New Design Cool: The Tea Bag Coffin Lets You Bury That Bag.

November 24, 2008 by guruofnew · Leave a Comment
Filed under: New Stuff 

The best design ideas are so elegant in their simplicity most of us feel like dunderheads for not thinking of them.

Here from Jonas Trampedach comes one of those ideas: The Tea Bag Coffin.

With the ‘Tea bag Coffin’, the drinker can tidily bury the bag under the cup and out of the way.”

Well, duh.

(Thanks to Likecool.com)

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Awwww. Garbage Bags So Cute, You’ll Want to Take the Trash IN.

September 25, 2008 by admin · Leave a Comment
Filed under: style & design 

A Japanese creative group, MAQ, has succeeded in making garbage bags adorable. The aim of Rabbit-Kun is to inspire a more responsibly eco attitude about waste so that people will carry their trash home rather than leave it outdoors. Kind of a cute version of ‘Leave no trace behind.’

The aww-inducing sack is the latest in a MAQ’s collection of Garbage Bag Art Work. Other colorfully cute creations include bags decorated with fish, flowers and pine trees. There’s even a bag starring Sesame Street’s trashy Oscar the Grouch, created as part of an eco-program for kids.

Now if they can only forget the plastic and transfer their cutesy-wootsy Garbage Art to eco-bags. Hemp Hare anyone?

Thanks to Elit Alice.

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Project Runway’s Olympic Designs versus The Real Olympic Designs.

August 12, 2008 by admin · Leave a Comment
Filed under: fashion & beauty 

With 15% of the world watching, the opening night ceremony at the 2008 Olympics has got to be The Ultimate Catwalk. So it was a kick to compare the recent Project Runway designs to the real-life designs sported by 204 countries during the Parade of Nations. Style elements that were sometimes tunked by Runway judges — like Jerelle’s hat — turned out to be virtually de rigeur in Beijing. Hats, in fact, turned out to be the It fashion accessory, especially the traditional Panama, maxed out by the Peruvians to a hat and half.

The preppy theme dominated the night as well, with legions of Olympians in yards of piping, crests and classic blazers, looking like escapees from the Ralph Lauren Country Day School. Jerelle also nailed another uber-stuffy, strangely unsporty trend: the ascot.

One look I wished we’d seen: Suede’s flirty, flouncy short skirt, which would have made all of those hot Olympian legs look (if possible) even hotter than they are.

No surprise that Leather Queen Stella’s signature leatha was missing-in-action.  Maybe in 2012 Stella’s Olympic design dream will come true: To represent the country in a bad ass way.

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The New York City Waterfalls Public Art Spectacular Opens With A Splash.

June 27, 2008 by admin · Leave a Comment
Filed under: New Stuff, Uncategorized, eco & sustainability, lifestyle & leisure, marketing & advertising, non-profit/social cause, style & design, tourism & travel 

Chicago has its cows. San Francisco has its cable cars. Las Vegas has its . . . well, you know.

As of yesterday, New York has its waterfalls.

New York City Waterfalls, the ambitious new $15.5 million project presented by The Public Art Fund and Danish artist Olafur Eliasson, is splashing its way across all five boroughs, bringing new energy and (hopefully) lots of cash into the city. The man-made falls tower 90 to 120 feet high in four sites across the East River’s shores:

Beneath the Brooklyn Bridge,
Manhattan’s Pier 35
Between Brooklyn’s Piers 4 and 5
On the northern end of Governor’s Island.

The Waterfalls, which draw water from the river at 35,000 gallons per minute, run from 9 a.m. to 10 p.m. on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. every other day through Oct. 13. They will all be visible from South Street Seaport and the Staten Island ferry. Maps, podcasts and more information on viewing these new ‘natural’ wonders are available at NYCWaterfalls.org.

And never fear, Carbon Cops. They will operate on electricity run by renewable resources.

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Inside IKEA’s Marketing.

June 26, 2008 by guruofnew · Leave a Comment
Filed under: Uncategorized, homes & housing, lifestyle & leisure, marketing & advertising, retail, style & design 

If you want to test out that hot new relationship of yours, taking him or her home to meet Mom may not be the answer. Instead, the true test of compatibility is buying something at IKEA, taking it home and (maybe) assembling it. Later, you can see how well you two do at Anger Management classes, the ER or while sharing a handful of Xanax.

This is why IKEA’s Flash masterpiece ‘Come Into The Closet’ makes me so crazy. The 5 minute spot brilliantly lures you into five different closets, from Pax Stordal’s 5th floor cool glass look to an urban party room with shimmering disco ball to a craft room so pretty-in-pink that it made me want to buy a glue gun. Almost immediately you begin to believe that all this detail and design is possible to achieve in your own home. You believe that you can twist and wind and pound those shelves into submission. You believe that because ‘prices are dropping’ you’re saving some money, too.

This then is the marketing genius of IKEA. They make you believe. They tease and tempt and convince you to give it one more try. You forget that the cost of the handyman you call for rescue plus the price of your stitches will pretty much wipe out the savings from IKEA’s sale prices.

But call me old-fashioned. Marketing has always been about dreams, possibility and what could be if only you use my product.

Do You Speak IKEA?

From a great site named Pigtown Design comes this additional peep inside IKEA marketing and naming:

  • Sofas, coffee tables, bookshelves, media storage and doorknobs are named after places in Sweden (Klippan, Malmö)
  • Beds, wardrobes and hall furniture after places in Norway; carpets after places in Denmark and dining tables and chairs after places in Finland.
  • Bookcases are mainly occupations (Bonde, peasant farmer; Styrman, helmsman).
  • Bathroom stuff is named after lakes and rivers.
  • Kitchens are generally grammatical terms
  • Kitchen utensils are spices, herbs, fish, fruits, berries, or functional words such as Skarpt (it means sharp, and it’s a knife).
  • Chairs and desks are Swedish men’s names (Roger, Joel)
  • Materials and curtains are women’s names.
  • Children’s items are mammals, birds and adjectives (Ekorre is a set of children’s toy balls; it means squirrel)

Who wants to find out where Fartful and Jerker come from?

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The Church of Apple Gets A New iPod Bible: iLounge Launches The Free iPod + iPhone Book 4.

June 3, 2008 by admin · Leave a Comment
Filed under: New Stuff, Parenting and children, Uncategorized, entertainment, lifestyle & leisure, marketing & advertising, media & publishing, style & design 

Now this is droolworthy.
If you worship all things Apple, this brand new version of what has been called the iPod ‘bible’ is bound to ramp up your religiousity a few notches. With 268 pages of bleeding edge content from hot website iLounge.com, this free book is likely to set another record for mondo-millions of downloads. Packed with juicy new information about the iPod, iPhone and iTunes, this sleekly designed and streamlined fourth-edition is, only hours after its launch, already being dubbed iLounge’s best pub yet.

Along with in-depth guides and ratings of more than 1,800 iPod and iPhone-related products, readers will find new cool features like “iDesign Retrospective,” a look at how talented designers created the world’s most impressive iPod accessories, “Sneak Peeks” , exclusive world premieres of 20+ new accessories and even the inevitable “iPhone Baby”, outlining the ways expectant Moms and Dads can get baby hooked on Apple while in utero. 150 iTunes Answers has been reorged and updated, with 100 pages of tips, tricks and pix.

Another inevitable in these days of user-generated-content, but still compelling nonetheless: The Next-Generation iPhone and Photo Galleries: luscious photographs and images submitted by iLounge readers that depict the past, present, and future of Apple’s iPhone family, as well as the latest globe-trotting iPods.

And even better, iLounge made their instant classic hassle-free as well. When you go to the site to download it, you will find a wide variety of options for easy viewing: from desktop to laptop or smaller pocket-size screens, including the iPhone and iPod touch.

Download The Free iPod + iPhone Book 4 in Adobe PDF format at http://www.ilounge.com/book4/.

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