Readymade News

An Illustrated Weekly of World Design, 16 February 2010

Porsche is seriously looking into hybrid drives, announcing its new AG 911 GT3 R Hybrid, featuring innovative hybrid technology developed especially for racing. The all-wheel-drive car will be unveiled at the 2010 Geneva Auto Show and will be tested in long-distance races at Nurburgring, depending on the amount of fuel needed at pit stops, the hybrid could have a huge advantage. Read more on the innovative hybrid layout and design here. 

For more news on electric cars, Treehugger has a great video from Peter Sinclair that explains the history, challenges, and potential future of plug-in electric cars, all in 10 minutes. Or if you like electric roadsters ripping up a Louis XIV period salon, have a look at the MOFO from James Piatt Design. Core77 reports that the MOFO team is aiming to deliver 300 units by 2012, and are in the midst of securing production facilities in South Africa.

 “I wish for your help to create a strong, sustainable movement to educate every child about food, inspire families to cook again and empower people everywhere to fight obesity.” Jamie Oliver is the TED 2010 prize winner, a $100,000 award and an opportunity to realize a wish to change the world. Jamie Oliver has launched campaigns such as School Dinners, Ministry of Food and Food Revolution USA combining culinary tools, cookbooks and television with more standard activism and community organizing to create change on both the individual and governmental level. 

 

For a summary of the event visit the TED blog or see mindmaps of the event from Young and Brilliant. 

 

One of the TED 2010 fellows, Hugo van Vuuren is a co-founder of Lebone  which uses microbial fuel cell (MFC) technology to provide direct current power for standard high efficiency LEDs and equipment like cell phone chargers. Hugo is from South Africa and says “Africa is a land of constraints. Constraints inspire creativity. Creative design that solves Africa’s problems will also solve problems around the world.” Lebone was recently named one of the 10 Most Brilliant Innovations of 2009 by Popular Mechanics.

 

The finalists for the Most Beautiful Object have been announced by design Indaba. The 12 finalists will be exhibiting their entries at Design Indaba Expo 2010 from 24 to 26 February. The Ostrich Barstool from Tsai Design Studio is supposed to emulate the sensation of sitting on the back of an ostrich. Tsai design Studio won the award in 2008 for their Nestled Bunk Beds. 

The Fifa 2010 World Cup is less than 4 months away and the event promises to deliver a unique African experience and shows off the African inspired designs of the new or revamped stadiums. Soccer City is one  of the revamped stadiums, and should benefit the surrounding community of Soweto through infrastructure upgrades and increased business opportunities. The World Cup is also a good opportunity for organizations to be involved in social campaigns.

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An Illustrated Weekly of World Design, 09 February 2010

Optimal Energy has launched an online campaign called ‘Don’t be a Passenger’, you can follow the blog, twitter feed, facebook page and win a trip for two to the Arctic. From the site: “How we live today will continue to have an impact on our future and the future of our environment. In the 4 minutes that you will watch this video many things will change. It's up to you to make that change for the better.” Spread the (green) word. 

Michael Young has been very busy lately: developing the Avalon swivel chair for Swedese and a great looking ‘Lancaster collection’ chairs an tables for Emeco which has cast aluminum seats and backs with ash legs. Young has also been appointed as the Creative Director of 100% Design Shanghai / IHDD 2010. See Dezeen’s feature on Young.

ARM has posted a video showing a Nokia N95, coupled with LEGO Mindstorm NXT kit and LEGO Technic pieces, solving a 4x4x4 Rubik's cube. The N95's camera is used to identify the layout of the color squares and work out the moves necessary to solve the puzzle. The N95 then instructs the LEGO model on the moves to make. A 4x4x4 Rubik’s cube is much tougher to solve than the classic 3x3x3 cube, which has been done before, but not using a mobile phone. 

 

For those serious LEGO fans, check out LDraw™ “an open standard for LEGO CAD programs that allow the user to create virtual LEGO models and scenes. You can use it to document models you have physically built, create building instructions just like LEGO, render 3D photo realistic images of your virtual models and even make animations. The possibilities are endless. Unlike real LEGO bricks where you are limited by the number of parts and colors, in LDraw nothing is impossible.”

Here is a cool video explaining the concept and design about the Nexus One. ‘Nexus One The Story’ is a series of short films documenting the making of Nexus One. 

 

South Africa’s Kulula airlines recently received the rebranding treatment from their in house creative team when they applied this 101 guide to the various parts of the airplane. Now you know that the captain is the ‘big cheese’, see more airplane paint jobs here. Originally from CherryFlava.

 

Who says design is rubbish? Louis Vuitton has launched a new handbag, that you can fit all you stuff in, it waterproof, has a nice strap and it looks like.......a garbage bag. Designed by Marc Jacobs, the $2000 bag should be a hit with those with more taste than sense.  

Ending off, we have started a topic of discussion on our Facebook page; “Do you think the iPad will become a an essential tool in design offices for sketching”, what do you think? Image; Michael DiTullo.

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An Illustrated Weekly of World Design, 02 February 2010

 

Peugeot’s new design team just released these images of a concept bicycle dubbed the B1K.  Sculpted as a race bike, it features a chainless drive train, carbon fiber construction and scant few details on the rest of the design. The rear rim is hubless, gaining an aerodynamic advantage. Both wheels forgo the traditional tire and tube in place of a rubber sleeve stretched over the rim. Pretty nice looking bike. Via psfk. 

 

Phillipe Starck is at it again, even though he vowed never to design again. He went off and did a reality TV show; Design for Life and his latest venture is wind turbines, working with Pramac. Starck introduced “Revolutionair”; 2 wind turbines aimed at home-owners. With price tags of between 2500 and 3500 Euros, they might not be part of every budget, but perhaps design can play a role in introducing wind power to more people. "I have always wanted to design an invisible turbine with the goal of making something everyone would want," Starck, said in a statement.

 

Dutch design collective Droog have launched a collection of clothes that are glued together rather than stitched, designed by denim brand Gluejeans. Called Juxtapose, the new collection consists of a denim coat for women, a denim jacket for men and some new designs for jeans. The glue comes in several colors and has been tested for over 2 years, Gluejeans technique radiates a simple, rough and direct quality, while at the same time being very durable. Handmade in the Netherlands, each piece has a unique and individual character. 

 

For those of you who always wanted a tree house but couldn’t quite figure it out, two Dutch designers Rogier Martens and Sam van Veluw have designed a 'build it yourself tree house'.

 

Aandeboom, which literally means ‘on the tree’ is made of water resistant panels, with straps and lashings, which can be fixed to any tree. The Ikea like structure looks sturdy enough to carry the weight of even the biggest kids. 

 

Whether you like or hate the iPad, the Apple induced hype that follows the launch of a product is more than before the launch. There are already applications and reviews and whatever else you can think of for the device. It will be a game changer in the way people use computers, and will hopefully make the experience easier. 

 

And ending off, Business Week has a special report; The Value of Design, good read, be sure to see the World’s Most influential Designers slideshow too. 

An Illustrated Weekly of World Design, 22 December 2009

 

Our good friends and collaborators at Mutopo together with Toby Daniels, have launched Betacup. The goal of Betacup is to reduce paper cup consumption through the Social Product Development to find a more convenient alternative to the reusable coffee mug. Americans currently use 58 billion paper coffee cups a year, most of which are not recycled and end up in landfills. The challenge will launch in 2010, currently Betacup is looking to raise $20,000 before the 31st of December in prize money to attract designers to participate in the project through Kickstarter. Image via Brynn Marie Evans.

The media landscape has changed dramatically this year, the latest print magazine casualty is ID Magazine, a veteran of design publications. But to fill the gap there is a new device category emerging; dedicated digital magazine readers. Wired and Sports Illustrated have shown concepts before, the latest is Mag+, a concept from Bonnier R&D the research unit of Bonnier publisher of Popular Science. Bonnier invited the designers from BERG London on a corporate collaborative research project into the experience of reading magazines on handheld digital devices. “The purpose of publishing this concept video is first and foremost to spark a discussion around the digital reading experience in general, and digital reading platforms in particular” Bonnier R&D. Images via Engadget.  

 

December the 15th marked Oscar Niemeyer’s 102nd birthday, for Brazils most famous architect it was just another day at the office. See more examples of the architects work here. 

 

 

An Illustrated Weekly of World Design, 09 December 2009

SpaceShipTwo was unveiled on Monday in the Mojave Desert by Sir Richard Branson and Burt Rutan. SpaceShipTwo will begin short flights into space with passengers in 2011. Book your tickets here. Image; Ned RocknRoll

 

Indian innovation is in the news again with Tata announcing a hybrid Nano and the Tata Swach; a new low-cost water purifier, aimed at lower-income households in rural areas.The Tata purifier is less than one metre tall, and does not need running water or electricity to work. Plans are to roll out in India first then Africa. 

 

For all you trainspotters out there who also have a thing for exotic subway architecture, DesignBoom has a great article with images from Stockholm’s Tunnelbana, Munich’s U-Bahn and others. Have a look at the the Carmelit too, an uphill subway system in HaifImage. Image; flickr. 

 

In other news: for those of you interested in attending the 2010 Design Indaba in Cape Town South Africa, this Friday is the last day to get your early bird tickets. Next year sees the the inaugural B2B trade exhibition, which “gives companies servicing the design, advertising and marketing industries the unique opportunity to interact directly with their target audience in an environment designed to inspire. Creative industry suppliers and collaborators will not want to miss this opportunity to personally connect and network with such a high-potential customer base.” 

Lastly, we are looking forward to collaborating on exciting projects with Brianna Sylver, President at Sylver Consulting.  Tasos met Brianna in Chicago last week, where Brianna is a specialist in market research, a leader in innovation strategy and teaches at the Institute of Design, IIT.

An Illustrated Weekly of World Design, 24 November 2009

Fabrication Africa creates beautiful objects with a social conscience and a technological heritage. Inspired by Readymade’s collaboration with MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology ) Professor, Neil Gershenfeld. Gershenfeld explains in his book, FAB , that instead of sending megatons of products around the world from factory to consumer, we could be sending electronic data around the world in seconds and making the products we need in our basements using personal fabricators. See Gershenfelds 2007 TED talk here.

The NEST range is Fabrication Africa’s way of bringing this vision to life. Working with the FABlab in Soshanguve, South Africa, Fabrication Africa created the NEST as the start of a range of distinctive new products which embrace social conscience. Economically empowering people like William Maseng is one of the objectives of Fabrication Africa. Read the story here at Design Altruism.

Continuing with the FAB theme, this article from Ponoko; MUJI and LEGO have teamed up to develop 4 sets of paper and LEGO brick sets, MUGO perhaps? 

Design Thinking is being used to improve business, health care and social enterprise, but can it improve peoples personal lives? Warren Berger thinks so, and with the help of several designers and Bruce Mau in particular he wrote Glimmer exploring ten groundbreaking principles of design in action—addressing business, social, and personal challenges, and improving the way we think, work, and live. Berger says the book's title expresses that moment when a new solution to an old problem comes into view. "The designer's job is to solve problems every day and create alternative solutions," Berger says. "What can the rest of us learn from that?" Via Fast Company. If you are into manifestos, here is Glimmers and Bruce Maus’. Core77 has a good review of the book here.

For words of advice for designers, read  Michael Bierut’s 7 steps to success (the lazy designer's guide to success):

1. Keep it simple.
2. Don’t reinvent the wheel (part 1).
3. Don’t reinvent the wheel (part 2): Rotate the tires instead.
4. Do as you’re told.
5. Steal.
6. Once you come up with something, never let it go.
7. Make other people do the work.

From Azure Magazine. Excerpted from a lecture by Michael Bierut at Toronto's Designthinkers conference, November 3 2009. Image courtesy Pentagram    .

           
Good news for young designers from Dexinger, “Red Dot is giving away up to 50 free registrations for the "red dot award: product design 2010" to up-and-coming designers. Designers can submit industrially manufactured products that were brought to market after 1 January 2008 and went into series production prior to 1 July 2010. On 11 December 2009, participants will have a chance to apply for the free product registrations for a period of 24 hours.” Good luck!

   

An Illustrated Weekly of World Design, 10 November 2009

It looks like Michael Young is on a roll after moving from Iceland to Hong Kong. DesignBoom has an article on the i24r3 portable wireless waterproof digital speaker and Dezeen covers his Chair-4A, a dining chair made of recycled aluminum.

Design Sojourn has posted a great video of Michael Bierut of Pentagram and Design Observer, summarizing 5 design secrets:

1) Listen first, then design
2) Don’t avoid the obvious
3) The problem contains the solution
4) Indulge your obsessions
5) Love is the answer

Beirut also says he is more "like a 'doctor' waiting for 'patients' to come to him with design problems to solve".    

The T.27 is the brainchild of McLaren F1 designer Gordon Murray and Zytek Automotive Technology. The car has been designed in a way that minimizes the use of materials and keeps the embedded carbon of the vehicle as low as possible. The firm claims the innovative manufacturing system will use 20 per cent less space and 80 per cent less capital investment than a conventional factory A spokesman for Gordon Murray Design said the body panels, for example, would be made from material originating from PET bottles. Via BBC.

Yesterday Tasos gave a talk at the SABS Design Institute which marked the opening  an exhibition tour of the 40 years of South African design excellence, celebrating original designs (innovations) from South Africa. Tasos presented selected Readymade projects including strategic consulting for Optimal Energy, the company behind the Joule and the Arivi Non-Pressure paraffin stove. See the presentation here. 

 

Lastly Wired.co.uk examines IDEO's design thinking approach and how they use lessons learned from product design to solving bigger challenges. Bill Moggridge one of the co-founders of IDEO says "if you don't get out there and see what it's like, then you couldn't really design it right."

An Illustrated Weekly of World Design, 13 October 2009

The Honda EV-N electric concept car has solar cells built into the roof, an illuminated communication system in the front black fascia, and a UX-3 Uni-scooter fitted into the passenger door, and it's pretty cute too.  

 

The "experimental model" of the U3-X uni-scooter is a compact experimental device that fits comfortably between the rider’s legs, to provide free movement in all directions just as in human walking – forward, backward, side-to-side, and diagonally.

The U3-X was designed to be friendly to the user and people around it by making it easier for the rider to reach the ground from the footrest and placing the rider on roughly the same eye level as other people or pedestrians. The EV-N, U3-X and EV-Cub will be part of Honda's 'HELLO!' display at  the 2009 Tokyo Motor Show, starting October 24th. 

Stefan Sagmeister has a really interesting TED talk where he explains the reasoning behind his decision to take one whole year off every seven years.  He figures that if he 'borrows' retirement years while still working he can get a lot more accomplished and get some excellent ideas. The first sabbatical he took was unplanned and was a disaster, but since then he has used the 365 days to find inspiration and new ideas that fuels his creativity for the next seven years of working.

It's interesting that not only graphic designers with accents do this, but major companies like 3M encourage employees to spend 15% of their time on personal projects, where products like Post-its were generated. Google has a 20% policy, so it seems like constructive time off is good for people to recharge, take the time to think and come up with great ideas.

The brothers Freitag, known for their philosophy of recycling everything from truck tarpaulins to shipping containers are currently exploring compost. 

DesignBoom reports that the 2 brothers were invited by the Walking Chair Gallery to create an installation/exhibition as part of Vienna Design Week 09. Entitled 'urban gardening' the show aims to direct the general public to be involved in recycling and encourages people to get involved in gardening within their local community. The duo designed 100 limited edition Freitag compost bags for the installation. each were given to guests on the opening night, granted that they would return to the gallery with their compost and place it in the compost bin within 3 months."

See more of the shipping container shop here and keep up to date with the Freitag newsletter here.

And finally, it looks like Google is not content to be the number one browser, or the world's largest library but also wants to improve the way we work with Google Wave.
 

An Illustrated Weekly of World Design, 22 September 2009

The Mission One Superbike was recently been put through its paces at the Bonneville Salt Flats, USA. The bike surpassed previous land speed records for an electric motorcycle, reaching 161 mph, which is almost 260 kilometers per hour! 

Designed in collaboration with Fuse Project, the "challenge was to create a design that would be accepted by motorcycle enthusiasts while also being immediately recognizable as a vehicle fueled by alternative energy. A central goal was not to appear as an ‘eco-toy’ but instead a performance bike augmented by electric power. Ultimately, the bike needed to balance innovation with tradition, overcome the stigma of a silent ride and define what an electric Bike should look like." 

The records were made with a production prototype, Mission One plans to sell 300 models in 2010 at a price tag of $69,000, with a cheaper version to launch in 2012. See YouTube videos here.

It seems almost everyone is launching an electric vehicle, the Trabant NT has been unveiled at the IAA Frankfurt Motor Show, Germany. The Trabant NT (new Trabant) is based on the original 1957 East German model. The project is the work of toy manufacturer Herpa, in partnership with auto parts maker IndiKar and engineering group IAV. The design was done by Nils Poschwatta, who previously worked for VW as a “Transportation Designer”. Out of enthusiasm for the newTrabi, he decided to devote himself to the project full-time and came up with the entire design-work for the “Trabant nT”.

The London Design Festival started on Saturday in London, seems like a busy week with 100% Design and Tent London happening from the 24th to 27th September. Additonally The Dock is an emporium of creative talent curated by Tom Dixon, running from the 21st to 27th. For coverage during the week make sure you follow Core77 and DesignBoom.

Fast Company Masters of Design has a great article on David Butler, the 43 year old master design strategist for Coke. Since he arrived in 2004, he has torn down and rebuilt the design strategy at every level of the company. And he has managed this epic list of projects with a low-key but extraordinarily effective strategy: avoid using the word "design" at all costs. "At work, I don't use the phrase 'design thinking.' Here, it's about creating more value. How do we sell more of something? How do we improve the experience to make more money and create a sustainable planet?" And "we're leveraging design to drive innovation and to win at the point of sale, which is fundamental to our business. Full stop."

The I.D. Annual Design Review 2010 is open for entries. Work must have been created between January 1, 2009 and December 1, 2009 and student work must be the result of a classroom/academic assignment completed during the 2008/2009 academic year. Related: Five Truths About Design Awards.

Johanna Schoemaker was declared the winner for her "Clam OLED lamp," at the BraunPrize 2009 Award Ceremony on September 16th, with about 150 jurors voting in her favor. The other Top 3 from the 22 finalists include Karsten Willmann for Skylino, Stephan Zimmermann for Anemone and Tobias Stuntebeck for White Cane.

An Illustrated Weekly of World Design, 15 September 2009

     

Hack 2 Work, 'essential tips for design professionals' from Core77 has articles like On Being T-Shaped by Tim Brown, How to Look Bigger Than You Are by Allan Chochinov and 5 Keys to Successful Design Research by Steve Portigal. Image: Ernesto Rodriguez.

Hack 2 Work has everything from how not to design a business card to dealing with clients. Well worth the read.

For students and professional designers Design Droplets has a great compilation of sketching resources including IDSketching, Coroflot and links to books and tutorial DVDs.

 

Apple launched a new version of the iPod Nano at a special event called "It's Only Rock and Roll" early in September. The new iPod Nano now has added photo and video capabilities, the quality of the video is good enough, but what really stands out is battery life and storage capacity, the 16 GB version holds up to 16 hours of video. Not bad for a device you can keep in even the smallest of pockets.

Design Thinking for Startups from Amir Khella of Fictiv is a good explanation of design thinking and how innovation fits into it. Some quotes from the presentation-design thinking is: "a mindset of combining creative and analytical thinking, and applying it to solving a problem", "it's believing the best solution is yet to be found" and  "it's being comfortable going forward in a state of uncertainty". 

The James Dyson Award is an international design award that celebrates, encourages and inspires the next generation of design engineers. Run by the James Dyson Foundation, as part of its mission to inspire young people about design engineering. The brief for the 2009 competition was put simply; design something that solves a problem.

One of the finalists was the Prio Paper Cast from American design student Nicholas Riddle. The products is a flat pack splint for disaster response that combines low-weight, ease of installation, and easy triage identification within a folding paper cast. The primary function of the paper cast is to immobilize injured limbs, in this case an arm. The problem that exists at the site of an accident or disaster is one of scarcity – of medical expertise, resources and communication.         

   

Congratulations to Clive Roux on becoming IDSA's (The Industrial Designers Society of America) new executive director on September the 14th. Clive was previously Chief Marketing Officer for Baumgartens and former design leader with internationally-renowned Philips Design. 

"With significant global experience across the design disciplines—including four years working in Africa, seven years in Europe, seven years in Asia and nine years in the US—Roux will bring both design thinking and business management skills to his new role, which will help him represent the Society both within the design world and to the business community." IDSA.