help us out?

Advertisement

Gwangju Design Biennale 2007 Gwangju, South Korea October 5 to November 3, 2007 The second Gwangju Design Biennale will be held October 5 to November 3, 2007, in the city of Gwangju, South Korea. The exhibition will provide the opportunity to share the ideas and experiences of design leaders, industries and educational institutes around the world. This year's Biennale is made up of 3 main programs, and the exhibition theme is L.I.G.H.T. Click Here for more Information. To learn more please visit our website

EcoSeek green search engine launches. Exploring earth-friendly options might get a lot easier now that EcoSeek has just launched. Keep in mind that this "search engine for all things green" is brand new, so they need your help to populate it with eco-friendly products in order to grow into a mean green look-up machine.

Three online videos you GOTTA see: Robot vehicle with multiple movement styles; Jordan C. Greenhalgh's Process Enacted; and Self-Sustainable Chair by Joo Youn. Seriously. Open those in tabs right now, get a coffee, and enjoy.

RISD and Brown University join forces to offer dual degree program. The Rhode Island School of Design and Brown University have just announced the approval of a new dual degree program that will grant accepted candidates with a Bachelor of Arts from Brown and a Bachelor of Fine Arts from RISD upon graduation. Prospective students are welcomed to apply for the 5-year program to launch for the 2008-2009 academic year.

This historic moment acknowledges and reinforces the collaborative and multidisciplinary educational efforts of these two world-class institutions, by forming a program to offer students enhanced opportunities for creative work that integrates, relates and develops diverse spheres of academic and artistic work.

'The creation of this dual degree program,' states Roger Mandle, president of RISD, 'allows our institutions to develop a consilient approach, merging the strengths and educational rigor of each institution to form a true model of interdisciplinary education.'

Intersections Conference: Design know-how for a new era. The program is set for the upcoming Intersections Design Conference in Newcastle, UK. The theme is Intersections: Design know-how for a new era, and promises "a two-day conference exploring what designers need to know for the future." Headliners include Tim Brown, Peter Saville, Deyan Sudjic, John Thackara, Gillian Crampton-Smith, and a ton more. Here's the pitch:

Design is transforming as it adapts to a world in transition. Design has expanded into new terrain and the boundaries between disciplines are breaking down. As it changes so do the skill-sets needed to practice it; to stay competitive designers are adapting to the new landscape, by acquiring new know-how.

Many developments in the nineties were driven by the integration of computer skills into the designer's toolbox. Now the emphasis is on acquiring more multi-disciplinary and contextual skills.

Groundbreaking designers from different disciplines will tell stories at Intersections about what they have learned lately, what they expect to learn next, and why. The conference will also feature lively debate between path-finding designers and thinkers with different views on how designers should prepare for the future.

The conference director is Riding the Flux writer Kevin McCullagh.

All info and registration at www.intersections07.com

Magic Wheels: Autodesk Inventor of the Month. Not only did Magic Wheels take Silver in BusinessWeek's 2007 IDEA Awards, they've just been announced "Inventor of the Month" in Autodesk's monthly contest. The wheelchair manufacturer used Autodesk software to design a two-gear wheeling system, making it easier for users to ascend ramps without batteries or motors.

All you Autodesk users out there will have plenty of chances to be named Inventor of the Month (12 chances a year, folks) though the competition is stiff; apparently there's 600,000 of you. Click here.

Veggies are a breeze if they're wrapped in Micky D's. We spotted a nice little tidbit on Unbeige today about a recent Stanford University study that confirms the sad reality that Micky D's knows all-too-well what the little ones want. The research revealed that kids are more inclined to gobble down any food in a McDonald's wrapper as opposed to, say, on a plate. A group of 63 low-income 3 to 5 year-old children were presented with McDonald's food items as well as "regular" items like carrots and juice both wrapped in plain and McD's packaging.

McDonald's-labeled samples were the clear favorites. French fries were the biggest winner; almost 77 percent said the labeled fries tasted best while only 13 percent preferred the others.

Fifty-four percent preferred McDonald's-wrapped carrots versus 23 percent who liked the plain-wrapped sample.

Fewer than one-fourth of the children said both samples of all foods tasted the same.

Unfortunately, it doesn't seem like kids'll quit begging for Happy Meals anytime soon, but parents might take advantage of this research and raid their local joint for some wrappers, cups, and boxes...

FLOTspotting : Bertrand Clerc. From the Coroflot portfolio of : Bertrand Clerc

Featured Project : Pelican chair

The subtle shape-shifting quality of Bertrand Clerc's chair design is the very reason why it's called "Pelican." When someone is seated in the metal frame and stretch-fabric chair, the seat gives way to form the shape of a pelican's lower beak. When standing alone, the fabric stays taut which makes the piece seem more like sculpture rather than furniture.

Tiny zoom lenses. The problem with zoom lenses is that they have to zoom, meaning two different lenses must mechanically increase the distance between them. This adds bulk to cameras; take a look at any sports photographer's Canon cannon and you know what we mean.

But a French company named Varioptic has been working on camera lenses made out of liquid droplets, rather than glass, for years, and they've recently been able to incorporate zooming features. With Varioptic's technolgoy you needn't physically moves the liquid lenses relative to each other, you just need to change their shape (and therefore focal length), which can be accomplished electrically.

Liquid lenses are also more rugged than glass ones--paradoxically, they are able to withstand violent shaking without losing their shape or breaking. They also zoom within milliseconds, much faster than a mechanical zoom.

What does this mean for product designers? Once Varioptics perfects the tech, we'll be able to incorporate absolutely tiny, yet fast and powerful lenses in everything from laptops to cell phones.

Science geeks can see how it all works here.

Two-dimensional kids slow traffic. Here's an innovative way to slow speeding traffic down: put life-sized cardboard cutouts of your own kids by the side of the road. Sounds crazy, but it worked in Ohio, where the man who came up with the idea is now selling them for 60 bucks a pop. We hope his kids get a cut. Billy, if you're reading this, don't sign that model release form just yet; hold out for more cash!

via hemmy

Herman Miller's Cradle to Cradle approach to sustainable product design. Metropolis Magazine shares the transcript of a talk given by Scott Charon and Susan Lyons on Herman Miller's sustainable design program based on the Cradle to Cradle protocol. Here's a snippet:

If you look at a disassembled Aeron chair at the end of its useful life you can see there are a lot of different components that make up the furniture. When we did the breakdown we were told we really need to be better at disassembly. It took a couple of hours to disassemble the chair, and we need to make sure we can get those materials into proper recycling bins.

There are four questions we ask. First, are the materials homogenous? Meaning they can't be molded steel and plastic together. Did we use common tools to take them apart? Did it take one person more than 30 seconds to reverse a connection? If it takes longer than that the material might end up in a landfill. The materials have to be identified and marked; the plastics have to have the proper recycling codes on them so they can be recycled. If the answer to all of those questions is yes we are going to give ourselves 100 percent credit, if one of those is No, we are not going to give ourselves any credit. Finally, recycling. If a material fits into the technical or biological nutrient cycle we will score that 100 percent, if it's down-cycled we will give that 50 percent and if we can incinerate it for energy recovery we will give that 25 percent. If it has to go to a landfill we are not going to give ourselves any credit within that score card.

Designing out crime. David Kester, Chief Executive of the UK Design Council; Professor Jeremy Myerson, Professor of Design Studies at the Royal College of Art; Professor Gloria Laycock, Director of the UCL Centre for Security and Crime Science; and Professor Lorraine Gamman, Director of the Design Against Crime Research Centre at Central St Martins School of Art and Design. What do these four designers have in common? They're all crimefighters.

"Designing Out Crime" is the UK's effort to reduce lawbreaking through clever and innovative design.

Home Office Minister Vernon Coaker says:

"...Designing out crime is about sustainable and innovative design of products, spaces and places to make crime unattractive and make communities feel safer... We must maximise the influence good design can have in the fight against crime."

Ian McInnes from the Association of Chief Police Officers Crime Prevention Initiatives:

"There are excellent examples to show designing-out crime works. The police service supports the Alliance to build on these examples and encourage more designers and manufacturers to address crime risk at the design stage. Neither crime nor unattractive add-on security need be a regular consequence of purchasing homes, consumer technology, or services."

So how exactly do they do it? Details are too numerous to list here, but you can check out the full-fledged PR description at this link.

International Journal of Design, Now Available Online. The International Journal of Design is published three times a year, the second issue is now available online. See www.ijdesign.org for downloads or submitting own manuscripts online.

Current articles
- Privacy in the United States: Some Implications for Design
- Imagining the Orient: Cultural Appropriation in the Florence Broadhurst Collection
- Metaphors in Design Problem Solving: Implications for Creativity
(+ case studies and reviews)

The International Journal of Design is a peer-reviewed, open-access journal devoted to publishing research papers in all fields of design, including industrial design, visual communication design, interface design, animation and game design, architectural design, urban design, and other design related fields.

And finally, Eames tattoo actually awesome, not awful. Here we have the unfortunate incident of someone's arm graced by a nicely executed Eames lounge chair and ottoman tattoo landing on a site that highlights awful tattoos. While we just as well would have posted and appreciated a Flickr photo of this, we were sent this link instead. Fortunately, a few viewers argued the awfulness claim, so there's a solid "Booya!" for the unappreciative side of this tat spat.

thanks felipe!

And again, please share the Monday Morning Must Read with colleagues, clients and collaborators. Many email programs do not forward messages in their original format, so please use this link: http://www.designdirectory.com/blog/newsletter

Email us your feedback and comments. We are looking for stories, case studies and global news on where and how design can make the difference.

Off light switch hook. Not too long ago, we reported on electrical engineer Scott Amron's pet project, Die Electric, where he experiments with strange objects that abstractly conserve power. His newest product is the Off light switch hook that grants extra utility to a normal light switch in order to add a real incentive for the user to keep it in the "off" position as often as possible. Lights on? Then you can't hang your undaroos here, sorry...

IDSA presents the Okala Design Guide 2007. Everyone knows it's not easy being green, but if you want to get greener and don't know where to start, this here handy lil' guide could be a nice option for ya. IDSA's just published the Okala (hopi for "life sustaining energy") Design Guide for 2007--it's an "introduction to ecological and sustainable design for practicing and beginning designers...It envisions a future where we recognize the value of global ecology and work to insure its protection." This year's revised version, supported by Eastman Chemical Corporation, Whirlpool Corporation and the IDSA/EPA Partnership, serves to emphasize usability to designers and design students.

The Okala promo site gives you a sneak peek at a few sections, but if you want the whole shebang, you'll have to cough up $19 for a copy. If it's a crew, and not just you, discounts are granted for larger orders, and apparently, over 60 D-schools in North America have already requested copies.

New Article at Core77: The Future of "User-Designed", by Bryan Hynecek. Bryan Hynecek and the folks at Ignition teamed up with the Texas Instruments DLP Products Group and students from The Guildhall at Southern Methodist University, putting together a program that would enable video gaming experts the chance to design their "ideal product"--a video projector design specifically for gamers. Here's a taste:

...Trey's foam model was also very large. The optical engine necessary for his concept wasn't driving the size however; the circuit boards that needed to generate the desired performance were. He understood that gamers were tolerant of larger products (such as gaming consoles or computer towers), but only if they were high performance. TI later found a new set of boards that would get Trey to a more comfortable size, so the team updated the foams.

The next step was to reconvene with the electrical engineers from TI. When they saw the foam models, their eyes brightened. The projector business has always been a race for the next smaller and brighter unit, which forces projectors to be a shoe box shape with offset lens—but these models were a breath of fresh air. TI brought engineer after engineer into the conference room; they brought people in from other meetings; they stopped anyone walking through the halls just to show them the foam models. None of the models stayed on the table for more than five minutes...

read article

Innovating Belgium's postal service through design. The UK Design Council website has posted a nice case study on how Belgium's postal service turned to design to help it make the transformation from outmoded institution to flexible service provider.

When in 2001 the European postal markets were being gradually liberalised, the Belgian post office (De Post) embarked upon a wholesale, design-led reinvention, appointing Fitch:London to help transform it from an out-dated institution into a sharper, more customer-focused retailer.

Fitch:London, supported by Belgian research group Columbus, undertook an in-depth discovery and definition period. Management interviews, trends analysis, customer segmentation and consumer profiling led to the identification of three key concepts: communication, community and convenience.

The "CityWall", a collaborative social space in Helsinki, Finland. In a practice dating back to ancient Rome and attributed in origin to Julius Caesar, where the Acta Diurna ("daily events") of political and social events were posted on the city walls, Helsinki, Finland's capital, has launched The CityWall (images - video), a large multi-touch display installed in a central location, a great example of the simplicity of multi-touch displays and surface computing, and the collaborative and playful human engagement that it naturally leads to.

Using a series of intuitive gestures users can navigate and arrange media as if you were manipulating physical pictures. The touchscreen technology which enables this direct interaction has been specifically designed so that several people can interact directly with display at the same time.

The CityWall is located in downtown Helsinki, Finland. It can be found in Lasipalatsi opposite Forum. The touchscreen technology and applications have been developed by the Ubiquitous Interaction research group at the Helsinki Institute for Information Technology, as part of IPCity.

Via Influx Insights, Surface Sightings and The Daily Galaxy.

Core77 Broadcast: Masa Inakage, interviewed by David Womack. Land of robot receptionists and more mobile services than you can shake iPhone at, Japan has so far offered few opportunities for foreign students wanting to study digital design at the center of the tech revolution. That's about to change. Keio University is launching a new Graduate School of Media Design that will offer Masters and Ph.D courses in both English and Japanese. Headed by renowned digital artist and filmmaker Masa Inakage, the new program is focused on training "the next generation of media innovators." The core curriculum includes design, technology, management, and public policy. Students will also develop their own research projects in partnership with international corporations and organizations.

David Womack talks to Professor Inakage about the new school, media design in Japan, and the next generation of ubiquitous devices.

LISTEN NOW (17 min.) | iTunes | More Broadcasts

Boosting the South African economy through ID. A small band of designers in South Africa is trying to boost their country's manufacturing economy, and they believe they have just the ticket: promoting industrial design. South Africa's Industrial Designer's Society has been observing the Asian "tiger" economies, particularly South Korea, in order to see what role ID has played in that country's economic success.

South Korea has ID programs at some 156 colleges and universities, producing 3,400 ID grads in any given year. In contrast South Africa has only 25 industrial designers in the entire country, and IDS chairperson Bernard Smith feels they are worse off for it.

"Abroad, industrial designers are generally paid well and work in an enabling environment where they are given sufficient access to research and development resources. The result is continuous innovation, which is the lifeblood of companies," [Smith] comments.

The newly formed association's mission is to consolidate the industrial design profession and promote the benefits of industrial design to all stakeholders as a competitive, value-adding resource in South Africa.

Read a more detailed explanation here.

Design Democracy vs. The Innovation Elites. Really? Once upon a time, anyone could make anything, because everything was made of sticks and rocks. Then came more advanced technology, and with it, specialization. Bakers baked bread and wheelwrights built wheels, but only because they were better at it--the average farmer's family could probably bake their own bread if it came down to it. In the past couple of centuries, that's been going away, because things get more complex, and while baking bread requires patience and practice, engineering an airplane requires a college degree.

But running alongside all of that have been the tinkers; the ones who may not be able to build complex objects from scratch, but through enough messing with them have figured out how to fix, modify, rebuild, and maybe even improve on them. Think HAM radio geeks, think home-built computers, think Anthony Hopkins in The World's Fastest Indian.

G. Pascal Zachary at the New York Times thinks that's going away too, and that it might be the fault of The Design Elite and their stranglehold on the process of innovation. In this article from July 29, Zachary investigates websites like Instructables that encourage hi-tech tomfoolery, and mourns the growing legion of common consumer goods that resist their pokings and probings. The iPod is once again the poster child for highly designed desirables, this time in a somewhat negative light which it shares with other products that are "dominated by a top-down, elite innovation model that doesn't allow for customization."

continue reading post

Designing for global markets. In "Crossing Cultures" (pdf), a new article published in IDSA Innovation Journal, Kevin McCullagh sets out the challenges in designing for global markets:

"Few design managers can avoid the headache of an international diversity of tastes. Since the 1980s, brand owners have dreamt of the economies of scale that global products promise, but managers on the frontline know that the reality of designing products for world markets is much more complex and ambiguous. The rogues' gallery of product faux pas that made disastrous translations to local culture is testament to the number of bear traps out there."

After speaking about many cultural differences, McCullagh acknowledges that "the most powerful products transcend national boundaries and touch our common humanity."

McCullagh recently also wrote Riding the Flux" on Core77.

FLOTspotting : Dan Bishop. From the Coroflot portfolio of : Dan Bishop

Featured Project : Vitals Monitoring System

Dan Bishop's senior year project at Arizona State University was an exploration into the future of inpatient medical care. The wrist-worn device uses sensors to measure temperature and blood pressure, and sends the data wirelessly to a paperless charting system. The automated vital info-gathering system creates a more efficient work environment for medical personnel who can remotely monitor their patients' stats while performing other tasks.

This FLOTspot was brought to our attention by Dan himself, who's Coroflot portfolio has recently been a hit on the blogosphere, here, here, here, and here, proving once and for all that it's awesome to post a portfolio on Coroflot!

Nokia to open first satellite design studio in India. Nokia has just announced they'll be opening their first satellite studio in Bangalore, India, where swelling numbers of mobile users make this handset market impossible to ignore.

Nokia said India is a dynamic and inspiring place for designers with its diverse mix of cultures, traditions and colour. "....I expect our work here to influence not only our thinking to develop new design trends and ideas for India, but also for many other markets around the world," Alastair Curtis, Nokia's Chief Designer, said.

"Designers must be exposed to how people live and work in different places around the world. Our new satellite studio will draw on the experiences of this dynamic market to develop new design ideas and identify trends," [Hannu Nieminen, Head of Insight and Innovation] said.

via the hindu

Win a Trip to Germany! The BraunPrize, in conjunction with Core 77, is offering you the chance to attend the awards ceremony, with travel and two nights hotel stay included. This year marks the 16th edition of the bi-annual BraunPrize, held in Kronberg, Germany (September 12, 2007). To enter the drawing, complete the form here and correctly answer the 3 multiple choice questions. One August 16, one lucky winner will be selected to receive the all-expense-paid trip to Germany and an invitation to the gala awards.

For full details, rules and schedule click here. Deadline: August 15, 2007.

Moss opens in L.A. So the word's been on the street and around the block a few times--the Moss LA opening word, that is--but Unbeige has the sweet breakdown and photos. Apparently it was one of "those" events where you couldn't touch anything and there were people there just to shoo you away from the important stuff, but at least they let Maarten Baas jam out on the charred 1938 Steinway Baby Grand.

Photo: Unbeige. And goodness! They've got a video now too!

Flatpack mini-ghettoblaster for your iPod (or "other" mp3 player). SUCK UK's new mini-Boombox looks just like the classic piece from the '80's but shrunk down a lot, made of paper, updated for mp3s, not cassette tapes, oh yeah, and you have to fold it yourself. Just pop 2 AA batteries in the mini-blaster and your tunes'll jam on through the fully working speakers. No word on price yet, but it's expected to be released by the end of September.

thanks raluca!

Book Review: The Internet Imaginaire, by Patrice Flichy. Review by Robert Blinn.
Rarely do I find my self in the sort of confluence of time and place as I did when I picked up Patrice Flichy's The Internet Imaginaire. I read the book while traveling on the TGV high-speed train from Nice to Paris, which couldn't have been a more appropriate backdrop for perusing its pages. The Internet Imaginaire attempts to explain the emergence of the Internet through the framework of semiotics. It is said that thoughts of profound importance tend to polarize those who encounter them and I must admit that my experience with semiotics as a discipline has been no exception. While I hesitate to agree that semiotics is actually profound, it is certainly profoundly French, so my placement was well timed, although my subsequent confusion would have been equally difficult to deal with in far less lush landscapes.

In his introduction Flichy relies heavily on the work of Paul Ricoeur, one of the originators of the semiotics. For those unfamiliar, it is a discipline concerned with exploring the deeper meaning of signs and symbols, and is a staple of communications studies. My personal experience with semiotics is based wholly on a single class I took at Brown University where we explored semiotics, Auteur theory and the deeper meaning of films like Taxi Driver. They say that the hallmark of science is that two scientists observing the same phenomenon should ultimately come to the same conclusion, and that is clearly not true for semiotics, where the main input is the Id of the observer. As a scientist and historian, this frustrated me deeply, since it seemed a redundant exercise to try to figure out what Scorsese's films were trying to say while the man was still alive and well in California. If I really wanted to know what he was trying to say I would have picked up a phone.

continue reading review

And finally, bring the newsletter full-circle: Hideaway doorknob. The Doorknob Condition, designed by Arnaud Lapierre, features an outside knob that retracts when the inside knob is pulled. We're not sure if it's for security, or to replace the "sock on the doorknob" situation we all remember from living in high-hormone college dorms.

via dumptrumpet

Please share the Monday Morning Must Read with colleagues, clients and collaborators. Many email programs do not forward messages in their original format, so please use this link: http://www.designdirectory.com/blog/newsletter

Email us your feedback and comments. We are looking for stories, case studies and global news on where and how design can make the difference.