2011 fiskar karma final price goes up again.
The 2011 Fisker Karma still on track to reach the U.S. in March or April. The price will be $95K. If you’ve been following you’d also know in 2008: $80K, 09:$87K. Full story [RK]
The 2011 Fisker Karma still on track to reach the U.S. in March or April. The price will be $95K. If you’ve been following you’d also know in 2008: $80K, 09:$87K. Full story [RK]
this repurposed old chair is technically a makeover, but the end result is so grotesque, so utterly appalling i’m naming it as the “makeunder” of the year.
The last days of December is usually the time when we compile our ‘Best Of’ lists – best movies, best books, best music, best design etc. But for there to be a best, there has to be a worst, and Dirk Vander Kooij’s nastily old brown chair is it. The dutch designer’s other work actually isn’t all that bad, but taking a puffy brown chair that was ugly to begin with and skinning and restuffing it to make a bean bag has disaster written all over it. The retch-inducing plasticky leather makes it look like a sick animal ridden with tumors and its teetering, off-kilter balance gives the impression that it’s about to spring alive and pounce. I don’t care how noble it is to recycle, the Earth would be a lot better of this was hauled straight to the dump.
designer: dirk vander kooij
about perrin drumm
bryan thompson’s teabag lamp–charges with solar cell “tag” light inside aramid “bag”.
Price: $80 USD and link to the online store.
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centenary trolley suitcase.
If your favorite part of THE DARJEELING LIMITED was the custom made Marc Jacobs for Louis Vuitton luggage, then you may just want to return all your Christmas presents and cash in on the Centenary trolley suitcase. Shown above in Hermes orange with brown straps (and also available in red, shown below), the Centenary, like all the luggage from Globe-Trotter, is made entirely by hand with their trademarked Vulcan Fibre, “an incredibly durable material made of compressed layers of paper,” the same since its invention
in 1850.
Even the suitcases themselves are made in England on original Victorian machinery. Who knew a million layers of paper was more durable than leather? If you think that $1,580 is a lot to pay for a suitcase, well you’re right, but consider that other luggage series from Globe-Trotters are so pricey the number is too big to list online – you have to send an official inquiry.
producer: globe-trotter
if the last time you raised your hand in mrs. murphy’s third grade classroom was a couple of decades ago, it’s hard to imagine the grade school experience with laptops playing just as vital a role as pencils and wide-ruled paper.
But imagine your day now. How many hours do you use your laptop? Just like the rest of the world, schools are becoming increasingly reliant on laptops, but as learning tools, not to YouTube the Double-Rainbow guy for the third time this week. Lots of schools around the world can hardly afford the roof over their heads, let alone laptops. That’s why One Laptop Per Child is an important, socially impactful charity that uses donations to get real results.
They even developed their own laptop, the XO “rugged, low-cost, low-power” laptop that’s easy to read outside for those schools that don’t have buildings to operate from. In countries where libraries are small and outdated, or, in some cases, nonexistent, access to the Internet is an invaluable resource for children who would otherwise have no contact with the world outside their own. Children in many developing nations are already becoming more educated than their parents’ generation, meaning they will be the first crop of young adults with the knowledge and ingenuity to pull their struggling economies out of a slump, and these laptops are the first step. All donations are accepted. $199 buys a laptop.
it’s no secret: i get excited about bikes.
From techie to old fashioned, my head turns at almost everything on two wheels that rolls by. But I’m really excited about this bike, the UrbanMover Electric Bike. For those who use their bikes for more than just errands or trips to the beach, there’s nothing like a little electrical boost to speed you along your commute to work, sweat free, because really, is there anything grosser than starting off the day with a body dripping wet and bound to reek?
What’s great about the UrbanMover is that it gives you the option to use to pedal power or switch to electric when you need an extra push on a hill or against heavy winds. The battery fully charges in just five hours and the bike folds up. If I’m using a lot of italics here it’s just so the awesomeness of this bike isn’t lost on anyone. Folding bikes have been looked down in the past, but that’s because they used to be lame excuses for bikes whose primary function was their ability to become small. In the city, having an obviously expensive bike that you don’t have to leave locked up outside and can take with you indoors, on an elevator, into any office building, is priceless. The UrbanMover, however, does have a price, but it’s lower now, $1,099 (normally $1,699), plus a $400 battery pack. Available at Real Goods.
for some people watches are a status symbol – the bigger and blingier the better.
For others they merely tell the time. We’re not concerned with either group, only with those who consider a watch like any other design element in their life, as something that’s functional but also interesting, designed to make life both easier and better. For those people there is & Design, a Japanese studio with four bold watches, the Pentagon, the Hexagon, the Icon and the LED. Let all those who can’t read time without a little help (like actual numbers on a watch face) be warned. These timepieces are stripped away of all extraneous information and rely on simple geometric shapes and basic yet striking color combinations. The first one to grab my eye was the Icon, which, with “a nod to the era of 8-bit computer graphics” has a face like an old Mac icon. The Hexagon and Pentagon take similar design cues, and the LED rounds out the bunch with a pop of color. ($75, at the MoMA store)
designer: & design
“we built this city: how art, graphics, and design policy take shape for new yorkers”
Victoria Milne, Director of Creative Services at the New York City Department of Design and Construction spoke at the SVA’s DCrit lecture series.
An interesting point: most people gain about a pound of weight a year. If you walk about five flights of stairs daily, you can keep that pound off. Making stairs in public buildings more available and attractive can encourage people to use them. In such small but pervasive ways, architecture and design can improve public health. In the nineteenth century, infrastructure had to deal with contagious diseases so the emphasis was on sanitation, clean water and so on. Today’s diseases are chronic diseases of “energy”—and many of the appropriate infrastructure changes parallel the changes needed to reduce overall energy consumption.
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handcrafted with wooden legs and a ceramic chalk surface, this ain’t your average rec room ping-pong table.
Made for PUMA by aruliden, a firm that approaches branding through product design, the “Chalk Table” aims to enhance the playful side of the highly competitive sports industry and to bring about a different kind of athlete. Here, they explain what they mean.
“When did sports become so serious? When did being an athlete require you to sacrifice your life? Shouldn’t playing a sport actually involve playing? Let’s bring back the social aspects of sports. Capturing joyful, active moments of life for a different kind of athlete: The After Hours Athlete.”
The chalk surface adds a fun element, allowing players to map out ideal moves or leave threatening notes to their competitors, and the under table storage is one of those amazingly simple, why-didn’t-I-think-of-that-first design solutions. The equipment is stowed away in protective cases with simple, magnetic closures to prevent weathering and runaway ping-pong balls. Game on! ($4,750)
refurbished twenty-foot potato chip truck, filled to the brim with extraordinary accessories.
for immediate release
who:
Joey Wolffer, Fashion Stylist and Jewelry Designer
thestyleliner.com
what:
Joey Wolffer has created a unique mobile shopping experience. The StyleLiner features carefully curated merchandise, a combination of unique and limited edition creations by a host of international designers (which you will not find in other stores) along with her signature jewelry and accessories collection.
where:
The StyleLiner is parked across from The Standard Hotel, New York in the Meatpacking District at the corner of 13th & Washington Streets.
when:
Thursdays through Sundays, from 4 – 9 PM nightly. Follow us on Twitter for additional times and locations twitter.com/thestyleliner.
contact:
Abe Gurko, abe [at] abenyc.com
about joey:
Joey Wolffer, jewelry designer, fashion stylist–and now entrepreneur, has spent years traveling the world on a quest for exciting and authentic accessories. Top Shop, Miss Selfridge and Jigsaw are only a few of the retailers who sold the merchandise Joey designed, based on the treasures she sourced in Northern Africa, Brazil, the Balkans, and Europe. While she designed for Meems Ltd. in London, this first-generation American further developed her sophisticated, worldly sensibility. When The Accessory Network tapped Joey to become their Senior Designer, she returned to New York. Two years later she accepted key positions as Senior Jewelry Designer and Trend Director for Jones Apparel Group. Today you can find Joey at the helm, or rather, at the wheel, of her own enterprise: The StyleLiner. As Joey drives The StyleLiner around, she proves that the entrepreneurial apple does not fall far from the tree: her great-grand father, co-founder of Marks and Spencer, started out as a street peddler. thestyleliner.com
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