Oakland A's New Stadium to get Touchscreens in Every Seat

If it's not bad enough having to look through a sea of back-lit mobile phones and cameras at concerts, the proposed interactive wireless touchscreens built into each seat at Cisco Field, future home of the Oakland A's takes us one step closer to the Buy n Large utopia envisioned in WALL-E.

via dvice

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Not Just Another Brick in the Wall

New York based Contemporary Architecture Practice created The Wall of the Future using state-of-the-art robotic manufacturing techniques for MoMA's exhibition Home Delivery: Fabricating the Modern Dwelling which opened last week.

The wall (9.6 x 7.6 x 0.8 feet) explores the possibilities of architecture in the near future combining space, structure and skin into a single form. While the title may sound a tad self-important, the concept highlights an intriguing trend we're seeing emerge in the world of architecture and generative scripting.

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Spring Water on Tap (?)

AT&T recently announced a contract with Spring Water On Tap, an Atlanta-based natural spring water supplier that maintains fresh spring water supplies in large local tanks for all of it's customers' personal uses.

The solution which attaches ultrasonic sensors and interlinked cellular-based modems to 65-gallon water tanks, allows the company to discern water levels and alert delivery trucks to bring more of the wet stuff. Claiming that "AT&T takes a very broad holistic view of RFID." Percy Jones, CEO of SWOT, says:

AT&T has enabled our company to provide customers with a seamless supply of fresh spring water at all times while unobtrusively monitoring the water levels in our customers' homes.

Given the fact that Georgia is experiencing severe to moderate drought in all but 5 counties, we're wondering: shouldn't they be using this for monitoring the aquifers instead?

Via RFID Journal

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The new bright red Italian train

Finally EU competition is also affecting Italian train service. Twenty-five red high-style trains, each with 11 carriages and 460 seats, will soon travel at 360 km an hour on the Italian tracks. Run by Nuovo Transporto Viaggiatori (ntv), an independent company, the trains will compete directly with Trenitalia, the main Italian train company.

See also here and here for more images.

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Couture Motorcycle Helmets for the Great Escape

No stranger to accidents, French designer Jérôme Coste has survived six cranial traumatisms, one of the contributing factors leading to his interest in crash helmets. Inspired by Steve McQueen, science fiction and Japanese biker gangs who eloquently blend street culture with vintage motorcycling, he founded Ruby in 2004.

>> see more

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Feel the Burn with Airun Plus Trainers

The Airun+ -- not to be confused with another shoe company using the "+" sign for their iPod combo -- is designed with a built-in Smart Technology Controller that calculates the exercisers' stats and recommends adjustments to their daily workout.

Intended for people focused on fat burning cardio workouts, the Airun Plus comes with two interchangeable weighted insoles based on the sandbag weight training principles. The lightweight insole weighs 106grams and the heavyweight insole weighs 588grams. The weights load the body resulting in accelerated weight loss and enhanced fitness levels. Apparently wearers can get the same value from a 30 minute exercise as they would from an hour long exercise using normal footwear.

The controller on top of the shoe wirelessly receives real time information from a sensor located inside the sole. The sensor not only measures the speed but also the weight applied from each step, a first in footwear technology allowing statistics calculating your performance to be collected more accurately. It may not play music but the idea is good, just don't trip while trying to read the display on the treadmill.

via engadget

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photo: FatMandy

The Clever Creative, Languishing in the Genius Trap, by Carl Alviani

It might take a genius the same amount of time to find what they are good at as it would a dedicated learner to practice their way into genius-hood. Over at Coroflot's Creative Seeds Carl Alviani enters the dichotomy of the gifted the talented and the downright challenged in the creative industry:

More than in most fields, our careers live and die by our ability demonstrate specific skills, and our employability is largely a function of convincing those in charge that we've got them. And this is exactly why one of Dr. Dweck's "fixed mind-sets" can be so very damaging.

Think of it this way. Two students enter, say, an illustration program at a prestigious art school. One is convinced of her innate talent and skill, the other unsure, but deeply excited about learning and doing illustration, even if it doesn't impress the way her fellow student's does. The first has been told all her life that she has natural talent, and she's there to develop and express it, the second merely enjoys the process, and the acquisition of new skills. Who will wow the teachers first semester? That's an easy one. But who will ultimately be the more successful, able to grow, keep things fresh, take advantage of new media and technologies, avoid getting pigeonholed? That's probably an easy one too.

Unfortunately, the obsession with genius, already strong in North American and Western European societies, is inflated to legendary levels among creative professionals...

>> view article

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Frog Design Launches Print Magazine

Frog Design is jumpin' into print. Yup. They've just launched a new magazine called 'design mind', written by frog designers, technologists and strategists. We got a sneek peek at the debut issue - full of juicy articles on China's mobile market, the potential of in-game brand placement and the creative process. This publication has as a goal to "open up new channels for frog to communicate [their] thought leadership in a highly visual and dynamic way." (oh yeah, there's a website too.) It's a tightly designed, thoughtful tool that promises to publish 3 times a year. We're looking forward to seeing how this frog....er...flies.

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Droog Aalto wins Climate Competiton

Czech designer Jan Ctvrtnik has won the Climate Competition organised by Droog. A vase based on Alvar Aalto's famous design, but modified to express the effects of global warming received 32% of all votes by visitors to Droog's website.

The original Aalto vase was inspired by the outline of a Finnish lake and Ctvrtnik's design suggests how the lake's shape could change due to climate change. Ctvrtnik says:

Climate changes are visualised mostly by numbers and scientific measurements. In order to show changes, it is good to have a reference point. And so the Aalto vase became that reference point with its shape originating from the shape of a Finnish lake. The 'Droog' part of the title can be translated as 'Dry', obviously relating to global warming.

>> see more

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Icare motorcycle concept

The Icare motorcycle concept is a cross between something from Tron and "a kind of Porsche or Aston Martin for the two-wheeled world," according to France-based Enzyme Design, the minds behind the concept. It's intended to have a six-cylinder 1.8 liter Honda engine, which is more than what you'd find in some compact cars. Will it ever go into production? No word, but Enyzme's earlier L'atomo concept did, so future bikers will have some hope.

>> see more

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Cameron Sinclair vs John Thackara

There's a (heated?) dialogue going on between John Thackara and Cameron Sinclair over JT's recent piece on Design Observer. If you missed the original text, we blogged it a few days ago. Choc full of Thackarian nuggets on the benefits of staying in the backyard, the essay focuses on the benefits of locality and culture (which, by the way, happens to have striking similarities to a graduation speech funny-man Patton Oswald gave in June....read it n weep. please.) Regardless, Cameron Sinclair's got some interesting responses (to Thackara, not Oswald). Here are a few bites:

"I find it a little arrogant of writers to speak of design and architecture as a 'western' or 'developed world' notion - and then occationally insinuate the 'look at what they are forcing on them' self-guilt world view. There are designers, both licensed and unlicensed, all over the world. They are not divided by boundaries but by skill and desire. There will always be the Zaha Hadids and Karim Rashids of this world but there are also the Diebedo Francis Keres, the Rodney Harbers and the Yasmine Laris of this world. For as many designers working in the realm of architectural plastic surgery, there are just as many working in the emergency room. The difference is that the latter are not seeking accolades and therefore do not grace the covers of magazines and the design media. In addition to training more global architects we need to encourage and develop new schools of design where the work is. Ie currently we are training 70% of the worlds' architects in the developed (over developed) nations, yet 70% of the work is in emerging nations.

Yes, there are a dozen 'examples' where we can point to designers screwing up, getting it wrong, undervaluing the input of the community. Yet there are hundreds of stories where quiet moments of innovation have been an element of incredible change in a community. Most of us who are actually building look at bemusement to all the structures going up in Dubai and Doha - why are those deemed as great feats of 'design excellence' but yet a community led participatory process is often scrutinized by cynical, often western, eyes.

Perhaps it is time to write stories of the successes on the ground. Come join any of us, but do expect to pick up a shovel when you are on a site visit."

Read the entire response at Doors of Perception.

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Interview with Method's Designer Danny Alexander

Josh Spear catches up with industrial designer Danny Alexander who moved to San Francisco to join the people against dirty, Method just over a year ago.

Growing up I always loved to create. Whether it was origami, painting, assembling furniture, etc., I was always working with my hands. When I grew up a bit, I began to think that industrial design was the perfect combination of left brain and right brain thinking, but the thought of creating more junk to fill landfills weighed seriously on my conscience.

read interview

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Microsoft's Folding Arc Mouse

Microsoft's new wireless Arc Mouse folds down to save space during transit, anyone that's used one of those mini-travel mouse devices will appreciate the full size body. It's questionable whether the space saving benefits are really necessary but you know you'll look like the man breaking one out in the airport business lounge. It will retail for approx. $60 US later in the year.

via gizmodo

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Michael Somoroff Sculpts Light

Recently reinstalled at the Fields Sculpture Park in Ghent, NY is artist Michael Somoroff's Illumination I . Somoroff used a myriad of 3D visualization software to create the large-format sculpture.

Originally commissioned by the non-denominational Rothko Chapel in Houston, the 12-ton project is a cross between sculpture and architecture that gives sheltering form to the lighting conditions in a scared space. Based on images of various mosques and holy ruins, Somoroff began by building a virtual mosque with 3D compositing software. He applied a computer program that could chart sunlight moving through the mosque's window and across it's interior based on a specified date and location.

Somoroff then used modeling software to simulate the effects of forces such as gravity, space/time, and other atmospheric contingencies at the chapel on models of that light. The final translation of this light relied on CAD software and CNC milling to create a 20' high sculpture in foam which was then cast in fiberglass and finished in stucco.

A commercial photographer and TV spot director by trade, Somoroff views art as a spiritual practice whose purpose is to assist in the negotiation of reality, virtual or otherwise.

>> see more

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Oink Oink, Chocolate for Fat Pigs

Well anyone with a chocolate addiction, The Brooklyn Brothers (who have 2 offices, neither in Brooklyn) recently completed the packaging design for chocolate maker Fat Pig Chocolates. Fat Pig is an organic milk chocolate bar currently available in one flavor and they assure us it has none of the bitter after taste of regular milk chocolate.

Self confessed chocolate pigs who want to know more about what makes some chocolate taste better than others should check out BBtv's visit to the homebrew chocolate technology startup TCHO.

via ffffound

>> see more

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Special thanks to toolgirl and Mark Vanderbeeken for their contributions to this week's 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.

Cradle to Cradle Motor Glider

Roland Cernat won the first prize at this year's Lucky Strike Junior Designer Award for his final-year project "Oriens", a sustainable and energy-saving motor glider. Based on the cradle to cradle principles, Cernat's design combines sustainable materials with an ecological energy concept including solar panels on the wings and body that create enough energy to power the motor. Don't worry, he included a back up fuel engine if needed. Cernat graduated from the University of Applied Sciences Schwäbisch Gmünd, Germany this year and currently works as a freelancer.

rolandcernat.com

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A Pair of Flying Slippers: Phil Patton reviews the Buckminster Fuller exhibition at the Whitney

"An exhibition is a verb," writes Whitney museum director Adam Weinberg bravely, in his introduction to the catalog of the museum's Buckminster Fuller show, Starting with the Universe.

He is echoing Fuller's own famous phrase "I seem to be a verb." But in fact, a museum show is necessarily more like an arrangement of nouns. And this one includes nouns like drawings, photographs, and models, with a few verbs of video of Fuller talking.

"His vision is difficult to approximate and present, much less encompass in an exhibition," Weinberg continues. The show does the difficult ably enough, providing a good chronological sample, thoughtfully arranged.

>> continue reading

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Advertisement

Spark Design Awards 2008 Sponsored by Hewlett-Packard, Spark welcomes entries and designers from all disciplines and countries. Initial Entries Due: August 1, 2008

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RCA Show 2008

Super-human toasters! Cell-phone scales! Chameleon cars! This and more graced the floors of the RCA's 2008 show (June 21 - July 5). Core-o-spondent, Victoria Kirk, sent us a bunch of snaps from the Design Interactions exhibition. Click through to see evidence of what these UK creatives are up to....

>> more photos

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Book Review: Bottlemania, by Elizabeth Royte

After just posting a rather lengthy sustainability diatribe, reviewing Elizabeth Royte's Bottlemania: How Water Went on Sale and Why We Bought It seems a little like environmental overkill, but her work is as much a classic David and Goliath adventure as it is a polemic. She opens with an interview with Dr. Michael Mascha, a self-proclaimed bottled water connoisseur, who advocates the careful pairing of pedigreed ground and glacier waters from around the world with meals during fine dining. While it would seem that such rampant consumerism virtually guarantees he's to be the easiest target in the book, the truth is a little more complicated.

>> continue reading

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SF uses wireless sensors to enable smart parking

This fall, San Francisco will test 6,000 of its 24,000 metered parking spaces in the nation's most ambitious trial of a wireless sensor network that will announce which of the spaces are free at any moment.

Drivers will be alerted to empty parking places either by displays on street signs, or by looking at maps on screens of their smartphones. They may even be able to pay for parking by cellphone, and add to the parking meter from their phones without returning to the car.

Read full article [New York Times]
Technical article [RFID Journal]

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New Core77 Gallery : Hamburg Harley Days

Custom details, tailpipes and tattoos! More than 75,000 bikers attended one of the biggest Harley Davidson events in Hamburg from June 20-22. Be sure to check out this gallery of rock n' roll of design by Core 77's Aart Van Bezoyeen.

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I.D. 2008 Annual Design Review Exhibition Photos

To celebrate I.D. Magazine's 54th Annual Design Review, Parsons The New School for Design is hosting an exhibition featuring innovative design work from the past year. There are eight design categories: consumer products, graphics, packaging, environments, furniture, equipment, concepts, and interactive media.

The exhibition translates exceedingly well from the printed magazine and is a remarkable improvement on last years efforts. The layout of the space ensures large crowds can easily get access to view work and small items that would otherwise be lost are cleverly presented in repetitive clusters to create visual impact.

Located in the recently renovated Sheila C. Johnson Design Center, the exhibition opens to the public today and runs through till September 28th, 2008.

>> more photos

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Praized - Trust Your Tribes

Praized - Trust Your TribesCongratulations to the guys over at Praized who's site officially made it's debut last week after 2 years of development. The new city search platform is designed specifically to be integrated into blogs and social networks allowing communities to rate and comment on businesses in their city, the example they give:

A Praized installation on a vegan blog will have completely different restaurant recommendations than on a meat-lovers' blog because the two groups have fundamentally different tastes.

Praized CEO Harry Wakefield run's MoCo Loco where you may have seen a beta version they've been testing called MocoLocal. The platform is free for publishers to install and comes pre-loaded with over 17 million US and Canadian local business listings, complete with contact info and location maps.

Learn more here

www.praized.com

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photo: Splodge

8 Keys to Writing a Killer Job Ad for Creatives, by Carl Alviani

You never get what you want, unless you ask for it. "A job that's well-defined is easier to fill, and a job posting (if that's how you choose to publicize) that's clear and compelling can raise your quotient of good candidates dramatically," says Carl Alviani from his most recent article on Coroflot's Creative Seeds. Here are some other good tips we found while reading through:

Avoid marketing speak.
Long lists of non-specific company characteristics (dynamic, insightful, engaged, consumer-driven, etc.), or applicant characteristics (hard-working, self-starter, team-player, etc) are generally ineffective. Not that these characteristics aren't important--because they are--but if you want to target the right job-seekers, you need to pick the few things you're really looking for and describe them, using examples if possible: if your position requires 60-hour weeks and the generation of 20 concepts a day, say that, not "hard-working and prolific."

Be flexible.
Teaching someone a new software package is much faster and easier than teaching them to lead a project team, or come up with innovative concepts, or perform well under a deadline. Too often, a job listing takes the form of a laundry list of skills: must use a Wacom tablet; must know Pro/Engineer; must code in Flash. While it's true that some jobs are so dependent on expertise with a particular tool that it's non-negotiable, long term success is often decided by more nebulous qualifications like enthusiasm, thought process and learning ability.

>> read complete article

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Ergonomidesign, Sweden: human-centered since the sixties

Ergonomidesign is Sweden's oldest established full service design studio. Founded in 1969 when Design Gruppen merged with Ergonomidesign, they have a long history of releasing award-winning human-centered design solutions based on a strong philosophy of user-centered innovation espoused by the founders.

Housed in a former missionary school in Bromma, a suburb of Stockholm, their space is as inspiring as it must have been designed - soaring ceilings, high rose windows, a sense that here is a home for grounding the beliefs and values that underpin their work.

>> continue reading

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Malaysian scientist reduces cost of producing Aerogel by 80 percent

Aerogel has remained in domain of government funded and commercial high-tech projects for years due to it's high cost. A new technique using the silica found in disposed rice husks after harvest could be the answer to making this material widely available.

Nicknamed "frozen smoke" because of its cloudy appearance, aerogel is made from silica, the basic ingredient in sand, and is 99 percent air by volume. The result is a nearly weightless and translucent material with a white powder that seems to float inside.

What makes aerogel so attractive is the combination of light weight with incredible strength and insulating properties...

...Aerogel can withstand mechanical pressure 2,000 times its own weight, making it suitable for bombproof panels. It makes good soundproofing material. Aerogel also can absorb oil spills and pollutants in the air -- NASA fitted a space probe in 1999 with a mitt packed with the substance to catch the dust from a comet's tail.

While the process is still a couple of years away from being ready to sell this new material commercially, the Malaysian government is funding a US$62.5 million project at Halimaton's university to speed things along. Good news for ID students who can now legitimately spec this material in their concepts.

View Article: International Herald Tribune

via Treehugger via PSFK

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Touched echo: Invisible Memorial for the Bruehlsche Terrasse in Dresden

Using bone conduction, a technology developed for hearing devices, the "touched echo" installation in Dresdon transmits sounds of the cities devastating 1945 carpet bombing through the visitors arms when they rest their elbows on the balustrade and hold their ears. Several custom made sound conductors mounted to the railing send sounds of the airplanes and bombs exploding through vibrations, it's completely silent unless you touch the rail.

Synopsis
"touched echo" is a minimal medial intervention in public space. The visitors of the Brühl's Terrace (Dresden, Germany) are taken back in time to the night of the terrible air raid on 13th February 1945. In their role as a performer they put themselves into the place of the people who shut their ears away from the noise of the explosions. While leaning on the balustrade the sound of airplanes and explosions is transmitted from the swinging balustrade through their arm directly into into the inner ear (bone conduction).

touched echo
Performative Installation
By Markus Kison
03.10.2007 - 31.10.2008
Brühlsche Terrrasse, Dresden

via notcot

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Changing the Change - a call to action

Bill Moggridge (IDEO), John Thackara (Doors of Perception), Josephine Green (Philips Design), Geetha Narayanan (Srishti School of Art, Design and Technology, Bangalore), and Luigi Ferrara (Institute without Boundaries, Toronto) were only some of the speakers and guests at the highly stimulating Changing the Change conference that took place in the impressive Molecular Biotechnology Research Centre of Turin, Italy, July 10-12.

This outstanding conference "on the role and potential of design research in the transition towards sustainability" was the brainchild of Ezio Manzini (professor of industrial design at the Milan Polytechnic). Jointly organised by the Polytechnic universities of Milan and Turin (with extensive support from their masters and doctoral students), Changing the Change was part of the programme of Turin World Design Capital 2008.

In this longer article I have tried to open up this important conference to those who were not there, which is made easier by the fact that all 138 papers are already online.

>> continue reading

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Another Three-Letter Green Apparel Business Starts Up in Portland

While many of us up here in the Pac NW breathe a sigh of relief that Nau's grand experiment in green apparel is getting a second chance, another major entrant in the category is just gearing up. END Footwear stands for "Environmentally Neutral Design," and like Nau, it's got an illustrious Nike alum on board, it's got a deep commitment to sustainable manufacturing practices, and it's got a cool logo with three letters in the name. The major difference is that where Nau took high-performance outdoor wear and made it calmer, sleeker and greener, END is working the same voodoo on shoes.

>> more reading + pics

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Dolphin Inspired Fully Submergible Watercraft

And finally, ditch the jet ski this summer and pick yourself up the Innerspace Sea Breacher to fulfill those 007 childhood fantasies. Constructed with a F-22 Raptor canopy, the three-quarter-inch thick solid polycarbonate can withstand hard inverted landings and the sliding mechanism is tough enough to drive the Sea Breacher at full speed with the canopy wide open.

>> more

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Special thanks to Mark Vanderbeeken and Niti Bhan for their contributions to this week's 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.

2008 Annual Design Review Winners

I.D. Magazine's 2008 Annual Design Review winners are published on their website if you haven't had a chance to check out the latest issue. The biggest dilemma for judges this year was whether to acknowledge the iPhone or not; in the end they took a historical perspective and decided it had to be included. Good call!

view winners

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It's the Economy, Stupid: A macroeconomic primer for design(ers) and sustainability, by Robert Blinn

Last week the International Energy Agency called for serious investment into alternative energy and carbon sequestering. At the same time, United States Senate blithely blocked environmental legislation with many elected officials indicating that our suffering economy could not bear such a cost. While the gulf between these two modes of thinking seems irreconcilable, a reframing of terms may go a long way toward closing the philosophical distance.

Having studied economics as an undergraduate and then worked on Wall Street for nearly a decade, I feel relatively attuned to the economy and economic thought. Having read and studied design for the last four years, however, I've begun to realize that much of what I studied and practiced (in both design and economics) was based on misunderstandings and taxonomic differences between science, economics, politics, and design.

While it is tempting to treat sustainability as a production or a materials problem, such a view neglects the realities of our global economic system. To truly do "sustainable" design, the solution must reach beyond the drawing board and into economic reality. Economists and scientists have actually already paved the way toward robust arguments for sustainable energy and design, but to understand them it is first necessary to profoundly reframe the lens through which we view the world.

Politicians and naysayers will often object to sustainable initiatives on the grounds that they limit "growth" and increase "costs." While these arguments remain difficult to refute on a commercial level, two simple observations are enough to defuse or derail even the most economically sophisticated political arguments against sustainability. Market forces cannot align with the common interest of humanity so long as prices reflect costs and benefits that occur in: (A) displaced locations and (B) periods of time other than the present. This piece of knowledge casts an "inconvenient" shadow over our current system of production, but in doing so provides hope not only for the environment but also for our economic future.

>> continue reading

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Advertisement

Spark Design Awards 2008 Sponsored by Hewlett-Packard, Spark welcomes entries and designers from all disciplines and countries. Initial Entries Due: August 1, 2008

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Samsung's Green phones

Last week Samsung released their green "Eco-Phone," made of corn-based bioplastics and lacking in harmful lead, mercury and cadmium. They're also Energy-Star-rated, and an alarm feature beeps when the battery's topped off, so you don't leave it plugged in and drawing juice. For now, the Eco-Phones are only available in South Korea.

via akihabara news

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1 Hour Design Challenge: WINNER ANNOUNCED!

It's big, it's brawny, it's dude heaven! (No - not mud wrestling!) Power Tools! This month we challenged Core readers to flex their skills and design the next greatest piece of mechanical muscle in one hour or less. Together with guest judge Brian Matt of Altitude, Inc. we've narrowed it down to a selection that would make Tim Allen proud. Here are the results:

First Place: Air Force

Second Place: Hacksaw

Third Place: Thor Chainsaw

>> continued...

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Cool tools: manhole magnet

Speaking of tools, if you've ever seen a construction worker hoist a manhole cover open, you know why they're built the way they are. Here to provide some assistance is the Magswitch Manhole Lifter System, an ingenious combination of a simple lever and an on-off magnet; the 23-lb. tool will hoist 400-lb. manholes with no problem. And the price? "Very affordable when compared to the cost of injury," says the manufacturer's website. Wonder if that means it costs an arm and a leg.

via tool monger

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Harvard study questions 'Long Tail' theory

The Long Tail theory, as explained by its creator, Wired magazine editor Chris Anderson, holds that society is "increasingly shifting away from a focus on a relatively small number of 'hits' (mainstream products and markets) at the head of the demand curve and toward a huge number of niches in the tail."

In a recent study Anita Elberse, a marketing professor at Harvard's business school, looked at data for online video rentals and song purchases, and discovered that the patterns by which people shop online are essentially the same as the ones from offline. Not only do hits and blockbusters remain every bit as important online, but the evidence suggests that the Web is actually causing their role to grow, not shrink.

Read more

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Photo Gallery Alert: 100% Design Shanghai

From June 26-28, the likes of Richard Hutten, Michael Young and Patrick Jouin joined creative directors Tobias Wong and Aric Chen in the Shanghai Exhibition Center to showcase design in one of the fastest developing parts of the world. Core 77's correspondent, Simon Husslein, was on hand to snap pics of this inaugural event. Take a look here.

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Zero Tolerance for Decorative Design, the ±0 Electric Kettle

Whether you're a minimal purist or stuck in a small apartment with limited counter space, you might want to consider Plus Minus Zero's latest offering, an electric kettle. Bordering on the ordinary, the small cylindrical kettle would look perfect with a coupe of ±0 mugs.

View more from their 5th Collection.

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John Thackara on North and South

John Thackara's got a wonderful piece up on Design Observer, jumping off from his refusal to take part in a swanky trip to discuss "design and development" and instead to stay home and do more good "in his own backyard." Well, not literally, of course, but here's some of the sweet spots:

I've never forgotten the time when Jogi Panghaal, one of Doors of Perception's co-founders, took me to a sleepy hamlet an hour from Bangalore. We encountered a group of villagers standing around a wide patch of ragi (a grain that is used to make dark bread) spread thinly over the road in a neat circle. Six chickens appeared to be eating up the grain, while the villagers watched and chatted. Why, I asked, don't you feed the grain in a bowl? The villagers laughed, and then explained that the chickens are eating tiny maggots, smaller than our eyes can see, which need to be removed from the grain before it can be stored. It's a smart, low-tech solution to a practical issue faced by farmers everywhere. But when I recently Googled "clean bugs from grain," the first link was to the "Opico Model 595 Quiet Fan Batch Dryer With Sky-Vac Grain Cleaner." I can't help but find this to be a clunker solution than hens in the street.

Read the whole piece here.

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Starck sees the light (and feels the breeze)

Philippe Starck is back--apparently the reports of design's death were greatly exaggerated--and Inhabitat takes a look at his new project, a mini wind turbine coming out in September.

The windmill can generate 20-60% of the energy needed to power a home, at a price point of around 400 Euros ($633). Not realistically within everyone's budget, but by combining creativity and elegance with ecology Starck will hopefully encourage more people to take greener steps. And for those who don't want their conservation pieces to be conversation pieces, a subtler version has been proposed.

The project was realized with the help of Pramac, a company better known for its petrol and diesel generator sets but one which has recently entered the renewable technology field. We can't help but think that Starck's latest design is a sign of his own transformation, marking the start of his new career as an advocate of sustainable design.

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"Fast" clothes

In this age of retail therapy, buying the right clothes is supposed to make you feel better. Can the right clothes also make you run faster? Nike seems to think so:

The Nike Swift System of Dress [increases] aerodynamic advantages on key parts of the body. Socks, gloves and arm coverings - an entire system of dress - were developed by Nike so sprinters could run faster. For example, the Nike Swift gloves and arm coverings have dimpled fabrics like a golf ball to cut wind resistance and allow arms to slice through the air faster. In testing, the design team found that compared with bare skin, the gloves and arm coverings reduce drag by 19 percent and the socks by 12.5 percent.

via businesswire

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"Toys for Pigs" by Sharon Geschiere Wins The First Design to Business Award

Dutch designer Sharon Geschiere receives the first Design to Business Award for designing the 'Wroezelaar', a play toy for pigs. The toys are made out of hollow cylinders filled with different kinds of food to stimulate the pigs' senses. She has been working with the LTO Nederland and the Dierenbescherming (a Dutch animal welfare group) to improve the modest lives of stalled pigs.

"Toys for pigs?" Yes, following European legislation, as from July 1st, 2007, pig producers in the Netherlands are compelled to offer some entertainment for their pigs. This decision was made because the animals could seriously harm each other when they get bored.

The Design to Business Award (D2B) is aimed at designers from Arnhem or the province of Gelderland and stimulates closer and more creative ways of working between designers and their clients.

via design.nl

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Student designers step it up: 2nd-year takes D&AD Awards

UK product design student Chi Shing Lo took first place in the D&AD Student Awards with his cell phone concept. And while his design is undoubtedly cool (large photos after the jump), we were more interested in the wake-up notice offered by D&AD Education Chairman Al Young, on the excellence of Shing and other students' work:

"The quality of work across the board was the best I have ever seen," said Young. "College standards have risen to such a height, that the judges agreed that much of the material exhibited by these students should have contended at a professional level."

"Winning an award at this level is significant," said Michael Marsden, Subject Leader for Product, Furniture and Industrial Design at Shing's De Montfort University, "especially as Shing is only a second year student and much of the competition will be final year students with far more design experience."

Note to the professionals: The students are stepping it up, so it's time to bring that A-game!

>> check out the larger images here.

via cellular news

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Photo: David Maxwell for The New York Times

No use crying over spilt milk, it's the cost of being green

The New York Times reports on a new milk jug container designed with a flat top and rigid sides allowing the containers to be stacked on a pallet using cardboard bands and shrink wrap instead of milk crates. Introduced by Sam's Club last November, the cardboard and plastic can be recycled, it eliminates the need to maintain and wash milk crates and reduces the typical number of weekly deliveries from 4-5 trips down to 2.

The redesign of the gallon milk jug, experts say, is an example of the changes likely to play out in the American economy over the next two decades. In an era of soaring global demand and higher costs for energy and materials, virtually every aspect of the economy needs to be re-examined, they say, and many products must be redesigned for greater efficiency.

But not everyone's happy, consumers are complaining that the new square design is hard to pour without spilling the milk as the jug has no real spout. It seems like that's a small consideration for Sam's Club who estimate this method of shipping has reduced labor by half and water usage by 60-70 percent. Sam's Club can now store 224 gallons of milk in a cooler that used to hold 80.

Read full article

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Perch - Ergonomic Furniture for Primary Schools

Irish designer Simon Dennehy has developed ergonomic furniture for primary schools targeting know problem areas of concern including posture, chair height and the relationship to the work surface. He undertook detailed research into this subject matter during his M.A. and hopes that Perch will alleviate poor posture in school children which is linked to obvious symptoms like back pain and possible issues of poor digestion, nausea, headaches and bad circulation.

perch.ie

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Michael Pollan on shortening supply chains

Yale 360 has a great interview with locavore Michael Pollan on the importance of shifting from environmentalism, which focuses on preservation, to sustainability, which focuses on a healthy relationship between industrial and biological systems. His argument for localizing food production also works for an argument to localize many other types of production:

One source of our sense of powerlessness and frustration around climate change is that we are so accustomed to outsourcing so much of our lives to specialists of one kind or another, that the idea that we could reinvent the way we live, change our lifestyles, is absolutely daunting to people. We don't know how to do it. We've lost the skills to do it . . . I think where climate change is taking us is to a point where many of us will need to take care of ourselves a little better than we do now. We will be less able to depend on distant experts and distant markets. We will need to re-localize economies all over the world because we won't be able to waste fossil fuel . . . These long supply chains are going to have to get shorter.

What do you think, designers? Is localized production possible? Comments please.

Pollan's garden-talk might not provide all the answers but it's sure got some good clues. Go ahead and read the full interview here

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A New "Super Glass" Material Discovered By Accident

A new kind of ceramic material has been discovered by the Swedish chemist Saeid Esmaeilzadeh who accidentally cooled down a ceramic substance too fast.

Instead of throwing away the results of the failed experiment, he decided to research the substance. This turned out to be a kind of "super glass" with unexpected properties such as extreme hardness (harder than steel) and high index of refraction.

Saeid started the company Diamorph to commercialize his discovery. Right now, the company is cooperating with the wind power industry to develop more strong and lightweight bearings for wind turbines that have to withstand tremendous pressure and poor lubricant condition.

Congrats to Saeid not just for his research but also for adding some user perspective in the world of research. Saeid earlier said: "If I talk about atoms and bonds and nitrides, people fall asleep at their desks. But if I talk about this wind power plant and the problems we're wrestling with, then everyone wants to join in!"

via product

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Cardboard bicycle

And finally, in thinking about how to thwart bicycle thieves, UK design student Phil Bridge reasoned that if the bike was only worth $30, it'd have a better chance of going unsnatched. His designed result? A fully functioning cardboard bicycle! Check it out at inhabitat.

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Special thanks to Mark Vanderbeeken and Xanthe Matychak for their contributions to this week's 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.

Dell trying to design their way out of the box

Chances are if we're playing the word association game and we say "Dell," you're not going to respond with "lust." But the manufacturer of formerly beige creations is hoping to change that up by going from boxy to foxy.

Last year Michael Dell announced the company's new design philosophy of "product lust," and now Ziff-Davis' Larry Dignan checks in on the new designs, with a photo gallery and an analysis of whether Dell has improved their design capabilities.

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Creating the garden of globalisation

Daniel A. Becker's Barcode Plantage project creates unique trees from the information stored in barcodes. An international code database on the internet provides details on the manufacturer and the country of origin of the product, the data is then analyzed to define positions, curves and the colors of the tree structure. As the algorithm is simply interpreting the data, there is no random aspect to the appearance of each tree.

The project adds a layer of transparency to the source of our products and was selected as the Grand Prix winner for output 11, which will be published later this year.

>> More tree visualizations here.

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Advertisement

Spark Design Awards 2008 Sponsored by Hewlett-Packard, Spark welcomes entries and designers from all disciplines and countries. Initial Entries Due: August 1, 2008

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Japanese Shipbuilder finds Architectural Niche

PingMag MAKE caught up with seventh generation shipbuilder Kazushi Takahashi, a natural opportunist whose advice to business success is loaded with battle survival metaphors and he has recently turned his hand to architecture.

The surface of the Gundam inspired Jimbocho Theater building in Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo is welded together without using a single bolt. He has completed a number of unusual projects applying shipbuilding technology and construction methods.

Architecture is about straight lines and structural dynamics, while ships are about curved lines and fluid dynamics. Plus, another difference is that carpenters and architects can't make boats, but shipbuilders can make both ships and houses. But the basic science behind it, the arithmetic and physics are the same. That is the common thread between them.

Checkout the interview for the back story and few points of wisdom.

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New Article up at Coroflot's Creative Seeds: Seven Ways to Make Your Business Card Stand Out

Over at Coroflot's Creative Seeds blog Carl Alviani covers everything from letterpress to cleverness in a comprehensive article on business cards:

Hand Stamped "...you can make a new card out of anything printable, from plain white paper to the backs of photos, bits of wood, coffee cups, people's wrists, whatever. In a more abstract sense, there's something wonderful about reducing the card to its bare essence, kind of a graphic answer to the "People don't want lamps, they want light" conundrum -- people don't want business cards, they want information, and here it is, in its most elemental form."

Way Too Clever
"This fortune cookie "card" would remind us of some of the tragic gimmicks our studio mates came up with when they had more enthusiasm than skill, back in school days -- except that it's fantastic..."

Extra Wordy
"Ever notice what someone does the second you give them your card? They read it. And then they flip it over, to see if there's something on the back that they can read. There's an opportunity here, if you're good with words; those brief moments after the exchange you've got someone's undivided attention. If you can provide something interesting and compelling to read that explains who you are, what you're like, what you're good at or what you're looking for, there's much impact to be made."

>> view article.

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WorldCard business card reader, Red Dot winner

Speaking of business cards, back when Palm Pilots (remember those?) were ascendant, we thought business cards would be a thing of the past and that we'd all be beaming each other our info via infrared.

Since that hasn't happened there's the WorldCard Ultra by PenPower, a handy-dandy business card reader that takes care of data entry for you. Stick a card in the slot, the machine does the rest. The Red Dot Design Award winner has multiple language support, and if you've got a Mac, it even drops the info straight into Address Book.

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New Nanopaper is Stronger Than Iron, Still Made of Wood

Nanotechnology, for all its recent growth and vibrant promise, still feels very sci-fi to us laypersons, what with all those buckytubes and nanoceramics. Lars Berglund of Sweden's Royal Institute of Technology, though, is bringing the nanotech treatment to thoroughly familiar, if not boring, material: paper. By processing wood pulp with enzymes and high-pressure microfluidic chambers, he's been able to create paper with dramatically finer strands, offering some impressive improvements in mechanical characteristics. According to the article in MIT Technology Review, this "nanopaper" is "stronger than cast iron and tougher than bone," featuring a tear strength seven times that of conventional paper, and the ability to stretch by 10% before failure.

Applications suggested include extra-tough filters, membranes, packaging, and mechanical parts -- making that paper-core messenger bike in Gibson's Virtual Light one step closer to feasible.

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Battery Powered Suitcase

If you're a so called "travel warrior", then apparently the LiveLuggage power assisted (PA series) suitcase is for you. Weighing in at 10.6kg (23-pounds), the 12V NiMH rechargeable battery will provide you with 1.5 miles of assisted travel under a 32kg load. If you're thinking, hmmm... gonna have to get me 2 of these to compensate for the reduced packing space, at least you'll impress your travel partner with the savvy foresight to only pack the one recharging cord for both cases. With a price tag of $1,365 US, we're guessing the team at LiveLuggage missed the irony in the recent Derrie-Air prank.

via engadget

>> See this case in action.

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Sol Focus: All That Silicon Valley Alternative Energy Investment Bears Some Fruit

We've been hearing about the boom in alternative energy research in Silicon Valley for a while now, but not so much in terms of actual marketable products. That may be changing, though, if Mountain View based Sol Focus is any indication.

Looking at the history of solar power, one of the biggest obstacles to its broad acceptance and application has been the high cost of manufacturing photovoltaic cells, and the relatively low output. Sol Focus has a solution that they think could revolutionize the industry, and it's so obvious you have to wonder why it took so long. Rather than make a large panel of pricey semi-conductors, they use comparatively cheap aluminum and glass mirrors to concentrate sunlight onto a tiny chip of photovoltaic, both reducing the cost of the unit, and increasing the efficiency of electricity production.

According to the company's website, these dished panels use 1/1000th the active material of a conventional panel, and will produce power as cheaply as conventional (fossil fuel) sources by 2010. As an added bonus, they also look much, much cooler than the typical shiny black slab, offering a gleaming sci-fi gorgeousness that we wouldn't mind on our rooftop one bit.

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Seven cities that influenced design

Currently underway at the Istanbul Modern is "Design Cities," which "tells the story of contemporary design through the focus of seven key cities, in each case looking at their decisive roles in the development of design. While focusing on how specific moments in the history of cities contributed to the evolution of design, the exhibition investigates the ways in which design has shaped contemporary culture."

Co-sponsored by Vitra and featuring 109 works by 64 designers, the exhibit looks at London, Vienna, Paris, Dessau, Los Angeles, Milan, and Tokyo. Check it out here.

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Kia's new Californian studio, and interview with chief designer Kearns

This week Kia Motors opened their Californian design studio in Irvine, with ex-GM'er Tom Kearns as chief designer.
Here's a link to an interview with Kearns, the man who penned Kia's Kue concept. Excerpt below.

Q: Other car companies rely on heritage, tradition and history to influence future designs. What are the advantages and disadvantages of designing for relatively new car company?

A: One is that you have, as you say, a clean sheet of paper, and we can chart our own path from day one. I can guarantee you that a lot of designers at BMW, Audi or some of the other established brands with lots of history would love to have that. They're sort of handcuffed....

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Coventry University student work: Transpo' & Product

Speaking of transportation design, reader and prolific photographer Shaun Hutchinson shot and collated a bunch of photos from Coventry University's 2008 Transport & Product Design students, who "recently won the Queen's Anniversary Prize for Higher & Further Education for its work in Automotive Design." The photos are up as part of Hutchinson's "101 Reasons to Design" website, which has recently expanded to 144 reasons.

More photos.

thanks shaun!

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Photo by oskay

5 (Almost) Affordable 3-D Printers for the Home

Looking to do some rapid prototyping in your all purpose design studio/bedroom but can't afford to buy in, Scientific American found five 3-D Printers that might be able to help you out. Pictured above, Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories three dimensional fabricator prints large, low-resolution, objects out of pure sugar. To cut costs, the Evil Labs crew replaced the multi-thousand dollar laser with a $10 heating coil similar to what you'd find in a hair dryer--nice!

Fab@Home Model 1
Materials: Epoxy; chocolate; Boursin (a soft cheese)
Price: $2,400 - $3,600

RepRap Version 1.0 "Darwin"
Material: Biodegradable plastic or polyester
Price: $500 - $900

Candy Fab
Material: Granulated sugar
Price: Estimated at $500

Craftsman CompuCarve
Material: Wood; can handle acrylics and foam, too
Price: $1,899.99

Desktop Factory 125ci 3D Printer
Material: Nylon-based powder (laced with aluminum and glass)
Price: $4,995

via boing boing

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Subversive Bathroom Scales from Alice Wang

And finally, Alice Wang, a recent graduate of RCA, has designed a set of 3 cheeky bathroom scales that ease the ritual of weighing yourself (and maybe dieting, for that matter). In "White Lies," the further back you stand, the lighter you become on the digital display. Comments Wang, "The user can gradually move closer and closer to reality." In her "Half-Truth" scale, your partner becomes responsible for deciding whether to lie or come clean, since the display is on the front face of the device, out of the subject's view. ("Weighing scales can be harmful cause they don't have intelligence to judge when's the right moment to hit you with the truth.") Finally, "Open Secret" reveals your weight every time you weigh yourself by sending a text message to a desired mobile phone. Wang offers that "the receiver is then responsible to reveal the answer immediately, or the next time you two meet."

All of these projects were conceived as a reaction to Isaac Asimov's 1st law of robotics: A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm. Here's more from the designer:

Artificial intelligence is a topic widely used in the media, however, exactly how far are we from such technology? Are these fears towards robotic developments necessary or purely irrational? What is it about these currently fictional characters that scare us? Are there existing domestic objects that already break this law? Weighing scales, although not performing physical harm, have been subtly damaging us psychologically. Should objects like these exist in a complex society like ours where people are more emotionally fragile?

See this and other work by Alice Wang at her site.

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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.

Winner of Next-Gen PC Design Comp

To hear creatives tell it, napkins exist solely to have ingenious thoughts, ideas and schematics scribbled on them. Avery Holleman developed that trope into a PC concept--and won Microsoft's Next-Gen PC Design Competition. Not only did he land $20,000 for his troubles, the design was apparently handpicked by Bill Gates, winning the Chairman's Award as well.

Next up: Apple needs to make a tablet we can wipe our mouths on.

via tg daily

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Brad Bonning's dream of garbage-driven motoring comes one step closer

Above is a photo of auto enthusiast Brad Bonning in his aluminum Bonning Roadster, which has just undergone Australian road certification testing. Should Bonning's three-wheeled vehicle be approved and find the appropriate funding, it will be perhaps the first mass-produced automobile that runs on garbage. The engine, developed by sustainable technology firm Eco Nova, runs on refuse.

We say "appropriate" level of funding because while Bonning has already had offers to produce the car, he's turned them down for reasons of economics; the car's goal is not just to be produced, but to be affordable. "To have [the car] become a really expensive, elite product is the opposite of why I did it," Bonning tells the Australian Daily. "If it costs the same as a Porsche or a Ferrari, it defeats the purpose."

via the daily

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Advertisement

Spark Design Awards 2008 Sponsored by Hewlett-Packard, Spark welcomes entries and designers from all disciplines and countries. Initial Entries Due: August 1, 2008

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Electric cars in the US: Can logistics win the war?

And speaking of cars, it used to be that you won wars by getting your guys to kill their guys. The Vikings, the Romans, and you name it knew you either had to get more guys or better weapons.

Then warmakers got crafty and started bombing factories, oil depots and supply lines. If you can't get your truckloads of bullets up to the front, and if you can't gas up your superior jet fighter, it doesn't matter how good your tech is, or how many guys you've got.

What's our point? Logistics matter, and it's how you win.

Just look at electric cars. We've been hearing about them for how long now, and how many of us actually have them? Why are they so expensive and out-of-reach?

The latest company hoping they can finally make electric cars a widespread reality in the U.S. is Scandinavia-based Think Global, who's bringing their product Stateside in '09. They are hoping to succeed based on at least two angles: design and logistics.

Even more than its well-funded sponsors or cutting-edge technology, the Ox's killer app could be its design. To date, most electric cars available in the U.S.--small, unsafe, and underpowered--have been intended strictly for the earliest early adopters and the most faithful green believers. In contrast, Think's senior vice-president for design, Katinka von der Lippe, says the Ox is a "real car, a big step away from the cuteness of [other] electric vehicles."

The company's business model, says James, is similar to that of PC maker Dell (DELL), which fueled its rise by ruthlessly optimizing its manufacturing and supply chain. Think's ultralean manufacturing system lets it build production facilities for about $10 million, compared with the billions invested in new plants by old-line manufacturers. That means more factories closer to customers, further cutting costs.

In addition, factories "could also be the retailers," says James, which would add a unique element to Think's branding. The company, he says, will be profitable if it can sell 10,000 vehicles a year. At 20,000 to 30,000 units in annual sales, Think can cut its component costs in half.

That focus on innovative manufacturing, in addition to the high-tech Ox itself, may ultimately set the company apart from previous attempts--and, Think is betting, finally help jump-start the U.S. market for electric cars.

via businessweek

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KOR ONE Water Vessel (Actual Size!)

For those of you who like to refill, reuse, and rehydrate, there's a new water bottle coming to town, and it's a serious design contender on aesthetics, ergonomics, materials, and manufacturing. KOR partnered with core-fave Gaylon White and the Eastman Innovation Lab on the project, utilizing their Bisphenol-A (BPA)-free Tritan copolyester. They partnered with California-based RKS on a one-handed lid latch system (no lost caps!) that seals the bottle even when laying flat, and they tapped manufacturing partner Nypro to gate the part so there would be a clear, lens-like bottom. Here's Eric Barnes, founder and CEO from Kor: (We really like the "from KOR" part, natch.)

One of the top priorities for the KOR ONE was durability--bottle materials and construction had to support a long product life to be in keeping with KOR's pillar of sustainability. The bottle had to be made of materials that were as healthy for consumers as they were for the environment. The product had to be easy to drink from and have a "big gulp" feature to allow a high-volume, thirst-quenching flow. The bottled had to be easy to refill from a sink, a refrigerator, or a water cooler. The cap had to offer one-handed operation and be impossible to lose. All these features and more had to be delivered in an eye-catching package that appealed to consumers seeking a luxury product to elevate their lifestyle. Buying the final product should make consumers feel good on at least three levels...they're doing something healthy for themselves, they're doing the right thing for the planet, and they're treating themselves to a premium product they can be proud to display in their homes, in their offices, and on the road.

>> More info and pics.

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The organic Cloud

The Cloud is an organic sculptural landmark that responds to human interaction and expresses context awareness using hundreds of sensors and over 15,000 individually addressable optical fibers. Constructed of carbon glass, spanning over four meters, and containing more than 65 kilometers of fiber optics, the Cloud encourages visitors to touch and interact with information in new ways, manifesting emotions and behavior through sound and a dichotomy of luminescence and darkness.

Located in downtown Florence outside the Fortezza da Basso. the Cloud is part of the "Redesigning Fashion Trade Shows" project that Pitti Immagine runs with MIT Mobile Experience Lab. It is a long-term project to creatively rethink the trade show concept and propose innovative technologies, perspectives and sensory experiences for fashion trade shows.

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Rob Walker: "The Invisible Badge"

Rob comes on stronger than he's used to in this essay published on ChangeThis (a collection of manifestos for CEO-types--honest). In The Invisible Badge: Moving Past Conspicuous Consumption, he discusses the true motivations for acquisition and display, moving past Veblen through Virginia Postrel, landing somewhere over the (Maslow) rainbow. Here's a nice taste:

In his book about luxury, Living It Up, scholar James Twitchell compared the effect of certain rarefied, high-end brands with a dog whistle. As an example, he pointed to the various sorts of logo treatments on a Prada bag. A bag with a small logo would likely be more expensive than one with a big logo--and one with no logo whatsoever would be the most expensive of all: Only true cognoscenti would "hear" it. "This was connoisseurship applied to consumption," he wrote.

During the course of reporting my book Buying In--which deals with the intersection of personal narrative and consumer behavior in some detail--I had many interesting conversations with young creators of a newer generation of brands (I call it the "brand underground") that take Twitchell's dog whistle idea into a new realm.

These brands--like Barking Irons, or The Hundreds--may be unfamiliar to you if not are a participating in the subcultures they are part of. But they do communicate participation in a subculture, and in a way that has a lot more in common with Twitchell's dog whistle than with, say, the aggressively flamboyant regalia of punk: As in the luxury arena, you need the proper background to understand what you were seeing. To everyone else--underground arrivistes, Twitchell might say--the brand symbols mean nothing and probably don't even register. Brand underground badges are, in effect, invisible.

And this is not a failure; it is the goal. It suggests a tighter relationship between the brand producer and the brand consumer, and speaks more directly to that most crucial relationship: the relationship between the consumer and consumed.

If the underground logo is a badge, it's one that is most noteworthy for how few people can see it.

Download the PDF here.

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Projects like these beg the question, at what point do you pull out. Chinese company Harbin Smart Special Aerocraft spent 12 years and $4.1 mil. to build a working flying saucer to carry out aerial photography and geological surveys. With a maximum flight time of 40 minutes, it makes google earth a pretty cheap alternative (we jest). If they are going to insist on building a saucer, it would be way cooler if they took some styling direction from Jack Frost's 1958 "flying Jeep" project.