Oh! Gizmo

By Andrew Liszewski

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, it takes a whole lot of alarm clock to get me out of bed in the morning. A whimpy electronic beep or even music at full volume just isn’t enough to instantly snap me out of my nightly coma. What I need is something like this.

Designed by Sam Hecht, the Bell Alarm Clock is not unlike the classic double-bell alarms of yesteryear, except that it forgoes the often inaccurate wind-up clock mechanism for a battery-powered electronic version, and it features a single large bell instead of two smaller ones. Simple, but loud and effective. It’s available in your choice of red, black or white finishes from Charles & Marie for $65, but I prefer the white version since the bell on the back has a classy chrome finish.

[ Bell Alarm Clock ] VIA [ bookofjoe ]

By Andrew Liszewski

Mike Thompson designed this clever wifi network detector in the shape of a dowsing rod to apparently make it easier for anyone to use. “By basing the design for a wireless internet detector on century’s old technology, the user feels immediately at home with the product, whilst feeling less intimidated by the simple shape and natural materials.”

But I’ll be honest here, I’ve tried using a dowsing rod before and quite frankly, I’m not sold on the technology. My results were less than successful. But wifi detectors? I’ve never had a problem getting them to work. So maybe for his next project Mike could design a dowsing rod that looks and works like a wifi network detector, but for finding sources of water.

[ miket - WiFi Dowsing Rod ] VIA [ Next Nature ]

By Andrew Liszewski

It may not recline like a La-Z-Boy, but the Athena sofa from Switzerland-based Artanova makes up for it with an integrated multimedia PC controlled by a couple of LCD displays that pop out of each armrest. It’s also got an iPod/iPhone dock (but what sofa doesn’t these days?) and will play your music over a set of hidden speakers which includes an 8-inch subwoofer. The best feature though is that the Athena as a sofa actually features a rather nice design, and I don’t think most people would mind having one in their living room. Except that most people probably aren’t willing to drop $15,436 on what essentially becomes a Doritos crumb receptacle.

[ Artanova ] VIA [ Freshome ]

By Andrew Liszewski

Sony is known for making some unusual decisions at times, but not when it comes to design in my opinion. Take these relatively new USM-L Micro Vault flash drives. They’re clean, compact and feature a BIC-inspired ‘click to open’ mechanism that hides and protects the USB connector when not in use. The drives are color-coded based on their capacity (they range in size from 1GB up to 32GB) and a “prism” LED flashes and glows to indicate when the drive is in use. The USM-L Micro Vaults also support Windows Readyboost, and include Sony’s Virtual Expander software which will automatically compress or decompress files as they’re copied to or from the drive, roughly tripling their capacity.

[ Sony Micro Vault USM-L ] VIA [ Fareastgizmos ]

By David Ponce

Within 24 hours of the 5G iPod nano announcement, the design community at Quirky had come up with a pretty cool case for it.

This case maintains a slim profile while adding a ton of functionality. We’re talking: hard plastic exterior, cord wrap, shock-resistant silicone core, as well as full body and screen protection.

Oh, but that’s only half of it. This case comes packed with a hand steadying video grip that transforms into vertical and horizontal kickstands.

That’s a lot of simple, ingenious features for a little $15. It’s currently on pre-order, with 35 out of the needed 300 pre-orders filled. Once that number is reached, you can expect to receive the product within 6 weeks.

[ Product Page ] VIA [ Crunchgear ]

By Andrew Liszewski

If you need a clock that will surely stand the test of time you’ll want to keep your fingers crossed that Daniel Kurth’s Nixie Concrete Clock actually goes into production. At the moment it’s just a one-off concept featuring a set of six vintage Z560M Nixie tubes embedded in a fairly hefty block of concrete, but Daniel is apparently looking into production possibilities.

The concrete clock can apparently be wall mounted too if you prefer, with sufficient engineering of course, and the time is displayed in an irregular fashion so as not to stress people out by constantly reminding them of what time it actually is. But if you just have to know, it was 10:28:09 when the above photo was taken.

[ The Nixie Concrete Clock ] VIA [ Yanko Design ]

By Andrew Liszewski

The Energy Aware Clock provides a more visually appealing, and easier to understand display of the energy usage in a particular room throughout the day. Created by a small army of Swedish designers (Loove Broms, Karin Ehrnberger, Sara Ilstedt Hjelm, Erika Lundell and Jin Moen) the clock forgoes a traditional face in favor of a circular graph that makes it pretty obvious to tell when the energy usage in the room where it’s installed has noticeably increased. And the actual time is indicated by the brightest spikes on the graph.

The Energy Aware Clock is part of the Visual Voltage Exhibition at Design Vlaanderen in Brussels, which runs until October 2nd.

[ designboom - visual voltage exhibition at design vlaanderen, brussels ] VIA [ Unplggd ]

By David Ponce

A simple stainless steel creation by Scandinavian designer Maria Kivijärvi, the Cake Server could replace your current wedge-shaped cake cutter (or even more primitive knife) with this more elegant, purposeful and efficient utensil. It’s both cutter and prongs. Slice, squeeze, carry and release. The only issue we can see is if your horizontally challenged friends demand a larger piece. Or if you’re 20 people sharing slivers of cake.

Still, it’s smart and we like it. It’s made by Magisso and costs €60.

Keep reading for a video and links.

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By Andrew Liszewski

Just because you’ve embedded an LED into some random knick-knack doesn’t make it useful, and to be honest I would have thought the same thing about an LED-equipped clothespin. But seeing photos of Sungho Lee’s ‘Lighting Pin’ in action has changed my mind. Being able to clip it anywhere for hands-free lighting is one advantage, but attaching a rolled up piece of paper and creating an impromptu lamp is clever enough to make me want one of my own! It’s just too bad it doesn’t appear to be available for sale.

[ Sungho Lee ] VIA [ designboom ]