By David Ponce

Currently in the development phase at Quirky, the Silo is a simple container that lets you serve an exact portion of dry good every single time. A set of adjustable dividers let you choke between 1/2 and a full cup and all you have to do is tilt. Want another cup? Tilt again. That’s a cool way to get to your cereals.

It’s not revolutionary tech, as some bars feature a similar system for pouring drinks. But at a projected price of $9, it’s not a bad deal. Availability date is unknown.

[ Product Page ] VIA [ Gizmodo ]

By David Ponce

Humidifiers are older than the world (not really). And humidifiers are ugly (yes, they are). Why should they be pretty, seeing as they’re essentially just functional devices, meant to stop your throat turning into parchment? Designers Youngduk Song, Sunman Kwon and Sungmin Kim don’t quite see it that way. If something is going to be in your house, why should it not be aesthetically pleasing? And this humidifier certainly is that. It is powered by either a retractable USB cord or a conventional 100V/220V plug, contains half a litter of water and can last up to 13 hours before needing a recharge. We don’t know how much it’s supposed to cost, but there appear to be plans for release in Japan this July.

Hit the jump for more pictures and links.

Read the rest of this entry »

By David Ponce

Another week, another watch from the fine folks at TokyoFlash. The Kisai Stencil is the 5th watch to hit production that was submitted by a fan to their design blog and became reality (one we covered is Optical Illusion watch). Telling the time in this one is fairly easy, especially once you’ve realized that it’s simply displayed, digitally. The only thing is, the digits are somewhat distorted, one per quadrant. Looking at the above picture should clear things up. The strap and casing come in black or white while the LCD background has 5 colour options. Currently (and for the next 45 hours, it’s $99. After that it goes up to $139.

[ Product Page ]

By David Ponce

Weighing in at an astonishing 2.74lbs, the Delta 7 Arantix Mountain Bike just looks awesome. “Featuring the patented IsoTruss carbon fiber and Kevlar spider web-like open lattice tube design,” you’ll be hard pressed to find a sturdier and lighter bike frame… anywhere. It is a hard tail (no rear suspension) and it’s handcrafted in the USA. Only 200 will be made and can be ordered frame-only, or decked out with SRAM or Shimano bike components. Of course with a design straight out of a sic-fi movie, no price is actually mentioned anywhere. We suspect low 5 digits, but who knows… For the cool factor alone, we say it’s worth it.

[ Product Page ] VIA [ Uncrate ]

By David Ponce

Sharing a small room with others is all fun and games until you want to do anything that requires privacy. The Privacy Pop is a small tent specifically designed to fit over beds typically found in dorms and kids’ rooms, and it aims to give you at least a tiny bit of separation from your undoubtedly grateful neighbours. Sure, you’re not going to fool anyone into thinking you’re “just sleeping”, seeing as a thin layer of polyester never stopped sounds from escaping, but at the very least you won’t turn your bed into a peep show. And of course if you start looking at the non-juvenile-minded uses, there are quite a few: using your laptop without the light waking up everyone in the room for example.

It fits Twin and Twin XL beds and is easy to carry around when not deployed. It’s $99 and is available now.

[ Product Page ]

By David Ponce

Because designers have the best ideas, we sometimes get to look at products like the above pair of jeans. It’s the brainchild of designers Erik de Nijs and Tim Smit and it’s called “The Beauty And The Geek”. We think it should be called something else entirely, but we’re just not funny enough to think of what exactly. The point is that these jeans, which thankfully are more of a proof of concept than actual projected product, integrate a fully functional keyboard, mouse and speakers. Or rather, we should say that the designers don’t have the funding to make a project of this complexity take off. If they did, Erik and Tim figure the pants would retail for around $400.

We could make endless commentary on these and crack some jokes and what not. But we think the images speak for themselves.

[ Designer's Website (in pretentious Flash) ] VIA [ WebProNews ]

By David Ponce

Tokyoflash’s design blog is where a lot of user-submitted designs go from concept to reality. One example is the Optical Illusion watch we posted about a while back. And being discussed right now is the above V-BL47, which not only looks cool sporting a Tron-inspired design, but happens to be ridiculously easy to read once you know how. No solving of puzzles (like the Sudoku watch). The lines on the display are simple regular digits, only distorted radially onto polar coordinates, each filling a quarter circle. You read the time from the bottom quadrant in a clockwise fashion. So the time on the picture above reads “03:59″. After a little bit of practice you’ll be able to read them at a glance.

Just hit the jump for a bunch more pictures. You’ll see how simple it is and there will also be links so you can harass the fine folk at Tokyoflash into making this asap.

Read the rest of this entry »

By David Ponce

Sometimes it’s the simplest design tweaks that make the biggest difference. Like with the above FreeKey keyring which features a small kink along one of the spiral’s loops. This kink allows you to press down behind it to lift the opening of the keyring and easily insert your keys. If you’ve ever struggled with trying to pry a regular keyring open to get your keys in, you’ll appreciate this little invention.

Sadly, the website is in Swedish and we have no idea where to get them or even how much they cost. Swedish readers are welcome to help out in the comments.

[ Product Page ] VIA [ LikeCool ]

By David Ponce

People still read paper books and it’s likely to stay that way for a while. Nostalgia and all that. So until then, why not store and display them in a visually (and organizationally) appealing manner?

“REK is a bookcase that grows with your book collection,” writes Reinier De Jong Design on its official website. “The more books the bigger the bookcase gets. The zigzag shaped parts slide in and out to accomodate books in the resulting voids. REK will always be full, regardless of the quantity of books. Also the books can be arranged according to their sizes. The narrow spaces are excellent for magazines.”

Sadly the REK bookcase is one of those items for which you have to ask the price. And we all know what this means.

[ Product Page ] VIA [ BoingBoing ]